lost my sons to adoption

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I think in a perfect world, those of us who have kids CAN be open about who/what we are.

As it is, people like myself will have to remain "in the closet" about AS until such a time as it is apparent there is nothing "wrong" with us.

What we do with our children, which I think is superior to a lot of NT parents, is we train our children to be entirely self-sufficient. Both of my kids--my 3 year old and my 1 year old--know how to go to the refrigerator, bring me the juice bottle, and let me fill their cups AND take the bottle back and put it up. We DO play rough, admittedly, and we actually do encourage "fighting" between our children. This works for our family because it forces our children to communicate and work out their own issues--and for US, it WORKS. They don't have much conflict between each other, and when they do, it's our little girl that does all the damage!! ! They are unusually affectionate towards each other, and our boy will throw a massive FIT if he sees us correct his sister. I've never seen kids that tight before.

Instead of baby-gating EVERYTHING, we let our oldest boy climb up the stairs in our old place. He was fascinated by the stairs, but frightened once he got on them because he didn't know how to come back down. So we made him climb all the way up, and then we taught him how to hold on while climbing back down. He has NEVER fallen down stairs, even at less than 1 year old.

We don't really pick up our kids and play with them because they are simply just not interested. They come to us when they want us, and they know enough about their world to stay safe.

Where it goes wrong is when hypersensitive parents see how we interact as a family, since I'm kind of a weird guy anyway, and they just assume something is horribly wrong with us. I wonder if they aren't somewhat jealous of how independent our children are. Apparently someone who used to be close to us developed some grudge against my wife. So social services knows all about our private affairs, my son's ear infections (which he has now outgrown, btw), our stress in dealing with job loss and nearly losing our daughter to premature birth, and my undiagnosed AS. My wife was escorted from church on two occasions, and she wasn't even causing any trouble or anything!! ! PLUS, we were accused of watering down our son's formula. Um, what??? We let the social workers see our son, who was drinking juice from a sippy cup and hadn't been drinking formula from a bottle for over 6 months by that point. We strictly prohibit pacifiers and bottles after a year, and I see parents with 2 and 3 years who can't kick the habit. UGH... And WE'RE the bad parents!! !

Our boy plays rough, but he's not atypical. He trips over his own feet, falls on his own toys, and runs into things just for fun. So he has a lot of bruises that are either accidental or self-afflicted, not anything out of the ordinary--heck, I was covered in scrapes and bruises when I was kid. I don't even want to think what DHS would say if they saw my kid, but then they'd have to round up all the kids in the area because they aren't any different!! !

ANYWAY, sorry for the rant. I don't want to hijack the thread with my personal bitterness. DHS is evil. And the fact that anonymous hotlines can be co-opted for malicious attacks on families you have a beef with is just insane.

Is there a disability rights group in your area? If so, check in with them.

Good luck with getting your kids back.

Social services are just evil people. They likely encouraged you to do what you did with the plan all along to take them away from you.

I really hope that you get your sons back.

I concur with zer0netgain.

I'll add this: In the US, it's a money-making scam. It really is. Foster parents/homes get government funding to take care of troubled children. Social workers come out to your house, even on prank calls, for the purpose of finding some way to corroborate the call. Once that happens, no matter what they "find," you are IN the system. Welcome, brother! We've been expecting you. Now, if it's obvious that the calls are pranks and EVERYTHING is untrue, you have a well-kept house, and you act normal, they'll leave you alone. But you'll still be on file as have gotten a call, and you'll have to live with that for the rest of your life.

The single easiest and best thing you can do is disappear with your kids. Don't leave a forwarding address. Just get out. My wife and I chose to stand our ground, and we were eventually accepted within our church and people left us alone. But we were lucky. I really feel that we prayed and God looked after us and kept our family together.

If you get caught in a situation with a social worker, answer all questions briefly and honestly. Don't elaborate. Don't volunteer information. Don't agree that the children should spend time elsewhere.

If you are chronically, deeply, clinically, suicidally depressed or mentally disturbed in some way, you don't need children around you, anyway, especially as a single parent because you do put yourself and your children at risk. But having AS, mild depression and normal anxiety (which happens to everyone from time to time), and other less severe issues don't make you an unfit parent. If you are a parent, as far as anyone else is concerned and as far as anyone needs to know, you are perfect. You don't even get headaches. Admit otherwise, and these people will hit you with a "shoot first, ask questions later," "kill 'em all and let God sort 'em out" kind of attitude. It's their JOB to make their minds up ahead of time, so unless your mental state really is that critical or worse, there is no need at all to confide in these people. You do so at your own peril.

Wow this is so sad. I hope you get your kids back, because this is a disgrace.

You're not being punished for anything. It's part of a widespread pattern of discrimination against disabled people. All you had to do was exist.

I'm so sorry this has happened to you. I can't imagine how horrible that feels.

Sounds like Social Services kidnapped your children. They lied to you and then adopted them out. Do they get paid for adopting children out?

Is there anyway to fight this because what they are doing is discrimination. They were there to help you, not take away your kids! Unless your children were not being fed, treated well then they have no right to do that. If they are going to use that discrimination then what about all of these so called "normal" parents who kill their autistic children??

Having aspergers does not mean you cannot be a good parent.

I'm sorry if I missed this, but do you have visitation rights?

I am currently fighting to keep this same thing from happening to me. I have an appeals hearing later this month to block the adoption of my children. They are using my diagnosis against me and my quirks and such of from AS against me. I feel like there is nothing I can do to win.

I am just... This makes me so angry!!

Aspies aren't unfit parents any more than NTs are. I can only imagine what might've happened to me if I'd ended up with my NT stepfather instead of my autistic mother when they divorced. This NT fellow, y'see, loved to hit me just because he got mad and wanted someone to take it out on, and I happened to be the most annoying person in the room. And yeah, there are Aspies here and there who are abusive--a lower percentage than there are abusive NTs, but they exist--but just like I can't blame my stepfather's abusive nature on his neurology, I can't blame an Aspie abuser's issues on his Asperger's.

Being socially clumsy doesn't stop you from being a good parent. All you have to do is give your kids a consistent environment (and, may I note, many Aspies are more organized than usual, and it's easy to know what to expect from them), and teach them the stuff they need to know to be adults. It's not like parenting requires you to be charismatic.

I can see that if someone had AS/autism and couldn't take care of themselves, then they probably couldn't take care of children, either. But that's not the case here. If you can work and provide for yourself; if you can keep your house clean and your kids fed; if you're reasonably sensible and can put other people before yourself; then you can raise kids.

What the f**k. That is the worst thing. That's shocking. I can't imagine what that could be like.
I'm really sorry. *big hug* I will pray for a miracle. :/

Honestly, I can't imagine the amount of pain the OP must be in right now. I don't know anything about how UK laws work, but maybe he can get the media or a heavyweight politician involved in this. A lot of time they can swing things in favor of the common folks.

I mean, based on the OP's description, it almost sounds like some kind of adoption ring scam. Crooked social workers and crooked judges in cahoots to get babies for adoption - big money.

Even in the states I've heard about the UK's systematic discrimination against competent parents with mental illness and learning disabilities. if they have more kids later in life the social workers just copy and paste old reports to have a judge take them away too. If you want any more kids you are going to have to leave the country.

Well that's social services for you.