Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
We are in the middle of a heat wave. It's
so hot, absolutely burning up, and it's weird because it's
not very sunny. And I think we just had a downpour.
Well I know we did.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
I could hear.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
It's funny, isn't it. Some rain You can't see. It's
like completely transparent. You have to look for clues. I
looked at a wet pavement. That's when I thought, well, okay,
it's raining anyway. Guys, look, I'm not here to talk
about the weather. I'm so British. I've fallen into a stereotype.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
Sorry.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
So my lovely, lovely, lovely grandson has gone as of yesterday,
and it's amazing how so much can change in a day.
So he was so miserable here, and I think mostly
it was because he was bored, but also because I
am a grandmother and very much out of practice of
(00:53):
disciplining somebody. We'd got into this terrible state where I
was just feeding him and he was just in bed
and he was so depressed. And mostly I think because
he was bored, stiff, and because he's been you know, abandoned. Obviously,
being abandoned has a very negative impact on your sense
(01:14):
of worth. And your sense of being and I just
let him play, you know, PlayStation and what have you.
Friday was because it was our last day, or Thursday,
I told him he was going. I'll tell you where
he's gone in a minute. So Thursday, I said, it's
our last day, so shall we watch a movie? Now?
Speaker 2 (01:34):
I've been asking him for a week.
Speaker 1 (01:36):
You know, he's been in bed a week at least
and hasn't really wanted to engage with me or any things.
And I don't think he's given me the cold shoulder.
I think it's just a complete lack of you know,
motivation and.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
For life.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
You know, it's so sad to watch, and that's why
I thought, no, okay, I can't. I absolutely cannot go
on like this. His mum he kept saying he wanted
to go home. I mean he wasn't you know, crying
or anything like that, but he just said, when the
opportunity arose, I really want to go home. And when
(02:13):
you hear that from a child, it's the worst thing,
isn't it. I Mean it's absolutely heartbreaking. So there's me
heartbroken and there's him heartbroken. And you know that last
night it was so lovely because the pressure was off.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
He knew he was going.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Back to Brighton the next day, and he knew where
he was going, and he was just overjoyed.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
And he I said she would watch a film.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
It's our last night, And I got a packet of biscuits,
the shortbread ones that my mum gives Hi me absolutely
adores them. And yet three quarters of the packet I
got a few so good, and it's quite bad for you.
But he's because he's he's very overweight. And while he
was eating them, he was making these noises of pure joy.
And I realized how easy it would be to become
(03:02):
a feeder, because he hasn't lost any weight since he's
been with me. I thought he had, but he's been
so inactive, and you can see weight pile on really
quickly or fall off really quickly with somebody who's only
five foot it really shows very much. So so all
(03:23):
these things I knew I was I was not. I
was failing. Not as a grandmother, I'm a very successful grandmother,
but as a as a parent, I was finding that
my parenting skills were much lacking. I'm not of this
modern world. I don't have the energy. There's a lot
of energy involved physical energy. I was trying to work.
(03:46):
He's something of a full time job in terms of
sort of going out and motivating. But the other thing
was because I didn't want to go out and buy
food for him, because it's you know, when you stop
buying food when you're out, it's really healthy, and so
he stopped wanting to go out. So you know, this
was all sort of piling on top of itself and
(04:07):
becoming I felt I was going to create a worse
situation than a better one.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
I've provided the.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
Safety for a number of weeks now out of harm's way,
which was important, but I'm certainly not the person to
be parenting him. So anyway, I my somebody. His father
got in touch with me, which was a bolt out
of the blue, and so I told him what's happening,
and I told him that I was going to take
(04:38):
him back to his mother because she wasn't prepared to
sign the relevant forms to give me temporary custody.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
And within twelve hours.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
He was, you know, legally going to his dad, and
it was just incredible the speed. Now this is because
he's a protected child, because he's on a child protection order,
they have to do things fast. Because small lives are
in danger. They told me that I couldn't take him
(05:11):
back to his mother. I'd phoned the emergency line. They said, no,
you can't, and I thought, well, that doesn't make sense.
She won't give me any care or custody, so he shouldn't.
He can't be here, you know, but through any legal
court action. So and he's desperately miserable and wants to
see her, So I don't understand why I can't take
(05:33):
her back there anyway. Fortunately, his dad, who has been
estrange for many many years, stepped in. And if that
hadn't have happened, I would have been a very very
in a very very unhappy position, because he wasn't flourishing here.
