Mia (Baby aged 2 months, Finland)

Introduction

At the time of the accusations, I was 35 years old, and my partner was 38. I work in Human Resources, while he is involved in the music industry. Our family consists only of us and our child. We reside in Finland.

Pregnancy and Birth

Our pregnancy and birth were without complications, and it was a natural delivery. Our baby was born at 39+1 weeks with normal weight, height, and head circumference. However, our baby’s weight dropped slightly during the first days at the maternity ward due to difficulty latching onto the breast for feeding. The situation improved once I started using a breast pump and bottle-feeding our baby. At home, we continued practicing breastfeeding but primarily fed our baby from a bottle. Our baby slept well and did not cry excessively. Family members visited frequently, but only my partner and I cared for our baby.

The Day Everything Changed

My partner was alone with the baby when he put the baby to sleep on the baby’s back after feeding from a bottle. Soon afterward, he noticed milk coming out of our baby’s mouth and nose. Our baby appeared limp, so he thought the baby had choked on regurgitated milk. He patted the baby’s back and pressed on the baby’s chest until our baby regained consciousness and began crying. To ensure the nasal passages were clear, he used a baby nasal aspirator. Our baby seemed fine afterward, so we did not consider taking the baby to the emergency room immediately but monitored our baby closely.

The next day, our baby appeared normal, and we had a quick vaccine appointment where there was no time for additional consultations. Afterward, our baby seemed sleepier than usual, and in the evening, we suspected a fever might have developed as a reaction to the vaccination. We did not have an accurate thermometer for infants but read about infant fevers and their symptoms, including harmless febrile seizures.

During the night, I observed two short seizures and assumed they were febrile seizures based on what we had just learned. The following morning, noticing another seizure, we went to the emergency room to confirm if these were indeed harmless febrile seizures and whether our baby’s fever required special treatment. We also mentioned the earlier choking incident. At the hospital, our baby experienced a more serious seizure, shocking us.

When the Diagnosis Was Made

Doctors conducted an ultrasound, CT, and MRI of our baby’s head, as well as full-body scans, and examined the baby’s eyes. Initially, they informed us about a subdural hematoma. That day, police arrived at the hospital to investigate possible neglect without prior notice. We were separated for questioning.

The next day, doctors explained that based on their findings, our baby had been violently shaken multiple times, denying any other explanations. This was when we realized they would accuse us of harming our child.

On the fourth day in the hospital, a meeting with doctors and child protection services confirmed there was no explanation for our baby’s injuries except abuse, making us “clients” of child protection services. Despite our insistence that we had not harmed our child and presenting studies questioning the reliability of shaken baby syndrome theory, their responses were evasive. The social worker assured us that the hospital’s doctors are experts in the field and have seen similar cases where parents later confessed to shaking their babies. We felt they did not believe our claims of innocence.

During that meeting, we were already close to the correct diagnosis ourselves. We asked the doctors whether the injuries could be related to birth, as we had read that retinal hemorrhages and subdural hematomas can occur during delivery and develop into chronic hygroma. They denied this possibility, stating that birth wouldn’t cause contusions or hypoxic-ischemic injuries. However, it was later confirmed by three independent radiologists that there were no contusions at all, and the hypoxic-ischemic injuries were actually ischemic injuries caused by clots and brain infarction (complication from BESS/chronic hygroma). We also realized later that the doctors present in the meeting weren’t radiologists or neurosurgeons, nor even responsible for our baby’s care. This explained why they struggled to answer our questions.

One morning, after we had already been in custody, the hospital’s social worker came to wake me up and question me. She asked whether there was violence in our relationship and whether we suspected each other of harming the child. She suggested that it takes very little—just one or two shakes when parents are tired—to cause these injuries. She mentioned that other parents had confessed, admitting they would never have believed they were capable of such actions, and told me it was better to confess so we could move on. I repeatedly stated that nothing like that had ever happened and that our relationship was good. Eventually, she gave up and left.

The first days were extremely hard mentally; everything felt surreal. I cried a lot. When informed about the severe and extensive brain injuries our baby had suffered, I was devastated and imagined our child would be permanently disabled. My partner wasn’t at the hospital at that moment as he had to work out of town, but I had a relative with me for support. I was nearly hysterical. Once I reached my partner, I calmed down because he was more logical and steadier than me. He immediately pointed out that what the doctors claimed didn’t make sense: such force would have also injured the baby’s neck. Later that evening, he called again to tell me he had been researching the subject and found that the doctors’ claims were nonsense. That conversation shifted my perspective. Until then, I had felt paralyzed, but after that call, I began taking action and doing my own research. From the beginning, my partner played a huge role in keeping us functioning. It was easier to stay sane when we had a mission: to prove the doctors wrong. Even though things became mentally easier once we started making sense of the situation, it was still very hard to stay in the hospital knowing that the doctors and nurses believed we had abused our child.

