My daughter was an addict so I took in four of her children

We live on a hilltop in the countryside; just look through any window and you can see the countryside sprawling out like a mercurial green carpet between the grooves of deep valleys. The sound of animals is all around. I escaped to this place from the noxious atmosphere of the city last year, fleeing along with my husband and three grandchildren. But it wasn’t the urban pollution we were leaving behind – the toxicity came from my daughter.

The seeds of our move were sown six years ago. I had taken six months off work to help my daughter cope with her children because she was in an abusive relationship. During that time, I worked with social services to keep the children safe; I was a point of contact for any problems. When my daughter became involved in a domestic dispute on a public pavement, the authorities called and asked if I could go and help take care of my three-month-old granddaughter, Donna. I arrived to find Donna strapped into the car wearing nothing but her nappy – no milk bottle, no water. As I scooped her up, my daughter hurled abuse at me, calling me all sorts of horrendous names. She was bundled in to the back of a police van, kicking and screaming like an animal, her face red with rage – I could still hear her cursing as they drove her away.

I felt a sense of disconnection, as if she had been dislodged from me. I found her behaviour repugnant; she wasn’t my daughter. I had given birth to a caring, loving child – but the woman I saw was the devil.

I remember walking around the supermarket immediately afterwards with my granddaughter, people staring and wondering why she was wearing nothing but a nappy. I frantically bought baby clothes and toys: it was as though I had just kidnapped a child. Of course she was my granddaughter and I loved her, and part of her belonged to me – but not like this; thrown into my arms because my daughter couldn’t be a mother.

Next, I picked up my two grandsons from school and nursery – Simon, six, and Gary, three. The need to care and protect overtook any angry feelings I had for my daughter. That evening, two police officers, two people from child protection and a social worker came to our home. They told me my daughter wanted the children taken away from me. This was unfathomable to me. I used to look after the children most weekends anyway; why would she want them to leave when both she and they needed me most? The social worker told me my daughter was a heroin addict and this was her way of lashing out. They explained that they would now be removing the children to place them separately in foster care. I pleaded with them not to, and they agreed for me to have temporary custody.

The phrase “drug addict” didn’t feel right being uttered in my house; a small, homely bungalow where my second husband and I lived, a place of domesticity that echoed with the voices of small children every weekend. I couldn’t see how it could describe my daughter. “But she’s got nice teeth and shiny hair,” I said. That’s when another emotion entered me, one that has never left: guilt. How could I not have known she was an addict? How did I miss the signs?

Even though the news was a shock, it helped me in a small way. Knowing this about her took the blame away from her and laid it with drugs. She had my genes, I loved her and I wouldn’t give up on her.

We had to go to court numerous times to get temporary fostering responsibility while my daughter was awaiting trial for numerous offences. Then, after 11 months, my daughter had a fourth child, Chris, who we took in at nine days old. Social services supported us when we went for special guardianship. This time my daughter was in agreement that we should look after the children until they were 18.

But we struggled to cope with the young children in our bungalow and I had to give up my job. Donna, whom I had rescued from the car, was especially hard to deal with; she would not sleep, and screamed until she gave herself a double hernia. Out of that came the body blow – it turned out she was having heroin withdrawal symptoms. She was going cold turkey. Her sinister screams were a result of my daughter’s drug-taking during pregnancy. When the doctor told me, I threw up in his consulting room. I hated my daughter.

Over the following years, I tried to get her to be the mother she could be. But when the kids visited her, she was never equipped for them; as if she couldn’t be bothered with the inconvenience of having them. Each time I dropped them off I had to make sure I took all the things the children would need: food, toys and clothes. She would make up excuses not to see them; she’d have a headache or simply say the kids were too naughty for her. She would tell Donna that she never wanted a girl, only boys. I could never draw any maternal instinct from her, no matter how hard I tried. Now I think it didn’t exist in her: the mother part of her was dormant.

My daughter ended up in prison for offences that included fraud, burglary and shoplifting. The breaking point – and the moment I knew we had to move out of the city to get away from her – arrived when she came out of prison and announced she was pregnant for a fifth time. I couldn’t cope with the shame and anger I felt towards her then. I could no longer come up with inventive answers when my grandchildren asked why Mummy could have another baby, when she didn’t want them. I could no longer deal with bumping into my daughter when my grandkids and I went to the supermarket, the way they would run down different aisles trying to avoid their mother. I had to cut links with my daughter; she felt too far gone for me to reach her.

The priority became survival. We decided to move to the country to formalise the break. From now on, the only contact between my daughter and us would be through social services.

We arrived in the countryside when the children were 13, 10, six and five. It welcomed us with open arms. Looking back, our city life felt like barbed wire, while here we quickly adapted to the soft, mutable rhythms of nature. The oldest, Simon, decided to go and live with his father, and the youngest baby also lives with his own father; so we now have Gary, Donna and Chris with us.

We’re trying to be self-sufficient on our smallholding. This is an attempt for us all to feel we have control, when for so long we had none. People think I’m strong, but there are times I wish I could scream from the top of the hills that surround us: “Why me?” My daughter took away my choices.

My second husband didn’t want children, but now we are raising a young family, and I feel as if I’ve gone back 30 years. It doesn’t feel right that I’m back at the school gates. We had plans to travel the world, but they’ve been taken away. I feel betrayed by my own daughter.

The future will be difficult. Two of my grandchildren will have lifelong problems because of my daughter’s drug habit. We pushed for counselling for all the children, who needed more than my husband and I could give them. But the hills that I wanted to scream from have now become the hills that I go horseriding on. It’s where I feel free. The air is cleaner up here. I can finally breathe.

All names have been changed