I think, you know that's the word I need to
(05:54):
use here. He hadn't been at school for months, He
had no friends, he was living with an old lady,
sleeping in an old lady's bed, in an old lady's bedroom,
with no motivation whatsoever to do anything. And the only
time he would wash and clean was if I gave
him pocket money. So you can see how this sort
(06:15):
of abbooring situation developed. And you know, I'm not saying
I should have necessarily had any support. But I would
have been a much better I'd have been in a
much better position if I'd had some support and if
he'd gone to school. Now, when he first came to
me six months ago, I said I wanted to have
(06:36):
this form signed so that I could get him into school,
and his mother refused to sign it. So this has been,
you know, going on for months and months now. And
when a child is not at school and they're not
you know that they are alone, no siblings, somebody like
myself who's trying to you know, work as well, trying
(06:58):
to juggle things, trying to you know, look after my mum.
I mean, this has been the hardest thing I've ever done.
You can look after one people person, but you can't
look after two full time.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
You just can't. It's impossible. You know, there's no downtime.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
But I'd said, you know, officially to all that listened,
if it comes to it, we'll I'll choose the child
over mum and we can sort mum out with private,
you know, somebody else. So you know, the speed at
which this was all happening was so slow that he
(07:38):
was being damaged in the process. Just day in day out,
more damage, more damage. Most of all, I think he didn't.
Of course, he loves me, I know he does deep down,
but he didn't want to be with me.
Speaker 2 (07:53):
He wanted to be with a parent.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
He was desolate having been taken away from his mother,
And of course it turns out now that he was
desolate because his father was nowhere around, and for whatever
reason that had happened, it was families and you know,
people with power not allowing it. The mother always has
the power, so you know, all of these things were
(08:20):
kind of manifesting in a very unhappy little boy. So
I took him and it was a bloody awful drive.
We had a heat wave yesterday as well, went up
to the thirties. I'm in the cars and I don't
have air con. Was so hot, and he kept going,
when are we going to be there? When are we
(08:41):
going to be there? How much longer? Eventually I gave
him the phone because I said, I can't check the phone,
and the sat Nav was on the phone. It's like
Google Maps, and he was directing me and it was
just wonderful. It doesn't know he's left and right. We
had to try and figure that out. But he said
we go round, go round, this roundabout and no, no,
don't go off that one. Off the next one, which
was fantastic. It was just so much better than Google.
(09:04):
So I thought, oh, that's really clever. She maybe let
him do that again, because he's got a wonderful sense
of pictorial imagery and syntax and single signals I suppose
from watching it from gaming. Yeah, so he's really he
was really good at that, was so impressed, and his
(09:26):
father was ringing as well.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
Every five minutes I couldn't answer, so he was answering.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
Where are you now? Where are you now? So I
hadn't even arrived in Chichester.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Where are you? I thought, God, I'm miles to go.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
And then it happened again at Arundall, and then again
at Winchester.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Sorry what worthing? And then finally we.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
Were there and they give each other a very very massive, huge,
big hug, which I never get. So I thought, oh,
I see it's like that is it? And I do think,
you know, it's absolutely incredible that this little boy feels
so much love and connection with this blood relative, this
(10:16):
blood relative parent, perhaps I should say, despite having only
met him a couple of times. You know, it's so evident. So,
you know, I've sort of come to terms with the
fact that i've you know, well, I've done the best thing.
I haven't really had to come to terms with anything,
(10:37):
but I did, Guys. I did have a cry last night.
I did have a cry because he's, you know, my
grandson's such a lovely, amazing force, and he creates such
a huge impact that when he's not there, there's this
dark chasm of empty sorrow. And I really felt it
(11:00):
last night. But I was a bit delirious because all
the decision making, all the panic, all the concern for
this desolate child who was you know, so neglected, so
so so neglected. And I would have stood up. I
would have absolutely stood up. And I was going to
actually say to the Social Services and child Protection, look,
(11:22):
I want her to sign that form and I'm not
having him before because if without the signing there is
no future. I couldn't send him to school. I couldn't really,
I'd have to give up work. I couldn't really afford
to keep him. He's very expensive, or that the lifestyle
that I, you know, I believe we need is not cheap.
(11:48):
You know, therapy and all the other things, because he
would have needed all that. She definitely needed all that,
and I couldn't get any of that, even the free stuff,
and I couldn't get him educated without her signing him over.
