After Court

After the court hearing/date, we were presented to the judge as bad parents and she made a lot of assumptions, and gave a very harsh criticism of the situation. She did not have the full picture, never asked us anything, we had no opportunity to speak, so how could she have the full picture or story?
She felt very comfortable in passing judgement though, all based on false or inflamed allegations.

We had no option but to stand there and take it, we had no right of reply, or correction, the process had been presented to us as "the quickest way out of court will do the relationship with your teen and your family the least harm" I will now say I do not believe it to be true.

In a phone conversation between our teen daughter and her father (my husband), the significant point I heard was:

That we got away with it, what she meant was that we got away with the crime and had not done time, I then realized, while she felt that way there was no way forward, she had no understanding, no maturity, and could not understand that we did what we felt was best, with the information we had at the time, hindsight is always a wonderful thing. She forgets that she was behaving in a manner which was alarming and needed to be stopped. Sending photo's of herself in underwear was not ideal at 15 years old, having a secret cellphone paid for by others was a concern, being online all hours of the night was not good for her sleep patterns and her moods, which then affected her study.

If I could go back I would have taken the matter to court, a trial by jury. I also would have taken her to the local benefit office and said, "she no longer wants to live at home, and she understands she can get a benefit please" That may have had a different outcome. The benefit office have apologized to me for not following correct procedure, but they do not correct their mistakes, so the current situation will remain.

Diary about my feeling over the last year....

I had started a diary of my feeling early this year, it was a decision I made on Valentines Day 2016, a diary to put my thoughts and feelings on paper, so I could get them out of my system.

It was written with the possibility to one share with my daughter, it would allow a look back at how I felt over time gone past, because as any journey, it is easy to forget how things felt back in time.

After nearly a year I have forward it to my daughter, I do not know if she will read any or parts.
If it will share it with friends and make fun of it, or if it may reach her heart.

After the court case has been an gone I was expecting to feel free of the burden and lighter, and with a more open heart towards the teen daughter. But I did not. After court the daughter wanted to catch up over lunch and set up a ten pin bowling outing as a family, I could not.
She felt we had got away with it all, and from our point of view, we felt she had got away with it. She had no remorse, she had lied in court, and what really hurt is the adults in court who should have heard the lie, say nothing at all. The judge did not notice the case did not add up.
We had to stand in the dock like criminals, and be blamed by a judge for things which were not wrong, which were not illegal, but things we had to do as parents. I did not want to read my daughters diary, but after advice was left feeling that if something was wrong with our daughter and we knew it, that reading it, was something I had to do. If it helped shed light on the issues it was the right thing to do.
Did I want to? No, I thought about it carefully, it did reveal some things I already suspected, she had shop lifted, and had skipped school, and was up to no good, she revealed about bulling a girl on the school bus.

I knew she must have been stealing, she had make up and no money, her explanations were weak, but how do you accuse her of that with no proof? I was very unsure, I did suggest the shop lifting, but that resulted in a temper melt down, which I hoped was enough to make her get honest.