I do not think its fixable now. The damage is done and mother dear will deal with it now and for the rest of her life. The girls will have a better relationship with you when they get older and they can stand up against their mother and finally realize what their mother did. These girls will hate her and i wouldn't be surprised if in their teens they leave her and come home to you guys.
i say for now, concentrate on your family and your husband. Do the best to keep in touch with the girls..send letters...etc..etc..call...well..their father should do this. and you support him in doing so.
what do you mean by you do not trust them in your home? Are they acting strange? doing stragne things?

"They say if the girls only do it in a public place and get receipts to prove you were there'" WHat does this mean??????

If those girls are behaving odd ...for the safety of your other 3 i would seriously stay away....and listen to your psychologists and walk away.

This is the wierdest custody thing I have seen on here!
At this point I don't really know what you can do with them living out of state. Does your husband have any court ordered visitation?

All you can do at this point is call often, send e-mails, cards, and try to keep in touch as much as possible. If he has visitation then I guess it would be best for you all to go there for the visitation. Stay in a nearby hotel and then just take the girls for the day and stay in public places. You may even need to use public transportation (trains, busses, cabs) to get them back and forth to their mothers home so your never "alone" with them.

Someday they will hate their mother for bringing this upon them.

"All you can do at this point is call often, send e-mails, cards, and try to keep in touch as much as possible. If he has visitation then I guess it would be best for you all to go there for the visitation. Stay in a nearby hotel and then just take the girls for the day and stay in public places. You may even need to use public transportation (trains, busses, cabs) to get them back and forth to their mothers home so your never "alone" with them."

Ditto to all of this!

did CPS question the girls? If there was no proof why cases weren't dropped? some people here shared that their Xs and even stepchildren accused them of abuse but there was no proof, so cases were dropped. why wasn't this case dropped if there is no proof?

I am surprised as well that the cases weren't dropped. When my DD was 3, my ex tried this as well. CPS worker visited us once, observed our home environment and my relationship with DD, checked with her day care and immediately dropped the case, expressing disgust at the accusations under the circumstances.

teachers, counselors, lawyers, social workers, DCFS, police officers are all either trained or somewhat familiar with abuse and false abuse allegations. Most would be able to spot false allegations a mile away.. especially a good counselor or social worker/DCFS. If proven false allegations, the courts might actually rule in favor of dad as using false allegations during a custody matter is seen as bad parenting on the accuser's part.

It's my opinion that if mom is making false allegations and poisoning the children against dad, it's a mistake to send the kids back and forget it. If it's true that mom is doing that, it is mental/emotional abuse and what kind of parent sends their child back to his/her abuser with no fight? Parent's are not allowed to just move away with the kids unless the other parent does nothing to fight it. Sure, the courts may allow it even with the other parent fighting it but from the OP, it doesn't sound like that's what happened. Sounds like OP is saying mom up and moved and dad is helpless to it. It sounds like dad isn't doing much at all and maybe it's too late now. The less dad does, the more the kids are going to believe everything mom says.

I agree that it would be best now to go visit kids in public by going to where they live. Bringing them to your house at this point might cause more problems with allegations, etc. Dad needs to get and be more involved with the kids, calling and emailing/writing more, visiting or contacting school to stay informed, and really work hard at being an involved parent. The only way for the kids (and everyone else) to see that what mom is saying is false is for him to show through his actions that he is not that kind of person and he would not do that. Kids will go along with mom but dad can tell them that he understands why they say those things about him but that he loves them very much anyways. The kids are truly in the middle and yeah, they should know better than to lie for their mom but she is their mom and the kids depend on her and want to please her. They will also defend her but I do believe that as they get older, they will understand more about what she is doing or has done and yes, they will hate her for it... especially if dad stays active in their lives despite their best efforts to kick him out.

Sorry wondering..my bad. I've reread your post and understand what your wrote..about being in a public place.

My other question is...why didn't your lawyer warn you that by you giving the girls to their mother it would indicate a guilty verdict in yoru case??? By giving them to the mother you confirmed the allegations even though your intentions were to drop the allegations. This is whey ignored the young child when she recanted her story.
either ways. those girls will hate their mother when they get older or be in denial.
Have your husband try to keep in touch as much as possible. and unfortunately contact at this point should be in public ...this way no misunderstandings....
i'm truly sorry for your situation. But i'm sure in the years to come those girls will come around. But not now....so dont let it harp you. Keep positiive and see if you can try to stricken those allegations legally. Its for your name sake.

wondering, I had a male friend in a similar situation. The mother accused him and his father of being abusive in some way with his then 9 year old daughter. I never got the full details, and I don't think they were sexual allegations, but serious all the same. So serious that his visitations were cut severely and could only be done in public places. The mother moved them out of state, not too far, but far enough where it was not easy for my friend to visit often. Since they had to be public visits he never got to bring the girl to his home at all and was limited to restaurants etc. in the other state. The grandfather didn't get to see the girl at all for years.