So this was a kind of last ditch attempt to
get her to sign these forms so anyway that she
(12:09):
I could have sent him back the night before I was.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
You know, there was no.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
Nothing to say that she had lost her right to
have her son, nothing at all. And I think that's
always important to remember. You know, until everything's signed, you
do have all the power. It's not a great situation
for the child. And if you're not putting the child first,
it's a black mark on your abilities to care for
(12:36):
another human being.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
It really is.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
You know, you have to put the child first. But
she retained all legal rights, and when you know, you
can't just go and take people's children away basically. But
as it turned out, she's happy to hand him over
to the father.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
So there we go.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
They've come to an arrangement. I think it's their co parenting,
and I think that's absolutely great for the moment. And
she's got MS, so she gets really really sick in
the future. That's that transition will be as painless as
possible at the time and really touch wood. This has
(13:20):
all turned out for the best, and of course I'm
taking absolute credit for it because because you know, I
didn't I didn't argue anything, you know, I just put
the child first. And for a very long time, I've
been the only person doing that. So yeah, I do
miss him, but yeah, I think it's I think it's
(13:42):
going to be really fantastic now in other news, because
autism and ADHD is uppermost in my mind. So my
grandson has both. My son has both. I think all
my daughters do, but they have only one has been tested.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
And my tests.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
I've got a letter from the doctor saying I had
to pick a different testing facility for the ADHD, so
I've asked for a different one, which is six weeks,
So I may get tested for that quite soon. I
thought six weeks not very long, is it?
Speaker 2 (14:17):
Anyway? There we go. That's enough.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
That's enough for now, loads of great books. By the way,
Tailtalor Club. That's all I'm doing now. I'm publishing a
chapter a day, so the Book of Immersion, go see
go see it really into the project, which is great.
But I'm going to make some music. Later, going out
for a drink with mum, will Bee
We are in the middle of a heat wave. It's
so hot, absolutely burning up, and it's weird because it's
not very sunny. And I think we just had a downpour.
Well I know we did.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
I could hear.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
It's funny, isn't it. Some rain You can't see. It's
like completely transparent. You have to look for clues. I
looked at a wet pavement. That's when I thought, well, okay,
it's raining anyway. Guys, look, I'm not here to talk
about the weather. I'm so British. I've fallen into a stereotype.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
Sorry.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
So my lovely, lovely, lovely grandson has gone as of yesterday,
and it's amazing how so much can change in a day.
So he was so miserable here, and I think mostly
it was because he was bored, but also because I
am a grandmother and very much out of practice of
(00:53):
disciplining somebody. We'd got into this terrible state where I
was just feeding him and he was just in bed
and he was so depressed. And mostly I think because
he was bored, stiff, and because he's been you know, abandoned. Obviously,
being abandoned has a very negative impact on your sense
(01:14):
of worth. And your sense of being and I just
let him play, you know, PlayStation and what have you.
Friday was because it was our last day, or Thursday,
I told him he was going. I'll tell you where
he's gone in a minute. So Thursday, I said, it's
our last day, so shall we watch a movie? Now?
Speaker 2 (01:34):
I've been asking him for a week.
Speaker 1 (01:36):
You know, he's been in bed a week at least
and hasn't really wanted to engage with me or any things.
And I don't think he's given me the cold shoulder.
I think it's just a complete lack of you know,
motivation and.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
For life.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
You know, it's so sad to watch, and that's why
I thought, no, okay, I can't. I absolutely cannot go
on like this. His mum he kept saying he wanted
to go home. I mean he wasn't you know, crying
or anything like that, but he just said, when the
opportunity arose, I really want to go home. And when
(02:13):
you hear that from a child, it's the worst thing,
isn't it. I Mean it's absolutely heartbreaking. So there's me
heartbroken and there's him heartbroken. And you know that last
night it was so lovely because the pressure was off.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
He knew he was going.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Back to Brighton the next day, and he knew where
he was going, and he was just overjoyed.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
And he I said she would watch a film.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
It's our last night, And I got a packet of biscuits,
the shortbread ones that my mum gives Hi me absolutely
adores them. And yet three quarters of the packet I
got a few so good, and it's quite bad for you.
But he's because he's he's very overweight. And while he
was eating them, he was making these noises of pure joy.
