OMG, now CPS showed up!!

It is a good idea to change my user name, though that would probably mostly work for other people not law enforcement or anything. I am sure some IT tech in law enforcement could still probably look up old usernames, even from defunct accounts like my old university email and grad school email. OK, I sent in an admin request for a username change, one I have not used before. I will let everyone know once that is taken care of. I do use other user names though also multiple times probably on a lot of forums. It's just so easy to forget it all the time. However, when I first joined sites like forums (and worse, I was on pro-ED forums before recovery), smartphones weren't around, or if they were, they cost a veritable fortune. I will put it in my phone & my cloud account (which does have a unique username).

I'm confused. Did I miss something? I thought the allegation against your husband triggered it which, I agree, would be frustrating if no allegation was made against you specifically. I admit, I may have missed something. I've been popping in and out lately.

—-thank you Tucson, she has been through so much lately that getting paranoid about govt agencies trying to sleuth out her usernames is the last thing she needs right now. The wisest thing she said was that she would do one thing at a time by priority, getting a therapist first. That shows strength under pressure. You go girl. These agency people are just a bump in the road. Love ya, cln!

No, the allegation is against me. If they accuse my husband of anything (they haven't), it would probably be that he kept living here with me and my daughter and left me alone with her at times. Of course, he did; he'd be at work, and I was with her all day before she started school.

I had MI diagnoses even before my daughter was born.

So I do feel I am being targeted just because I have a mental illness.

I agree that it would look suspicious and like I had something to hide if suddenly all my usernames change exactly at this point in time. I think it would lead investigators to believe I'm trying to cover things up. I may have reconsidered the way I typed a lot of things in the past, but none of them are things I hide from anyone. And they probably could get records from my old psychiatrist and therapists I tried that never worked out (one as recently as this year, I think); she just had so many reservations about working with someone with an eating disorder that I decided she was not the best match for me.

I know things like that would be harder for police to get their hands on and a lot of information not disclosed by past therapists or the pastor of my church if it was stuff that didn't suggest I was a danger to myself or my daughter, but still. I can't remember what I said to everyone and when. Though obviously it did not alarm anyone to the point of calling in authorities.

I understand what you're saying - and agree that using different usernames across sites is wise (I also omit location data) - but even changed data that hasn't been directly tagged by a search engine or an archive site like the wayback machine, can often be recovered by other means - not all of which need a court order.

Online privacy is important, but some data out there is increasingly inevitable, so it's also something not to get too freaked over.

Rights aside, changing data at this point is more likely to look like something to hide. Just IMO.

I am thinking about protecting for the future.

For instance, anyone could type your location into google and contact the local police department about someone they found concerning. Given that you have your photo up along with your location, it would be easy to identify you if police have ever had a run in before. This is just basic safety considerations.

It is like locking your doors to go to sleep at night. That is different than buying a machine gun to protect yourself should your home be invaded. I am only talking about locking doors. There is no need to conflate this type of consideration with investigations taking 1000s of man hours looking through decade old university emails (if they still exist). I am not sure why this all gets lumped together...

I think this may be veering off topic a bit, but there's almost certainly enough data on anyone with any sort of online presence, bank account, credit records, drivers license & other public data to create a pretty good profile on them, in a fairly short amount of time. And that's not touching the extensive data profiles that almost certainly already exist in govt & commercial data centers right now. That pony has left the stable, won the Kentucky & returned for some fresh oats...

I'm really just suggesting that, in this case, I wouldn't worry too much about the online stuff, but concentrate on the things that Laurie & tucson wrote about.

I'm just really beyond the point of worrying about user names and photos. Enough stuff is already out there, pics of showing off pregnant bellies in the fertility forum, pics of my ulcer scar healing, even pics I'd scanned & posted over 20 years ago in pro-ED type forums, most have probably been shut down but who knows if all of the ones I was on are or if someone copied a pic of me and posted it on a current pro-ED forum or website (because, yes, those are still out there), and yes, I was pretty darn pro-ED looking and triggering.

My user name here is changed, and now probably nobody knows who I am when they see the new user name should I update a post.

On the positive, I have a therapy appointment scheduled Monday at 9 AM.

It's GREAT that you have that appointment scheduled!!

I am in no way trying to be mean or unfair here. I'm speaking as someone who has mental illness myself. I understand that investigating someone just because one family member has a mental illness can sometimes be wrong. It can be stigmatizing.

Here's what I'm thinking, though. Sometimes someone with a mental illness does need to be investigated, for the safety of any children involved. In short, as difficult as this is to accept, and as unfair as it feels, do you think that possibly CPS is actually doing the job they're supposed to do, just to be absolutely sure that your little girl is safe? Because they only see what might be...that's the purpose of their investigation...to look more deeply into what might be happening - OR what might not be happening, at all.

Something else to think about. CPS doesn't just yank kids out of their homes. In fact, if anything, CPS likes to leave kids with their birth families. CPS can provide resources to hook you and your family up with services, though. That could be why they're investigating...to figure out which services you need, or your daughter might need.

People who would be investigating from CPS or to evaluate your mental health would be much more concerned about posts in the present rather than anything in the distant past. It isn't true that it is pointless to take any actions to protect your privacy going forward.