Organicmaria is right, by giving the girls back you and DH have acknowledged some kind of guilt inadvertently. It sounds like you may just have to write them, send gifts, try for visits occasionally when things cool down. It sounds as though things have gone too far to reverse at this point.

First to organic maria, the reason we cannot see the children in private is because once children do this more than once (make false allegations) and don't stop or are not sorry, this is how they learn to manipulate people, and they have been taught that it is ok. We have been told that it is very clear that the mother isn't done with us. There are many people sitting in prison from false allegations. Think about Duke - it doesn't really matter that they were innocent, there lives to a large extent have been ruined. This happened to us in the town we live in. I am homeschooling my son in a large part due to the problems she caused in the public school for us. The receipts and public places is to prove/witness we didn't do anything to the girls. A proactive approach. The accusations escalated as time went by. They began with false allegations of denial of visitation, to emotional abuse, to physical abuse. They even had one child accuse my sons of abuse. When it is two girls ages 5 and 10, guess who they believe?

These girls behave badly, accuse their father of choosing me over them, have temper tantums frequently, are physically abusive to everyone in the home (physically attacking us etc...-I think they are trying to escalate us to physically abuse them).

My husband does have court ordered visitation, which she was always trying to block. We couldn't have them overnight and she refused to let him see them for the day and said he had to take them for the weekend.

To finedreams and mariealways, the cases were dropped. The problem was this was done multiple times with many calls to many people. I would say at least 50 to 100 accusations were made involving upwards of 50 people over a period of approximately 3 to 4 years.

To imamommy, it was shocking and scary to see how badly this was handled. Further, my husband makes a really large income which made matters 1,000 times worse. I didn't realize that there was a whole abuse industry and that these people get bonus' based on what they collect from 'abusers'. Well guess what they don't collect anything from the unemployed crack addict, but they could collect alot from my husband. Pretty stupid way to set up the system. We sent the kids to get them out of the line of fire. This was the best, temporary solution to minimize the abuse for the girls. We didn't just 'forget it', we were fighting a custody battle. After spending over $250,000 for the custody battle we could not fight her moving. My husband has been stuck with all the attorney fees and couseling fees. When they see my husbands income, they have him pay her attorney, the gal, and two separate counselors. My husband makes very low 6 figures, pays $2,000/month in child support, $500/month in insurance premiums, is still paying $500/month in debt from the marriage, has no home equity (after 20 years as a home owner - she spent it), and gave her 60% of his retirement. So we couldn't spend another $25,000+ to fight her moving, plus she would have just continued to petition the court as frequently as she was allowed and we would have been stuck with all the bills.

We had no choice. Try to imagine taking care of a child that everytime she fell, she would go to school or daycare and point to the bruise and say I did it or daddy or worse your sons. It was becoming an everyday occurance and I was walking around on pins and needles. No one can live like that. We also tried to get the lawyers and couselors to do something and no one would.

Why would that assume guilt? I think that is REALLY silly. I mean if we were abusing the girls, we could just stop the abuse, no problem. But how do you stop something you never did, how do you control people making up horrible, life ruining slander about you? The only way is to remove them.

Also, she is constantly trying to bring cases, because she is trying to ruin my husband financially. She doesn't have to pay for anything or very little, and of that very little she does not pay.

She does not pay her bills. Her home was foreclosed on (she paid less that $1,000 a month and got $200,000 in divorice settlement - which was gone in less than one year).

"To imamommy, it was shocking and scary to see how badly this was handled. Further, my husband makes a really large income which made matters 1,000 times worse. I didn't realize that there was a whole abuse industry and that these people get bonus' based on what they collect from 'abusers'. Well guess what they don't collect anything from the unemployed crack addict, but they could collect alot from my husband. Pretty stupid way to set up the system. We sent the kids to get them out of the line of fire. This was the best, temporary solution to minimize the abuse for the girls. We didn't just 'forget it', we were fighting a custody battle. After spending over $250,000 for the custody battle we could not fight her moving. My husband has been stuck with all the attorney fees and couseling fees. When they see my husbands income, they have him pay her attorney, the gal, and two separate counselors. My husband makes very low 6 figures, pays $2,000/month in child support, $500/month in insurance premiums, is still paying $500/month in debt from the marriage, has no home equity (after 20 years as a home owner - she spent it), and gave her 60% of his retirement. So we couldn't spend another $25,000+ to fight her moving, plus she would have just continued to petition the court as frequently as she was allowed and we would have been stuck with all the bills."

