PLEASE, PLEASE, WALK WITH ME IN THIS BATTLE, last of 15 posts in series

THE STORY OF AYN VAN DYK

As told by her father Derek Hoare

Part Fifteen of Fifteen

PLEASE, PLEASE, WALK WITH ME IN THIS BATTLE

January 23, 2012

In this entry, Derek expressed his emotion as vulnerably as any father can and readers cannot help but to be moved by his request for moral support reflected in the title which I gave to this piece because they are words he himself writes near the end of today's journal entry. This is entirely Derek's writing. It concludes fifteen days of entries from several months ago. Time has passed since then and still Ayn is not at home. It appears likely that the court case will not be heard until December 2012.

Jan 23, 2012

"We arrived early for the case conference which was set to begin at 10:45. It started a bit late, likely closer to 11. The meeting is in an informal setting at a round table where all parties are to discuss the situation as it stands; what the hang ups are and how we can move forward from here. Time is very short so all points are made in extreme brevity, I tried my best to outline some of my frustrations and concerns. 


I did not walk away with any greater understanding of MCFD's position, though they were questioned about it many times. My understanding of the "conference" before entering was that it was my chance to finally get the judicial process to the point where I can argue my position before an unbiased judge. In that it was successful, there was alot of pressure to put off the trial and wait until after mediation. However, I was adamant that I wanted that opportunity. 

It was very emotional for me, I cried several times, and tried to get them to see the harm they were doing to a beautiful girl and her loving family. My lawyer requested a brief recess towards the end to try to reduce my emotions, upon my return I did get them to agree to a trial. With that we set off to the court clerk to find some available dates.... well my lawyer did, I went outside where my emotions again poured out rather embarrassingly. A group member did happen to pop in and was right there to let me cry on their shoulder.
I then went in to sign off that I had received my dates (yet another pink slip); but this one was different it was the finish line, win or lose it will be the end. So here they are: Oct 23rd- pre-trial, Dec 7th- Trial begins, Jan 30th 2013 second trial date, Jan 31st third, Feb 1st fourth, Feb 14th fifth, and finally Feb 15th completion (this could elongate mind you). So now finally we can see the end of the judicial process, a year away but we can see it. This does not mean that the ministerial process is over but that the oversight of the courts has reached its point where a trial is set to determine the justifiability of this. 

I am meeting with the new SW on Wed, where I do hope to discern where this process is headed from here in terms of the ministry, I hope to continue where it had left off but as of yet I am still in limbo.

I do know that are going to begin drafting a counter proposal to offer me, but I have to wait weeks longer for that to complete, it is "hoped" that it could be done by Feb 24th, a week prior to my Formal mediation which is scheduled for March 2, I believe. 

So tonight I ponder what to do and where to go from here, lots of possibilities lie before me and I am sorting through it all. Will be posting more and am hopeful that I'll get lots of input and advice from everyone.
So where to even begin.... as I am sure most would understand the last 8 ½ months have been beyond nightmarish. Tortuous does not begin to describe this either, the reality is that I have dedicated my life to my kids. I have dropped everything to ensure their happiness and development and to have this culminate in an attack by my own government, who has taken no time to understand my children or my family yet claim some authoritarian power over it is monstrous. To make matters worse this is being done under the guise of “help”. They throw around phrases like “child’s best interest” as if they empower them with some dictatorial aura, yet have no idea what those words even mean. 

We are now 8 ½ months in..... 263 days..... and my daughter has yet to see an autism expert. The closest she came was a tertiary glance by their resident expert on day 45, who told them to not treat my child as a psych patient. I have requested the assessment, input and opinion of an autism expert since the very beginning, yet we continue to wait. How quickly they rushed to have her drugged and put into a psych ward, yet still have yet to enlist the expertise of an expert in her known, diagnosed condition... autism. I have spent dozens and dozens of hours trying to explain the situation to them, trying to explain how to appropriately treat a child with autism, to try to get them to understand the concerning behaviours of autism and how it was this terrible mistake was made. 

Within the first six months Ayn had already had 4 different social workers, this fact has been used as a consistent excuse by MCFD who justifies their inaction and ignorance with a claim of “staffing issues”. And while I try to be empathetic to the daunting task faced by each new worker to get caught up to speed, the reality is that my child and family continues to languish whilst this persists. And rather than pick up where we left off with the previous social worker they simply want to begin anew, of course each time however we are further along in the unabating process. 

MCFD continues to arrive to the variety of meetings uninformed, operating under a blanket liability protection which does not hold them to any standard of quality. 

What I am about to type will require qualification and I will be drawing up an elaborate timeline of this whole ordeal to do so; however the reality is that MCFD has not done anything in terms of an investigation or a plan of care since Sept 20th, nothing. On Sept 26th they were granted a 22 day interim order to give them time to complete an investigation (which never happened), we are still operating under that interim order to this day... that is 159 days.... on a 22 day order. Now is the painfully slow judicial process to blame? No not really, it would be nice if the wait times were not as long as they are, but that is no excuse for MCFD to literally have done nothing in terms of my daughters care or keeping me informed of her well being. I have faced: broken promises, lies, threats, stonewalling, wilful ignorance, and silence... ohhh the silence. 

Now as per the restrictions on my speech in regards to the Mar 2nd Mediation, I will try to elaborate on my understanding therein. Sect 24 of the CFCSA is quite clear that anything “obtained” in mediation must not be disclosed, so in essence anything NEW which was disclosed at mediation cannot be disclosed, except under a few circumstances which I likely do not meet, except arguably “d) if the disclosure is necessary for a child’s safety”. However until I get some further clarification on that point I will refrain from such disclosure. Now that does not mean I have to shut up or that anyone else does either, as a matter of fact screaming from the rooftops is one of the few recourses left available to us and I intend to use it. 

With that said I am facing an escalating battle not an improving one, one which is taking place on many different fronts; my time on FB will be limited, my time in front of cameras or in print will be on the rise, and the time I need to spend studying will also continue to be pressed only to the limits of my fatigue. I ask for everyone’s help spreading the word about this and keeping up a dialog on how it is we got to this point and what we can do to inform others of what is happening, not simply in regards to Ayn, but to the “child protection system” which has strayed so far from its goal to now become an imposing threat to the safety of children and not the heroic saviour they would like to cast themselves to be. If the populace knew how this worked it would not be tolerated, and in fact will serve as a clear exemplification of why the granting of such powers under blanket liability protections is a terrible and dangerous thing. 

So please, please, please walk with me in this battle, in whatever capacity your individual talents endow. We have been setting up groups to facilitate this movement, and will need all the help we can get; what it will take is simply communication and coordination between everyone. 

We love our kids, and we as their parents need to advocate for them.... to treat an issue as serious as the removal of a child(ren) with such casual disregard is not tolerable, my child is not a number....

Her name is Ayn... she has hopes, dreams, fears and loves.... I am one of them and I will not let her down."

Many thanks to Jean Nicol for this Collection of Derek's entries from Ayn's Facebook page 

Also downloadable in its entirety at this SendSpace site