Welcome to the DAD.Info forum: Important Information – open to read:
Our forum aims to provide support and guidance where it can, however we may not always have the answer. The forum is not moderated 24 hours a day, so If you – or someone you know – are being harmed or in immediate danger of being harmed, call the police on 999.
Alternatively, if you are in crisis, please call Samaritans on 116 123.
If you are worried about you or someone you know is at risk of harm, please click here: How we can help
– aka - extracting the truth from lying public service “professionals” hiding behind the ‘Patient Confidentiality’ laws.
OK I'll try to précis this as succinctly as possible…
For the past year I’ve been a single Father to two young lads (7 & 10yrs) after I had no alternative but to have my darling Wife removed from the home by police. Her mental condition had been deteriorating noticeably since Dec 2011 and constant attempts to get her to engage with her paranoias, delusional ideations and eventually full on violent hallucinatory schizophrenic episodes had fallen on deaf ears. No surprise there, it’s a standard and signal feature of delusional paranoid psychosis for the sufferer to incorporate denial into their mental landscape. The sum total of the medical profession’s response was “Sorry Guv, can’t do anything until there’s a crisis!” And boy did it arrive bringing all its mates! 👿
Whatever inhabits my Wife’s mind now views me as some sort of evil synthesis of violent wife-beater, serial adulterer, that I have installed cameras in light bulbs, in old rawlplug holes in the walls, that I’m a prolific publisher of internet pornography, that I can instigate flash mobs to gather in Sainsburys that insult her at random, that I have the power to direct police helicopter overflights of the house at will, that I have fathered neighbours’ children… honestly it goes on and endlessly on… she really had lost all connection with rationality.
So last July the boys and I found ourselves sat in the wreckage of the front room as the police drove her away into custody and thence detention in the local NHS psychiatric ward.
From that moment I have been treated as entirely superfluous to proceedings, as an active inconvenience if not the direct fount of all evil and the obvious cause of all her distress to be treated with dismissive contempt and absolute caution. My wife’s delusional state meant that she had refused permission for any information about her condition, care or ongoing prognosis and treatment to be revealed to me. Her ‘care team’ have embraced that with a will. Complete radio silence
It took 3 months of constant pressure to get her assigned Community Psych Nurse to even condescend to meet me in order that she might have some of the background facts imparted to her. You’d think that would have been a matter of urgency in the treatment of someone who’s so severely mentally disturbed but it seemed that they were only agreeing to do so on sufferance.
So the CPN sat there on the sofa as I spent an hour and a half relating to her the story of my Wife’s 3 year spiralling descent into the grip of delusional paranoid psychosis. And here’s the rub;
I briefly related two instances where I had been so in fear of getting a blade in the back as I slept that I removed the knives from the kitchen drawer and hid them. Once in a rucksack buried under the shoes in a cupboard and the second occasion in the kids’ sock drawer (last place I thought she’d look in her drunken stupor). I mentioned to the CPN that I only did this because I do keep them regularly diamond honed as a blunt knife is more dangerous in use than a sharp one and that I might have had a chance of fending off a blunt knife but definitely not our 10” razor sharp carver in the hands of a drunken psychotic intent on some ad hoc spinal surgery!
Well the next day I got a call asking if I’d be prepared to receive an URGENT visit (on a Sunday???) from their ‘support team’ on account of the obvious stress that this CPN had felt I was under. “Blimey, someone’s finally noticed? OK Sunday it is”. An hour later I received a call asking if they could rearrange to a “neutral venue” rather than the flat. Upon questioning it turns out that this lackwitted CPN had transmuted my recollections into a bizarre and highly defamatory narrative in which I was now apparently “knowledgeable in the sharpening of knives” (errr… so is the average chef or jobbing chippy) that I was “…in the habit of keeping razor sharp knives in the childrens’ drawers! That I was undoubtedly suicidal and possibly infanticidal; that I represented “…an ongoing threat to any public servant and on no account should I be seen alone or at home.”
All of this libellous fantastical horse**** has now been recorded on medical notes and computer fields and now forms part of my NHS patient record and thus my wider IT heritage. Trying to extract an explanation, retraction, correction and apology has been totally fruitless. They have point blank refused to even discuss the matter citing their duty to “respect my Wife’s patient confidentiality”.
Eh? How the [censored] does that work? Basically this is a matter of an NHS ‘professional’ openly and publicly libelling me quite apart from her gross misunderstanding and glaring professional incompetence. It in no way encroaches upon my Wife’s patient confidentiality. It’s a civil matter between myself and that CPN plus anyone else who knowingly aided the publication and distribution of those libels.
