Author Archives: Rainbowgirl1980

‘The gift that keeps on giving’ is something I have heard those from our community say a lot, myself included.

It’s almost 3 years now since ‘the knock’ Yet this shitty gift..keeps on giving!

We have 2 sons. One has been right through one high school and left. The other is due to start this September.

Tonight we were supposed to go to an open evening to find out more.

I finished work early then met both boys in a cafe to go.

As soon as we walked in my youngest got tearful.

He told me he did not want to go. He got very tearful and apologetic. I know when he uses the words… ‘Sorry. I just can’t’ that his anxiety is through the roof. Which it clearly was.

He told me that he cannot think about going to high school. He does not want to leave primary.

It’s around 5 months until he will start. He will have summer holidays prior to this. So we don’t have to mentally prepare him just yet.

I decided I would not drag him there. That was not the answer. I will rearrange for nearer the time.

I now sit here feeling upset but also angry.

My beautiful, funny, empathic and sweet natured little man is still so very broken.

The trauma of his Dad being in prison for 16 months, not living with us for almost 3 years, is still very raw.

Whilst his dad was away, he had 50 lates within the school year. Morning spent me trying to coax him out of bed and to eat breakfast, get ready. Him crying at the school gates telling me he misses me when he’s not with me. Already missing his dad every second of every day complied with not being with me, was sometimes too much to bare. I tried to balance pushing him with listening to him. There were days I could manage to get him in and days I just couldn’t.

Since his Dad’s release in December 2022, he has settled more and more over time.

Today was a stark reminder of that underlying anxiety that is still bubbling under the surface of my beautiful boy.

Our children suffer irreparable trauma when their Dad is sent to prison. Then the ongoing impact of Dad not being able to return home.

These agencies such as social care and Probation do all they can to protect them from ‘assumed risk of abuse from their Dads’ yet the very real psychological trauma of having their Dad removed from their life is not considered.

When will the emotional impact upon our children be recognised by these agencies who make ill informed blanket decisions on our children’s behalf without considering what they actually want?!

Our children are so broken. They deserve the relationship they want with their Dads 💔😭

I haven’t wrote a blog for a while as life has just been plodding on I guess. That used to scare me, the thought of plodding through life. Now I crave simplicity.

I’m off work today. We both are for a change. My husband has gone to see Probation. The anticipation of what he will come back with makes me feel anxious.

He is seeing him every 2/3 weeks now. The meetings seem like ground hog day….my husband updating on family life, work, settling back in the community. All positive steps of moving forward. Probation will tell him precisely nothing new. No date for the course. No update as to when he can come home to us properly.

Last year we had been 20 years. We could spend the day together as he was in prison 😭. So this year we want to go stay in a hotel together, which we have provisionally booked but not paid for. We have not officially slept in the same bed together for almost 3 years now.

My husband had to email details to probation. Today he will discuss with him whether it has been approved. I know my husband will challenge if it hasn’t.

I told him that if he says no, tell him you are going to end up divorced. How will that reduce your risk of re-offending?

We won’t end up divorced. We’ve come too far. However, it feels very much like they are doing their upmost to force us apart.

I understand risk has to be managed. I understand licence conditions are all part of the sentence / the punishment. However, right now there feels as if there is no end in sight. We have no certainty around anything.

They presume as my husband committed an online offence against children, he is a risk of contact offending towards his own.

Research shows just 2% of online offenders’ go on to contact offend over the first 2 years I think it is. It’s almost 3 now, nobody has assessed him psychologically. Nobody wants to understand his remorse, his guilt and shame and his commitment to rehabilitate.

So in the meantime, our life, our family and our relationship is on hold.

I am exhausted with it all to be honest. I have forsaken so much for my marriage, for my little family. I can’t describe how Horrendous it feels to have to seek permission to sleep in the same bed as my own husband. I feel like I am on that register too.

In my line of work I am meeting more and more people with conditions such as Fibromyalgia. Chronic pain and anxiety due to previous Trauma. I worry so much for my own mental health and the long term effect of this on my body.

I am only in my 40s and I am already exhausted. I have spent these 3 years in almost a constant state of hyper arrousal and high emotion, in fight mode. I feel tired and achy today. I feel tired and achy a lot of days.

For anyone reading this who thinks that standing by your partner after ‘the knock’ is the easy option, let me assure you that it’s anything but!!

As Non Offending Partners we are NOT recognised as victims of crime. Yet evidently we are victims of the fallout of crime.

