Then earlier this week, Mary defended Angie was a busy-body and apologized for her earlier shameful behavior. Jude and Angie approached her later that day and told her that they would allow Mary access to Baby George again. She was allowed to babysit her grandson. Of course, Mary was given no notice so she took George with her to work, at the local florist shop.
She spent the morning covering the baby with flowers and taking pictures of him. Despite Mary's best efforts, George was increasingly fussy at the store. In fact, he ended up getting sick again and his parents ended up rushing him to the hospital for the third time in a month or so. When asked about George's health, he told Mary to stay away. Which was upsetting.
But as upset as she was and despite being a little strange, Mary had the common sense to recognize a possible sign of Baby George's illness. Could he be having some sort of allergic reaction to the flowers in the store?
Jude wasn't taking Mary's calls, so she said that she would text the theory to her son. I can't help wondering if Jude had blocked her messages because I haven't heard anything from him or Angie or the doctors about allergies to plants or to flowers or to related scents.
But Mary learned that other people were being allowed to visit Baby George so she took it upon herself to visit her grandson in his room -- and he had another reaction shortly after her arrival!
This was enough for Angie to decide that Mary was purposely making Baby George sick. Somehow. So, the hospital hooked Angie and Jude up with the hospital social worker and they immediately filed a complaint against Mary!
And just to clarify a point, they made this decision to contact social services before Mary ever visited Baby George at the hospital. That medical setback was just the final slice of cake.
I understand that there are some people who purposely harm children in order to gain sympathy and attention. And I understand that hospitals sometimes report people to social services in those instances. But my experience is that they don't just into "report mode" this quickly unless they have some pretty convincing evidence. Which they really don't have here.
I mean, what exactly is Mary supposed to be doing to purposely make Baby George ill? How is she making him feverish? Or causing breathing spells? It really makes no sense to me.
Worse yet, social services took the report seriously and called in the police, who promptly visited Mary at her home. They asked her a bunch of vague questions and then told her to stay away from Baby George and his parents.
I always hear about Britain's stressed economy. And I understand that this is happening in a fictional world. But I can't help but wonder if social services is truly contacted regularly for this type of thing -- and wonder if this type of knee-jerk reporting process helps contribute to the UK's overwhelmed social services network
Anyway, George's parents and the hospital would probably be more effective with tracking down the source of his illness -- if they truly believe that Mary is the source of it -- by actually talking to her and working with her to track her movements than they have been by simply reporting her to social services!