During our research, we found a study describing the same symptoms as our baby had. We contacted the researchers, and one referred our case to a colleague who immediately suspected BESS/chronic hygroma. Eventually, we received reports from five independent experts confirming this diagnosis: our baby had BESS/chronic hygroma complicated by subdural hematoma, clots, and brain infarction. All of them agreed there were no contusions and no signs of trauma. Fortunately, our child has recovered well and so far seems to be developing like any other child.

Inside the Legal System

On the very first day at the hospital, the police questioned us, and six days later they took us into custody for further questioning. I was held for two days, and my partner for three. They confiscated all our phones and laptops to search them.

Although we were allowed to stay with our child in the hospital, when our child was ready to be discharged, we were told our child would be placed in an emergency foster home with strangers. We had asked to be placed under 24-hour supervision together with our child, but this request was denied. They also refused to assess our immediate family network, even though Finnish laws require relatives to be considered first. We had already made it clear that if our child had to be separated from us, we wanted our child placed with family.

All of this was done despite the police finding no evidence of abuse beyond the Finnish doctors’ claims. The authorities spoke as if they already believed we had abused our baby. Instead of talking about suspected abuse, they called it abuse outright and wrote about “repeated traumatic events” our child had experienced.

It took seven months until our child was finally moved to live with a relative. The first family had only been meant for emergency placement, and once the child protection services decided on taking our child into care, they looked for a long-term placement. In the meantime, our contact was restricted to one supervised two-hour visit per week. We were even excluded from our child’s frequent medical appointments.

We Faced Unfair Accusations

We appealed every decision to the administrative court, but nothing changed. The system felt broken: online forums suggested that courts almost always side with social workers, and that was exactly what we experienced. At the custody hearing, we were not allowed witnesses, and although the social workers could not answer the judges’ questions, the custody order still went through. It all felt like a staged process where our actions made no difference.

Our social workers never tried to understand us; they only met with us to impose new restrictions. They admitted that all child health clinic visits had gone well, that our background showed no signs of violence, and that supervised reports described us as gentle and caring parents. Yet they still insisted on taking our child into care and imposing strict rules. It was clear they were waiting for the police and prosecutor rather than conducting their own assessment, even though it is legally required.

At times, they even lied. They claimed some restrictions were based on requests from my relative who was taking care of our baby, which turned out not to be true. They also tried to stop us from bringing breast milk to our baby, saying it caused problems. When I questioned this, a social worker altered an old memo to support her story. We have screenshots before and after the alteration.

Meanwhile, during the preliminary investigation, we submitted a statement to the police with references to dozens of studies challenging the claims of Finnish doctors and the shaken baby syndrome theory. We attached five expert medical statements, all concluding that the Finnish doctors had made errors and that there was no evidence of trauma. These were sent to a forensic pathologist who ignored most of our points and those raised by the experts. He admitted there is controversy around SBS and even said he could not confirm whether our child had BESS/chronic hygroma because he was not qualified to interpret head scans—yet he still concluded that abuse was more likely. The police accepted his opinion and forwarded the case to the prosecutor. We responded with a final statement pointing out the inconsistencies and weaknesses in the forensic report. After that, we simply had to wait to see whether the prosecutor would press charges. Nearly ten months after everything began, the supervised meetings were finally lifted. We were then allowed one weekly visit at my relative’s home for up to six hours. Around the same time, the social workers were replaced, and shortly afterward, the visits increased so that our child could also come to our own home once a week. The new social workers began an assessment of us, and as everything was going well, they increased our child’s visits at our home and told us that the goal was to reunite our family.

Fourteen months after the start of the preliminary investigation, the prosecutor finally decided not to press charges. After that, the social workers accelerated our child’s reintegration plan, and our child was soon able to return home. Our baby has now lived at home for several months, and we no longer have to deal with child protection services.

Living Under Suspicion

All of this had a significant impact on our relatives and friends. In particular, our family members were very sad, angry, and stressed. Everyone’s trust in the authorities has been shaken.

The financial impact has been substantial. This case completely destroyed my partner’s career, resulting in a direct financial loss of tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of euros. We also lost all family-related financial benefits and had to use our savings just to cover living expenses. In addition, we have had to spend thousands of euros on lawyers and other costs. Although our relationship has not been severely damaged and in some sense it has even become stronger, the situation has naturally caused stress and created challenges that would not otherwise exist, so it has not been easy.

Even though we got our child back, we remain angry at the doctors, the police, and the child protection workers for the unfair treatment we have faced and for the fact that, because of them, we lost more than a year of our child’s life. I am heartbroken that our child was separated from us and moved from one family to another. Even though our child is still very young, I worry about the psychological effects this could have.

What helped me cope under the suspicion was the belief that things will eventually be resolved. I knew we couldn’t be legally convicted—we had such strong evidence in our favor. My main concern was simply how long the process would take, because of course I wanted our child back home as soon as possible.

For consistency across testimonies, this text may have been slightly edited or translated by artificial intelligence. If you notice any error or inconsistency, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

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