When my husband was arrested, I could not work. Partly as I was a complete and utter mess on an emotional level and partly because on a practical level I was unable to work shifts anymore.

No longer could he do school pick ups, drop offs or even be alone with them. Thirteen years of 50/50 parenting, over.

Even during pre school days my husband had condensed his hours to have a day a week at home.

Whatever my long term decision on my relationship was to be, I was suddenly 100% responsible for my children.

I remember that being one of the most overwhelming shocks of it all. I knew he had never harmed our children, however, due to the nature of his crime, he was stripped of his parenting duties and the burden was placed solely upon me. The non offending partner.

This is how it’s been for almost 3 years.

I suppose in hindsight I was fortunate in some ways that I was partially paid whilst I took 5 months off sick.

My employer , although understanding, could not accommodate my part time hours and need for flexible school friendly hours.

I applied for many jobs and eventually settled on an 18 hour role working from home. This enabled me at the time, due to lockdown, to homeschool my children. Then eventually to get my youngest to school and pick him up. My elderly in-laws helped a little with pick ups but not drop offs.

I managed this job for over 2 years, until suddenly I wanted more..I needed more. It’s difficult to progress your career when working just 18 hours per week. Also working from home was starting to negatively impact my mental health.

So today I started a new job. Back in the community. This won’t be easy either. My husband, now released from prison, is still unable to be with our youngest on his own. Not until he’s done his course they we don’t even know if he’s on the waiting list for yet. In the meantime, our life is on hold. I am forced to juggle my working hours and days to ensure my son can get to school and juggle my inlaws and eldest to pick him up.

I suppose I am more fortunate than some as I have managed to work, in some capacity.

I have seen many fellow Non Offending Partners, lose their academic careers, businesses, reputational damage, all due to a crime they did not commit. Forced into poverty by a system that doesn’t recognise offenders families as victims.

Standing by your partner after the knock is no easy task. My 70+ previous blogs talk of the pain and destruction and the sacrifices I’ve made. The people I’ve walked away from to remain in my marriage, to keep my family together.

He has been out for 11 weeks now, not far off 3 months.

Prior to his release, social care assessed me as a protective parent and agreed that I can make decisions around contact….ONCE he has done the I Horizon course that probation insists he does. Until then he is unable to stay overnight with us.

Self funded rehabilitation work prior to Sentencing has been completely dismissed.

He was told that his OaSys risk assessment had to be updated to enable them to determine hus place on the course waiting list.

According to their policy, this should have been done and dusted within 2 weeks. However, due to the Probation Officers manager being on special leave, this has been delayed over 2 months. Apparently it’s now signed off but we still don’t know if or where he is on the waiting list.

In May it will be 3 years since the knock that turned our world upside down. 3 years since we have lived together as a family.

I continue to be responsible for our 11 year old son 24/7.

I’ve just been accepted for a new job which I start on 20th March, 4 days a week. No longer home working as I am now. As excited as I am about a new challenge, I have undue anxiety of how I will juggle childcare.

My husband is working again now and working shifts. He will be off at times I am in but at the moment he cannot be with our son on his own.

I’m not minimising his offending, but he’s assessed as a low risk of contact offending because he is not a contact offender. The leap from online to contact offending is huge and should not be assumed by any agency.

Yesterday we argued over something petty. The underlying cause being the resentment bubbling under the surface for me. The anger and frustration that our life is still dominated so heavily by the burden of his offending.

If our little family has a hope in hell of moving forward and living a healthy life again, then we need to be able to have some sort of normality.

I have done a lot of work to understand his Offending and understand risk. I can do no more. Neither can he.

We are backed into a corner and at the mercy of these agencies making detrimental decisions about our family.

I am currently looking into us self funding an independent forensic risk assessment. However, we have no idea if this will be accepted by Probation and Social care.

Sex offenders are by far the most discriminated group in our society. Their offending yes I agree does deserve judgement and punishment but also, they need to be rehabilitated and integrated back into society..this is the only way to reduce risk.

Wives like me, who stand beside them through everything, our children and I deserve our family back together. Section 8 of the Human Rights act talks of our ‘Right to family life.’ So we should not be at the mercy of these agencies and their unachievable conditions. It’s unfair and inhumane.

I am married to a Sex Offender. He will be on a lifetime registration due to his online offending. Labelled a Sex Offender for the duration of his life, unless he can challenge in the future.

The abandonment from my family and friends has been equally as devastating as the offending and custodial itself.

