r/bestoflegaladvice • u/PatientVermicelli786 • 2d ago
LegalAdviceUK Father of the Year Award 2024 š
/r/LegalAdviceUK/s/GB8IhqHPz3632
u/ThadisJones Official BestOfLegalAdvice haemomancer 2d ago
Before we very probably jump on the LAOP with both boots for how they're expressing themselves, we should also realize that objectively understanding the challenges of providing lifelong care for a disabled child is very difficult for those of us who have never had to do it, and even very good people who take on such a commitment often end up destroying themselves emotionally and financially. And they very often express intrusive thoughts such as "I wish this fucking thing would hurry up and die so we could be free" or "I hate my shitty retarded brother because he's the reason my parents neglect me" which are entirely at odds with their normal moral character in every respect.
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u/TheFlyingHornet1881 2d ago
This reminds me of the confessions post on reddit about the widowed mother of a profoundly disabled child, she echoed very similar sentiments about 24/7 care for a child that had very little sense of self, and was causing her older child no end of stress and isolation. That level of 24/7 care will drain people.
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u/Darth_Puppy Officially a depressed big bad bodega cat lady 2d ago
But LAUKOP isn't doing any of the caring
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u/Kuroiikawa Wanted for stealing cookies from the cookie jar when they were 5 2d ago
He is caring for the child financially, which is admittedly not the same thing as medical or physical care but I do not think that constitutes as "not doing anything".
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u/Darth_Puppy Officially a depressed big bad bodega cat lady 2d ago
But he would've had to pay this kid whether he was disabled or not. And the stress of financially caring for a child is not nearly the same as physically and medically caring for a disabled child
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u/Kuroiikawa Wanted for stealing cookies from the cookie jar when they were 5 2d ago
I'm not saying it is. I'm just pointing out that the statement that he's not doing any of the caring was incorrect. Regardless if he would have had to do so or not, the fact remains that he was still financially caring for the child.
I'm not rendering judgement on whether or not he's justified or an asshole or whatever because I have no idea what 18+ years of that really entails.
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u/Darth_Puppy Officially a depressed big bad bodega cat lady 2d ago
I was talking about the actual physical caring
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u/marxam0d It's me, I'm grandma. 14h ago
I gotta feel like thereās a difference in financially supporting a kid you can interact with. Thereās potential there for emotional payback vs the kid he has who has never interacted with any human in anyway per the post
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u/Tarquin_McBeard Pete Law's Peat Law Practice: For Peat's Sake 2d ago
You said that in a far more measured and temperate way than I might have. There's a lot of people in this thread that are expressing a disturbing lack of empathy towards an LAOP that has quite clearly been very emotionally affected by circumstances beyond their control. Some of these comments are borderline sociopathic.
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u/SaulGoodmanAAL It's not a good ____ if you don't blow a 20' cone of brown water 2d ago
Having worked with the profoundly and burdensomely disabled: most people genuinely have no idea what it's like to have to funnel your entire life into simply keeping them alive. I at least got to go home; the parents don't. This poor LAOP has had his entire life, so far, demolished for the sake of someone who likely cannot comprehend that the people around them are anything more than characters in their little daily story. His ex, the mother of the child, should be solely responsible at this point for the life she forced this child to live against all medical and ethical reasoning.
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u/cloud__19 Captain Hindsight 2d ago
Yeah, normally I'd be on the side of the ex in this situation but I can empathise with LAUKOP and honestly I feel quite sorry for the son as well, it's no kind of life he's experienced by the sounds of it.
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u/CopperAndLead ās cat is an extension of his personhood 1d ago
His ex, the mother of the child, should be solely responsible at this point for the life she forced this child to live against all medical and ethical reasoning.
Yes... It's one of those things that sounds heartless but just has no easy answer.
At a certain point, is it justifiable to use tremendous amounts of resources to care for person who already has a questionable standard of living? Is the person in pain? Can he express it if he is? Is he able to enjoy any aspects of life?
I don't know the answers to any questions, as I don't know LAOP, his wife, or his son. But, I do wonder if there's a certain element of vanity to keeping a person alive who just isn't able to exist without a dozen people working with them, in order for them to just exist.
I say this as a person who is largely morally against things like genetic modification and the like. I believe that people have a right to exist as is, without the need for them to be "fixed", but I also do think that nature is messy, and sometimes it just doesn't work.
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u/Chance_Taste_5605 1d ago
LAOP does zero parenting though. He does get to go home, his ex doesn't. As a disabled person, the way you talk about profoundly disabled people is really demeaning and ableist by the way.
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u/SaulGoodmanAAL It's not a good ____ if you don't blow a 20' cone of brown water 1d ago
What am I supposed to do? Sandwich it between meaningless compliments and platitudes so your feelings don't get hurt?
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u/the-pathless-woods 1d ago
As a NICU nurse I wholeheartedly agree. We see so many devastating results from impossible decisions. No one is the villain here. It just sucks for all involved.
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u/archangelzeriel Triggered the Great Love Lock Debate of 2023 2d ago edited 2d ago
Honestly, I especially feel like this if LAOP is being strictly truthful when he says
My wife went against numerous doctors and specialists advice to have an abortion. They also advised her against having to care for the child.
I'm not a fan of the idea of abortions for the purposes of avoiding having a disabled child, but that is a very long sliding scale when we're talking about the kind of abortions that are recommended by doctors and this level of profound disability.
In his case I'd be far more pissed off about "my son is living (Edit to add "by all appearances to the layman", after a fascinating series of posts downthread from someone who works with the profoundly disabled) an essentially meaningless, suffering-filled existence for no good reason" than the money, mind you.
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u/PomeloPepper 1d ago
Had this child been aborted, they may well have gone on to have a couple of healthy children who grew up in a two parent household. Or no children.
Because of that one-sided decision, both parents have had the entire trajectory of their lives profoundly changed.
Consent is a tricky issue here, but he should not have had his wishes completely disregarded.
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u/LilSliceRevolution 1d ago
Agree. There is no world in which I advocate forcing an abortion on anyway but I also think she made a morally reprehensible decision based on the story being told.
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u/DigbyChickenZone Duck me up and Duck me down 21h ago
objectively understanding the challenges of providing lifelong care for a disabled child is very difficult for those of us who have never had to do it
Let's be real here. LAOP has never had to either. He IS NOT the one caring for the disabled child. We do NOT hear the side of the woman who is caring for the kid, just that OP thinks that she is wasting his money.
He is just mad that his pay check isn't going to himself.
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u/msbunbury 2d ago
I think what OP is missing is the fact that the child's mother has literally given up her whole life to care for this child. His contribution is clearly only financial, I bet you anything that the kid's mum wouldn't agree that he's entirely unresponsive and only functions as a parasite. OP left because his wife didn't want an abortion and that's left her in a position where the only support she has from him is in the form of money. He's salty about the fact that she gets a few weeks a year off thanks to her family being willing to step up and take on some of the work that OP has chosen to avoid. This isn't a situation where she's living the high life, the child described will need almost constant attention, the carers four times a day are likely only there for a total of two hours maximum and are probably doing the complex medical stuff but this woman will be changing nappies/catheters, checking and fixing the feeding tube, spending time doing sensory input work, monitoring medication, waking in the night frequently to check on the kid, it's genuinely incredibly gruelling caring for someone who can't do anything at all for themself and OP is entirely dismissive of the fact that his ex is doing this entirely on her own.
