Mental illness, child safe-guarding, and scaremongering stories.

Have a look at this article in The Spectator.

It describes one woman’s experiences of being referred to child safeguarding after being diagnosed with a post-natal mental illness.

Some people are very unhappy with this article. They correctly point out that the vast majority of women with mental illness pose no risk of harm to their children, and that this article will create fear in women and put them off seeking help.

What people seem to be missing is that experiences like this are real. Child Protection social workers have very little training in mental illness. Child protection social workers often have deeply stigmatising ignorant views of mental illness. Those social workers are likely to incorrectly see mental illness as a severe risk, and they will put in place a wide variety of burdensome restrictions. They will coerce and force mothers to take medication.

We need to accept that terrible practice happens in child safeguarding, and that some very good parents get trapped in the system.

That’s not scaremongering — that’s trying to change a broken system.

When you describe the bad interactions you’ve had with various medical professionals around mental ill-heath you’re not scare mongering, you’re trying to change their attitudes; you’re trying to show people what it’s like.

One thing that is missing from this story is some numbers. How many women are referred to child safeguarding each year? How many of them are referred because of mental illness? How long do they stay in contact with child safeguarding?

We don’t hear the stories of these women. There is still stigma around mental illness. Imagine how strong that stigma is for women who’ve been through child protection social service procedures. We need to hear these voices. We need to help these women talk. We should not be trying to silence these women.