Child Abuse Story From
Cheryl

This child abuse story from Cheryl page was created July 31, 2007 and was originally posted on July 21, 2007 as story #163.

PLEASE NOTE: This story has not been edited for grammar, spelling, punctuation, sentence structure or Internet-eze. Where necessary, I have edited for length and inappropriate or gratuitously graphic content.

Cheryl is from ISA, Queensland, Australia.

The following child abuse story from Cheryl depicts: emotional abuse and physical abuse by Cheryl's family, sexual abuse by a foster dad, and abuse at the hands of the government

The child abuse effects on Cheryl: runaway; sent to juvenile prison for wayward girls for running away; teenage pregnancy and subsequent abortion, then another teen pregnancy that resulted in the birth of a son; government removed Cheryl's son from her care, at first temporarily, but after fighting for custody for 3 years, they took him permanently; this story also identifies the child abuse effects on Cheryl's son after he spend most of his childhood in foster care

Child Abuse Story From Cheryl:

I come from the WOTS family (Ward of the State) and I would not only like to speak up against my family, but also about our Government.

I was physically, emotionally, sexually and financially abused by mother and two of her husbands. Other family members, friends of family and neighbours didn't want to get involved and I was left to deal with it on my own.

The first husband basically put a gun to my head, warning me that what goes on at home stays at home. The second used his personal relationship with police officers, leading me to believe that they would believe him over me.

At fifteen I had had enough and ran away. When I was caught I was charged and sent to a prison for girls. At sixteen I was released into community housing for girls such as myself but I did not view myself as a criminal and certainly wanted better for myself. Others believed I thought I was better then they were, which then led to them being physically abusive toward me. I so wanted to get away from this new abuse that I found a foster home for myself.

As a juvenile offender made a member of the WOTS family I had to remain under our governments control till I was eighteen. So when I fell pregnant at sixteen and the foster family sent me back, they aborted my pregnancy.

I found another foster family, and had to face my new foster father climbing into my bed with a statement that I owed him. I was also still on probation till seventeen and lucky for me, my probation officer was good about it and let me move in with a male companion of my own choosing.

On my seventeenth birthday I discovered I was pregnant again. There was no way I was going to let our government take another child from me, so I moved in with my natural father and his parents. Several months later I had a healthy baby boy. I stayed until I was eighteen and no longer a ward of the state. I moved back to the town [where] the father of my new baby lived.

Three weeks later our government took my welfare payments off me because I had not filed maintenance action against the father. This left me with no other choice but to ask my family for financial help. In return they filed a false complaint about my care of my child and I had DOCS on my doorstep. To be sure they would follow it up, my family told them I had a five-week-old baby rather then a five-month-old baby.

DOCS immediately started laying down rules. I had no family and after using community child care services a number of times, they told me no one was to care for my child but me. I found this extremely difficult, but they told me if I didn't do this they would take my baby off me.

When things did not come together for me with my son's father I spent nine months trying to get by on my own. Rather than risk somebody else relieving me from my motherly duties for a break, I told the DOCS that I could no longer do this all alone. They took my child and put him in foster care. I had been getting counselling and had had DOCS representatives tell me I needed to be forced to face up to my problems. So while my son was in care I went back to my mother's house and the juvenile prison I had been kept in. Coming face to face with my mother and one of my abusive stepfathers was an experience in itself. After that I decided I wanted to return to my hometown where I grew up as a young child. I still had friends there. As soon as I arrived back I got a seasonal job on a station and then applied for the return of my son. At the time I was living with my grandmother. Then my mother got a divorce and came back to town. She started dating my first evil stepfather and brought him around with her when she came to visit her mother. Every week she would ask me if she could have my son for awhile and every week I would find some excuse to say no.

In the end it all became too much for me. I needed and wanted to get myself and my son away from her, him and the situation I faced with them coming to visit. DOCS had told me to stay in touch with the foster family that had cared for my son, so I asked them privately if they would take him while I get a job and a place of my own. The foster family was not willing to do this without DOCS involvement so I had no choice but to go back to them for help. I was not going to risk giving him to somebody else and then have DOCS take him from me permanently.

After I found a good job and a place of my own I requested custody of my child and custody was denied. They used the original false complaint filed by a family member three years earlier and took my child from me permanently. He was raised by the foster family he was sent to until he was twelve and when he started getting into trouble they sent him to many other caregivers. Year after year I had asked them to give me back my child and year after year I was told he would not be returned unless he wanted to come back. So he was shifted from home to home until he was fourteen, and then he was given back to me. By fourteen he had had plenty of experience in lies, drugs and theft, so things did not go well with him living with me and my two young girls I had by the time. I wanted DOCS to take him back several months later. His previous foster family refused to take him back because they didn't want him causing trouble for them over Christmas, so I organised a job out of town on a station for him. When Christmas was over he returned to his foster family.

My son grew up being told that I never wanted him. How he felt about that he made very clear to me later on in life. Now I have a grown child with children of his own that I cannot see. In fact I am not sure I want to because he has grown into a very large and angry man. He may not believe the truth and on paper one of his foster parents appears to have a lot to do with why he was never returned to me.

Why do some people believe that speaking out about family is all good until that family becomes our government? How can we fix the problems of abuse unless we address all sources of it!

Cheryl. Australia.

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References

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Child abuse story from Cheryl was re-formatted May 30, 2015