Confusing Henry

I’m also quite cross about this storyline because it’s making me dislike Pat and Helen even more. They’re already annoying, virtue-signalling, do-gooders without this kind of thing making them worse in my eyes.

And Pat letting it slip that Helen wants to raise her boys to be less hetereo-normative and more gender neutral just adds to my irritation.

Also, why did they mention Kaz/Caz this week? To emphasise the fact that Helen pretty much abandoned her once she was out of prison?

So much for being liberal, “right on” and socially conscious, Helen!

The other thing that occurs to me is that Henry must be a little confused that Rob isn’t around. In my dealings with court cases involving “horrible/violent” dads you can do more harm than good by trying to “erase” all traces of a “bad” parent. It’s often true that those professionally involved in child care law and psychology maintain that a child needs to understand his/her identity and life story and therefore needs to know about the absent parent. Rob has largely been forgotten already. Thankfully, yes, because it serves the drama to do so. But what will happen as Jack grows older?

Helen seems to have made a remarkable recovery from her trauma at the hands of Rob compared to a lot of the women I have as clients. She has blithely returned to cheese-making without a hint of reliving her difficulties or having any sort of intrusive, distressing thoughts or flashbacks. Odd, considering that she was not exactly the most robust character to begin with … I’d fully expect her to have some sort of depression or anxiety and need time to cope with some sort of setback.

It would be better to shelve her completely rather than allow her and Pat to take centre stage with their charitable works.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 3 months ago by Miss Mid-City.