It is clouded somewhat by the CPN’s gormless insistence that my Wife is now “free of delusional ideations and the only remaining symptoms being anxiety and depression” when in fact it is plainly obvious from the 200 plus texts my wife an I have since exchanged that they are very much still extant.
Going up the complaint resolution food chain we encounter PALS, the Patient Advice & Liaison Service who ironically offer no advice, refuse to conduct any effective liaison and offer no degree of service that I noticed, They certainly tested my patience though. They again refused to investigate citing this mythical connection to the issue of respect for my Wife’s right to patient confidentiality. I’ve repeatedly requested a detailed and legally referenced justification for their refusal but not a single answer has been forthcoming much less any piece of law in support of their nebulous and self serving contention.
In order to resolve this matter and a score of others I arranged a meeting with PALS senior complaints manager. It didn’t go well. It was obvious from the start that nothing at all was up for discussion and that this manager’s only pre-programmed reply was “…if you don’t like it take it up with the ombudsman”. It dodged every single question and point blank refused to engage a single issue raised. It eventually declared that “I don’t think this meeting is going well so I’m going to terminate it and ask you to leave the building”. Well it wasn’t going well for her that’s for sure as basically the embarrassment she was feeling at spouting this repetitive line was becoming mutual and obvious.
A call to the boys’ social worker a few days later revealed that unbelievably this ‘manager’ had written some sort of scurrilous and derogatory email to him alleging that during this meeting I had behaved “inappropriately” (it was her very favourite word) that I’d been aggressive, unreasonable, intimidating and well… god knows what she wrote as once again he refused to read it out verbatim or let me have a copy. Apparently he has to ask her permission to release it??? This manager is obviously and childishly trying to lay down a retrospective fog of disrepute around my character after getting their corporate @rse discursively and comprehensively kicked.
So let’s get this straight, a CPN authors and distributes a completely unfounded and highly defamatory series of allegations about me directly and I have no right to challenge this without my Wife’s permission?
A senior NHS manager similarly authors and distributes a series of highly defamatory statements directly about me and I have to seek HER permission to even have sight of them let alone challenge them?
What the [censored] is going on here?
If I am physically attacked in the street do I need to seek the mugger’s permission to have him arrested or otherwise seek redress? Of course not, so what’s the legal precedent here that allows them to hide behind this veil of patient confidentiality when they are entirely unconnected.
Incidentally this manager in the process of sending that email has unthinkingly made a serious career choice; I have a recording of that meeting in its entirety!
It will be an interesting comparison for a disciplinary tribunal to consider when set beside this idiot’s petulant, ill motivated little email.
p.s.
Rocking this forum folks, learnt more in the past three hours on this forum than in the last 4 years!
Hi there
You need to be very careful about what you say here, this is a public forum and we are aware that SS and others regularly check such forums out looking for members to incriminate themselves.
You are battling something I have had full and similar experience of and that is having a family member with serious mental health problems, so I can relate to the brick walls you have crashed against! There is no way around patient confidentiality and they use it with impunity, they don't listen to family members actual experiences and rely wholly on their own assessments when making crucial decisions about a patient and their mental state.
Paranoid Schizophrenia is the disintegration of personality, not intelligence. An intelligent Schizophrenic can easily disguise symptoms from the health care professionals for the required amount of time and knows exactly what to say and what they want to hear. My family member has duped many a CPN, Consultant and others, and is still doing so
The other thing to remember is the financial side of things, the cuts to the budgets means that the services are spread very thinly and that's one of the reasons they will only deal with crisis, and that has to be extreme before they will step in. You will never get them to admit that their service is lacking because of the cuts though.
I would suggest you contact Sane and talk to them, when I was having a particularly difficult time they were supportive. The other agency that might be of some help is the Family Rights Group, they have experience of family's involved with Social Services.
www.frg.org.uk
My advice for what it's worth is concentrate on yourself and the children, you need to take yourself off their radar. I would instead look to protect your children by applying through the courts for a Child Arrangements Order for residence and also the possibility of an injunction to prevent her from contacting you. If she breaches an injunction it becomes a criminal matter.
Best of luck with it and please don't hesitate to contact me via private messaging or on the forum if you need to talk
Hi there
Many thanks for the reply Jane...
You need to be very careful about what you say here, this is a public forum and we are aware that SS and others regularly check such forums out looking for members to incriminate themselves.
Hmm I'm sure they do; thought I'd anonymised everything sufficiently. Of course the bitter irony is that they are quite willing to allocate an undiscoverable number of staff to trawling the online forums for complaints spawned by their own under-staffing but at the same time plead that they are under-manned. I'm also well aware of their willingness to stick the legal size 11s in and have blogs and forums shut down if something really upsets their conveniently assumed sensitivities.
