Waiting: Fran Lyon has named her baby Molly
Posted on 11/20/2007 7:17:44 PM PST by DogByte6RER
Mother-to-be flees as social workers warn her they will take her baby away at birth
By PAUL SIMS
20th November 2007
A mother-to-be has fled her home after social workers threatened to take her baby within minutes of the birth.
Fran Lyon, 22, hopes a new local authority will take a different approach.
She insists that the mental health problems she had as a teenager - she started self-harming at 15 and has been treated at psychiatric hospitals for borderline personality disorder - are now behind her and there is no evidence she will harm her child.
Miss Lyon moved out of Hexham after receiving a copy of her "birth plan" from social services at Northumberland County Council.
It says she will be given a maximum of 15 minutes with her baby - who she has already named Molly - before she is taken into care.
She is now in the Birmingham Yardley constituency of Liberal Democrat MP John Hemming, who has taken up her case and is campaigning to overturn the decision.
Miss Lyon said she had been hounded out of her home by a "barbaric" decision and felt she had no choice but to move if she is to have any chance of keeping her baby.
She added: "It is a sad indictment of a local authority in the way they have dealt with an expectant mother who has tried to co-operate with some of the most extreme measures imaginable."
Miss Lyon said social workers fear she is likely to develop Munchausen's syndrome by proxy. The controversial condition is said to lead mothers to seek attention by harming their child or claiming it is ill.
"I have been told that I am not even to breastfeed my child in case I try to poison her," she said.
"As far as I am concerned, the birth plan is abusive and I will just not stand for it. It would leave Molly isolated from anybody who loves her from the first few minutes of her life. It is barbaric and it deprives her of a basic right."
She hopes Birmingham City Council will review the case, but admitted: "I don't know what's going to happen. It's a waiting game at the moment."
Miss Lyon became involved with social services in July after a domestic incident involving her former partner.
At a subsequent meeting, she revealed her history of mental health problems and was told they would be taking action to remove her child once she is born in January.
Munchausen's - first identified by Sir Roy Meadow during the 1970s - has been at the heart of a series of miscarriages of justice.
Sir Roy was responsible for evidence that led to the wrongful convictions of Angela Cannings and Sally Clark for murdering their children. Mrs Clark died earlier this year.
Miss Lyon has appealed for a place in a mother and baby unit so she can look after her child under supervision.
Northumberland County Council said last night: "Where a child or unborn baby is subject to a child protection plan and they move to another local authority area, responsibility would normally pass to the new authority.
"A transfer conference is arranged as soon as possible and the family and their support are usually invited to attend. The existing plan is discussed, but the new authority makes its own decisions about how to proceed.
"Northumberland County Council would make sure the new authority has all the relevant information it needs to make informed decisions."
Mr Hemming is chairman of the Justice for Families organisation and believes councils are now taking more babies to meet Government adoption targets.
He said of Miss Lyon's case: "What could be more traumatic than for a mother to have her baby taken away at birth? It's monstrous.
"That, in itself, can cause mental health problems which are then used by social services against the mother as a reason not to return the baby. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
"There has been a massive increase in younger babies being taken into care before there is even any evidence of harm."
The MP, married with four children, made headlines in 2005 when he fathered a love child after a six-year affair with his personal assistant.
Waiting: Fran Lyon has named her baby Molly
Waiting: Fran Lyon has named her baby Molly
All this fun can be yours via Universal Health Care from your Uncle Sam.
I give up
commits e-suicide
What is the cure for intrusive statist nannyism?
All this fun can be yours via Universal Health Care from your Uncle Sam.
Are you kidding? Our social services already take away babies at birth. Regularly. This is nothing new. Usually if the mother is considered too mentally ill to take care of it or if the mother has lost other children to the system.
Didn’t say the state should take the child. Just pointing out that borderlines can’t be cured.
There is NO cure for personality disorders. None.
I work with the dx on occasion. I have seen young borderlines grow up and lead terrific lives. Personally I think many young women between 12 and 24 could code as borderline but time grows them up.
Others otoh, never get better.
“...became involved with social services in July after a domestic incident involving her former partner.”
July huh? I wonder if the argument began with her partner saying something like “You’re pregnant? How could you get pregnant....? Well - you’ll just have to get an abortion then!”
Agreed. That's why we need to lock up most of Congress.
And throw in post-partum hormonal changes.....
If you're the Child Protection folks, do you take a chance? Not an easy decision. The cost of doing nothing and being wrong is a lot higher than doing something and being wrong.
Freakin great. NOW you tell me.
You don't really believe that do you?
The cost of allowing this kind of behavior on the part of non-accountable State workers will be that your grandchildren, or certainly your great-grandchildren, will be constantly under the thumbs of the State. As in the USSR.
To me, and to your grandchildren, that's a much greater cost than the state doing nothing today.
Silly me. I was merely thinking of the baby's safety.
I’m glad you realised your mistake.
Happy Thanksgiving!
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