Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Here's another one. We were sent outside to play in the morning and got to go back in when it got dark. (Well, that may be a BIT of a stretch, but we WERE sent out for the day, and seldom went in before dark except to eat.)
Most of the time, even if child services is called to investigate, if the issue is frivolous like most of the ones described here, they aren't going to open a case. Most social workers aren't ogres. But it's a good question why we tolerate the ones who are. Are people too damn lazy to write their elected officials or their newspaper?
BTW reasonable spanking is still legal in all 50 states.
Um, no (on the so-called "frivolous" cases) and no on writing elected officials. It is useless. Yes, there are entire GROUPS of people fighting this sort of crap, and they are all assumed to be "abusers in hiding" since they dare to oppose the abuse by overzealous social workers....
And it is overzealousness that's the problem. Too much in one direction, with not enough visits and kids dying at the hands of their parents. Then bad press for cps, so they react by swinging the pendulum in the other direction. Social workers are not evil but they want to keep their jobs and in the current climate it's best to err on the side of caution. It is best to mistakenly open a case and involve a family in "services" or even remove a child who is NOT in danger rather than let one child remain in a dangerous home. Since there are no real "investigative" techniques used, this can mean anything.
I'd rather be falsely accused of drug running or money laundering or anything else that the POLICE would be handling, vs. being accused of child neglect or abuse. I'd take the cop's investigation any day. At least they have to have some decent evidence and they have to follow some standards when investigating and they must at least respect the accused's rights in certain respects. Not so with cps.
This is not a thread solely about CPS and I won't derail it by turning it into one.. there are entire websites out there for THAT...but I would gather from your post that you have never been at the other end of one of these frivolous reports, or you'd have a different view.
I have been investigated for "pulling my child's hair", she was mad at me when she went to school because I BRUSHED her hair and she was yanking her head around...well it gets pulled that way.
I was reported for giving her bread and cheese for breakfast..instead of their school breakfast that I would have had to pay $.75 for and she wouldn't have eaten it unsupervised. Not to mention it was HOMEMADE wheat bread and HOMEMADE cheese.
One time when we were doing counseling after their father's and my divorce, she told the counselor my mother called her a *******.... so I was reported for THAT too.
Finally the social worker told her to STOP LYING or she was going to take HER to see the judge, and no matter what she wasn't going to get to go live with her Father. That was what she wanted. Needless to say, she quit and I haven't heard from them again. Then she had her little ADHD fit every morning (as usual) and I finally had enough of interference from the school so I took her to school to THAT counselors office in her PJ's..fit and all. She talked to her and calmed her down and sent her to the restroom to get dressed and says to me, "Don't you think maybe she would benefit from a three day inpatient stay for observation in a hospital that is qualified to deal with that.." to which I responded, NO..She would BENEFIT from YOU minding your own dam business and letting me spank her BUTT. The nice lady actually apologized for reporting me and has never said anything else to me.
Rode a bike with no helmet.
Roller skated with no elbow/shin guards (did my knees ever get bruised too!)
Was given baby aspirin (70's my kids also) now it's Tylenol I think.
No seat belts, (70's held the baby in my lap while husband drove)
Rode a bike with no helmet.
Roller skated with no elbow/shin guards (did my knees ever get bruised too!)
Was given baby aspirin (70's my kids also) now it's Tylenol I think.
No seat belts, (70's held the baby in my lap while husband drove)
I have the best one....my parents used to send me in the store to buy their cigarettes while they waited out in the car. I think I even bought beer once in a while. My father said if they say anything, just point out here and tell them I'm (my father) sitting here.
LOL - that's frigging awesome. Ok, not really but you have to admit there's no way in hell it'd happen nowadays.
I was outside for hours at a time, rain or shine, with no supervision. Walked, or rode five miles, by myself, (starting around age ten), into town, and five miles back. Climbed trees. Went down to the swamp, and played. When my cousin came to visit, we bought grocery bags full of fireworks, and used them, with no supervision, including firecrackers, bottle rockets, etc. We used to jump out of the top of the barn, (it's a wonder we didn't break anything!). I rode horses, and bikes with no helmet, (no one had them at the time, to my knowledge). I slept outside, (except during nasty thunderstorms), or in the barn, throughout the entire summer.
We had a small ranch, and I worked my tail off, helping with the cows, irrigating, repairing fences, (barbed wire ones, no less), etc. We were also extremely broke for awhile, and I had one pair of cowboy boots, two flannel skirts that my mother made for me, and a couple of blouses, and that's what I wore to school. I also took my lunch, (which sometimes consisted of nothing more than tuna fish and crackers, and an apple, or something along those lines), in a tin lard pail. We had no indoor plumbing, so baths had to be taken in the kitchen, by the wood stove, (in the winter), and in a homemade bath house outside, (in the summer), and the bathroom was outside, (wind whistling around your backside, in the dead of winter, isn't a lot of fun. Or looking for spiders or snakes in the summer). If I got sick or hurt, it had to be pretty darn serious, for my mother to take me to the doctor. Her general rule of thumb was, if it wasn't broken, or bleeding profusely, or there wasn't a raging fever involved, it wasn't necessary. The usual treatment was horse medicine, (topical), aspirin, and a bandaid. And, lest anyone think I am extremely ancient, this was back in the 1970's, (in Wyoming).
At school, we had monkey bars, (we hung upside down on them), the maypole-looking thing, (that you could smack others in the back of the head with, when you turned loose of your particular rope ladder gizmo), swings, (we jumped out of them, as they were level with the top bar), the teeter-totter, (remember getting off of one, so the other person came crashing down to the ground?), and merry-go-rounds, (someone was always turning it as fast as they could, so it was tricky, trying to jump on). During recess, we played baseball, (one girl did get hit with the bat; knocked her out for a few minutes), dodge ball, tetherball, darts, tag, and whatever other game we could come up with. When teams were picked, you took your chances, if you weren't one of the popular kids, that you would be picked last, or not at all. And, we survived the trauma of having our self-esteem considerably lowered. A bout of fisticuffs between the boys, normally landed them in the principal's office, where they got their behind warmed up, (and this was all the way into high school), and a bout of detention. And, if you got into trouble at school, chances were pretty darn good, you'd get it, when you got home, too!
I had a BB gun, and a long bow, by the time I was about eight. My parents started teaching gun usage, and safety, from the time I was very young. Started carrying a pocketknife, when I was ten, (I still carry one, and when I pull the thing out to use it, in public, people's eyes sometimes get buggy, which amuses, and exasperates me. They look at me like I'm carrying a machete!).
Started carrying a pocketknife, when I was ten, (I still carry one, and when I pull the thing out to use it, in public, people's eyes sometimes get buggy, which amuses, and exasperates me. They look at me like I'm carrying a machete!).
It drives me up the wall when they tell me now to turn around and dont bring my pocket knife back
We might have a MacGyver type situation I need my tools
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
The usual treatment was horse medicine, (topical), aspirin, and a bandaid. And, lest anyone think I am extremely ancient,
), dodge ball, tetherball, darts, tag, and whatever other game we could come up with. When teams were picked, you took your chances, if you weren't one of the popular kids, that you would be picked last, or not at all. And, we survived the trauma of having our self-esteem considerably lowered. A bout of fisticuffs between the boys, normally landed them in the principal's office, where they got their behind warmed up, (and this was all the way into high school), and a bout of detention. And, if you got into trouble at school, chances were pretty darn good, you'd get it, when you got home, too!
).