I am and always will be shocked and appalled by what my husband did, but I also know it’s not who he is.

I feel that others expect me to feel guilt and shame for his behaviour. Guilt and shame for standing by him. For a while I think I did.

Through therapy I have accepted my love and commitment to my husband. The man I know is a good man who has done a bad thing. A bad thing he has paid for, he is still paying for.

He was released from prison 8 weeks yesterday. Since then he has achieved so much.

Release on top of Christmas meant as well as adjusting back into the community and dealing with the practical transition, he was also shopping and preparing for Christmas with me.

He has done lots of DIY jobs that needed doing around the house, fixing things and bits of painting etc. He has taken equal rolls and responsibilities of cooking, cleaning and washing. He has spent quality time with me and the boys, re-establishing that bond.

He has applied for many jobs. As a civil servant of 20 years, losing his job through his offending was another huge blow for him. However I know he now sees that the pressure of his job was a contributory factor in his offending.

Prison has given him perspective. There’s nothing like being stripped bare of everything to help you to evaluate your life.

His long term plan is to set up his own business, related to his previous career.

However, for now, he has applied for practical jobs, where he can go in, do his shift and then switch off. We talked a lot about this and he told me how much less pressure that feels than working on long term projects and feeling like a hamster on a wheel.

So he’s now working 2 different jobs, juggling shifts. He seems motivated, happy, fulfilled. Work is such an important part of our life. It gives us our sense of self worth and purpose. I can see such a positive difference in him after just a couple of weeks.

So for those who think or expect women like me to walk away from a good man, because he has done a bad thing, then I no longer care what they think.

I met a good man, I married a good man. He told me for those 16 agonising months, he was in prison, he would do everything he can to make it up to me and the boys and he is.

I am so glad to have him back by my side.

I am proud to be his wife.

It’s the lull between Christmas and New year. A time to reflect?!

This Christmas has been a world apart from the last one.

Last year it was just me and the boys, with a visit from the in-laws.

This year, we have my Husband/ their Dad back. His release on 9th December, felt like a Christmas miracle.

I cannot describe the contrast between him not being here and him being here from last Christmas to this.

A family tradition of cooking the turkey and chicken (I don’t like turkey) on Christmas Eve and having a turkey or chicken barm before bed, he was here for this year. Then putting out the presents off Santa along with eating the mince pie and drinking the milk left out for Santa by our Son. Then in the morning, creeping into the living room saying ‘has he been?!’ as my Dad used to.

The holiday has consisted of; nice food, presents, watching lots of Christmas TV and playing games and quizzes together. It was priceless.

However, the last 3 nights I have dreamt about my family. I have now, completely lost contact with all of them. They cannot accept or understand my reasons for staying with my husband. I cannot accept or understand their reasons for acting like he’s dead.

He has served his time. 16 months behind bars for online offences.

He is allowed to change. He is allowed to rehabilitate.

Many women I know live a double life. They see friends and family and don’t mention their husband. We shouldn’t have to live like that. I couldn’t live like that. Neither should my boys be forced to. My husband has made a mistake but he has paid the ultimate price.

He is the best version of himself now that I have known in over 23 years since we met. He deserves a second chance at life, at family.

Today I am going to visit my parents grave. I will put flowers on. I’ve not been able to face it until now.

The rest of my family though, my siblings and my nieces, nephews etc, they may as well be dead too. Although I don’t get to grieve their loss. I don’t get sympathy or empathy.

This is the price I have paid for standing by my Husband.

They have let me down too. They have not been there for me and the boys during the biggest trauma of our lives.

I have the most gratitude at having my husband here. My heart breaks for my beautiful Friends who are still going through Imprisonment. Yet there’s a great sadness lurking at the many losses I have had too. I hate that my family are creeping into my head. I’ve dreamt about them the last 3 nights too. I wonder if they think about me and the boys too?!

I wonder if they are having the usual parties I used to mostly organise, without us, fooling themselves into thinking we don’t exist?!

I wouldn’t swap my husband and our little family of 4 / sometimes 6 with the in-laws too, for the world, yet there’s still so much sadness at what’s happened. It feels incredibly unfair.

I hope one day that society accepts that most sex offenders CAN be rehabilitated?! Then maybe the bomb that’s dropped on our lives will cause a little less pain and destruction.

He’s out!!! He’s finally out!!!

It’s been 4 days since my husband was released from prison. After 16 months apart, it’s been a whirlwind for us all.