You are battling something I have had full and similar experience of and that is having a family member with serious mental health problems, so I can relate to the brick walls you have crashed against!
And then some! When it comes to institutionalised indifference, reflexive evasion of the subject and constructive obstruction I thought the DWP and its corporate trading arm Jobcentre+ swept up the medals but they have still much to learn from this shower of over promoted rent seeking drones.
There is no way around patient confidentiality and they use it with impunity, they don't listen to family members actual experiences and rely wholly on their own assessments when making crucial decisions about a patient and their mental state.
Indeed, which explains why they are so reluctant to open this can of worms because it instantly brings the professional judgement of the allocated CPN into immediate question. Her pronouncements stand in stark contrast to the facts and I'm now supposed to be content with letting this person have control over my Wife's ongoing care and recovery when it is clear she has not the skill to determine fact from fiction and what is worse is prepared to invent total garbage in the course of her work.
Paranoid Schizophrenia is the disintegration of personality, not intelligence. An intelligent Schizophrenic can easily disguise symptoms from the health care professionals for the required amount of time and knows exactly what to say and what they want to hear. My family member has duped many a CPN, Consultant and others, and is still doing so
Yep, that's ringing bells everywhere with me. maybe I'm old fashioned but I'd have expected any trained psych professional worthy of the job title would be able to sift through all the delusional stuff to reach the causes of their patient's illness but speaking to her and reading her texts it seems as though no-one has even told her she's ill and what's happened to her or why I have been given custody of the boys. Of course, and as you will certainly know it's pointless trying to argue with a paranoid schizophrenic on the basis of fact. it just doesn't work like that! Any facts that are admitted into their reality are done so on a highly selective basis and only allowed in if they can be shoehorned or otherwise rationalised to fit their current delusional topography. It is extremely frustrating for a bloke like me who lives by logic and fact.
The other thing to remember is the financial side of things,... ... You will never get them to admit that their service is lacking because of the cuts though.
I hate to think of the expense their prevarication and rank unprofessionalism have generated in additional cost to the NHS never mind the severe effect it has had on me. If they'd been honest about their limitations and accountable for their errors I would have a given them a sympathetic hearing. I'm a reasonable man. But they slammed that window of opportunity shut by their own venality and lack of integrity so frankly at this point it's hard to give a flying one about their admin/staffing/ case management probs et al when they are so wilfully playing 'fast and loose' with my Wife's mental health. By failing to challenge her delusions effectively they are delaying her recovery to the point that I can safely allow her access to the two boys and eventually and hopefully return to us as their mother and my Wife. They/the CPN have now encouraged her to initiate proceedings for access but by any reading of the Mental Capacity Act my Wife lacks the capacity legally to do so.
I would suggest you contact Sane and talk to them, when I was having a particularly difficult time they were supportive. The other agency that might be of some help is the Family Rights Group, they have experience of family's involved with Social Services.
www.frg.org.uk
Ah thanks for those Nan 🙂 I've come across SANE before but not the FRG. I'll be on it first thing Monday.
My advice for what it's worth is concentrate on yourself and the children, you need to take yourself off their radar.
Wish it were that easy Jane but I've always been one of those who'll 'march towards the sound of the guns' if you know what I mean. Can't change that and wouldn't want to. My whole ethos is one of "if there's a problem, you fix it, you don't leave it for the next bloke to take up the slack!" in this case the slack wits of the NHS management monolith. I'm a pretty forthright chap, not one to shy from conflict, articulate, persistent and can recognise bull**** before it hits the stable floor. It's what made me a good foreman. I also have a useful (but annoying for them) habit of actually downloading, reading and assimilating complete Acts of Parliament, codes of practice, guidance notes, Select Committee reports as necessary and depending on which speculative bit of legalese they've cited. I then catalogue their departures therefrom and fire it straight back at 'em. The only thing they've ever offered in their defence was a link to the The Local Authority Social Services & NHS Service Complaints (England) Regulations 2009. It uses the word consent 7 times and all of them related to their requirement to seek MY consent and not a single incidence of the word "patient". Why they'd cited this ostensibly irrelevant piece of legislation was one of the questions I was hoping to ask at my last meeting. They don't even know the law they're citing themselves! It's all smoke and bluff.