None of this makes sense to me... most of the 'abuse' industry are public employees. (aside from private counselors) How do they collect from the abuser? Are you saying his ex is an unemployed crack addict?

The numbers don't really add up but it doesn't really matter. $250,000 for a custody battle? For that, you could hire Gloria Allred. That's pretty unbelievable in and of itself, but what do I know?

Quite frankly, if I had the earning capacity your husband has and was willing to spend a quarter of a million dollars to fight for custody, if I couldn't stop the CP from moving, I would use my resources to be closer to my kids... maybe move to where she did.

I would focus on my relationship with the kids, not the fight with the ex.

First the bonus' and income of these government employees and the department (promotions and all forms of added income) are based on the collections. They collect from the abuser by the same method that they collect child support: as a percentage of income to provide for the children in the legal system. Second don't forget we had to pay her legal fees as well as ours and she actively pursued driving the legal fees up and had no interest in keeping them down. You have trouble believing in greedy lawyers or a corrupt legal system for the interest of greed? When you have a salaried corporate job they can garnish your wages to collect the fee. A lot of guys are in prison for the simple crime of the inability to pay or quitting their job under the terms you suggest (to be closer to children, taking lower pay). And we did have to hire an out of town lawyer. Third, we do not have the option to moving to be closer to the kids because my husband cannot quit his job as he would still be liable for the $2,500+/month child support. A job change would carry a significant reduction in salary. And we have no resources left except those that we need to survive.

I can understand why you gave the kids to the mother. After all their lies, yes i would have done the same. BUt this bonus...sounds crazy!
I think its best to keep no contact with BM whatsoever. Public contact with those girls for father only. I thinkyou and your boys should stay very far away from them for safety of yourself and your kids.
If bm tries to ruin him financially then she can kiss her 2500 cs goodbye and if he's out of a job , then you will have to support your family and him. But at least it will only be you guys and make sure mom doesn't give the kids bakc to you because she has no cash eh?
She sound like a nut job. And i'm truly sorry for the hell that i've read right now. I cannot imagine the stress you must live in. And those kids are completely mixed up and the damage is already done on them. Very sad.
Have you even considered moving to a farther state away from her. I know yoru dh would have not see his girls but the state this is in...maybe it would be better when they are older and more wiser..i dont know..this is such a hard situation. Can your husband be transferred to another state with the same job. ?

Update:
Crazy ex brought husband back to court for more child support after moving half way across the country and part of the agreement to move was a reduction in child support. What should have been a quick court call turned into 9+ months that is still going on (from October 2009) AND
17 year old daughter got pregnant (after mother let the daughter, unsupervised, spent the night with boyfriend on multiple occasions even picking him up from the airport), had an abortion, and tried to commit suicide AND
Crazy ex wife tried to have daughter commited to the cost of $2,000/day and force my husband to pay for it AND
Crazy ex wife tried to force us to take custody of 17 year old after court case from above showed the 17 year old was no longer a profit on her financial balance sheet AND
Crazy ex had daughter 17 year old daughter arrested for domestic assault (in court in Vt today) AND
daughter is accusing mother and boyfriend of abuse (surprise, surprise) AND
my husband has been laid off from his $150,000/year job at 55 years old, is partially disable and will be lucky to get another job making $50,000....
What next...

Quote from Ima:
"teachers, counselors, lawyers, social workers, DCFS, police officers are all either trained or somewhat familiar with abuse and false abuse allegations. Most would be able to spot false allegations a mile away.. especially a good counselor or social worker/DCFS."

I don't mean to start a fight or anything :-) but I can believe the system is flawed and that there was great injustice on the OP's behalf. This happens.

Yes the courts/ therapist/ policemen/ teachers and nurses should pick up on false allegations etc.. but some people are just really good at it, they have a knack for misleading other people.

This sounds like it's one of those cases.

OP, I wish you all the best

I agree the system is flawed. I don't doubt that some fall through the cracks.... I worked in a social services setting for a decade. One of the reasons I left was politics & I was somewhat disgusted by what I saw as a waste of tax dollars as well as inconsistency in following procedure/regulations.

