Jungendamt

[DaringD]

Hey people.

A little history before I get into it.

My eldest daughter has ADHD and we got her into a therapist to help her with it which compliments the medication she gets.

After a meeting with myself and her mother, the therapist has told us she is a little worried that our household might be unstable, due to me also having ADHD and also Bipolar. She wants us to ask the jungendamt to send soneone out to 'help' us.

Now, I'm not naive enough to think that this is just about helping us out, and my wife assures me they aren't there to check on us, but I have a huge problem with authority, and this steps we'll over my boundary and makes me feel very uncomfortable.

For me it's the idea that my house is a safe place for my family away from the broken education system that has effectively made my daughter feel like she has something wrong with her, and the uptight society that makes me feel like I'm lesser because my German isn't perfect and I don't Conform to their small minded 'traditonal, rural' (read as racist/sexist/xenophobic) village mindset. The idea of soneone coking into my house and judging the way we run our family absolutely terrifies me. I always feel relief when I walk through my front door and close it behind me knowing that sanity and reason reign, but I already feel that this is being taken away from me, that broken, lop sided system is going to be in my home making judgements.
It's already affecting my mental health in a big way, I just don't feel safe.

I need advice, I don't know how to deal with this.

I'm scared if I say no to doing it, the choice will be made for us.

My wife is a teacher, she used to be a social worker and knows that me having two mental health issues and being an immigrant are automatically de-facto red flags, she thinks if we so no that they will do it anyway without our say so.

I feel like I'm in a real One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest situation here and I have to say that I have never felt so scared of having no power in my entire life.

Edit: my daughter is 8, there is no history of violence, abuse, etc, they just keep on using the word instabil, and I'm pretty sure it's in direct reference to me.

[LeonG]

After a meeting with myself and her mother, the therapist has told us she is a little worried that our household might be unstable, due to me also having ADHD and also Bipolar. She wants us to ask the jungendamt to send soneone out to 'help' us.

Now, I'm not naive enough to think that this is just about helping us out, and my wife assures me they aren't there to check on us, but I have a huge problem with authority, and this steps we'll over my boundary and makes me feel very uncomfortable.

I would be uncomfortable too. Exactly how are they supposed to help you? In case they were to find that your household is unstable, what would they do?

[Franklan]

It's already affecting my mental health in a big way, I just don't feel safe.

Your daughter is 8, might have ADHD, and you (an adult individual!) feels to be the victim (of the system, potentially)?

About whom is this post, if I may ask?

[Fraufruit]

Are you also on medication and also getting psychological treatment for your 2 diagnoses? I've known/know a few people who are bipolar and refuse to stay on their meds because they make them feel numb instead of experiencing the extreme highs and lows. It always turns out badly when they do that. I have 3 bipolar friends who have bipolar children. It is genetic as is ADHD.

You sound a bit paranoid. Only comfortable when you go in your house and close the door and shut out the world? That's not normal.

Do see somebody if you aren't already.

[DaringD]

About whom is this post, if I may ask?

Well, this specific post is about me and how this situation makes me feel, because I'm scared in a way that I never have been before and I would like to hear other people's experiences of dealing with the Jungendamt so I can try to put my feelings into perspective.

Your daughter is 8, might have ADHD...

She definitely has ADHD (ADHS) and is diagnosed.

Providing a stable home is very much about having parents who are in the right place mentally, emotionally and physically, this is true for all parents regardless of any mental health issues that may or may not exist.

I appreciate that you are giving your opinion here, but I don't appreciate the sentiment of your message: it adds nothing and is not helpful.

I'm explaining how a situation I find myself in has affected me and asking for advice, if you don't have advice then please just think twice before you reply with something like this, and think for a moment about how your comment is going to be received.

Forgive me if this feels a little pointed, I don't want to create bad feeling, I'm just saying what I feel needs to be said, no hard feelings, lets move on from this.

Are you also on medication and also getting psychological treatment for your 2 diagnoses?

I was on medication for bipolar, though I am no longer on medication at the advice of my GP because they were starting to have a seriously adverse affect on my liver, this came up in January and was serious enough to have me stop immediately.

I am still waiting for an appointment to speak about my ADHD diagnosis, which was made by a psychiatrist I no longer want to see (unconnected and a whole other can of worms not worth going into here).

As for getting medication to replace what I was taking for bipolar, I currently cannot get an appointment to see a psychiatrist until the middle of next month which is not ideal (even stating the situation they simply asked if I was suicidal and upon my answer to the negative they called it good), but I have been able to manage and stabilise myself mostly though conscientious eating, sleeping and mood and habit monitoring.

I am also in therapy for Bipolar and connected problems, so in that respect everything is largely ok, though this situation has come at a rather unfortunate moment.

