| Greetings in the name of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. How is everyone doing? I pray that this blog finds you all in good health and spirits. I am on extended home time which is a blessing on one hand and not on the other. It is a blessing because I get to spend more time with my family which is always a blessing and I also have been able to get more things done. On the other hand, a truck driver only makes money when the wheels are turning. The reason I am on extended home time is because rather then put my truck in the shop while on the road, I waited till I was on home time. The idea was so that the truck would be worked on while I was home and would not have me shutdown when I am trying to make money. A great idea that didn't work out so well. I was supposed to be home 6 days but my truck is still not fixed and I have been home 9 days. My dispatcher is going to have me pick up another truck on Monday. My wife and I have gotten our letter from DHS in regards to the assessment they did on us. We are now free and clear and DHS has no recommendations for us. I want to thank everyone for their prayers and concerns for my family. This isn't totally over with though. I had a long talk (2 hours) with DHS on Monday and got a lot of answers on how Child Protection Services (run by DHS in Oklahoma) works and what the laws are in Oklahoma. My concern is that DHS is wasting lots of time on reports that really doesn't need to be looked into and also by false reports made by people who just want to use the government to get at others they are mad at. I was pleased to find out that it is illegal to file a false CPS report in Oklahoma and such reports are looked into. I am disappointed to find out that DHS does waste a lot of time looking into reports that really don't need to be looked into. The reason this is a problem is because while they are working on the report made against us, a child is really being abused or neglected in another family. The child that really needs Intervention doesn't get it because time and resources are being wasted on a family where their is no problem. We need to use our resources wisely. The way this can be done is by having someone screen through the reports and see if there is any reason to check it out or if it should just be discarded. The other thing that makes it to where this isn't totally over is a new law that was passed this year. The law says that if a family gets reported to DHS three times with different complaints then the third report will be an investigation. The DHS worker tried to assure me that this will not happen to us because the reports has to be different and by different people. I explained to her that there are people who are very much against our lifestyle and our boldness that we do everything in the name of God. The last person added two lies to the report and chances are someone else is going to report us and add different lies to the report. Because of this law, my wife and I will be getting a prepaid lawyer to help us if someone does report us to DHS. This way so once we are cleared we can fight to get the reports off of our record since the reports are false. We can also have the lawyer make sure that DHS is indeed going after the people who are falsely reporting us. My next step in this is to contact my local elected officials to have some laws changed so that DHS is run more effectively and can concentrate on children who really need help. I may be starting up some petitions and I will publicize what my family went through in hopes to gain support in changing some laws. Lets face it. It is impossible to end child abuse. There are children who will die from abuse by the very people who should be protecting them. I hate to think that such terrible things happen but we must face facts. Even before I became a parent I have always said that children is our most valuable and precious resource. I wish we could take every child out of every abusive home. You can pass a law that every single parent must go through an assessment every month and children will still die from being abused by parents. Not only would children continue to be abused but you also take away peoples rights just because they are parents. The best way to help as many children as physically possible is to spend our time and resources on families where the possibility of abuse is very likely. This can be done and Oklahoma should be doing it. I will end this for now but will be writing more later on this subject. Take care and God Bless. Love, The Oklahoma Tomcat | ||
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