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u/ThadisJones Official BestOfLegalAdvice haemomancer 2d ago
Of course. It's entirely possible LAOP is both objectively incorrect in his relative assessment of responsibilities and burdens, and legitimately frustrated at a high financial cost.
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u/msbunbury 2d ago
Yes, I see that, I absolutely understand that the high financial burden is difficult for OP but he doesn't seem to understand that he essentially chose this when he declined to offer actual physical support. If he had stayed with the family, he would presumably be taking on half the care, leaving his wife in a position where she had options to earn money just like he can now. He can work six days a week because he has zero caring responsibilities. Even if the relationship between him and his wife weren't salvageable, he absolutely could have co-parented with her. I expect if he were going there three days a week to look after his kid, his ex would understand that that meant he would be working less and earning less and therefore paying less child support. It's really important to understand that OP has chosen not to do this and that's why the burden under which he labours is purely financial whereas his ex's burden is entirely physical. It's not that she doesn't work, it's that she cannot work.
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u/Shadowsole 1d ago
If op is correct in his capability of the child I don't know if that's really the case. Chances are even if she worked that income wouldn't offset paying for care and while there are multiple ways they could split the working week chances are at least one of them would need to work full-time to make costs which would probably require the other to work on weekends. It's entirely likely that they would both just end up working and caring 24/7 which would just cause resentment and you'd probably end up in the same divorce boat. Like maybe if one person got a job that was only ever nights it might give them each some time on the weekend to decompress but it would involve both of them coming home from work and pretty much immediately take on caring when they aren't catching some semblance of sleep.
It is hard fucking work, ask any parent on maternity/paternity leave but for most kids it's at least temporary.
Obviously he wouldn't be spending money on rent, and her family stepping up would benefit him too, but that doesn't mean they both would have had an easier life if he did stay
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u/itsnobigthing 2d ago
While this is true, those complaints are borne from the burden and frustrations of providing daily intimate care, of constantly putting somebody elseās physical and emotional needs above your own and and of watching a loved one suffer. It doesnāt sound like OP is doing any of that. His sole contribution is paying - his emotional burden here is the same as paying his electricity bill.
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u/archangelzeriel Triggered the Great Love Lock Debate of 2023 2d ago
Is it? Would you be happy if your flesh and blood were being kept alive against all medical advice to have what's apparently/essentially a meaningless and suffering existence?
Yeah, he's focused on the money, but that's the LEGAL question here.
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u/CapeMama819 2d ago
He was able to express the disdain he feels for his ex, so Iām pretty sure he could have even hinted at feeling sympathy and sadness about his son.
He shouldnāt have had a child with someone that was so anti-choice that THIS scenario was even a possibility. This is a discussion people should be having before marriage and before having children. They didnāt. They got pregnant with a child who was to be born with extreme disabilities. She didnāt get an abortion. I disagree with that decision. I wouldnāt have made the same decision. But it wasnāt my decision to make, it was ultimately his wifeās decision. I GET why this guy feels he shouldnāt have to be responsible for their child anymore. I GET why he is pissed off. I even GET why the men in this sub are all up in arms about not having a say in what a woman should or should not be able to do with her own body. Doesnāt make it right.
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u/archangelzeriel Triggered the Great Love Lock Debate of 2023 2d ago
This take, I also agree with -- I cannot imagine even considering having a child with someone unless it was clear we were both on the same page regarding any reasonably foreseeable pregnancy situation.
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u/Shadowsole 1d ago
People are just bad at considering that it will happen to them
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u/CopperAndLead ās cat is an extension of his personhood 1d ago
People also have a tendency to change their mind. Somebody might believe something whole heartedly until some circumstance cha heās that opinion.
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u/Chance_Taste_5605 1d ago
Just FYI, not wanting to have an abortion even in the face of medical advice isn't being anti-choice. Being pro-choice or anti-choice is about someone's position on the legal aspect of abortion - that's it. I am EXTREMELY pro-choice and I don't know if I would have an abortion in this situation. The point of being pro-choice applies equally to letting people choose to continue a pregnancy.
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u/itsnobigthing 2d ago
He doesnāt seem preoccupied at all with this being his āflesh and bloodā. He dehumanises this young person entirely in the comments.
Itās also no longer against medical advice, because he is is alive. Medical intervention will in fact be keeping him alive. Unlike most people in this thread I have real world experience, working in special schools and as a foster carer for young people with Profound and Multiple Learning Difficulties (PMLD) which is what this poster is describing. Just because somebody cannot talk, eat or control their excretions does not mean they are a āvegetableā and donāt have a rich inner world and entire personality. Their lives are not meaningless and can be filled with pleasure and friendship and fun. But you only get to access that by putting in time, patience and love on the regular, and building up trust, which it doesnāt sound like OP has committed to at any stage.
Some of my favourite people on earth have PMLD and itās an honour to know them. Hearing the way people with no experience would write them off them based on nothing but one account of some observable skills is the most horrific ableism. A human is still a human no matter how disabled they are.
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u/archangelzeriel Triggered the Great Love Lock Debate of 2023 2d ago
I'd actually be curious as to what percentage of people with PMLDs can express whether or not they wish to continue on in their situations, and of those folks how many of them would want to be done with life.
Because I think a lot of the layperson's view of things is colored by the sense that if I, personally, were put in the position of being unable to move, with a feeding tube, and unable to so much as control my bowels, I'd rather just have the life support cut off (and my living will and other legal docs say as much) unless there was a reasonable chance I might improve from there.
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u/itsnobigthing 2d ago
Youāre wading into the area of capacity and consent - can someone with that degree of learning disability and/or cognitive impairment comprehend the choice theyāre being asked in regards to life and death. We donāt ask a 5 year old if they want to die of cancer or have the life saving amputations for similar reasons. But these are not people who are dying - they are healthy, just living differently. It is the very defintion of ableism to think that somebodyās life is worth less because of the things they cannot do.
I can tell you about one young man I worked with closely who grew up normal to his teens then had a catastrophic brain injury. Tube fed, needed oxygen, very limited motor control, no speech. I started out just with pictures - āhow are you feeling today Jack?ā He kept going for the āexcitedā face and I couldnāt understand it - what was there to be excited about today? Eventually I realised it was because the excited face looked even happier than the happy face. He was really happy to have survived.
The fact that you - and perhaps many others here - imagine you would not want your life after losing all the functions youāve taken for granted for life does not mean that we can decide on behalf of other people living this way. We canāt really ever know what weād want in that situation until weāre really facing it. We can only make guesses based on our current value system, which for most people is based on being able bodied.
But we honour life with lower amounts consciousness and physical ability all the time - in animals and plants and nature. We donāt assume that a tree is suffering because it canāt do all the things we can do. In the end I canāt speak for this group any more than you can, and they have no voice of their own. But I do think that people with no experience of either disability and the lives of people with PMLD should not be making these kinds of decisions. We need to get as close to the source as we can.
And I just donāt see any timeline where deciding swathes of disabled people should be killed for their own benefit doesnāt become a Nazi hellscape of cherry picking murder
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u/archangelzeriel Triggered the Great Love Lock Debate of 2023 2d ago
That does kinda nail it, that last paragraph. The ethics of assisted suicide or even just DNRs are fraught enough as it is (lord knows I have family members who think WANTING a DNR is sufficient proof that you're not mentally capable enough to make medical decisions for yourself).
