‘I was forced to f lee the country to stop Tusla taking my new baby’
Woman and child ‘doing really well’ in the North after her other kids taken from her care in the South
A PREGNANT woman who fled to Northern Ireland after learning Tusla was preparing to take her unborn baby into care is now living independently with her three-year-old child in Belfast.
According to documents seen by Irish Mail on Sunday, the woman’s other children were removed from her care after an expert witness brought in by the State’s child and family agency to assist their case told the family court she had the ‘minimum cognitive capacity required to manage the demands of parenting’.
However, an assessment by a clinical psychologist in the North, conducted four years later found she has an average IQ and scored above average in her processing speed index.
The mother’s other children were removed from her care after her former partner assaulted their youngest baby.
A court heard how the mother was out of the house at the time of the incident, and the judge in the case noted how she suffered because of the actions of her violent ex-partner.
Speaking to the MoS about her case, the mother – who is now aged in her 30s – said her baby daughter was put into an induced coma after being hurt by her then partner, and that she agreed to an interim care order while the assault was being investigated.
‘He hurt my baby when she was only a few weeks old,’ she said.
‘A few days earlier I went to Tusla for help because I could see his [her former partner] mental health was not good. I asked them: “What do I do? I don’t know who to go to, can you help me?” That was a Friday. The social worker said, “they are not there for me, they are there for children” and there was nothing they could do. And on the Monday he hurt her.
‘My baby was put into an induced coma because she had a bleed on her brain. When she came out of it she was blind, and doctors didn’t know if she would see again, but she has brilliant vision now.’
The woman said that, a year after agreeing to the interim care order for her baby daughter, ‘they [Tusla] went for interim care orders on my other children too.’
She told the MoS: ‘I was told the children can’t go home because of domestic violence; this was despite the fact he [former partner] was completely gone from the home.
‘The gardaí actually had to tell the social worker I am not under investigation, my ex-partner is.
‘They told the social worker he was the one who hurt my baby, but Tusla claimed “it didn’t add up”.
‘The gardaí told them I was never arrested, and they had video evidence of me leaving the house and coming back and running out with my baby for help. But Tusla kept using it against me.’
The mother fought desperately to get her children back, but she claims Tusla determined she was ‘susceptible to violent relationships’ and had a cognitive learning difficulty.
The mother subsequently entered a relationship with another man and found out she was pregnant again.
She asked to go to a mother and baby home where she could be supported to keep her baby, but instead her newborn son was taken from her care at five days old.
Hospital notes seen by the MoS show she was breastfeeding her baby and continued to pump breastmilk after he was removed from her care.
The mother recalled: ‘They took him at five days old out the back door of the maternity hospital because I “couldn’t meet his needs”, because I was susceptible to domestic violent relationships and apparently had a cognitive learning difficulty.
‘I begged to go to a mother and baby home, but I was told no. His father was willing to go, but they said no.’ She added: ‘We broke up as a result of all this.’
When the woman subsequently became pregnant again, she resolved to do everything in her power to keep her baby.
She travelled to Belfast three years ago and presented at the Health and Social Care Trust. She was then placed in a mother and baby unit and passed all the assessments Tusla said she had failed.
The woman is now living independently with her three-year-old toddler, and is a support mother to another vulnerable woman.
She told the MoS: ‘I got pregnant again during Covid and the prebirth assessment was done over the phone.’
She added that she then went to Tusla and asked whether this time they would put her into Bessborough [mother and baby home]. However, the mother claimed that this request was refused because it would be a ‘waste of Tusla’s money’.
She continued: ‘I decided to go to Northern Ireland because I knew my baby would be taken off me. I presented myself to the Trust up here and I had my baby. I was supported, I was put into a mother and baby assessment unit up here and I passed all my assessments that Tusla said I had failed, and they eventually closed my case.
The mother said that, despite being free to live independently with her son in Belfast, Tusla will not allow her other children who were removed from her care, to live with her.
‘They say they have been in care too long and it will be too upsetting. I am in contact with my older children and my three-yearold is living with me, but I have no contact with my other children who are in care.
Barbara Scanlon from the Alliance of Birth Mothers Campaigning for Justice group supported the mother throughout her last pregnancy.
Speaking about the case, she told the MoS: ‘I just feel that in the South from the day she was pregnant with [baby’s name] she was never going to be allowed keep him. At case conferences there was never a discussion about supporting her, the discussion was always about taking him straight from the hospital and putting him into foster care.
‘They’re both doing really well and they’ve closed their case here, which proves there was never an issue.
‘It’s so sad she could drive a couple of hours over the border and have such a different experience. I think she should have all of her children with her, but she doesn’t.’
In response to queries from the MoS in relation to the woman’s case, a spokeswoman for Tusla said their ‘main priority is the safety and wellbeing of children and young people’.
She said: ‘Internationally, Tusla has a lower level of children in care in comparison to our neighbours in Northern Ireland, England, Scotland and Wales, including for babies under one-year-old.
‘Tusla also prioritises the return home of children in care at the earliest possible opportunity.
‘Tusla will only place an unborn child on the Child Protection Notification System (CPNS) where there is an assessed risk of significant harm for the baby when it will be born.
‘Removing an infant is a last resort and only considered when all other means of ensuring the child’s safety have been exhausted.’
‘He hurt my baby when she was a few weeks old’
‘I think she should have all her children with her’