And I realized how easy it would be to become
(03:02):
a feeder, because he hasn't lost any weight since he's
been with me. I thought he had, but he's been
so inactive, and you can see weight pile on really
quickly or fall off really quickly with somebody who's only
five foot it really shows very much. So so all
(03:23):
these things I knew I was I was not. I
was failing. Not as a grandmother, I'm a very successful grandmother,
but as a as a parent, I was finding that
my parenting skills were much lacking. I'm not of this
modern world. I don't have the energy. There's a lot
of energy involved physical energy. I was trying to work.
(03:46):
He's something of a full time job in terms of
sort of going out and motivating. But the other thing
was because I didn't want to go out and buy
food for him, because it's you know, when you stop
buying food when you're out, it's really healthy, and so
he stopped wanting to go out. So you know, this
was all sort of piling on top of itself and
(04:07):
becoming I felt I was going to create a worse
situation than a better one.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
I've provided the.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
Safety for a number of weeks now out of harm's way,
which was important, but I'm certainly not the person to
be parenting him. So anyway, I my somebody. His father
got in touch with me, which was a bolt out
of the blue, and so I told him what's happening,
and I told him that I was going to take
(04:38):
him back to his mother because she wasn't prepared to
sign the relevant forms to give me temporary custody.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
And within twelve hours.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
He was, you know, legally going to his dad, and
it was just incredible the speed. Now this is because
he's a protected child, because he's on a child protection order,
they have to do things fast. Because small lives are
in danger. They told me that I couldn't take him
(05:11):
back to his mother. I'd phoned the emergency line. They said, no,
you can't, and I thought, well, that doesn't make sense.
She won't give me any care or custody, so he shouldn't.
He can't be here, you know, but through any legal
court action. So and he's desperately miserable and wants to
see her, So I don't understand why I can't take
(05:33):
her back there anyway. Fortunately, his dad, who has been
estrange for many many years, stepped in. And if that
hadn't have happened, I would have been a very very
in a very very unhappy position, because he wasn't flourishing here.
I think, you know that's the word I need to
(05:54):
use here. He hadn't been at school for months, He
had no friends, he was living with an old lady,
sleeping in an old lady's bed, in an old lady's bedroom,
with no motivation whatsoever to do anything. And the only
time he would wash and clean was if I gave
him pocket money. So you can see how this sort
(06:15):
of abbooring situation developed. And you know, I'm not saying
I should have necessarily had any support. But I would
have been a much better I'd have been in a
much better position if I'd had some support and if
he'd gone to school. Now, when he first came to
me six months ago, I said I wanted to have
(06:36):
this form signed so that I could get him into school,
and his mother refused to sign it. So this has been,
you know, going on for months and months now. And
when a child is not at school and they're not
you know that they are alone, no siblings, somebody like
myself who's trying to you know, work as well, trying
(06:58):
to juggle things, trying to you know, look after my mum.
I mean, this has been the hardest thing I've ever done.
You can look after one people person, but you can't
look after two full time.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
You just can't. It's impossible. You know, there's no downtime.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
But I'd said, you know, officially to all that listened,
if it comes to it, we'll I'll choose the child
over mum and we can sort mum out with private,
you know, somebody else. So you know, the speed at
which this was all happening was so slow that he
(07:38):
was being damaged in the process. Just day in day out,
more damage, more damage. Most of all, I think he didn't.
Of course, he loves me, I know he does deep down,
but he didn't want to be with me.
Speaker 2 (07:53):
He wanted to be with a parent.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
He was desolate having been taken away from his mother,
And of course it turns out now that he was
desolate because his father was nowhere around, and for whatever
reason that had happened, it was families and you know,
people with power not allowing it. The mother always has
the power, so you know, all of these things were
(08:20):
kind of manifesting in a very unhappy little boy. So
I took him and it was a bloody awful drive.
We had a heat wave yesterday as well, went up
to the thirties. I'm in the cars and I don't
have air con. Was so hot, and he kept going,
when are we going to be there? When are we
(08:41):
going to be there? How much longer? Eventually I gave
him the phone because I said, I can't check the phone,
and the sat Nav was on the phone. It's like
Google Maps, and he was directing me and it was
just wonderful. It doesn't know he's left and right. We
had to try and figure that out. But he said
we go round, go round, this roundabout and no, no,
don't go off that one. Off the next one, which
was fantastic. It was just so much better than Google.