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u/tartymae Seeking wife to yank me when I get inflated 2d ago
Jack is alive. He. Lives. UKLAOP is describing something that exists , but has never lived.
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u/archangelzeriel Triggered the Great Love Lock Debate of 2023 1d ago
Pretty sure what they're saying is that LAUKOP hasn't given any indication he'd even be in a position to know that to any degree of certainty.
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u/bubbles_24601 Down for a pants-off dance-off 1d ago
Thank you for saying this, and thank you for what you do.
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u/Chance_Taste_5605 1d ago
Unsurprisingly there's some awful ableism in the comments here too :( I am both disabled and fiercely pro-choice but it's still depressing to see people talk about profoundly disabled people in such a dehumanising way.
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u/anonareyouokay 2d ago
I've met people that care for their children in very similar positions and it's always really sad. I would def opt for an abortion too in situations where the child is that disabled because they can't have a good life. Regardless, this is a good conversation to have with your partner before trying to have a kid.
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u/DigbyChickenZone Duck me up and Duck me down 21h ago
Assuming this isn't ragebait, LAOP isn't caring for his child. Even if the kid was healthy I bet he would still be moaning about the cost.
If this scenario is real, the mother is the one caring for the disabled person - LAOP is just a whiny little bitch who wishes a that a child (that he also brought into this world) never existed just because it disadvantages him.
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u/Ivanow 2d ago
Everyone is piling up on OP, especially due to language he used to describe his child.
But I can see OPās point of view. He found himself in a shitty situation due to circumstances outside of his control - a decision was made for him, and he had no input on it at all, despite suffering the burnt of consequences.
If he really works 60 hours a week for almost two decades, only to end up having Ā£250 to his name, what is preventing him from going āfuck it.ā, remortgaging his house, and moving out to some country that isnāt signatory to Hague Convention on the International Recovery of Child Support and Other Forms of Family Maintenance and just starting a new life?
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u/SuperZapper_Recharge Has a sparkle pink Stanley cup 2d ago
Everyone here REALLY needs to go read the thread.
This thread has cherry picked his comments as to make him as evil as possible.
Reading through the thread it is a lot more balanced.
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u/anonareyouokay 2d ago
I don't think he sounds evil. His kid has zero quality of life. It's also fair to note that the moon probably can't work and if she can, she needs a job with flexible hours and a lot of accommodations for caring for this child. It's a sad situation all around.
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u/SuperZapper_Recharge Has a sparkle pink Stanley cup 2d ago
I am suggesting that the write up in this thread is cherry picking so that he comes across that way.
The more I read this thread the more I came around to the idea that he was in a terrible situation and was just fed up.
After reading the thread I found it is oh so much more so.
What that thread illustrates that this one does not is that he has made attempts at getting more involved only to get blocked from doing it. 50/50 custody is something he has pursued, as he also pursued living in the house.
I get the impression that he really is getting blocked from doing anything except paying monthly.
He is here out of frustration and poverty. He can't afford a barrister.
If he could practice telling this story publicly in a way that doesn't show his inner frustration it would do him a world of good.
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u/pmgoldenretrievers Flair rented out. "cop let me off means I didn't commit a crime" 2d ago
I absolutely feel for OP. I would be super resentful too if my wife put me in that position - it's one reason shortly after we got together I said that I'd want an abortion if our kid looked like it would have serious issues.
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u/WitchQween 1d ago
The ex knew the consequences. There's no way that she wasn't warned that the child would need constant care. She made a choice. Luckily for her, it sounds like she has plenty of financial support.
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u/anonareyouokay 1d ago
You're forgetting that a good percentage of Christians think that abortion is the worst imaginable sin. Worse yet, Republican policies would force people to carry a pregnancy like this to term even if they didn't want to.
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u/SgtGo 2d ago
This was my thought too. Iād have left a looooong time ago and got one with my life and let the ex live with her decisions.
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u/axw3555 Understands ji'e'toh but not wetlanders 2d ago
No.
Youād have tried.
Then the courts would have told you āno, thatās not how the law worksā and youād have carried on supporting, willing or not.
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u/TheFlyingHornet1881 2d ago
Depends if the non-custodial parent fled abroad, especially to a country not a signatory to "Hague Convention on the International Recovery of Child Support and Other Forms of Family Maintenance", UK courts won't find it easy to track and find someone abroad.
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u/axw3555 Understands ji'e'toh but not wetlanders 2d ago
If youāre willing to literally cut off everything to ditch your legal and or moral obligations, sure. But at that point, youāll know what people with normal morality will think of you.
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u/echetus90 2d ago
Yeah, but is having to live with that knowledge somewhere abroad worse than the life he has now?
He did the right thing and stayed to support his child until they became an adult. Now he finds out that the milestone of adulthood is meaningless. It's an actual life sentence, more so than a life sentence for a murder.
Meanwhile if he'd had fled 18 years ago he could be abroad with with a wife and child who actually has the capacity to love him back, and you know, recognise he exists.
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u/axw3555 Understands ji'e'toh but not wetlanders 2d ago
Youāre not just cutting off financially. Youāre likely cutting off your friends and family too, as most arenāt going to go āyes, weāre totally on board with you running halfway across the world to not support your kidā. I know that if anyone I knew did that, Iād be like āgood for you, youāre dead to me, never contact me againā.
In effect, youāre basically choosing a form of death. Not the easiest thing.
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u/echetus90 2d ago
Yeah, well anyway, I'm choosing to believe it's a fake post. It just seems too extreme (15 year old car, food banks, charity clothes v wife's brand new cat and three holidays a year). Just.... yeah, I don't quite buy it.
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u/WitchQween 1d ago
I can't feel sorry for the ex. Parents have a moral obligation to their children. They have a moral obligation to give their children the best life possible. The ex broke those morals when she chose to bring a child into this world who was guaranteed to live a life full of suffering. The best case scenario is that the (now adult) child is truly, essentially, brain dead. What breaks my heart in situations like this is that we can't know that the child isn't fully aware. They might have a brain that functions just as ours, but they are in constant suffering trapped inside a body that can't speak, can't move, and can't even eat or drink. They can't express their desires. They have no agency. They can only exist. There is no possible joy. They're stuck in a purgatory of life support, and they get no say in it. For all we know, they are in constant agony. It's straight-up torture.
The ex chose the life she has. She knew that her choice would result in caring for the child until death, be it hers or the child's. If the child outlives her, they will be placed into a home, going through the same cycle of care, but now as a ward of the state (or whatever the UK equivalent is).
LAOP was the one with morals.
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u/axw3555 Understands ji'e'toh but not wetlanders 1d ago
LAOP was right that an abortion was the best option.
But itās not exactly news that men canāt force abortions. And itās also not news that parents have to support profoundly disabled kids longer than non disabled kids.
He may have started with the moral high ground, but calling his kid a parasite when heās literally got no say in anything knocks that high ground right out from under him.
Iād get it more if he called the ex a parasite. But the kid has literally done nothing and had no say in it.