But, I stand by my statement that professionals in the field ARE trained... but yes, they can be overworked or just plain lazy. What I found "unbelievable" is the OP's statement that bonuses were given to anyone for collecting from an abuser... and that his socioeconomic status was the reason he was being burned at the stake. I don't believe that for a minute. Government my collect fines as income but individuals that work for government do not get a bonus if they convict a wealthy person over a poor person. That's ridiculous. I've never heard of a bonus being given to a government employee for anything... they may complain of being underpaid/overworked, but their wages are negotiated by their union & they are usually under contract.

In a way, I also understand why the kids were given back but on the other side of that, why would someone give the kids to someone that was so unfit? She was mentally/emotionally abusing the children (and apparently physically abusive too) and if she was truly a crack addict, I would not send my kids with someone like that willingly.. under ANY circumstances, except a court forcing me to. and then allowing her to move across the country with the kids, without a fight? It sounds like dad traded letting his kids be taken across the country in exchange for lower child support. IMO, that is selling out... especially when he thinks their mother is a crack addict that made such awful false allegations. But, what's done is done.

What next?

How does a parent refuse to take custody of their child? I get that she's been through a lot & she has lots of problems, but he is her father & should at least TRY to offer her a better life. Does the 17yr old WANT to live with him or not? At that age, it would be pointless to force a 17yr old to live with dad, but if she wants to... then he should set up the rules & boundaries before she arrives. It may wreak havoc on the marriage... troubled teens do that, but he is her father & from what was said.. she NEEDS a parent. That's what I would do if it were MY child.

"First the bonus' and income of these government employees and the department (promotions and all forms of added income) are based on the collections"

that is not true, government employees do not get bonuses or added incomes, their salary is negotiated by the union and is not based on collections.

if 17-year-old is not taken care by mom why is dad refusing to take care of her?

mom is clearly unfit, i don't understand why dad sent his kids away to unfit people without court order. no one forced him to. dad was making enough money to hire a good attorney.

what's done done, but why not doing something about it now? all these years he had freedom from children who were raised by unfit mother and her abusive boyfriend. what kind of dad does that.

By the way raising children is much more expensive than paying child support, so he got it easy.

--". What I found "unbelievable" is the OP's statement that bonuses were given to anyone for collecting from an abuser... and that his socioeconomic status was the reason he was being burned at the stake. I don't believe that for a minute. Government may collect fines as income but individuals that work for government do not get a bonus if they convict a wealthy person over a poor person. That's ridiculous. I've never heard of a bonus being given to a government employee for anything... they may complain of being underpaid/overworked, but their wages are negotiated by their union & they are usually under contract."--

As a longtime state employee family of OP's state I do know a bit of the actual state worker structure vs the non-employee. Yes, union negotiated wages and contracts for frontline, and nope, no bonuses and especially not based on the type of thing OP is suggesting.

Recent years many of the mid-level merit comps (MCs) also petitioned to go union ...and again these employees are now union negotiated wages and , nope no bonuses.

Then we have MC employees, which are not union employees (keep in mind that most of our MCs have recieved 2 raises of peanuts since 2003 and the last few years have been mandatory furlough days taking roughly 5% salary away).

We also have many contracts through out social services (and other areas) which are not state employees at all nor union employees.

I don't think what OP was stating about 'government' workers actually had a thing to do with actual public service state employees...I would bet OP is labeling her employees in a generic basket if she is accurate at all in who and what she is blaming with her wild accusations.

I also would bet that the claim of these accusations are mere grasping at straw , assumptions, misplaced rumor mill blah blah blah.

And as a total aside, $150,000 in Chicago isn't all that great nor of the amount 'to write home about'...I seriously doubt OP's DH was targeted for his income.

I would think there are many things and details left out of this story.

Anyway...hope somebody in this girl's life steps up to the plate here and takes this teen in and helps her. It sounds like she's had the childhood from hell. As to the insurance part of it, OP, if your Dh has been insured and just recently lost his job he should be able to enroll in like COBRA. Also several other programs opening up.

You're not going to get much symapthy from me if DH gets a $50,000 a yr job...sure, it's not what you're use to, it'll be an adjustment. That's when you downsize and learn to live like millions of other people in Illinois live. We have a state full of people got just what your DH did (loss of job, middleage or older and will likely never regain what they had), all now wondering how they are going to make it. If DH can latch on to that pay you may have to lower your expectations, you trim your lifestyle and take the job and continue to look...our recovery in the state is not expected to bounce back soon and when what your Dh did for a living picks back up he's still chancing that position will be filled with younger entry level (lower costing) employees.