Friday was beyond emotional. My youngest (11 year old) and I, stayed overnight 2.4 miles down the road from him. We didn’t sleep much, either of us, we were too excited.

The next day, we were having our breakfast in the hotel, just after 8am, when he called and told us he was ‘ready to go.’

Driving to that prison for the last time, knowing he was leaving with us, felt amazing. Surreal.

I gave his name in at the reception gate and they called him down from reception. As soon as my little man and I saw him walking down, we burst into tears. The 3 of us hugged tight and we cried together.

Driving away for the last time, with my husband sitting beside me, felt absolutely amazing.

Coming back to the house was overwhelming for us all. The first time he has set foot in our house in over 16 months.

He hadn’t saw our eldest for a couple of months due to him not always wanting to spend a whole day traveling a 5 hour round trip and sitting in the visitors all day.

He also hadn’t met our puppy dog. We got her 7 months ago when we were struggling missing him and she has brightened our lives. It felt strange she was such a big part of our lives and yet they had never met. She took to him instantly.

As much as I’ve wrote these blogs to help me to process the trauma, the grief of your husband being in prison, there’s an element of you that is not quite able to process it. Self preservation I guess.

These first few days have been a whirlwind. Everything has overwhelmed me.

The knock is the atomic bomb that’s dropped on our lives when our husbands are arrested. There are many smaller ones along the way. Prison is another atomic bomb.

It’s unbelievable how much your life can change in the blink of an eye.

Release from prison was the opposite of a bomb. I am struggling to find a word to describe. I guess it felt like the biggest hug I could possibly imagine. A hug that engulfed me, soothed me, allowed me to start to fully heal.

Your husband going to prison means that you miss out on so many things; date nights, holidays, family days out. Yet it’s the simplest things I’ve missed the most; sitting next to me on the couch, seeing him watching the match with our eldest son, playing a game with our youngest, making me a coffee.

We have survived whilst he’s been away. As my counsellor tells me, I know I can do this alone. Yet that is not what I want. I told my therapist this morning that it may sound dramatic but it feels like he is ‘back from the dead’. As much as we have maintained regular contact throughout his sentence via letters, phone calls and visits, he hasn’t been here. He hasn’t been a part of our day to day life for such a long time.

Those first couple of days, I cried so much, at the firsts we experienced together as a couple or as a family. The pain of the last 16 months spilling out and healing.

The boys. What can I say aside from they are happy. They are our amazing boys again. They were not them without their amazing Dad, just as I was not me without my amazing Husband.

Things aren’t perfect. He cannot stay overnight with us until he has done his I Horizon course. Yet we can be together during the day, until bed time. He can be here first thing when we wake up.

As much as I have anxiety at what the future may hold, right now I am so happy and grateful that prison is behind us. I am counting my blessings and appreciating every moment of us being together as a family, as a couple. I am hopeful that we can move forward and start to heal from the trauma of prison.

When my husband received a 16 month custodial sentence on 10th August 2021, it felt like such a long road ahead.

“This too shall pass” is what kind people told me. It didn’t feel like it.

The aftermath of the knock has been the most traumatic of experiences. Prison adding another level of trauma. My husband and the children’s Dad being removed from our lives. It’s been an equal punishment for us as it’s been for him.

My blogging has helped me to process the highs and the lows of the last 16 months. Additional to hours upon hours of counselling and chatting to my fellow prisoners wives.

On Tuesday, I had a reflective counselling sessions with my therapist. I’ve saw her almost every week for the past 6 months so she knows me well. I’m not exactly a closed book. I do half of their job for them by being so open. As a support worker I always tell clients how much easier it makes my job by them being so open.

Having traits of ADHD (self diagnosed), I feel things very deeply. I am also an empath which means I not only feel my own emotions, but those of the closest to me. My youngest son has almost an identical personality type to me. I tell him that we have huge hearts but huge hearts can be hurt easily so we have to look after ourselves.

The marked change in me from my therapists observation, is that I have learnt that I can do this alone. I have learnt how to be a single parent, looking after the kids, the pets, the house, whilst working etc. Yet I don’t want to be. This isn’t my life. This isn’t the life I want or the life I signed up for. Yet I am incredibly proud of myself. Always feeling such an underdog in my life, I have finally realised that I’m pretty awesome actually.

That long road ahead is now almost behind us. With my Husbands release less than 24 hours away, I am starting to feel a weight lifting off my shoulders. I have bared the weight of his sentence too. Now it’s finally coming to an end. Whilst there is still anxiety at what lies ahead, I know that I will no longer be sailing this ship alone.