You sound a bit paranoid. Only comfortable when you go in your house and close the door and shut out the world? That's not normal.

OK, yeah, I can see how that comes across - It's not that I only feel comfortable when I get in the house and close the door, but this is my sanctuary and so far I feel as anyone should feel in their home, safe, relaxed, comfortable. But the idea of someone coming into my house and taking notes...

Also, I want to clarify that my paranoia, if it is that, doesn't come from nowhere. My wife worked along side them very often in her last job as a social worker and a very good friend works for them, and both of their candid stories about the inner workings are doing a lot of the heavy lifting here.

I know that certain unwritten rules and guides, even with no mental health conditions, would raise a red flag simply by being an immigrant. The bipolar raises the biggest (unofficial) flag even though it absolutely shouldn't (lawfully you can NOT discriminate based on a disability, which it very much is - I score enough points on the government's scale to be considered "severely disabled" by it in terms of how it affects my ability to do certain kinds of work but should not be a consideration under any other circumstances). and despite having no history of violence, no criminal record, nothing, these thigs combined absolutely DO work against me.

I should explain that I do have a well documented (by my therapist) problem with authority - instilled in me when I was a child by inept teachers in the UK's broken school system during the miserable and largely hopeless early 90s. I should clarify, however, it's not the actual authority that scares me, but the fact that so many people with authority are almost criminally incompetent.

It is a fact that, much to my therapist's chagrin, things happen around me regularly enough to prove this isn't just a paranoid theory but an unfortunate reality (do I really need to mention Olaf Shultz's unintentional throwing of the UK and France under the bus with respect to Ukraine? and then Mr Luftwaffe himself getting cyber security so wrong that I'm amazed he hasn't lost his job) The idea that just such an incompetence could have authority over how we raise our child, and could potentially interfere in that - I have no words for just how much that scares me.

Exactly how are they supposed to help you? In case they were to find that your household is unstable, what would they do?

Good questions... on the send one "what would they do?" I don't know, and I don't really want to guess.

My daughter's therapist is basing this worry of instability on my daughter telling her that she often doesn't know things like what time mom gets home from work (she just completed her Referendariat which was not entirely family friendly - three cheers for the Bavarian school system) and this has contributed to that in large part, I also feel the same, but this legitimate issue that my daughter has, has lead her to a fear of other things becoming unpredictable.

This fear manifests as a nervousness in her, and her constantly asking about what time we will be picking her up from school despite her knowing, what time we might do such and such a thing, or on what date is it that mommy will be away for the night. Perfectly understandable and, I think, normal things for a child to worry about.

The thing is, my wife started her new job three weeks ago and is now on a solid timetable, we have figured out our schedules, and were beginning to feel like we had things nailed for the first time in a long time, because now we can plan. But despite that, they still insist that they want us to get a helper in.

The helper: they want us to ask for help around the house, someone to play with her a couple of times a week when she gets home from school. I understand the idea of her knowing that on this and that day she has this person coming to spend time with her could definitely be a help, but we don't need for that to be someone from Jungendamt, we can absolutely arrange to have locked in events for her on certain nights, Oma and Opa would be more than happy to chip in, we already have swimming on Tuesdays, Film night on Fridays, two fixtures in the week where she knows for sure that she can look forward to, mom's new schedule means she will have that security of knowing exactly when she will be coming through the door on any given day.

it is her insistence on this being someone from Jungendamt that worries me.

I'm just looking for people's advice who may have dealt with them in the past or are dealing with them now, or even work for them.

[PandaMunich]

I have asked someone who had first-hand experience with the Jugendamt to chime in.
So hold tight, help is on the way.
But don't expect an answer before the morning.

[Fraufruit]

I'm happy to hear that you are taking care of your own issues. You know what they say about putting your own oxygen mask on first.

If the Jugendamt wants to send help a couple of times a week and it isn't for nefarious reasons, consider the possibility that it might be a good thing for all 3 of you. You are doing your due diligence going into it and that is admirable.

[Alberto]

Our 14yo daugther had problems and we were also encouraged to get in contact with the JA, which we did. Our experience so far has been very, very positive. It seems to me that you, not knowing, get scared in advance and draw conclusions about the JA that are simply not true. Understandable. But wrong.
Sorry busy now, I will write report more on our own story sometime soon.

[Alberto]

Here our story.

My daugther, now 14, suffered from depression, started when she was ca 12. Cause still unclear. She never suffered physical or sexual abuse (not at home, and I think neither elsewhere). Arguable if she suffered psychoemotional abuse. So severe that on 2 occasions (sorry, I prefer not to report everything), she was hospitalized. Soon she made it clear she refused help from any therapist, so we were told no therapist would work with her. And at the same time the therapists (more than one) suggested we get in touch with the JA instead, which we did.

