What Would You Do? Part Two

I wanted my niece to do the right thing, to take The Newbie to a doctor, to decide that she was never going to let her mother take care of her child again. Four days had elapsed between the time the baby was injured and my aunt and I saw her and my niece had done nothing but ask her own grandmother (the abuser's mother and The Newbie's great-grandmother) whether or not she should go to the doctor. The answer was, of course, no. (We must protect the abuser at all costs. Could you be the one who turns in your own daughter or your own mother? Even if she has injured your baby?) My niece grudgingly decided that her mother couldn't be around the baby without supervision and when she informed her grandmother (the abuser's mother), her grandmother said, "Well, if there's an emergency or something, we'll have to take the baby to her."  As if it were inevitable. As if there were no other options.

My niece did tell her mother that she wasn't allowed to be around the baby unsupervised. Her response was a reasonable, "Well, I guess I don't blame you. I'd be worried if you weren't worried."

But my niece still refused to take the baby to the doctor to have her injuries looked at.

Here's what can happen when you smack a twenty-month old baby in the head: bruising, of course, dizziness, loss of consciousness, hearing loss, brain damage, death. Obviously, the baby isn't dead. But has she suffered any damage? My niece refused to face the possibility. By her reasoning, the baby didn't seem to be bothered by her bashed, bruised ears so no doctor was required. (Though the baby had, when we had lunch, been climbing under the table and had whined and cried a bit when she accidentally brushed her ear against the edge of the table.) My niece refused to acknowledge that when a child is beaten, the bruises heal but the soul does not.

I knew the baby had been abused and was suffering. I knew it was the grandmother who had done it and I suspected that it wasn't the first time. (The baby had had a black eye several months before and when I questioned my niece she had explained it away with what I had thought was a reasonable explanation and I, not having children of my own, had accepted it. Children get bruises, right? But too, the baby is also developmentally delayed--at twenty-one months is only speaking a handful of words and those only sporadically, cannot drink from a cup, and so on--and that is also a common sign of abuse.) I wanted my niece to do the right thing and take responsibility for getting medical attention for her baby. But with every passing day she was moving toward maintaining the status quo, keeping peace with her mother and her mother's family (with whom she and The Newbie live) at the expense of her child's health and well-being.

I watched, with a sinking heart, the cycle start all over again and it triggered all the memories of the times I was beaten by my father--out of sight of my mother, true--beaten with a belt for small infractions, beaten with a broom for who knows what reason, held off the ground by my hair once until my hair was pulled out and I got away.

None of my angst was helping The Newbie.

My niece decided, stated to everyone, that she was going to stand by her mother "no matter what." And that was it. She told my mother (her grandmother and The Newbie's great-grandmother) that if she had to chose, she would chose her mother. She chose her drug-abusing, child-beating mother over her own daughter.

Yesterday, when the state's child protection services came to take The Newbie, my niece's response to my family's alarmed inquiries was a selfish, "Leave me alone. No one understands what I'm going through because my child has been taken." When pressured further, she threatened us (me in particular) with police intervention and I have not had any contact with her since.

The Newbie was taken to the hospital to be examined by a doctor finally, one week after being bashed on the head at least twice by her grandmother. No one yet knows the results. At the very least, the abuse will have been documented in this instance and someone with neutral alliances will be watching over The Newbie.

The investigator has until today to decide whether or not to file a case in children's court.