Now if they're prepared to relentlessly obstruct and lie to someone like me who's more than happy to bite back, how many hundreds/thousands of other "service users" have they utterly ignored who don't have the wherewithal to embark on such an intimidating slog through their slough of indifference? Somebody's got to take it on and call them to account after all they're trousering good public sector salaries on the back of their demonstrable inadequacies.
Essentially I've been pushed as far as I am prepared to let them and the forebearance I've shown up to now has been at a great cost to myself. One can also start citing their interference with our Section 8 rights to respect for our family life. Then there are the gross departures from their own CoP and the wholesale ignorance Ombudsman's published directions and recommendations.
I would instead look to protect your children by applying through the courts for a Child Arrangements Order for residence...
That's why I'm challenging them, to protect the boys from any further harm as they've had to put up with her increasingly unstable behaviour as long as I have. The residency issue is a done deal. They are resident with me and I don't see any way they can rescind or revise that status given the events that have transpired and the effect it has had on them. Basically when she trashed the front room I was 600 yards down the road having an extremely stressed conversation with her GP pleading for help with her imminent meltdown and completely unaware of what was happening back home. Suffice it to say that I later learned from the boys that she had flung the computer straight over their heads and took out the huge mantelpiece mirror sending shards of glass over where they were sitting. They legged it into their room after she got them to trample up and down on the shrapnel! I'd allowed her to meet up with us in town for a few hours on several occasions but her delusional state meant it couldn't be allowed to continue for the boys sake and mine. It was just devastating.
and also the possibility of an injunction to prevent her from contacting you. If she breaches an injunction it becomes a criminal matter.
Wouldn't achieve anything really. Since the last set of exchanges she has stopped replying to or sending texts and such is the development of her condition that she has effectively gone 'silent running' and doesn't want to contact me. She now believes it was me how trashed the flat that morning and told me to get the police report as proof. ??? I had been telling her to do exactly the same thing for months since she obviously didn't/couldn't believe it was actually her that was responsible. The police asked me if I wanted to press charges against her for criminal damage but I deferred saying "Get real mate! that's my Wife and God knows she's got enough problems going on in there without me and the law shovelling another pile in on top."
Right now I wish I had done so I could at least blow that bit of fantasy out of the water. But in the same breath it begs the question: why haven't her medical/psych team even tried this approach to get her to address her delusions? Put the proofs in front of her. Not very sophisticated as a piece of clinical psychiatry I agree but it might at least make her start to question what she believes to be the irrefutable truth as filtered through her altered and erroneous perceptions. A no brainer to me but hey what do I know? I'm just the bloke who's been at her side come [censored] and high water without fail or falter for the past 15 years so what the [censored] would I have to contribute?
Best of luck with it and please don't hesitate to contact me via private messaging or on the forum if you need to talk
Once again Nanny, thanks for your time and input and giving me a different voice to listen to. It's much appreciated.
The immediate question remains though. By what legal contortion or semantic arabesque can they conceal their professional negligence and refuse to answer for it on the grounds of my Wife's patient confidentiality?
Got a meeting with the local trust's 'independent' investigating officer in a few days. He's already had my 20 page fisking of their complaints resolution regime and the appallingly dismissive treatment we've received at their hands. i have also requested that he come equipped with a credible legal justification for their obstinate silence on the issues raised. We shall see.
t.t.f.n.
aye aye what's this?...
sit. rep.
Following that last farcical meeting with the PALS Complaints 'Manager' I compiled a 26 pager listing every complaint and a summary of their derisory "response". Among many other things I observed that a 'response' and and 'answer' are very different things but they seem unable to discern the difference. A dog 'responds' by wagging its tail; a bell 'responds' when it'[censored] but neither imparts any useful information! Whatever...
I fired this off directly to the desk of the Trust's (a misnomer if ever there was one) Chief Exec and surprisingly quickly was contacted by an investigating officer about two weeks back and a meeting was arranged here at home for this Monday coming.
(er... hang on a minute...? I was supposed to be a homicidal knife wielding sociopath who on no account should be visited "in home" Well according to your own expert psychiatric professional who's in notional charge of my Wife's mental health that is...??? you know...? your own staff member...? Are you now in fact ignoring the warning given by your own 'expert, highly trained, psychiatric care professional'? How very interesting.)
So another nugget of self contradictory evidence of their/her/someone's rank incompetence gets added to the ever expanding litany of unanswered questions and anomalies. Whatever...
So with that arranged I immediately requested PALS to fast track their answer to this patient confidentiality issue. I explained the need for urgency and was assured that I'd "...receive their response by Friday."
"Response??" No I want a legally referenced ANSWER not another vacuous bit of speculative drivel dreamt up by some Billy No-marks with no legal training or knowledge of the question at hand!"