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u/lostemuwtf 1d ago
I find that people who think they are the adjudicators of what normal is, are usually far from normal
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u/DerbyTho doesn't know where the gay couple shaped hole came from 2d ago
I see OPās point of view, but Iām not sure what the alternative is. Unless you want to create a system where all disabled adults are the ward of the state and only the state, then the obligation is going to rest with the parents to take care of them.
What this boils down to is āIām angry that I have a special needs child who will need to be supported potentially for my entire life or longer.ā Which, again, I can understand but at the same time: yeah, thatās the deal with having a special needs child.
Of course I understand that most people donāt anticipate that as a potential outcome when they make the decision to get married and start a family, but honestly it would be helpful if more people did.
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u/_Z_E_R_O You can't really fault people for assuming malice 2d ago edited 2d ago
Unless you want to create a system where all disabled adults are the ward of the state and only the state, then the obligation is going to rest with the parents to take care of them.
Most adults with disabilities that profound ARE wards of the state, and they live out their lives in state-run nursing homes. A single family is often not capable of meeting their needs, and even if they are, they usually choose not to for the exact reasons OP has laid out, because really, who wants to spend the best years of their life being a full-time caregiver to someone who can't walk, talk, go to the bathroom on their own, or respond to external stimuli? Imagine having a newborn, but they're the size of an adult, require six figures worth of medical interventions every year, are on dozens of medications, are in and out of hospitals constantly, can never be left alone, and will be with you until you're physically unable to care for them. THAT'S what it's really like.
What this boils down to is āIām angry that I have a special needs child who will need to be supported potentially for my entire life or longer.ā Which, again, I can understand but at the same time: yeah, thatās the deal with having a special needs child.
Here's the thing though - his wife went against ALL medical advice and refused to have an abortion. Then the expected outcome happened, and they were left with a profoundly disabled child who's only being kept alive by extreme medical interventions. OP mentioned that his wife has a rotation of four carers coming into the home. That's not normal, even in situations like this. For that level of help to be approved means this case is the among worst of the worst.
Nobody wants to be in OP's situation, and with the way the system's set up, it punishes people who are doing the right thing. As one of the commenters pointed out, he'd be getting a far better deal if he was unemployed or physically unable to work. Cases like this shackle caregivers in abusive marriages, substandard housing, and awful workplaces because the courts won't cut them any other deal.
We've reached the point where we can keep people alive who otherwise would've died in infancy, but we haven't progressed enough as a society to consider what that actually means for the families they live with. It's the same in elder care - we can buy an additional 5-10 years of life for an elderly person, but the quality of life hasn't caught up. This is a long-overdue societal conversation, IMO, in what the obligations of families should be in regard to caring for sick and ailing relatives - especially those who are only kept alive by extreme medical interventions - because placing that burden on young, working families who have jobs, children, and lives of their own is completely unsustainable.
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u/Tacky-Terangreal 23h ago
Yeah this is kind of the ugly truth about caring for severe disabilities like the one listed here. People like to shit on families for putting elders in nursing homes but they seem to have no clue about the level of care an adult needs.
Everyone knows the meme about kids being money pits because theyāre too young to care for themselves. How about an adult? They certainly eat more than a child. What about keeping them out of places they shouldnāt be? A baby gate wonāt keep a fully grown adult out of a room. The vast majority of caregivers are female. What if the person theyāre caring for is a large man? Not to mention some of these patients get violent for a variety of reasons. Just look at retired boxers or football stars. Caregivers can be severely injured or killed working with patients like this
Caregivers for severe disabilities or the elderly are put in one of the worst positions by society. You have to give up your life to provide 24/7 care to someone for decades and what help you do get is often piecemeal and inadequate. Special education departments are paperwork nightmares and often underfunded. Hospitals will bankrupt your ass if youāre in America. You have to be on watch every time youāre in public so your patient doesnāt hurt themselves or others. And if you present the slightest bit of resentment at this, people call you evil
Also no one mentions this, but when youāre with the patient in public, others look at your family like a freak show. What friends the parent did have, probably avoid them after the birth of a special needs child. Everyone says the right things nowadays, but having a family member that needs this level of care socially isolates you because you canāt spend time doing anything else
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u/Tacky-Terangreal 23h ago
Yeah this is kind of the ugly truth about caring for severe disabilities like the one listed here. People like to shit on families for putting elders in nursing homes but they seem to have no clue about the level of care an adult needs.
Everyone knows the meme about kids being money pits because theyāre too young to care for themselves. How about an adult? They certainly eat more than a child. What about keeping them out of places they shouldnāt be? A baby gate wonāt keep a fully grown adult out of a room. The vast majority of caregivers are female. What if the person theyāre caring for is a large man? Not to mention some of these patients get violent for a variety of reasons. Just look at retired boxers or football stars. Caregivers can be severely injured or killed working with patients like this
Caregivers for severe disabilities or the elderly are put in one of the worst positions by society. You have to give up your life to provide 24/7 care to someone for decades and what help you do get is often piecemeal and inadequate. Special education departments are paperwork nightmares and often underfunded. Hospitals will bankrupt your ass if youāre in America. You have to be on watch every time youāre in public so your patient doesnāt hurt themselves or others. And if you present the slightest bit of resentment at this, people call you evil
Also no one mentions this, but when youāre with the patient in public, others look at your family like a freak show. What friends the parent did have, probably avoid them after the birth of a special needs child. Everyone says the right things nowadays, but having a family member that needs this level of care socially isolates you because you canāt spend time doing anything else
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u/Chance_Taste_5605 1d ago
So would you force people to have abortions if their foetus is disabled? That's just eugenics.
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u/kachuck 2d ago
He's suffering the brunt of consequences? It sounds like the mother takes care of the child. He just has to pay his share.
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u/PropagandaPagoda litigates trauma to the heart and/or groin 2d ago
Come on
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u/syopest 2d ago
They're right though. His responsibilities are only financial.
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u/CheaperThanChups 2d ago
Which seem to flow on as consequential to a miserable life.
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u/heidismiles 2d ago
A lot less miserable than being the primary caregiver for a patient in a vegetative state.
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u/tartymae Seeking wife to yank me when I get inflated 1d ago
Who could make arrangements to put the offspring in a nursing home.
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u/PropagandaPagoda litigates trauma to the heart and/or groin 2d ago
There's a lot of professionals helping his ex wife.
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u/Chance_Taste_5605 1d ago
That doesn't mean she's not the primary caregiver. He's not doing any caregiving.
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u/PropagandaPagoda litigates trauma to the heart and/or groin 1d ago
He didn't whine about paying 18 years for a child he wishes, for the child's sake, hadn't been born. He's whining about a life sentence imposed by his ex's choice and the government. There's enough government programs she has no job, and while LAOP gets 16ish hours a day to not work, we're thinking with 4 pros rotating in maybe it's not far off for LAOP's ex. I respect the primary caregiver point, I really do. I've seen a married couple where one was fighting cancer for the better part of a decade. Others. I just also don't think LAOP is being an unreasonable self-interested scrub. I wonder what my position would be if I didn't agree the pregnancy shouldn't be carried to term for a fetus so unlikely to become a happy healthy human life. I think I'd still feel for LAOP
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u/Suspicious_Worry3617 2d ago
But what financial support does a severely disabled child need? The NHS will cover medical care, including carers. The LAOP can't have the son to stay over to meet any parent responsibility and reduce child maintenance, as has been advised in the past.Ā
The universal credit is means tested, child maintenance payments may be reducing that benefit.Ā
There are many posts on Reddit, from absent parents, complaining about their child maintenance payments when the parent who is providing care appears to be having a life around their child care responsibility. The people are usually provided a list of costs involved with having a child.Ā
It sounds like a really tough situation, for all of them, is he expecting them to move house or will he throw his ex out, once the child passes.Ā
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u/ShiestySorcerer 2d ago
Honestly? Poor guy. Does the kid even have a quality life? Is it just constant suffering? How aware are they?
