> No More Secrets And Lies: Mary's Unexplained Changes - July 2010

Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Mary's Unexplained Changes - July 2010

During the winter of 2010, Mary's friend, Ann, moved in with us. Ann was a girl about Mary's age who had been sleeping in her car because her parents had kicked her out of their house. Mary asked me if she could stay with us, and I told her it was okay until she found a place of her own. We had a small apartment.

Ann ended up staying with us until I lost my job some six months later, when we all were forced out. Her parents had kicked her out of their house but they would visit her at my place. I was nice to them, but I wanted to sit them down and ask them what was going on — but then maybe I didn't know the whole story.

Then one day during July of 2010, Mary began to change,
in a different way. She told me she was going to get a social worker, get a place of her own, and then move out. Just like that. She also told me she didn't want me to know where she was moving , who her new social worker would be, nor did she want me to talk to this new social worker.

I didn't know what to think. This wasn't like Mary. One day she and I were extremely close, and then the next day she's a completely different person who doesn't want me in her life anymore. Was Ann making her do this, I wondered?

Later one day, I overheard her saying something to Ann about me taking her social security money. I didn't know where this came from. She had never mentioned anything about this before. When I finally asked her about it, I reminded her that we only got a little over $200 a month; and other than giving some of this as to her as an allowance, the rest was used to buy clothes and food and other things a she needed, and she understood this. I reminded her that I was also raising her by myself, housing and feeding her friend Ann,
raising Grace half the time, and paying her mom child support. She said said she realized this too, and knew how much we struggled each month to make ends meet. But something had changed in her, and it was nothing like I had ever seen before.

Looking back, I now realize that Mary's problem with me didn't come from Ann or from Mary herself. It came from her social worker — the same person who had threatened me a year and a half earlier — and it came from her mom. They had contacted Mary without my knowledge (and without Mary understanding what was going on) and had worked their way back into her life with the goal of separating the two of us. I know this now, but I didn't know it then.

Mary got an apartment with Ann, and I never have seen it. I wasn't allowed. Something changed in her overnight, and the Mary I knew transformed into a different child altogether, who, to this day, still refuses to have anything to do with me. And, to this day, I'm still waiting for the Mary I once knew to return.





6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I call it poverty coatching. social workers , womens advocates like bolton house here in Eau Claire. Victim witness advocates , Child support workers on the top of the list. They coach people to go after the programs and bennifits that will make the county the most money.

john brosnan said...

Interesting. I hear about things like this more and more.

Anonymous said...

The Apt I am sure is through housing or county housing. that is the bigest money maker for the county . Here in Eau Claire every dirty trick is used to split up a family to get people in county housing. I am hoping when the goverment defaults on its debt this money grubbing by the counties will end. Social security title IV-d and IV-e is destroying families.

john brosnan said...

I have no doubt believing this happens. I don't know if this was the motive in my case or not, but then since there's so little transparency, I have no way of knowing either way.

Anonymous said...

So the local SS office made determination of eligibility, that is bunch of crap. You sir are a liar and narcissist.

john brosnan said...

How is it I am a liar and a narcissist?

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