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Jani Schofield's parents are divorcing


mstee

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I can't say I'm surprised to hear this news. I think anyone under their amount of stress would have a hard time keeping a marriage alive. I am surprised that the father had an affair, though. Where did he find the time? Also, his words on the divorce felt cold, especially when he mentioned the kids. He talks about not being into entertaining Jani anymore and not relating to his son. I guess it's honest, but just sounded a little too honest. Although, if I remember correctly, there was some drama surrounding him that he admitted to shaking Jani as a baby? Not sure. Anyways, here's a link:

 

http://starcasm.net/archives/322429

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I can't say I'm surprised to hear this news. I think anyone under their amount of stress would have a hard time keeping a marriage alive. I am surprised that the father had an affair, though. Where did he find the time? Also, his words on the divorce felt cold, especially when he mentioned the kids. He talks about not being into entertaining Jani anymore and not relating to his son. I guess it's honest, but just sounded a little too honest. Although, if I remember correctly, there was some drama surrounding him that he admitted to shaking Jani as a baby? Not sure. Anyways, here's a link:

http://starcasm.net/archives/322429

Can't say I'm surprised either. Didn't they even live in separate apartments at one point? God their lives must be stressful.

Also, if both children have paranoid schizophrenia, it seems odd to me that neither parent has it. Does anyone know if any of the grandparents were afflicted?

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I watched most of their specials and didn't have a strong opinion about the family. I was mostly just interested by the idea of such a young child being diagnosed schizophrenic. A few months ago I found the GOMI thread about Michael's blog (which I had never read or heard of) and was definitely interested in what was said there and observations of some GOMIers. The thread is worth checking out (even if you hate GOMI) since there's good discussion of the specials and blog content.

getoffmyinternets.net/forums/mommy-bloggers/janis-journey/

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Can't say I'm surprised either. Didn't they even live in separate apartments at one point? God their lives must be stressful.

Also, if both children have paranoid schizophrenia, it seems odd to me that neither parent has it. Does anyone know if any of the grandparents were afflicted?

I believe his mother had Schizophrenia.

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I followed their specials, too. Spirit bless 'em. I can't even begin to fathom how they kept it together for so long. Managing each of the children's needs was a full-time job. I wonder if the children & marriage would have been better served if the children lived in a facility or each had their own aide.

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A lot of people think these parents wanted a diagnosis of schizophrenia for the children for whatever reason - I can't see why they would, unless it's a Munchausens type of scenario. There's a bit of a cloud over them I believe, with Michael admitting in his book that he had hit Jani and kept food from her, and also some accusations of funds going missing from the charitable organisation they set up - the Jani Foundation. I don't know whats true or not, and can't find links atm, so feel free to take it all with a grain of salt.

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In Michael's own words:

"once when I was giving her a bath I had...This is hard to write... I had inserted my finger inside the washcloth into her vagina."

"She was two months old. I shook a two month old infant, screaming at her "WHY WON'T YOU SLEEP!" She screamed harder"

“There have been times when I dosed Jani with Benadryl to knock her out. By the way, we are not talking children’s Benadryl. We are talking the adult dose. 25 mg per pill.â€

"Hitting her back (I won't tell you how many people told us that all she needed was a good beating). We took all her toys away. We gave her toys away. We tried starving her. We did EVERYTHING we could to try and break her. Nothing worked."

"Susan and I both lost it and hit Jani as hard as we could. We hit in impotent rage."

* All quotes are from his blog and book.

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OMFG WTH??? Why isn't this monster in prison? He admitted to molesting and physically abusing his daughter.

I need to go throw up now.

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In Michael's own words:

* All quotes are from his blog and book.

Well, that's horrifying. Even more horrifying is the fact that he's admitting all this as if it's somehow understandable because his daughter was so difficult.

And what the actual fuck is up with the first one?! Is there any context for that? Did he see it as some sort of punishment or did he think it was needed to properly clean the baby or did he just give no explanation for it?

EDIT: Oh, and maybe a part of the reason she struggles so much is because she was abused since birth...

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Well, that's horrifying. Even more horrifying is the fact that he's admitting all this as if it's somehow understandable because his daughter was so difficult.

And what the actual fuck is up with the first one?! Is there any context for that? Did he see it as some sort of punishment or did he think it was needed to properly clean the baby or did he just give no explanation for it?

EDIT: Oh, and maybe a part of the reason she struggles so much is because she was abused since birth...

I am really, really disturbed by the first one. Don't get me wrong, the hitting is incredibly disturbing as well, but something that I can imagine happens when parents are stressed and unsupported (perhaps an indicator that going into an assisted living facility might have been better?).