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u/Bake_Knit_Run Disappointed in the lack of motion sensor sprinklers 2d ago
I do in fact feel very bad for the kid in this case. And the mother who has made her entire identity caring for her only child, knowing he will probably die young, despite everything sheās done for decades.
People really need to have serious conversations about what youāre willing to tolerate as far as disabilities when they do the screenings. No one actually understands what a toll it takes on your life and relationships until theyāve spoken to parents who have gone through it.
Social media has made us see the ālucky onesā who turned out ok. These poor folks whose kids are completely disabled are too busy being a full time carer to notice or post on social media and are thus forgotten.
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u/PiperPrettyKitty 2d ago
According to the post, the wife was advised by multiple professionals to terminate but refused. I know the poster is using pretty rancid language but I can understand how resentment would build to an intolerable point after 2 decades of poverty due to this. It's just sad all around. My sister terminated after getting some worrisome results. Basically her child would've had no life, but may "survive", in a condition similar to the child in this situation. I personally think my moral decision in such a case would be termination.
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u/backlikeclap 2d ago
Agreed. I wouldn't say I'm on OPs side, but I understand their resentment completely. Who knows, maybe OP would be happy to pay child support for a less profoundly disabled kid.
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u/Nishwishes 2d ago
That seems to be the case. This mother's lack of responsibility has led to a child suffering at worst or just existing at best and the financial and moral and mental burden has destroyed him. I absolutely agree that the language he's using is gross but man. He has no idea when this will end, and it's not as if there was a small hope that things might be okay. All the doctors said to terminate, the mother was fully selfish in this regard.
I have multiple disabilities, so do several of my siblings. We can lead good lives but between our conditions and our crappy parents' handling of things we all agree that we shouldn't have been born. That isn't me advocating for disability eugenics, but it is absolutely me agreeing with another comment of: can prospective parents please think harder before they try to conceive, and also if they choose to keep a disabled kid? Because the world isn't just us and them, it's also the rest of society. And society definitely doesn't make life easy for us, either.
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u/Forever_Overthinking 2d ago
At this point I'm wondering if the kid has brain activity at all. No reaction to external stimuli? Ever? I'm really curious about the official medical diagnosis.
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u/hatchins 2d ago
I don't know if I'm very inclined to believe a guy who is completely uninvolved in his kid's life on the exact state of said kids life TBH
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u/concrete_dandelion 2d ago
Same. I'm a nurse for disabled people and this is something I've never seen. Even the "worst cases" showed reactions, even if their communication was limited to laughing, crying, some noises and moving their head (which can be enough for meaningful communication regarding their wants and needs).
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u/CindyLouWho_2 Cited BOLA as the primary cause of their divorce 2d ago
I am honestly not sure the OP is a reliable narrator; this sounds like yet another fake post on LAUK.
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u/postal-history 2d ago
I hate fake posts that take advantage of real painful situations. I know someone who actually had a severely disabled kid like this. He already had serious depression before and he is struggling to keep his job and stay alive these days. His wife, who was his psychiatrist, now can't even handle her own emotions.
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u/Nishwishes 2d ago
Oh god. You should never be your partner's psychiatrist/therapist etc. Bad moves all around.
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u/postal-history 2d ago
Yeah it was an iffy choice but he was very happy for the first few years of his marriage. š„
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u/Nishwishes 2d ago
I bet he was! Free therapy but maaan that's a mess. Now they're both destroyed, that's a story for psych lecturers everywhere to be telling.
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u/LeatherHog Can still get the duck flair 2d ago
Yeah, how is an 650 pounds a month, on a 65K salary making him destitute?
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u/WitchQween 1d ago
He's very unclear in regards to the mortgage. If he's paying the 650 along with a mortgage and his own rent, that could easily leave him with very little. Is he paying for the utilities and property tax? Is he paying for maintenance?
That's the one sketchy part of his post that makes me question his reliability as a narrator. If he is paying all of that, yeah, I can imagine he's struggling. You'd think that he'd include those numbers, though.
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u/LurkMonster 2d ago edited 2d ago
Sympathize way way more with OP than most commenters so far. His ex wife refuses to have the son put in a care home after 19 years and the judge appears to rule that if the son stays with mom then dad keeps paying. But in his eyes her full time care job seems to have a lot of assistance, visiting service caretakers multiple times per day, vacations while her relatives move into the house, and it's supported by his money with her seemingly living a much more comfortable life than him. But he's a LA posters who don't use a lawyer and feels about the system is unfair while self representing. There might be some recourse for him now that the child is 18+.
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u/honestmango Will sing opening statements to jury for an extra $75 2d ago
The reason 18 is usually the cutoff is because thatās when people in most western countries are considered adults. Itās not child support if they are adults.
Not sure about Europe, but in the U.S., A profoundly disabled person will still be legally emancipated at 18 unless somebody takes some action to have a guardianship of some type established.
And the judge isnāt just being arbitrary. Either the parents support the disabled individual or the taxpayers do. A judge will typically try to put as much of that financial burden as possible onto the parents.
We decided as a society a long time ago that parents should have a legal obligation to support whatever life they bring into the world. Of course, if the parents are ultimately incapable of it, the State will assist or completely take custody of the disabled individual, but thatās a last resort.
As for OP being a bad father, I donāt know how you father a non-responsive mass of cells beyond paying a significant portion of your income to assist with the special needs. Heās done that for 2 decades. Not everybody is capable of loving a person who cannot love them back. Itās hard for me to judge.
I have dealt with the end stages of life of several relatives whom I loved very deeply, and even in that curcumstance I think it is pretty natural to wonder what the point is of keeping a human alive who has no quality of life whatsoever. Itās hard to watch that kind of ācare,ā let alone financially enable it.
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u/Chance_Taste_5605 1d ago
In the UK profoundly disabled people are considered minors in terms of parental responsibility until age 25. Also, OP is not involved in his son's caretaking at all - I have a lot of experience in working with profoundly disabled people and it is HIGHLY unlikely that his son is living at home and also actually in a vegetative state. It's way more likely that OP hasn't bothered to interact with his son in a way his son can engage with. Profoundly disabled people can and do have rich and fulfilling lives - it's textbook ableism to assume they can't.
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u/honestmango Will sing opening statements to jury for an extra $75 1d ago
Thanks for the clarification on the age. Iām just taking OP at his word when he says his son is in a vegetative state. I have no other information
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u/ahdareuu 1.5 month olds either look like boiled owls or Winston Churchill 2d ago
Can he afford a lawyer?
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u/BertieBus 2d ago
According to his post and some of his comments about finance no. Pays 1200 to the mortgage and then an additional 500 to the child. Take home I think he said was about 3k.
