assignment

October 13, 2013, a date my family and I will never forget. The morning of October 13th, my mom received a text message from my brother’s girlfriend. The message stated, “I need a break, come get the baby”. My mom response, “I will come get the baby when I get off work in a few hours. After my mom response, she never got a response back. She then contacted my brother and told him to go get his daughter. My brother went to the girlfriend’s house to get the baby. The girlfriend refused to let my brother get the baby. A few days before my brother and her had got into an argument. He told her that he didn’t want to be in a relationship with her anymore. After her refusing to let the baby go with him he then left before the situation escalated. Finally, my mom got off work.

Upon arriving, she heard the baby crying. She stated that the cry wasn’t a normal cry. She described the cry to be a hurtful cry. She rushed to the door to see what was going on. The door was locked, so she knocked and knocked until the door finally opened. When the door opened, the house was very dark, and the baby continued to cry loud. My mom said, the girlfriend face showed a nervous look, as if something had just happened to the baby. My mom told the girlfriend to give her the baby so she can put the baby in the car. While walking to the car, she noticed blood on the baby’s leg and a mark on her face.

My mom and dad rushed to the hospital. On the way to the hospital, my mother called my siblings and I to inform us what was going on. We all met them at the hospital. On the way to the hospital, my niece had a seizure. When they arrived at the hospital they had rushed my niece to the back immediately. My niece continued to have seizures. She had also died, and they had to bring her back to live. By then, my niece face was swollen. Her head wasn’t the normal size for a six-week-old child. The doctors stabled her, but she was still in so much pain. My niece wasn’t recognizable. Seeing her in the hospital bed having seizures and having complication was very difficult for my family and I. The doctor said she had old blood and new blood on her brain. She also had four broken ribs and both legs were broken. The bruise that was discovered on her face was a hand print, as if someone slapped her. My mother told the doctors what she discovered when she picks the baby up from her mother’s house. She told them that she thinks the mother did this to the baby.

While at the hospital, my niece mother kept calling my brother and mother phone. She had threatened to call to police and report that we had kidnapped the baby. Child protective services was called. The investigating worker reported that she had never seen an abuse like my niece. She was in critical condition and no one thought she would’ve made it out the hospital alive. The girlfriend had reported that she didn’t know what happen to the baby. She blamed my parents of doing something to the child. She claimed that the child wasn’t like that when my mother picked her up. My family and I were all under investigation, including the girlfriend. We all had to submit to urinalysis test. Everyone tested negative but my niece mother, who tested positive cocaine and marijuana. The case was under investigation, my niece had to go stay in another home. The people who she was residing with were complete strangers. We didn’t know anything about the people or where they stayed.

This incident had a big effect on my family. It affected us emotionally. My niece was the first grandchild and witnessing her go through so much pain and fighting for her life was very hard for us to watch. She couldn’t spend her first Thanksgiving and Christmas with her family. She was away from us and we were only allowed supervised visitation until the case was resolved. At the time, my mom was an owner of a home daycare. She had to take time off because every time she heard another baby cry it would take her back to the day my nieces was fighting for her live. My father was also affected emotionally. My father was the type to not show emotions. This was the first time we witnessed our father to cry. He also had to take days off work. My brother who is her father was affected the most. He blamed himself for almost a year. He blamed his self because he told his daughter mother that he didn’t want a relationship with her anymore. He thinks if he wouldn’t have told her that then she wouldn’t have taken her anger out on the child. However, that wasn’t the case. The mother had history of abusing her other kids who she doesn’t have custody of. She was known for abusing kids.

My brother had no clue that she had other kids. My brother had started to smoke marijuana to cope with the problem. He also stopped working, which lead him to stealing out the stores. He got arrested for theft and was given 2 years adult probation. My sister and I were also affected by this incident. We cried so much and tried to get a better understanding of why was she abused. We couldn’t understand how someone could abuse a child. We couldn’t understand how someone could abuse their own child the way she did. We became very angry and had negative thoughts. These thoughts were to get even. We had started to plot to hurt her. Our prayers helped my family and I get through a dark place.

It also affected us financially. The police weren’t going to proceed with the case because they claimed that it wasn’t enough evidence. This was unacceptable for my family and I. So, we hired an attorney. It cost us money, but it was worth placing her behind bars. We weren’t satisfied with the sentence she received but we got justice for my nieces.

My parents were then able to get custody of my niece. She had to go through so much therapy to be able to crawl, walk, hold a bottle, and more. She is now four years old and she is unable to do things that a four-year-old does. She can’t talk, and she’s still in pull ups. She was just recently diagnosed with traumatic brain disorder.