"Well we'll get that to you by Friday anyway Mr. Guvnah." said their case worker obviously refusing to acknowledge the difference between the two.
Needless to say the only thing that arrived this morning was the electricity bill so I was on their case immediately demanding that this legal reference be emailed over to me tout ***g suite and anything less will be considered as active obstruction and pursued as such. I no longer [censored] about with these people, in my line of work you're as good as your last ten minutes and I expect the same degree of diligence and professionalism I'd expect from any of my colleagues.
Looks like I ruffled a few feathers because within the hour I received a call from the trust's Director of nursing!
So here's the Dir. Nursing for the whole trust on the dog and bone asking me what the problem is and that he is the fellah who allocated the current investigator (a senior manager from a completely separate area of healthcare) to my case. Amazingly he spends the next fifteen minutes listening in silence as I downloaded the the compressed history of the case to him and their manifold departures from their own CoP, the Ombudsman's published guidelines or indeed any semblance of an equitable and co-operative complaints handling regime. Basically I ripped him a fresh one over the dysfunctional management structure that has allowed this wayward department to evolve in the way it has and permitted a shower of dissimulative, clueless patently over-promoted [censored]-wits to remain in post and drawing salary. This is the laughable regime over which he presides and over whom he has titular control, he is the one to whom responsibility ultimately devolves! That realisation coming from the mouth of the layman seemed to wake him up a bit more.
All in all we had a good half hour conversation and at no point did the BS detector go off! This is a first! I had to check it was still working and re-calibrate by turning on the news - nope all working fine.
So the upshot was that he assured me that when the investigating manager arrives he WILL come equipped with answers to the specific questions that I perceive (pending subsequent correction) to have [censored] all to do with my Wife's patient confidentiality namely;
1) Explain your CPN's ludicrous libels and the reason you refuse to investigate, explain, correct or apologise for them.
2) Why have you refused or are in anyway unable to supply a legally referenced reason that connects this complaint to any infringement of my Wife's right to confidentiality in any way however slight?
3) Why have you refused to acknowledge and investigate the erroneous pronouncement of this CPN that my Wife is now free of delusional ideation and symptoms when she plainly is not?
4) Why have you refused to supply a copy of the unprofessional, scurrilous and defamatory letter authored by your P.A.L.S. complaints 'manager' to our children's social worker.
5) Why have you attempted to excuse your refusal by linking it yet again to my Wife's right to confidentiality.
He agreed to immediately email his inv. officer and make him unequivocally aware of what information I will be expecting him to be in possession of when he arrives. Moreover he volunteered to c.c. me into the emails. Blimey this bloke sounds serious.
True to his word he's sent me a copy but fer *'s sake he's completely missed the point and simplisticly repeated to his investigator that I need a legal explanation of why I'm not allowed to be informed about my Wife's treatment etc. Oh fer God's sake mate did you actually hear what I've just explained to you in excruciating detail for the past half hour.? give me strength! I mean what the **** can a man do when presented with such cloth eared cognitive deficiency? Do I have to draw pictures or something. Is it any wonder the NHS is in such critical condition when this is the calibre of their senior execs?
Anyroadup I immediately sent him a corrective email so ... we shall see.
You need to write a book - you are able to make a disastrous situation very readable (and I was laughing at points) so I'm pretty sure that any subject to turn your prose to would be equally readable.
However, keep us up to date, will be interested to see what progress you make.
You need to write a book - you are able to make a disastrous situation very readable (and I was laughing at points) so I'm pretty sure that any subject to turn your prose to would be equally readable.
You're too kind but thanks all the same AC. Humour is one of the few things I've got left and as the Guv's sainted Mum would often say "If you'couldn't :p you'd :boohoo:
However, keep us up to date, will be interested to see what progress you make.
Yep, shall do. In fact it's one of the prime motivators to signing up to Dad's Info; to be able to hopefully help anyone else who finds themselves forced to navigate the treacherous legal shoals of **** Creek. I'll bet cash money I'm not the only one who's been churned endlessly round in this patient confidentiality "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitewater#Pillow s">stopper" and spat out downstream exhausted, battered and none the [censored] wiser. Well they're not going to pull that trick on the Guvnah.
And so to today's meeting...
Well what can I say, where to start? Chap seemed reasonable, pretty well briefed on the substance of my complaint/s and attentive to what I had to say. Hells bells he even made notes! 5 pages of 'em!