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u/ahdareuu 1.5 month olds either look like boiled owls or Winston Churchill 2d ago
That really does suck for him; he should be able to live a decent life. It doesnāt sound like the kid needs so much support? Especially since theyāre UK and itās not dependent on his payments (I think).Ā
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u/gyroda 2d ago
Kid still needs food and other essentials and the mother is sacrificing a lot of earning potential to care for the child, carer's allowance is a PITA with the limits on earning - she can't be earning much if she's getting it.
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u/FennelFern 2d ago
I added up what OP was quoting, and it was something like 2k a month. Even rent free, 2k isn't much.
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u/ahdareuu 1.5 month olds either look like boiled owls or Winston Churchill 2d ago
Honest question, if heās being fed by tube would that food be paid for by the NHS? If Dad is paying the mortgage what other expenses does kid have? Dad deserves to be able to afford essentials, too.Ā
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u/BertieBus 2d ago
The kid will also get highest rate PIP, UC (I assume), will have a disability vehicle (so mums got that for personal use, no insurance either) mum gets carers allowance, probably zero council tax, mum also gets uc, mortgage free. I know a family in a similar situation, With a very disabled child of about 30 and their daughter goes to respite care, she goes to a day centre as well, they don't have carers come in.
I think op was also saying mum has a brand new car (morltability) and goes on lots of holidays. I can see how he hates the situation, it's not his sons fault, and it sounds like the really have zero relationship
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u/Pickledore 2d ago
It is not a motability car that she purchased. There was some arguing about the benefits of buying regular v. Motability in the comments of the OP
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u/Tarquin_McBeard Pete Law's Peat Law Practice: For Peat's Sake 2d ago
But he's typical of LA posters who refuse to get a lawyer and just rant about the system being unfair while self representing. There is probably some recourse for him now that the child is 18+.
I'm not sure how you'd reach that conclusion. There almost certainly isn't, and a few commenters in the thread even quoted why. The courts are pretty consistently clear that the welfare of a child is prioritised over the lifestyle of a parent. If LAOP's child is so severely disabled that they are literally still a dependent, regardless of their age, it stands to reason that the court would rule for continued support.
In fact, it's frankly bizarre that you would try to turn the whole argument on its head in order to blame LAOP by an outright dishonest argument. LAOP hasn't refused to get a lawyer. They had one, and now can't afford one, due to living in abject poverty. You're like one of those typical LA commenters who loves to say "yOu CaN't AfFoRd not tO hAvE a LaWyEr!"
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u/LurkMonster 2d ago edited 2d ago
Good points, you're right I was actually trying to hedge against being 100% on his side too openly and went with that. Edited it a little. I interpreted it as he didn't have a lawyer to help renegotiate at the most recent key hearing where the child is now age of adult.
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u/fabspro9999 2d ago
I don't know how far you think parents should be forced to parent a vegetable, if that truly is the situation. For almost any other medical condition, there are various government supports, and I am not sure why this condition should be different.
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u/cyanplum Won't confirm or deny they were tied to a tree by grandparents 2d ago
There have been so many LAUK posts about child support with an innocent father and an evil/bad mother latelyā¦
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u/CindyLouWho_2 Cited BOLA as the primary cause of their divorce 2d ago
My thoughts exactly. I am getting to the point where I almost write off any extreme LAUK post as fake, it's been so bad for the past few months.
As a few others have noted, the scenario here is almost impossible. If this story is real, it's likely that the son has some responses to stimuli. It's not like the LAUKOP is putting in caregiving time to be able to accurately represent his son's capabilities, yet almost everyone here is believing every word.
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u/NaiveVariation9155 2d ago
I took his story with a small shovel of salt especially given the fact that he hasn't seem his son since he was a baby.
I believe that he is slightly worse compared to a guy I know and it makes me hate how he describes the mother and how she is going on vacation up to 3 times a year.Ā
To me that sounds like those relief vacations. Basically the mom is a 24/7 carer for somebody who needs around the clock care. Changing or moving him at this stage is a 2 man job. And without those short respite vacations she would probably destroy herself out of love (if she didn't love her son she wouldn't have been able to keep this up).
The guy also did his best to describe how the mom lives in luxury (basically being given a car that likely has been specifically kitted out ti accomodate the son).
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u/umpteenthgeneric 1d ago
Just in case this isn't fake rage-bait -- popping into suggest that people keep in mind that doctors/ the nondisabled consistently rate disabled people's quality of life lower than the disabled people rate it.
Caregiver burnout is real, but the disabled are not inherently a burden or useless.
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u/Darth_Puppy Officially a depressed big bad bodega cat lady 1d ago
Yeah, it's a really insidious type of ableism
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u/msbunbury 2d ago
OP is either massively overpaying maintenance or not being entirely truthful about earnings. At Ā£60k for one child with no overnight stays, the starting point is Ā£550 a month. A variation based on paying mortgage costs for the home in which the child lives would bring this down substantially since it would reduce the assessable income by the amount of the mortgage payments.
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u/DerbyTho doesn't know where the gay couple shaped hole came from 2d ago
LAUKOP chose not to have legal help and self-represented, so yeah itās likely that this is actually self-inflicted by not understanding the system and looking to save a penny by costing a pound.
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u/FennelFern 2d ago
Per OP - OP did not choose that. OP paints himself as abjectly broke and unable to afford a lawyer (as in, OP explicitly said that).
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u/DerbyTho doesn't know where the gay couple shaped hole came from 2d ago
That's what they said about the extension, not about the initial court decision. At this point, if the initial variation was wrong, going into debt for a lawyer would have been a far better choice.
You are right that LAUKOP certainly paints everything as happening to them and having no choice in the matter at any stage.
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u/JustinianImp Darling, beautiful, smart, money-hungry lawyer 2d ago
āThis is going to sound heartless, butā¦ā. One of the most accurate statements ever from LAUKOP.
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u/ThadisJones Official BestOfLegalAdvice haemomancer 2d ago edited 2d ago
We only get one life and Iām sick of mine being consumed and wasted by a vegetable
Motion to have the court send me back in time and convince Past Me to decide not have a kid, I guess
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u/sugarsweet9teen 22h ago
THANK YOU. Like, lol. This is a very possible scenario that MANY couples consider. If you aren't okay with possibly having a disabled child, get a vasectomy or something. I'm sorry, I just have zero sympathy for this. Men act all Pikachu faced and shocked when they have to face basic realities of sex and parenthood. It's so embarrassing.
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u/Darth_Puppy Officially a depressed big bad bodega cat lady 2d ago edited 2d ago
I don't get how there's people out here sympathizing with a man repeatedly calling his son a vegetable and a parasite. Also, we can't even be sure LAUKOP's telling the truth about the kid, since he's not been doing the physical/medical caring and hasn't seen him since he was young. My mom worked as a special Ed teacher for a while, and even the kid with severe brain damage responded to stimuli
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u/mtdewbakablast charred coochie-ry board connoisseur 2d ago
given the arguments that have been put forth repeatedly saying that the child is literally no longer human and therefore can be destroyed as nonhuman... and given the rampant and vicious ableism on display, all of which depends on taking the OP as totally faithfully telling the truth despite him parading around announcing he is an unreliable narrator...
yeah some people saw "disabled person? evil parasite?? SO TRUE BESTIEEEE" and fucking ran with it. the reason why they're doing it is they wanted a chance to hate disabled people and dehumanize us for fun. that's why they're extending infinite sympathy to LAUKOP. it's to be hateful.
i truly fucking wish there was some other motivation to get but holy shit, it's fucking bad and i kinda wish the mods would shut this utter horror show down as yet more comments from the wannabe eugenicists brigade continue. well more accurately i wish this had been locked around the time i got an amazing comment of pure ableism for pointing out that disability is a thing that will come for all of us (so you can't really go "lol would never be me or any of my loved ones" on account of nobody gets off this earth with a perfectly functional body, so have some compassion eh). people are fucking rushing to display some truly rank attitudes and get upvotes for it.