This girl is going to go right through the cracks and live a miserable non-functioning adulthood if your DH does not do all he can. If bringing the girl back to dad's state to reside with dad is going to help straighten the girl up and set her on the right path, it needs to be taken into consideration. Why would somebody send 1/2 a million in a custody fight and then turn their back on the kid now? Dad's don't get the 'right' to write their kids off just cause they lost their job or now make less money or even if the kid is a messed up near adult.

yeah I had the same thought, justmetoo, about salary, 50K is a pretty normal average salary. 150K is 3 times more than average salary and most people don't even dream of such incomes. and no wonder CS was high with such income.

seems that both parents messed up their kids' lives big time and no one takes responsibility

To Yabber: Thanks for the support.

First: She is not a crack addict, that was just an example. She is extremely disturbed mentally unbalanced malignant borderline narcissist type. And a very good con.

Second: There is bonus' given to the departments for the collection of child support/foster care. The government employee does not see these bonus' but there is a trickle down effect in the form of reviews and raises. If the department head is getting bonus' or the department is being awarded with bonus' in effects the departments budget, you don't collect from unemployed crack addict - that was my point. I was told this by people that worked high up in the system. There is definately pressure by the upper management to meet budgets and pressure from the state that these organization be self-sufficiant.

Third: We tried many times to fix this at great expense. The child now lives 1,000 miles away and 17 years old. It is too late. The 17 year old has become ungovernable. The mother is the only one that can fix it. At 17 it is too late to catch up on the parenting that the mother failed to provide since she was 2 and prevented anyone else from providing and continues to do so. Both the mother and daughter made some pretty bad choices over the past 7 1/2 years, they need to accept the consequences of their choices. That is what we are doing. That is called parenting.

Fourth: I am not complaining about the loss of income. Actually it is not going to be much of a loss for us. Out of the $150,000 income we were paying, $40,000 in income tax, $10,000 in insurance premiums, $30,000 in child support, $6,000 in debt from the marriage (which we just recently paid off 9 years after his divorice, $5,000 in addition annual fees assessed by the court, and we had $50,000 in legal fees hanging over our head. So it's pretty much break even income wise and it will save us from being assessed with all the fees. I think we may even come out ahead in the long run.

Fifth: Cobra is not an option at $750/month.

Sixth: It's clear you have no idea what we are dealing with or what you are talking about. You are simply lacking the expereince of how bad these things get or the havoc false allegations of abuse wreak in mostly the lives of the children that make them (almost always at the instruction of an adult/caretaker).

We did everything we could and then some.

If a mother is determined to destroy her children she will.

This has been heart wrenching and horrible. Your comments are callous and ridiculous.

"Fifth: Cobra is not an option at $750/month."

Yeah - That's what I thought... Until I priced individual policies and compared coverage. Hate to tell you this, but that COBRA deal is probably the best you can find...

We aren't going to get insurance. It would be cheaper to pay for the health care directly. We might just get a catostrophic policy, which is much cheaper.

With $2,000 coming in for six months from unemployment, it is not an option to spend $750 on insurance.

Obviously, for the sake of the safety of them and my children we had to send them to go live with her. We thought the court would understand, but they did not. Needless to say both girls are very disturbed. We can't trust them (mainly the mother) in our home."

if dad sent them there voluntarily, I don't think he should blame only the mother for how they turned out.

"Crazy ex brought husband back to court for more child support after moving half way across the country and part of the agreement to move was a reduction in child support."

so he agreed for her to move kids away (unfit mother???)as long as child support is reduced. does money really mean that much...

i think both parents are neglectful, is the other girl still young? maybe something could be done

"That is called parenting".

what's called parenting? not raising one's children but then refuse to help when they are messed up, I don't think so, parenting is more than child support

I really do not get what is so difficult to understand, but I will try again.

First: The mother was using the children as weapons of mass destruction in the custody case, giving her custody got them out of the line of fire. They were both making serious abuse accusations against my husband, me, and my three children (I had a 15 & 10 year old boy that the girls made abuse accusations against too). For everyone concerned and to keep the situation from escalating we had to get both girls out of the home. Further, when the younger girl recanted the abuse accusations and told the GAL her mother coached her into saying them, the GAL accused us of coaching her into recanting. Given the situation we had no choice, but to turn to the authorities. And the authorities either got it wrong or did not care.