At no point did I feel I was being rushed or that he urgently needed/wanted to be elsewhere which I'm sure is an attitude and body language that you'll all have encountered at some point if not regularly when dealing with the average mid rank, rent-seeking, apathetic department wonk. You know the scenario... they start looking at a point over your shoulder for instance, even if there's nothing behind you but the corner of the room. What I now do is look round at where they're staring and come out with something like "what? ...was it a ghost... waaah!..." If they're gawping at a queue behind me I'll turn round saying "Is yer mum here or something?" If they look at the clock on the wall I ponderously look at my watch, tell them the time and ask "Have you got a tea going cold or something...?" Sarky? Yes, I cannot lie, but I've just lost all patience with anyone involved in this omni-shambles and whose attention isn't now 100% fixed on the issues.
In my defence I will say that they're now having to deal with a monster of their own creation. I didn't choose this fight, I had no choice if I was to feel I had fully honoured to the very end of my ability my public vow to love, honour and care for her "...in sickness and in health forsaking all others..." Like I said, I'm unashamedly old school and I meant it. I won't give up on her until [censored] freezes over and Beelzebub has to ski to work. So as they say, "Mess with the bull and y' gotta deal with the horns."
To be honest I wasn't expecting any of that nonsense given the fulminating stink I've raised over their risible performance to date and the seniority of the staff who are now involved and thankfully none was forthcoming. In all I spent a good 2 hours and more downloading to him each and every question to which answers are now so loooooong overdue. Every departure from their own published Code of practice. Every piece of professional negligence both clinical and administrative. Every instance of their confused and contradictory claptrap masquerading as "a response".
All of it he took down in impressively meticulous detail, all be it in a totally indecipherable (to me) semi-hieroglyphic script/Venn diagrams that obviously meant a lot more to him than it did to me. Then I remembered that he was Head of Pharmacy...so that made sense :p
Several things couldn't be discussed in much detail because the Data Access Request is still in process, in particular the content of that petulant little email sent to the boys' social worker by P.A.L.S. Senior Complaints Manager. I got the impression that he will be supplying some urgent wind to their sails now to expedite its production (including the vital FULL audit trail). I made no bones about my cynicism as to the completeness of the records that will be offered up and cautioned him that I do NOT expect to discover any evidence of deletion or alteration of texts within that audit trail nor any of that "...oops, sorry Guv we mistakenly flagged it for inclusion in the monthly I.T. housekeeping routine and it's been deleted.." hogwash.
The upshot of the morning was that he would take it away and absorb, categorise and prioritise and produce a summary which he will email to me, effectively these are the minutes which he's submitting to me for verification and agreement that it's a true comprehensive list of ALL the outstanding issues and proposals for their remedy.
That's all I had a right to ask for and at this point more than I was expecting but what I've always found is that once you've cleared a path through the lower and middle ranks of management one encounters the more reasonable type. The lower management's job is to keep their bosses desk clear. To act as increasingly obstructive first and second stage filters to prevent their evidenced incompetence arriving at the top desk. Annual personnel performance assessments are at stake here so it is absolutely not in their interests to allow anything to pass upwards hence the default response of "...well if you're not happy contact the Ombudsman." Anyone but our boss.
In fact it was a massive relief finally to have a sensible and adult conversation with someone. I kid you not. The past few years have been a constant battle with bureaucracy and wilful ignorance to the degree that every conversation I have with these people rapidly descends into pointless patronising circularities, It changes your character when the only adults you get to talk to are either card carrying jobsworths, arrogant condescending barstewards or vindictive hypersensitive over-promoted social inadequates totally ill suited to a public facing role.
So that was it, Preliminary meeting done and dusted. Promises given to "...keep me in the loop" and that promise alone was worth more than he could imagine.
He did ask if he could have a quick look around to get a feel for the situation (very Dirk Gently! 🙂 ) after I had related the 'hiding of The Knives incident. Feel free said I and he made his way to the kitchen and the hallway where I have a workbench built into the alcove. Might seem a bit left field to some but in the alcove I've got an old bench lathe stripped for refurb and a little precision jig borer, watchmaking, toolroom grade stuff. He seemed genuinely intrigued by all the metrology and gauging kit strewn about.
As he was poking about on the bench I thought I'd grab a quick bit of nosebag and sliced off a sliver of Cathedral City (other cheeses are available) and cheekily thought I'd demonstrate to him why a sharp knife works better than a blunt one by doing the full 'Subway advert' slicing of a squishy cherry tomato in one swift stroke, Gordon Ramsey himself would have applauded in admiration. He seemed to accept that my allegedly sinister knowledge of how to sharpen a bit of metal to a razor edge was hardly the mark of psychopathy as the CPN imagines it to be. If he felt at all intimidated by this he certainly didn't show it and I didn't even murder anyone! How about that? Yay me!
