Tuesday, 22 September 2009

Weekend and CYFS

We had a great weekend up north with Larissa. Forgot my camera so no pics.

Larissa is bubbling along. She loves her jolly jumper and will give a great big grin and then bounce like mad. If you are lucky she will do a little squeal for joy as well.

Katya was excellent. She wore her glasses and processors practically constantly. She is playing with her cousins better and better each time she goes up. AND her flying is just legendary. She was pretty tied on the late flight we got back but sat in her seat and pulled her seat belt together like a pro.

Today we had a good morning and then Katya has a huge 3 hour sleep. She has a little cold/cough which I think she was trying to sleep off. Either that or she was really enjoying her own bed.

We also had a visit from CYFS. I have to say I feel the same feeling I had dealing with Maternal Mental Health (that sense of dealing with people who think they can help but actually can't). They can provide absolutely no useful support to us but want us to dance through hops (regular meetings, Risk Management Plans, Reports, Letters from Doctors...). This of course is not exceptionally helpful with the stresses and strains we are currently facing.

The most outstanding part of our meeting was their desire to have a Risk Management Plan for when Claire re-enters the family. I was happy to do this (I have already thought it all through anyway) and asked for them to provide their standard template so I could fill it out. Hmmm... they don't have one!!! Can you believe it? They say that they need to be happy with the RMP but don't have a standard one so you know what issues you need to address. They eventually agreed to develop one and send it to me.

The lack of systemisation in these softer areas of social work and mental health has been excused for far too long. The rigour of structured processes with the ability to slide outside these disciplines from time to time is so needed and would be the biggest revolution in their respective areas on a few decades.

So what started as a pretty good day crashed and burned in the afternoon with the CYFS visit. It is so frustrating dealing with people who think they are being helpful but are actually a hinderance. Fortunately the evening was pretty good. I bought Katya a bathing doll as she has not been happy having a bath. This worked. I put the doll and her little bath in the bath and Katya got keen to follow!!! And her bump around her processor has gone down as well.

So hopefully back on the upwards track again tomorrow.

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