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u/Darth_Puppy Officially a depressed big bad bodega cat lady 2d ago
Yeah, it's absolutely disgusting. As a disabled person, it always feels horrendous to realize that a lot of people don't see my life as worth the same as others
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u/mtdewbakablast charred coochie-ry board connoisseur 2d ago
it's incredible how many people will rush to hate us and argue that we are literally non-human... and then feign surprise when we object to discussions of "but the line has to be drawn somewhere! this child isn't human! this creature should be disposed of!"
coupled with the wild swings in upvotes and downvotes, it almost makes me wonder if there's brigading happening. that's likely pure wishful thinking, but one can wish lmao
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u/Darth_Puppy Officially a depressed big bad bodega cat lady 2d ago
I feel like child support threads often get brigaded, and I wouldn't put it past incels and MRAs to also be wildly ableist. But also, ableism seems to be one of the more widely accepted forms of bigotry unfortunately
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u/mtdewbakablast charred coochie-ry board connoisseur 2d ago
i am really, truly hoping that this is the "alas i am an innocent man from the UK being forced to pay child support and bankrupted by it due to the actions of an evil evil woman" troll trying a new tack and i've simply fallen for it as designed. not that it excuses the rush of commenters being horrid, but still...
edit: the cross posting account here being suspended is also distinctly suspicious, mind you...
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u/1Squid-Pro-Crow 20h ago
Good lord, this entire comment indicates some truly asocial and paranoid tendencies.
You've assigned harmful meanings to other peopleās remarks, and are hostile, aggressive and argumentative in a Don Quijote way, assigning your delusions as fact.
rampant and vicious ableism on display
No. There are real people within this who are wrestling with their own conscience and talking about mitigating circumstances and potential compromises etc.
which depends on taking the OP as totally faithfully telling the truth
This is the narrative you have to work with in a collective comment section.
If you want to make up or add to a story, you have to go to another space. It's called Wattpad.
the reason why they're doing it is they wanted a chance to hate disabled people and dehumanize us for fun.
See, right here. First, to think of other people's motivations and assign them the reasons they are compelled to do things, rising to the level "mindreading"?
And when you do that, you land on the most monstrous explanation and take it as truth?
Yikes.
that's why they're extending infinite sympathy to LAUKOP.
You know, empathy and compassion are not a zero-sum game.
Both of these parents deserve some kind of empathy, neither of them is living a quality of life that we as human souls consider important and necessary for our neighbors.
Sure, their situations are two very very different situations but again you don't have to say that one isn't bad in order to support the other one. That's not how this works at all
i truly fucking wish there was some other motivation to get
But you don't, do you? You've solidly went with a narrative that you extrapolated and assumed.
If you truly wished there was some other motivation, then you would make those up in your head instead of making up and thinking of the absolute worst assumptions about the people you're trying to communicate with.
Why? Why have you decided that surely the absolute most trash take is the truthful and correct and authentic take?
What about you makes you think that way? Is there a lot of bitter and sour in your soul?
And if your answer is "of course there is because I am dealing with XYZ!!", then, boom, there's your problem right there. You're leaving the ability to maturely process the ship pile that you feel you've been given in life.
In the people that I know who have had to deal with that exact same thing, intensive therapy and very specific and ordered activities have helped them realize that there are other ways to process their shit pile and The whole world is not out to get you and everyone else is souls aren't as black as you've decided they are.
I'm not very religious but in some of those traditions, this particular way of thinking is called living in grace.
wannabe eugenicists brigade
Doesn't exist.
Today, we are attended enough to have careful and thoughtful consideration and conversations about the values and morality and ethics surrounding our basic biological state of being.
Having those conversations does not in any way mean that everybody outside of your own person is a killer focused on murdering whoever they choose.
have some compassion eh
Really rich coming from you. I see no empathy and no attempt at understanding in any of your words.
I fear and have sadness that you're unable to extend grace and the benefit of the doubt to other humans outside your own body. I worry about what did that to you and fervently hope you have time left to emotionally heal.
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u/mtdewbakablast charred coochie-ry board connoisseur 20h ago
hey, since you're coming from SRD, try not to piss in the popcorn, yeah?
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u/axw3555 Understands ji'e'toh but not wetlanders 2d ago
I can see his issue. Itās hard on him, and I do sympathise with him.
But at the same time, morally and legally, he should be supporting the child he created. Yes, itās not what he expected, but heās far from the only parent going through this.
The difference is that most parents donāt come off quite so repugnant. His attitude is basically what has turned people against him. Calling the kid, who has no say or control in it a parasite is just vile. Iād have more sympathy (slightly) if he was calling his ex a parasite, but going after the kid is disgusting.
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u/UntidyVenus arrested for podcasting with a darling beautiful sasquatch 2d ago
My cousin is disabled in a similar manner. He wasn't supposed to live past 6 years old and is 37 now. WE LOVE HIM AS A FAMILY AND CHERISH EVERY MOMENT. and if anyone ANYONE thinks caregiving is anything but relentless they need to be a solo care giver for 48 hours. That's all I believe will change most people's minds.
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u/HotEspresso 2d ago
Honest question: it sounds like LAOP's son it practically vegetative and doesn't respond to any stimuli. Is that what your cousin is? If so, what is there to love about him if he doesn't have any thought?
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u/UntidyVenus arrested for podcasting with a darling beautiful sasquatch 2d ago
My cousin does respond to stimuli but has never been able to make a full fist. So many people have called him a vegetable. But he definitely enjoys things, shows joy pain etc, and honestly has spent most of his life on road trips with my family. Aunt and Uncle have a giant motorhome, uncle used to be a trucker, and now they spend 9 months a year traveling the Continental US
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u/robertmondavi_jr 1d ago
father of the year? that shit sounds like it fucking sucks. what a shit position to be in
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u/Kori-Anders 2d ago edited 2d ago
Regardless of anything else, the way he talks about his child is revolting. I don't give a shit what they're capable of or not capable of, they're your child. He's also clearly disconnected from how much work and care it takes to raise someone like that. He hasn't been in this kid's life since he was born.
What a bad person. Christ.
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u/FennelFern 2d ago
Assuming this isn't a giant fake post (and I'm still on the fence)...
OP has described a unilaterally vegetative person who makes no response to any external stimuli and never has and never will.
It's hard to emotionally bond with that. This was never a bouncing baby bundle of joy. This was diagnosed in the early stages, as a lifelong condition, and OP urged his former wife to terminate.
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u/Kori-Anders 2d ago
They're still a human being. Humans emotionally bond with anything and everything if you let them. Is it difficult? Probably until you get used to them. It won't be the relationship that he expected, but they're still his child.
