Couples therapy and mandatory reporting
![[Post New]](/jforum/templates/default/images/icon_minipost_new.gif){kind=icon}
Anonymous
Troll. |
Anonymous
There's actually a very simple way of expressing "bruises" that people often use. It's the word "bruises." |
Anonymous
| My DH was reported by our couples’ therapist. He’s an alcoholic and had a relapse which started with drinking one beer in the car while driving our DD to my dad’s house. Of course I was and am livid about it, and it haunts him. He told the therapist about it. We didn’t consider the mandatory reporter element, but obviously she did the right thing. CPS did not pursue an investigation because he was in active treatment already, but certainly could have. |
Anonymous
^^This. I was the child in a similar situation. They will likely not remove him but he may have to go through mandated counseling and your child may have to have a safe place in the house that he can’t access. It’s definitely a situation you need to take seriously, OP. You can’t have your child thinking this is acceptable. In some ways it may be a relief to the child to have both of you accept responsibility, which it sounds like simply isn’t happening in your family as it has become dysfunctional. |
Anonymous
Lost my cool with my child? Sure. I kissed her and put her safely in her crib and *I* left the room for five minutes because her screaming was making me feel out of control. It is, in fact, what parenting books and pediatricians and even the internet all tell you to do with a screaming child. You’re right about one thing— good parents do not “lose their cool” the way OPs husband did. |
Anonymous
While all bruises are marks, not all marks are bruises. Anyone who was physically abused knows this. My father could hit us with a belt that left marks but no bruises. I still have a scar from one of the marks. |
Anonymous
But it does, in effect, mean that this couple can no longer work with this therapist. Even if mandated reporters were in 100% agreement that this should should be reported (which even on this board they're not), if the therapist reports to CPS it's unreasonable to expect that the DH could continue to speak freely and vulnerably with this therapist which is an essential for the relationship to work. And if CPS doesn't pursue a case (which, based on the info, everyone seems to think they won't), then the they'll have to find a new therapist. And it's likely the OP will have a hell of a time getting DH to agree to couples therapy again. I also think it's worth pointing out that the OP and DH and are pursuing couples therapy, not individual therapy, which indicates she also has some things to work on to parent this child effectively both as an individual and with her spouse. We don't know what those things are. I want to share one analogy from my daughter's former private school for the OP to consider: To keep the story short: a boy in the school ended up punching another boy in the school. The school has a zero tolerance policy for that kind of physical violence so the boy who punched was expelled. Meanwhile, for over a year my daughter had been experiencing increasing levels of emotional bullying from a couple of girls. It was acknowledged by the school and efforts at reconciliation by the counselor were made at various points. What those girls did to my daughter were objectively equal to or worse than the boy getting punched. But at the end of the day, it's much more difficult to create policies and draw lines in the sand around whispering campaigns and social exclusion than it is around something that produces photo evidence. OP, I'm not trying to slander you or make you feel badly when you clearly know your family is at a low point and you want to take steps to improve things, which you will. But if in your heart you know that you have created emotional marks that are equal to or worse than the marks your husband left, please don't use the fact that documenting male-typical aggression is easier than documenting female-typical aggression as leverage here. You'll know if and when it's the right time to get CPS involved when you don't have to crowdsource from strangers. I really wish you the best of luck. From someone who has been there, you can definitely right this ship and get your family to a functional and happier place. I want to share one analogy from my daughter's former private |
Anonymous
What would you do if a kid was screaming inside and didn't stop when told to stop? |
Anonymous
HELL NO. No child should ever have this happen ever. And OP is an idiot to be staying. |
Anonymous
| OP, get your husband in individual therapy. He doesn't need to disclose this incident in detail to his therapist. He can tell the therapist he wants to work on anger management toward his family. In addition to therapy, I'd do parenting classes together so you can both learn strategies and reinforce them. |
Anonymous
Yes and you have never raised your voice not even once. |
Anonymous
|
OP it is insanity to expose your child to CPS over this.
I |
Anonymous
Okay, projecting much. We really have no idea what happened here or the severity of it. You don’t leave as the result of a one-time event. Op does not describe anything even vaguely resembling a repeated pattern of abuse and control. |
Anonymous
I agree that there isnt a lot of information but I personally did assume a pattern. She said there is a general problem of anger and she took photos of this incident to show her husband so he could see it when he was emotionally okay to see the problem. My assumption could be wrong, of course, but I think it could be a pattern. OP perhaps you should just go in and say he grabbed the child without going into detail. Don’t say anything about marks. But I don’t see how marriage therapy is going to help his anger. He needs his own therapy. It’s not really an issue to be solved as a couple. |
Anonymous
Right. This isn't a situation where someone is "disciplining" a child in a way that someone else disagrees with. I do think that "spanking" as discipline is abusive. I get that a lot of people don't think that, and there are rules. At CPS, there are rules about what physical discipline can be used and when, specifically to differentiate it from abuse. A parent losing his temper and putting his hands on a child such that marks were left that could be photographed is not "discipline." It is "abusive parenting." I don't think that the OP's husband is a monster who the OP should divorce and report herself, but I do think that there is very little to be gained by suggesting that what happened here was an appropriate response to the situation. I agree (as a therapist and former CPS worker) that getting involved with CPS is bad news for any family, worse if they are poor or non-white, but that doesn't change the reality that this man put his hands on a child in anger and left marks. There are real legal definitions of that and real consequences for them. Those things should not just be blithely set aside because y'all think this is excusable. If I, as a therapist, agreed to see this couple and this incident was reported to me and I didn't report it, my license would be in jeopardy. Most likely that would never be discovered, because like the rest of y'all, I don't think that this guy is a monster who should have the book thrown at him. My experience with CPS in the very few cases I had like this was that it was a very quick investigation that didn't often result in any kind of action. But the people who are reporting it are not responsible for investigating. We are responsible for reporting things that meet the threshold of reporting, like a parent putting hands angrily on a child and leaving marks that could be photographed. |