Has any one ever looked at their social services file?

Question

I am 21 years old and I am due to go threw my socail services file in a month or so. I guess I am intriegued to hear about other people experiences, how you felt, what effect it had on your life, did it bother you to see what was written about you? And so on....

Answer 1

My brother and sister have read their files within the last year and both were daunted at the prospect. I chose not to read mine as I remember good bits of when we were in care and I don't need to know anything which may cause me distress. My sister didn't get on to well as she had quiet a difficult time back then so there were things in her file that caused her great upset. My brother on the other hand has since been back to one of the many homes we where in and seems to have taken the content on the chin. Don't get your hopes up too high though as alot of your file which involved others will be omitted when you get it because of confidentiality reasons. Most of my brothers wasn't there due to this. But I did have to sign something saying any bits in his file about me could be left in.

Answer 2

a friend of mine was adopted and was in foster care b4 that when he got his file, it was quite upsetting cos it brought back lots of bad memories that he had forgotten and things hed gone through that he had blocked out

Answer 3

i read mine about 2 yrs ago,i went with a friend,take one with you if you have one you can trust,my records were very sad and i'd forgotten a lot of stuff until i read it and it brought it all back,my friend said it was like reading them books you get in the shops i became very depressed and anxious after and needed medical help,i don't regret it though it gave me a strong sense of self and let me know who i truly was,instead of trying to be perfect and failing every time in my life i accepted who i was and understood that with my kind of life no wonder i messed up so many times.

i also saw that social services thought i was liar and fantasist over my truthful claims that i'd been sexually abused(a counsellor has sinced reassured me that is part of the symtoms of being sexually abused)and they really didnt give me the support i needed but then this was 20yrs ago.

so my advice is go do it be with someone you trust and somebody you can talk it over with after,i just wish we could have those those records as thats a detailed diary of our lives,but it helped me to discover the real me.

Good luck!

edit it also enabled me to stop talking to my mum as i'd always had a bad relationship with her but read in records that she admitted not ever loving me and thinking i was jealous of her etc(a child jealous of its mum????)so that day i thought im not pretending no more and i stopped talking to her and she moved away and im a lot happier!