Second: We tried to fight the move to no avail, when that was not possible we reduced the child support so that we could visit the children. Which obviously is much more expensive proposition when they are 1,000 miles vs. 20 miles. The reduction in child support did not even come close to covering the cost differential for any reasonable visitation. She was also supposed to cover part of the visitation expenses, which she never did.

Third: Parenting is allowing children to experience the consequences of their actions. If you don't do that you create sociopaths. Which is why we have so many sociopaths. Parents are not willing to do the difficult thing. I didn't raise my children to be happy children. I raised them to be happy adults. And guess what? The happy children thing got thrown in too. Most parents today raise children to be happy children. And guess what? They get spoiled brats who turn into miserable adults. We begged the older girl to come clean, to go to counseling, to try and fix the situation while she was here. When she asked to come live with us two years ago when her mother was moving, we told her some basic ground rules, she refused the ground rules, walked off in a huff, and refused to talk about it. We didn't even get to the professional help/counseling stuff. Her mother taught her that she should get to do whatever she wants, that there should be no rules or consideration for other people. That people are there for her to use and provide her with a 'happy childhood' (which we could have given her, but it would have involved rules).

Fourth: She is 17 years old. Parenting? Really? Do you really think this can be reversed at this point? It's over. It is not safe for her or us to be under the same roof. We have not had overnight visitation for over 5 years.

Fifth: The younger daughter is 12 and the mother won't give up custody. The problem is these girls want to be with their mother. It wasn't until the older girl was 15 that she wanted to be with the father. By then it was too late and she was unwilling/unable to do what was necessary to make it work. With everything that went on, I don't even think it is possible with either one any more. You don't undo false accusations of abuse. It is about trust and we don't trust them. The finances are depleted, no savings - retirement - nothing (this woman has blown through approximately $750,000: home equity ($200,000), divorice settlement ($250,000), child support ($150,000), legal fees ($150,000-paid so far, not what is still owed)-these are conservative estimates). Also I am now working full time and homeschooling my son (as a result of the abuse accusations he couldn't go back to the public school he was attending, so I have been homeschooling him since). My husband is extremely busy looking for a job and going to school. The finances are depleted. They live 1,000 miles away. You can't always hit the rewind button on life.

This horrible situation happens more than people realize. Parental Alienation Syndrome is REAL and a danger to our society. Yet, in some states the courts are slow to accept this. Are you familiar with the word pseudologia fanstastica? There is another post called step-mom needs help is sounding similar to the the woman that did your family wrong. Adults that use children as weapons need to be jailed, charged with child abuse and registered as sexual predators

mammaw11: I agree. We are currently waiting to hear from social services in Vermont. Somehow we are being dragged into this case between mother and daughter. We believe they are trying to force us to take custody so that they can wreak more havoc in our life. At the very least, the mother completely wrecked this kid and now wants us to fix an impossible situation or pay the consequences for what she did. This girl treats us like dirt. And is very disturbed in a scary way. I believe they are both sociopaths and the mother is too. They only way to fix a situation like this is to remove the children, give the mother no visitation for a time, and then only supervised visitation that the mother has to pay for. Usually you have to put the children at a safehouse/neutral spot for a period of time to equalize the situation, because the children have to been taught to hate to the point of violence. And this girl is extremely violent. We were also told, no matter how ok the younger girl seems now at 12, the same thing will happen to her at some point in her teens. She said the technical term was an "ungovernable youth" and these situations always turn out the same. I think these kids are going to be clogging already financially desperate municipalities. I don't get why family court insists on handling these situation so poorly. If we had gotten custody these kids would have turned out stellar. I have three kids that were all honor roll, smart, good kids that are going/go/went to college and scored with 2200+ SAT scores. What the hell is wrong with the courts. They wouldn't even look into the abuse allegations. I begged them to: if real - easy custody decision or if false - easy custody decision. Right?

Child abuse is a HUGH $ INDUSTRY!!, the intentions are good but the amount of money it generates keeps the wheels of change moving slowly, yet the life of a child is gone in a blink of the eye. Youv'e done your research and know first hand what happens to these children as they mature. What I find very discouraging, rarely is the true abuser punished. The spiraling results to our society are painful, expensive and dangerous. This type of abuser should spend the rest of their lives in a teeny tiny cell. More people should speak out but until it hits your home do you then begin to understand. Your response to the other thread had lots of insight overlooked by others. Maybe this is a way to open some eyes.