I'm also a bit of a watch nut and at the end of the meeting I couldn't resist asking him about the knuckle-duster sized chunk he was sporting. I'd recognized it as a Nixon (big in the States) and had considered chucking a few quid at an Ebay one at some point as a daily 'beater' so I asked him straight out if he'd mind me having a quick looksy to get an idea of their quality control. "Sure no problem, in fact would you mind having a quick look at the deployant clasp while you're at it because it keeps flipping open."
Aha, Yep, see there?... you've somehow bent the fold-over part, if I had a decent jeweller's vice here I'd pinch it back parallel for you but haven't got I'm afraid, Best thing, jewellers in town; 5mins and a tenner for his trouble probably and DON'T go to one of the battery change shacks whatever you do."
Initial impressions then are hopeful. I did make repeated emphasis of the point that he should also view the conduct of this case and the dysfunctional nature of the participating departments as evidence of a catastrophic failure of management and directorial oversight, something of which the Trust's Directors should feel rightly embarrassed professionally speaking. At this level of management it pays to understand that a subtly different management dynamic exists and thus a different ethos pervades. This is because individual accountability is more rigorous and immediate when they have to answer to Directors and Chairs of Trusts, Select Committee et al. I just wish that same degree and immediacy of accountability were better imposed lower down the hierarchy. It would save us all a huge amount of gratuitous suffering for one because I am now heartily sick of having to recount the nightmare of the last 4 years again and again to faceless call handlers and indifferent civil servants.
so the signs are good but... I've heard this tune before.
I have to say I agree with you about the knives - I'm not much of a cook, but have a set of Sabatier K knives (the proper ones made in Thiers, not the Richardsons of Sheffield knock off ones) - have had them for over 30 years, and slicing tomatoes is definitely a pleasure with them 🙂
Hi all,
Apologies for the extended absence but this has been a very hard few months to deal with. The depression really got a grip, it's a total b**d and it's proving intractable so didn't want to burden this thread with a bunch of indulgent self analytical rhetoric. But...
.When I put this ring on I meant it so never suffer it to be said that The Guvnah wasn't a persistent son of a [censored] or was ever a breaker of oaths and vows. I just will not walk away from this, or from her. and persistence pays off...
So to bring it up to date:
The formal (internal) investigation has concluded and the result was as predicted; a worthless bit of wilfully ignorant [censored] covering. Total expenditure = 1 x 10ltr Wickes's trade tub of fresh white undercoat with a topcoat of hogwash. Lavvverly!
Just incredible how far wide of the events and facts it actually is. Now this chap was a senior pharmacist so could by no means be described as a 'dumbass', he didn't drool, he didn't know the difference between "defamation" and "deformation" which worried me slightly but he at least took copious notes when we met to discuss my complaint/s (5 pages of 'em) so why and how could he still not "get the f point??? I'll give a quick example...
This business of my telling the CPN about the two times I had to hide our razor sharp kitchen knives from her, once buried under all the [censored] in our hall cupboard and the second time in the last place I thought she'd look, the boys' sock drawer. This, as I've described above, was turned into a bizarre garbled half recollected narrative by the CPN that took all the elements of my Wife's past behaviours and transposed them onto ME. In the eyes and IT system of the health service I was now transformed into some sort of knife sharpening infanticide and an immediate threat to any public sector worker I might encounter. I mean [censored]? So an obvious no brainer presenting little difficulty for a diligent investigating officer of average intelligence to debunk, or so one would have thought. But get this...
The investigator took that scenario and skewed it into an issue of it being merely a matter of her 'professional' opinion and although I might disagree with her opinion and it might indeed have been wrong in that you are obviously not a psychopathic infanticidal sharpener of knives, it nevertheless was a valid one for her to record.
Woah there Tonto... I'm sorry? ...? .... So what they're saying here is that: OK our CPN may have got her assessment of your mental state wrong (just a bit) but hey we all make errors of perceptual judgement and what might seem perfectly normative behaviour to one observer seems grossly abnormal to another but she must record what she sees and that is what she saw.
In fact what she did was take a string of situational events induced by my Wife's uncontrollable psychosis and transfer the causation to me. F me is this guy actually a complete cretin who just happens to fit a well tailored suit? God knows I spent at least half an hour of our 2hr meeting relating this piece of weapons grade idiocy on the part of the CPN and still the penny didn't drop. I know he's not that stupid, jesus he's Head of Pharmacy fer chrissakes so what other explanation could there be for him so blatantly misconstruing the substance of my complaint. Of course I am in the process right now of totally fisking the living [censored] out his vacuous ponderings and firing them straight back at their newly installed common purpose placeman Chief Executive.
