By Shamara Kelly, Rise, October 31, 2022
My biggest fear has always been ACS taking my kids. I have embodied trauma from when I was a child—the system broke me and my siblings apart and took us away from our mom. I wasn’t going to allow that to happen to my two kids.
As a parent, I had my share of ACS cases when I was experiencing domestic violence, but because of my childhood experiences, I don’t believe ACS could have helped. ACS actually made things worse for me because caseworkers weren’t sensitive about my needs and didn’t understand the domestic violence (DV) situation I was in.
Over time, I realized that the ACS investigations weren’t about me. My cases were accusations towards the kids’ dad—our neighbors in the shelter reported they heard him slapping me and my babies crying. Neighbors heard our cries and did not intervene, but called ACS. I wish they knew about the trauma caused when ACS and cops are called and that they could have talked to me and shared any resources they knew about instead.
Every time I got a case, the kids’ dad said it was my fault. In reality, I was the one that kept things together for my kids. I had the world on my shoulders dealing with him. I did everything for him like I was his mom.
I remember the ACS worker telling me I needed to leave him based on the reports. At one point, the worker threatened to give my kids to my mom. I felt like everyone was against me—the system, my family—not realizing the danger I was in.
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