The wise ones were right, no matter how difficult life gets, it passes. Time moves on. Then we can look behind us and be proud of the road we have travelled.

My Son is 11, possibly has a mild form of ADHD, as do I. Although neither is diagnosed.

He is kind, empathic and very loving. I tell him that he has a BIG heart like me. Big hearts are easily hurt.

I do all I can to maintain ties with his Dad / my husband whilst he’s in prison. We visit regularly, we speak at least once a day on the telephone and we visit every 2/3 weeks. This is best we can manage since he moved over 110 miles away from us, to an open prison. He moved to get temporary licence and spend more time with us. What a joke that’s been. I have wrote previous blogs about this so I won’t go on.

We have survived over 15 months of his sentence. However, since my Husbands release in December has been imminent, my son appears to be struggling more.

It’s hard to understand why. My guess is that he’s ‘had to’ cope, he’s had to go on..now we are on a countdown, he is feeling overwhelmed of the change that’s coming and it’s making him focus on missing his Dad more.

Right now he is struggling to regulate his own emotions. As I’ve said, he feels deeply like me. This morning his game logged him out and he has a complete meltdown. He told me he was going to ‘kill himself.’ I knew it wasn’t really about the game. We talked this through. He has no plans to harm himself, he is simply trying to convey the overwhelming emotions he is much too young to understand and control. it’s hard enough for me and I’m almost four times his age.

My children were born into a very loving and stable family. Up until their Dad was arrested in May 2020, they were happy and healthy boys.

My husband called, I cried, he cried. He feels beyond guilty at what he’s putting us all through. He is serving his time for his crime. He can do no more.

Who does prison punish?! Not only the person who has committed the crime but those who love them too.

Part way through writing this blog, the post arrived, I went out and went through the pile. One for parents of my son. I opened. It’s from the school. It’s telling me that they are concerned around my son’s attendance which has now fell below 90%, only just. My son is going through an Adverse Childhood Experience of the Imprisonment of his Dad. There are days he feels sick with anxiety and is highly emotional. Is he recognised as vulnerable right now?! No, he’s just another child on a report.

The children of prisoners are forgotten victims. Collateral damage.

2.5 years into this journey since my husband was arrested, last week I heard the best analogy about Social Workers, I’ve ever heard.

A Professional who has a vast amount of experience of working with online offenders, talked of the lack of training and experience Social Workers have when it comes to online sexual offending.

One of my friends recently has had a Social Worker who has admitted she has no training or experience of dealing with cases whereby a Parent has committed an online sexual offence, unrelated to their own child. Yet she states she has capacity to assess risk and safeguard.

This Professional described it as someone coming out to fix your boiler. “Well I’ve never seen one like this before” they admit, but “I’ll give it a go!”

What’s the worst that can happen? They blow up our house?

What’s the worst that can happen if an inexperienced social worker is making detrimental life changing decisions in a child’s life?

They blow up the family?!

Probation and Police have no concerns of my friends husband returning home. Seeing the rehabilitation work he has partaken in since his arrest and sentencing, they do not assess him as being a risk to his child. They have no concerns.

He has recently completed the Horizon course inside prison prior to release, he has identified the reasons why and how he offended, he is committed to his rehabilitation, for an offence that was now, many years ago.

My friend suggested that an independent risk assessment is carried out by a trained Forensic Psychologist who specialises in robust risk assessments.

The social workers response?! She is ‘just as qualified’ to carry out this assessment as he is.

She had continued to do so. She has came in and worked with my friends husband, interrogating him about the offence and what he was thinking at that time.

This is not only offensive but it’s actually dangerous. She is messing with something she has no idea about. She is poking about that boiler she is not qualified to deal with. Mob handedly bashing with her big hammer.

This is just one example of a recent story. I can assure you that there are many more social workers up and down the country who feel that they are in the best position to assess risk.

If you’re a social worker and you’re reading this, please, be led by the professionals, police and probation. They are the experts in assessing risk when it comes to re-offending. Or better still, allow a professional Forensic Psychologist to assess properly.

Also, think about the child, you are supposed to be there to protect. You are creating further trauma and Adverse Childhood Experiences in removing their father from their life.

Social care love to tell Non offending partners that they ‘minimise risk.’ well in contrast, they ‘Maximise risk’. Let’s allow the professionals to make these decisions.