(09:04):
So I thought, oh, that's really clever. She maybe let
him do that again, because he's got a wonderful sense
of pictorial imagery and syntax and single signals I suppose
from watching it from gaming. Yeah, so he's really he
was really good at that, was so impressed, and his
(09:26):
father was ringing as well.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
Every five minutes I couldn't answer, so he was answering.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
Where are you now? Where are you now? So I
hadn't even arrived in Chichester.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Where are you? I thought, God, I'm miles to go.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
And then it happened again at Arundall, and then again
at Winchester.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Sorry what worthing? And then finally we.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
Were there and they give each other a very very massive, huge,
big hug, which I never get. So I thought, oh,
I see it's like that is it? And I do think,
you know, it's absolutely incredible that this little boy feels
so much love and connection with this blood relative, this
(10:16):
blood relative parent, perhaps I should say, despite having only
met him a couple of times. You know, it's so evident. So,
you know, I've sort of come to terms with the
fact that i've you know, well, I've done the best thing.
I haven't really had to come to terms with anything,
(10:37):
but I did, Guys. I did have a cry last night.
I did have a cry because he's, you know, my
grandson's such a lovely, amazing force, and he creates such
a huge impact that when he's not there, there's this
dark chasm of empty sorrow. And I really felt it
(11:00):
last night. But I was a bit delirious because all
the decision making, all the panic, all the concern for
this desolate child who was you know, so neglected, so
so so neglected. And I would have stood up. I
would have absolutely stood up. And I was going to
actually say to the Social Services and child Protection, look,
(11:22):
I want her to sign that form and I'm not
having him before because if without the signing there is
no future. I couldn't send him to school. I couldn't really,
I'd have to give up work. I couldn't really afford
to keep him. He's very expensive, or that the lifestyle
that I, you know, I believe we need is not cheap.
(11:48):
You know, therapy and all the other things, because he
would have needed all that. She definitely needed all that,
and I couldn't get any of that, even the free stuff,
and I couldn't get him educated without her signing him over.
So this was a kind of last ditch attempt to
get her to sign these forms so anyway that she
(12:09):
I could have sent him back the night before I was.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
You know, there was no.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
Nothing to say that she had lost her right to
have her son, nothing at all. And I think that's
always important to remember. You know, until everything's signed, you
do have all the power. It's not a great situation
for the child. And if you're not putting the child first,
it's a black mark on your abilities to care for
(12:36):
another human being.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
It really is.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
You know, you have to put the child first. But
she retained all legal rights, and when you know, you
can't just go and take people's children away basically. But
as it turned out, she's happy to hand him over
to the father.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
So there we go.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
They've come to an arrangement. I think it's their co parenting,
and I think that's absolutely great for the moment. And
she's got MS, so she gets really really sick in
the future. That's that transition will be as painless as
possible at the time and really touch wood. This has
(13:20):
all turned out for the best, and of course I'm
taking absolute credit for it because because you know, I
didn't I didn't argue anything, you know, I just put
the child first. And for a very long time, I've
been the only person doing that. So yeah, I do
miss him, but yeah, I think it's I think it's
(13:42):
going to be really fantastic now in other news, because
autism and ADHD is uppermost in my mind. So my
grandson has both. My son has both. I think all
my daughters do, but they have only one has been tested.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
And my tests.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
I've got a letter from the doctor saying I had
to pick a different testing facility for the ADHD, so
I've asked for a different one, which is six weeks,
So I may get tested for that quite soon. I
thought six weeks not very long, is it?
Speaker 2 (14:17):
Anyway? There we go. That's enough.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
That's enough for now, loads of great books. By the way,
Tailtalor Club. That's all I'm doing now. I'm publishing a
chapter a day, so the Book of Immersion, go see
go see it really into the project, which is great.
But I'm going to make some music. Later, going out
for a drink with mum, will Bee
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New Heights with Jason & Travis Kelce
Football’s funniest family duo — Jason Kelce of the Philadelphia Eagles and Travis Kelce of the Kansas City Chiefs — team up to provide next-level access to life in the league as it unfolds. The two brothers and Super Bowl champions drop weekly insights about the weekly slate of games and share their INSIDE perspectives on trending NFL news and sports headlines. They also endlessly rag on each other as brothers do, chat the latest in pop culture and welcome some very popular and well-known friends to chat with them. Check out new episodes every Wednesday. Follow New Heights on the Wondery App, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to new episodes early and ad-free, and get exclusive content on Wondery+. Join Wondery+ in the Wondery App, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And join our new membership for a unique fan experience by going to the New Heights YouTube channel now!