I knew the JA has a bad rep., but didn't really know what to expect. At first with the JA we did nothing. They only gave us an "emergency number", just in case. For some weeks nothing happened. Eventually, she was so much down that one night she called, bluntly saying "I no longer want to live with my parents". Ironically, she was so much in panic that she couldn't even dial the number, so it was actually me to call them. She spent the night at a friends'. And we met the JA a couple of days later. The first thing the JA suggested was that she moves into a WG, Wohngemeinshaft. As I expected, she opposed it (typical todays teenager: not want the current status, but also not ready for a change if this requires more than zero effort). Then they suggested she stays home and we have regular contact with Pedagogen (2 for us parents, one for our child), and then let's see how it goes. This was accepted by all. 

What would have the JA done had we refused this last offer? I can guess. I'm aware ultimately they could in principle take the child away, even if we parents disagreed. Sometimes this happens. But what really would have happened, of course nobody knows.
The JA has huge power. And of course they sometimes use it, misuse it, and make some people unhappy. But they have to have such huge power. What should we as a society do in extreme cases, like if a child is beaten by the alcoholic dad, or whatever? I'm grateful there is such a body with so much power. It can, and does, well happen that sometimes they use it in the wrong way. I'm aware of the very bad reputation the JA has. But for sure, they are neither stupid nor evil. They are very decent human beings, with huge training behind them, and with extremely difficult tasks and responsibility. Criminally incompetent, for what I've experienced, would 100% be a very very unfitting term for them.

So, the 2+1 pedagogen we are in touch with....
The two women my wife and I are in touch with are absolutely fantastic. One is an Oma, the other very young. We meet now like twice a month and just review parenting topics. Every time they blow my mind apart. I'm super grateful for their assistance. This was at first set for 6 months. At the end of it, we reviewed and I could have walked away, but I begged the JA to continue granting us this service, I'm happy they accepted. 

On being foreigners and speaking less than perfect German.
Yes, we're foreigners. My German is not "not very good", is actually very bad. And my wifes even worse, and unlike me she's even visibly ethnic minority. Sometimes, but rarely, I feel at disadvantage because of language barriers. But more with the obvious burocracy monsters everybody (even highly educated native Germans) is scared of, like Finanzamt or Bauamt, rather than with "real" human situation. Wonder if I should actually, if anything, feel superior: because of our family background bla bla long story short, German is one of FOUR languages all 3 of us use every day. I have 500 colleagues at my workplace, and many 100s more elsewhere, and NOT ONE OF THEM is less than fluent in English (for most of us, including myself, is a foreign language). I do not expect all Germans speak English. With some I never tried English (random neighbor, plumber, bicycle mechanics, mates at the running club). But as soon as they've been through higher education (Arzt, Hausmakler, Steuerberater, whatever...), or they belong to the TikTok generation, as much as I'm happy to make an effort language-wise, I demand they do too. Or they get a bloody nose (well, sort of).

This our story so far. Feel free to ask anything.
Good luck,

[DaringD]

First of all thank you, so much...

I can't describe how much this has changed my feeling, and in the short time I have right now to reply, I also can't do your reply any justice.

Once I am home and can sit and have time to reply, I'll sit and write once more.

Thank you, again and again.

[DaringD]

I'm sorry it has taken me so long to reply, but there has been a lot happening.

So first of all, as previously stated, thank you for taking the time to write up your experience, it really did give me some comfort to know that the system works the way it is supposed to, I'm glad you got the help you needed and that you feel so warm towards them.

I spoke unofficially with soneone from JA last week who met me for a coffee. I went over everything with them and explained the situation with the therapist, what I could piece together about her fears, and we had a very good, open and honest discussion that left me feeling a lot better about everything.

It seems that it's quite a common problem for new, young therapists in training to do things like this. They err on the side of caution (of course this is the correct thing to do when it is children's welfare on the line) and their inexperience quite often leads to this exact outcome. They explained to procedure that they would go through, and how everything would happen if they received a report.

My wife and I spoke to the therapist again together and she was not happy at all that we were refusing to go through with getting JA involved, but we explained our plan of how we hope to help our daughter anyway, and she still didn't relent. She gave us what felt like an ultimatum: if you don't do this of your own free will then I'll report you. Ten days ago this kind of threat would have sent me on a downward spiral, though now I feel a lot more knowledgeable we were able to weather that threat and told her she should do whatever she feels is the right thing to do.

Since it would be a massive disruption to our daughter to move her to another therapist, and since our daughter really likes her and responds well to her, we aren't considering moving to another therapist. In our next parent session with her we're ging to have to have a very frank exchange with her about this situation to dispel any animosity and them move on from it together.

All in all, this was a terrible experience to go through, but with help and advice from here and others, it remained a storm in a teacup and didn't escalate to much else.

Thank you to everyone.