When this guy visited the second time to personally hand over the raw data dump of my DPA access request he was accompanied by a chaperone, obviously to retrospectively lend credence to the CPNs wild allegations that I was unstable and shouldn't be seen alone. What he didn't realise was that after describing the 'knives incident' for the benefit of this chaperone I deliberately asked her "now then... do my actions or anything I've just described to you seem at all irrational or indicative of the slightest mental instability or illness on my part?" And of course her answer was "No Mr. Guvnah, not at all, totally rational, not much else you could've done it seems to me."
Thangyoop, so Mr. Investigator are you quite clear about this now? He assured me he was. Now he's not stupid so that must make him plain and simply a lying, duplicitous knuckle-pumper of the very first water.
I however am not and there was a deliberate reason for asking his chaperone that question. Put simply I recorded the whole 2 1/4hrs of our meeting so now he has to explain why 2 months ago he absolutely accepted my actions and the substance of my complaint as entirely valid. Mrs. Chaperone did likewise. You were both nodding your heads and going "no I see that, I would have done the same etc etc but now you done the full "reverse ferret". Why was that? We both went through ALL the available records on my dining table, this was observed by an 'independant' witness and you could point to nothing... NOT ONE THING... that in any way countered my proposition so do tell us...
" ...Why how now Gentlemen,
what see you in those papers that you lose such complexion?
Look you my nobles, how they change.
Their cheeks are paper.—Why, what read you there
That hath so cowarded and chased your blood
Out of appearance??
(Henry V Act II scene II)
What indeed? I tell you what I see, I see a higher brief being imposed from above.
His 'investigation' of the PALS Complaints Manager, my catastrophically pointless meeting with her and her subsequent scurrilous little 'Secret Squirrel' with the assigned Child Services social w**ker was again excused as merely procedural and "quite within her remit."
Really? and when exactly did the state assume full parental rights, displace me and appoint this simple minded patronising PC'd cow as their surrogate mother and moral guardian? Bollocks then matey, If that's how you're intending to play it then you're getting the recording of that meeting as is the Care Quality Commission whose most recent report labelled you "inadequate". And so too is the Ombudsman, (yet again; Jesus they're building up quite a backlog) Let's watch them pick the bones out of it (and her) and now he's added his name to the pile. From here on it's just a question of how two-faced and ridiculous he wants to appear by continuing to parrot this nonsense.
The social w**ker was unavailable to the investigator and has remained quarantined off and completely unavailable to put his side of the story onto the table. Further investigation revealed that he was indeed as I suspected an agency wallah who it seems quickly succumbed to the pressure of actually doing a job properly. Now trying to track down which agency. His employing office predictably refused to ring the agency to pursue the matter further. Slack bastards! God spare me any further talk of their alleged and much touted "professionalism".
As for this pivotal issue of the Trust/s hiding behind the Patient Confidentiality provisions; readers will recall that I specifically demanded (not just 'requested') that he provide the definitive legal justification for the 'Trusts' point blank refusal to investigate these issues concerning me by arbitrarily and automatically linking them to my Wife's right to patient confidentiality regardless of the fact that they have nothing whatsoever to do with her and incidentally despite her lacking the capacity to make any kind of informed decision on such matters due to her ongoing delusional state.
A state that her medical team religiously insist has been completely resolved despite my offering categorical proof that she's still completely under the direction of her illness as we speak. Well needless to say after around 20 unequivocal requests for that legal justification the bell end STILL failed to supply a single paragraph or link t legislation. It's all just *ing bluff. Oh boy have they got a nasty surprise on the way that's gonna ruin at least one ****'s Christmas at least. But all will be revealed shortly.
And thus we turn the guns on the staggeringly inept offices of Child Services but the hour is late.
to be continued...
Ciao
Welcome to the DAD.info forum.
We don’t like to set ‘rules’, but to make sure that you and the other dads are kept safe, we have some requests. When engaging with the forum, please be aware of the following:
- The forum is not moderated 24 hours per day.
- Many of the moderators do so on a voluntary basis. Whilst they may be able to provide some guidance, advice or support, they may not be able to deal with specifics.
- We are not an emergency crisis service so if you or someone else is in immediate danger, please call emergency services.
- If you are concerned about the safety of a child, please click here to find the support you can get for them (link to new page)
- If you are in crisis, please call Samaritans on 116 123. They are open 24 hours a day, 7 days per week.
We hope you find this forum a supportive environment and thank you for joining us.