Honestly, to me it feels like being targeted because of the MI. I mean, if the child is perfectly healthy, not constantly out of school or at the doctor, getting good grades, and the CPS worker knows this, goes to wellness checkups yearly without cause for the pediatrician to be alarmed at any point, it would seem to me they should close the case right there. Why do they need me to get a "psychological evaluation" if the psychiatrist at the psych ER doesn't admit you, if your pdoc or a therapist has never seen cause for alarm to report you for over 10 years? In fact, I used to bring my daughter to pdoc appointments until she started school. My old pdoc was good about it though. Once my daughter turned about 2, my pdoc would call me and talk to me on the phone at home. Then, a couple days later, I'd come into the office with my daughter because the pdoc always wanted to see me in person. Everything she'd ask when I had my daughter with me, were very minor questions like everything the same as when we last spoke or how are you sleeping? And she'd go over the medications and dosages. In fact, she saw children too and had a box of toys in her office. My daughter loved going there and playing with the toys. So she got to see my daughter & know her a bit (because there were also times she was school aged, say 7 years old over the summer when I had appointments, my husband couldn't watch her, I didn't feel she was old enough to stay home alone). And my daughter was very attached/clingy. It would not have gone over too well to make her wait in the waiting room as she really liked seeing my pdoc and giving her a brief update on a major triumph from the last school year. But that's a different tangent.

Plenty of parents without MI labels have MI and aren't treated for it. Others are just bad parents. Case in point, my dad was a bad father. Does he have a labeled mental illness? No.

What really burns me up is even though my daughter is fine, I have to do a "psychological evaluation" for the CPS when I've been going to psychiatrists forever!

Very insightful post! Thank you!


WC

If I recall correctly, there are some concerns about your daughter. I understand that she's very bright and gets excellent grades. That is all highly commendable and I'm happy that you're such a great mom that you're proud of your little girl. And what a wonderful blessing it is that she's physically healthy.

You have also posted about some profound concerns you have about your daughter being possibly autistic and/or having some other developmental issues. If I remember correctly, she's not in treatment for those disorders? Forgive me if I'm wrong about that. Do you think that it might be a good idea and ultimately very helpful for T. to be assessed for autism or similar disorders?

There's one more concern I'd like to mention. You have posted about your struggle with an ED. I can only imagine the hell that must be. I am not a medical professional. Just as a mental health consumer, I am concerned about you being on Adderall at the same time you're losing weight because of your ED. Have you spoken with your pdoc about the struggles you have with the ED? If you have, has he explained to you what advantage Adderall has for you? You certainly don't have to answer my questions. I am asking them just because I'm hoping that you have some potentially important things in place when speaking with the CPS worker. Oh - and one more aspect of this I might have missed is, do you know when a worker will be visiting you again? Is there a timeline on that yet?

Yesterday was a hard day for me.

[QUOTE=tecomsin;6260582]People who would be investigating from CPS or to evaluate your mental health would be much more concerned about posts in the present rather than anything in the distant past. It isn't true that it is pointless to take any actions to protect your privacy going forward.[/QUOTE

Respectfully, none of us knows exactly what is going on, or why CPS is investigating. We only know what has been posted here on the forum. There are cases in which investigators certainly will review past online activity. Whether or not they will do that in this case is unknown to us.

I don't ever post anything about hurting my daughter or myself or things other people don't know that I've already emailed. Or texted. Or talked about with other people like my sisters. I've never said anything about doing things that would harm myself or my daughter. I have posted online about that 20 some odd years. Other people have posted a lot more disturbing things than I have.

And also, I would just like to stop rehashing this please. It doesn't do me any favors.

On a different note, CPS called and said they would be setting up the psychological assessment but didn't have a date or time. Because they can't seem to find someone outside of Houston with an appointment less than 6 weeks away, they want to do it in Houston, areas I don't like to drive to. But they did say they would send someone to pick me up and drive me to the assessment. I said fine because I want this thing over with ASAP and all I need is a panic attack from driving to the assessment to start the assessment. I told the case worker the best times for me to do it, which is basically while my daughter is in school (though whether she can get an assessment at that time, I don't know). She said she'd try. I told her I appreciated that and to please try to make me an appointment soon as this investigation is upsetting not just my husband and me but my daughter too. She said she'd do her best. And she and the booklet she gave me said they generally wrap up their investigations within 30 days, so that implies they can get an assessment done before then. It will be a huge weight off my shoulders not to be worrying about this.

What’s being “ rehashed “ ???

You have multiple threads going at once, there will be overlap of course.

Maybe start a new thread and just post in that one daily to help avoid confusion for everyone.

Just a thought of course.

Ps I still feel it’s time to suck it up and act as though this case is over for your daughters sake, if she thinks it’s over she can get a load off her shoulders , she doesn’t need the stress you and your husband can discuss things once she’s asleep. Fake it til you make it is in order.

I would avoid telling cps that this investigation is upsetting your daughter. There is no reason to lie but to volunteer information is different. Anything you say that raises questions in their minds as to your daughter's welfare is something I would try to avoid.

^^^^^^