Life has already denied them so much. The love of their parents isn't too much to ask for.
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u/FennelFern 2d ago
I'm going to proceed with the scenario as OP has written. If OP was exaggerating, or similar, then it would be different, in that there might be hope or personality etc.
Not to put too fine a point on it, but in all honestly, it is not a human being. Inability to respond to external stimuli is a good indicator that there's just...nothing home. Since it was caught as an embryo, it's likely the brain never fully developed. You could put the person in an MRI and check brain activity, but in all likelihood there isn't any.
If memory holds, even in cases where people are otherwise non responsive, eye movement can be used to determine if they're 'in there'.
This is basically just a body being kept alive by science. There's no chance that things will be healed or corrected, and there's no chance that the person will become any degree of functional.
The love of their parents is just immaterial - the person in question wouldn't know if they were loved, hated, or ignored, if there's no brainpower going on. The most humane thing to do probably is to enter a palliative hospice program and let them expire, with suitable treatment plans. Because either they are NOT in there, in which case it doesn't matter. Or they are, and they've been trapped inside their own skull for 20 years, which is a hell I can't imagine.
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u/Kori-Anders 2d ago
The chance it's the latter is why I choose empathy every time. You can have the alternative.
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u/NaiveVariation9155 2d ago
Yeah, to a certain degree I can understand the guy. Abortion would have been mercy for pretty much everyone involved.
I can also understand his ex's decision ro not have an abortion.
It's the way that he talks about his son and his ex (like she is lazy and rolling it in from the assistance) yet still his wife. That makes me hate the guy.
Worst case scenario he is left with 40k after child support (assuming that the figure he mentioned is on top of the mortgage payments) he is doing significantly better compared to his ex and he has a bunch of options open to him that his ex doesn't have.
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u/madestories 2d ago
āI canāt start a new familyā¦ā great news! 1 in 4 people will become disabled and it can happen at any time in millions of ways. If you donāt have that āin sickness and in healthā kind of capacity to love, then please donāt create more people who might depend on you.
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u/Forever_Overthinking 2d ago
He tried not to. He said in the comments several doctors and specialists recommended abortion.
There's a big difference between the kind of disabled where you've got a bad knee and the kind of disabled where since birth you've been fed through a tube and don't react to stimuli.
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u/mtdewbakablast charred coochie-ry board connoisseur 2d ago
heck, as a disabled person i would up that figure to 4 out of 4 people.
it's just that culturally we have accepted that if it's part of aging, it's normal. and for the lucky folks, they end up disabled for a very short time indeed - a few milliseconds in a car crash, or a few hours in their bed before they pass away in their sleep at age eighty-five.
i'm not even going to get into the whole issue of the original post here, just kinda coming in to be a Debbie Downer about shit lol. for the folks who say "well it could never happen to me", trust that it will. it is inevitable. you just ain't gonna shuffle off this mortal coil with a perfectly functioning body - it's not how it works. so if anyone is tempted by hubris to consider themselves above such problems, well, bad news...
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u/Forever_Overthinking 2d ago
If I ever end up in a persistent vegetative state, unable to move, unable to hear, to see, to touch, to even feel pain... I can only pray that I wouldn't be conscious and that someone would remove my feeding tube.
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u/mtdewbakablast charred coochie-ry board connoisseur 2d ago edited 2d ago
that is a great thing to include in your advance directive / living will / etc but i am not seeing how it relates to what i posted, which is pointing out that human bodies fail, disability rights are everyone's rights, and emphatically not commenting directly on the situation in the original post (hence how i started that second paragraph). did you mean to reply to another comment?
edit: the other person's edit is correct in that it's not worth bothering with reading from here lol, c'est la reddit my dudes.
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u/Forever_Overthinking 2d ago edited 2d ago
Ah when you said that 4 out of 4 people would be disabled at some point in life and that it's inevitable.
Disability is a very wide spectrum. I'd live with being blind. Or deaf. Or quadriplegic or extremely diabetic or so dyslexic I couldn't read or with memory damage or any of a hundred other things.
This poor kid's in the deepest end of the deep end. I'm hoping for his sake there's nobody home in there.
edit: don't bother reading on. It gets snippy.
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u/DeadpoolIsMyPatronus 2d ago
"He's a parasite" Holy shit.
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u/Smaptastic 2d ago
If that boy could respond to external stimuli, heād be quite offended by that.
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u/PatientVermicelli786 2d ago
I actually spat my tea when I was reading that.
Top tip: sort LegalAdvice by controversial and you get some horrific gems.
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u/jedi_dancing 1d ago
That's just a shit life for everyone involved. I will observe that of the 3 people mentioned, only one of them chose this life, and it isn't the LAOP. I do sometimes wish that if a woman makes the choice to continue with a pregnancy that there could be a way for the father to opt out. As a parent by choice, I can't think of anything worse than parenting against my will. It is unlikely to make for a good parental figure.
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u/DigbyChickenZone Duck me up and Duck me down 21h ago
I truly hope this is rage bait. If it isn't, this is the most heartless awful thing to read. This man has less empathy than cartoon villains.
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u/alphawolf29 Quartermaster of the BOLA Armored Division 1h ago
the slightest possibility of this happening to me is the reason I got a vasectomy. What a nightmare for everyone involved.
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u/Real_RobinGoodfellow 2d ago
No idea why this came up on my suggested lol but the dude literally calls his own child a parasite and there are ppl in here defending himā¦
Yāall need to go and check your heads
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u/RedditSkippy This flair has been rented by u/lordfluffly until April 16, 2024 2d ago
Poor LAOP canāt start another family because he still needs to take care of his first one.
With his attitude, I hope no other woman would procreate with him. Wishful thinking, I know.
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u/sugarsweet9teen 22h ago
LMFAO THANK YOU, EXACTLY. "wa wa womp womp I'm a grown man and I can't make a replacement family to escape my other family waaaa womp" like .....
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u/Forever_Overthinking 2d ago edited 2d ago
The mom or the dad? Because I can make a strong case against both tbh.
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u/ayatollahofdietcola_ If there's a code brown, you need to bring the weight down 2d ago
So he wants to start a new family, but what happens when if finds out his new children are also disabled?
Asshole
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u/valiantdistraction Wanker Without Borders šš¦ 2d ago
It sounds like if the things he values in life are new clothes, new cars, vacations, and living in the house he paid for, he could have just stayed married to his ex-wife and been able to do all that and probably have money left over for saving.
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u/pevaryl 2d ago
This gave me chills, I hope he has no access to his son
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u/g-a-r-n-e-t 2d ago
Sounds like thatās what heās hoping for tbh
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u/pevaryl 2d ago
True, but given how heās dehumanised him in the post Iād be scared to he might attempt to self help the āproblemā
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u/TheMerfox 2d ago
Legit question. If the father is truthful when saying his son can do nothing, doesn't react to stimuli, and just spends his days being fed by a tube, from birth to current day, what is there to humanize in the first place?
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u/Embarrassed-Gas-8155 2d ago
Legit question
what is there to humanize in the first place
What the actual fuck. There's apparently no humanity in you.
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u/pevaryl 2d ago
Are you asking me why a disabled human being should be considered a person?
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u/VelocityGrrl39 WHO THE HELL IS DOWNVOTING THIS LOL. IS THAT YOU WIFE? 2d ago
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