But the first one, um, what the hell does that have to do with your daughter's condition or your stress? Sounds like he's got some mental health problems himself. I doubt it had to do with having to properly clean the baby, in which case he wouldn't write about it with such shame.

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Yeah, I'm reading the GOMI thread and I'm fucking horrified. This child has been physically abused since she was an infant, and we are supposed to see these fucking parents as suffering heroes, soldiering on for the good of their children?!

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Yeah, I'm reading the GOMI thread and I'm fucking horrified. This child has been physically abused since she was an infant, and we are supposed to see these fucking parents as suffering heroes, soldiering on for the good of their children?!

Me too. I just can't believe this.

And these parents going on and on in interviews about the sacrifices they are making so their daughter never has to go to inpatient care. Inpatient care sounds a lot better than this shit show!

(He pushed his wife out of a moving car??? And that Facebook post about readers donating? My jaw is on the floor.)

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I haven't read the GOMI thread yet, but there have been rumors and discussion about the Schofields and Munchausen by proxy for years.

I haven't followed it closely, but here is one discussion from last year with "insider info" worthy of "Alice and "Concerned Mom." disqus.com/by/nochildabused/ Also see the Amazon discussion.

There are other discussions on more legitimate psych. sites. A lot of people question Jani's dx and wonder whether she is just on the autism spectrum. Although god only knows what mega doses of anti-psychotics have done to her over the years.

I have always found both parents really creepy.

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Yikes! After reading the GOMI- I actually think these kids would be better not being in the full time care of their parents.

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Wow. I can't believe he admitted to doing those things- especially that bath time incident. Even worse than I thought.

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I remember seeing them on TV and feeling very bad for them. I had no idea about the abuse.

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Got his book from the library and read it a couple of years ago. The whole thing struck me as a grotesque and skeevy PR effort.

Any sympathy I might have had for either of the adults vanished when I read that he & his wife decided to have a second child. I do feel sorry for the kids who didn't ask to be brought into this maelstrom.

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What the father is admitting to is horrifying and disgusting beyond words. That man should be in jail. What a POS. The parents keep priding themselves on the fact they their children haven't had to live in an inpatient facility. It seems like in this case that would have been what's best for them.

I'm not surprised about their divorce though, as nausica said they lived in separate apartments for a while. From the documentary I saw it sounded as though they never got to spend time alone or any nights together.

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Well, that's horrifying. Even more horrifying is the fact that he's admitting all this as if it's somehow understandable because his daughter was so difficult.

And what the actual fuck is up with the first one?! Is there any context for that? Did he see it as some sort of punishment or did he think it was needed to properly clean the baby or did he just give no explanation for it?

EDIT: Oh, and maybe a part of the reason she struggles so much is because she was abused since birth...

Context: He'd taken over bathtime duties and said he was doing it to clean her when a nurse confronted him about it (and I think reported him, too).

They are monstrous people, imo.

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Context: He'd taken over bathtime duties and said he was doing it to clean her when a nurse confronted him about it (and I think reported him, too).

They are monstrous people, imo.

...yeah, these are monstrous people.

I don't know enough about schizophrenia to knowledgeably doubt the diagnosis (though it seems that plenty of people who are familiar with the subject doubt it), but I can't imagine that whatever-her-diagnosis-should-be would be nearly as bad if she hadn't been subjected to physical and, it appears, sexual abuse.

Horrible.

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OMFG WTH??? Why isn't this monster in prison? He admitted to molesting and physically abusing his daughter.

I need to go throw up now.

IKR! :censor2: Vile, disgusting monsters. My spirit hurts for those children. I feel duped. Now, I want to wring those sorry-excuse-for-human-beings' necks.

Was this blog public? Where were these children's advocates?

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This is all so horrible! I watched 2 specials about this family and just felt horrible for them all. I couldn't believe it when their second child was showing the same symptoms as Jani but worse and more violent. Abuse?! Those poor babies! :shock:

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Not surprised. I read his book. He basically told his wife to leave with their son and he'd take care of Jani since no one else could like him. He also took a massive overdose of antidepressants and tried to kill himself.

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I never heard of these people until earlier today, and I have fallen down the rabbit hole! I downloaded the book and I've also been reading the GOMI thread and a handful of links from both threads. Those poor poor children (with such awful parents)... its really heartbreaking. Send the rescue ferrets, please.

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The book is worth a read. I have it. And he DOES shake her as an infant.

I feel bad for Jani. I hope she can work through the divorce.

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