WHEN mum Jill Goss visited a GP for a routine appointment to check a swelling on her baby daughter's arm, she thought she'd be home with her ten-week-old in a few hours.

But after an unimaginable sequence of events, her child was taken from her forever and she was thrust into a living nightmare.

The mum-of-two is one of tens of thousands of parents who have had their children seized by social services using secretive court care orders.

Parents up and down the country are facing agonising court battles each year against councils who are removing children in record numbers.

Jill, who has not seen her daughter since she was taken by social services and adopted in 2012, said: "I think about her every day.

"On her birthday some years we have let off balloon lanterns for her birthday or lit a candle.

"I've also got a memory book so I put things in there. But once she turns 18 I will do everything I can to try and find her."

Campaigners and judges have warned of strong-arm tactics by social services who hide under a cloak of secrecy granted by the courts.

Devastated families are being torn apart with thousands of children under the age of one alone taken from parents each year - many of those removed after birth from hospital wards.

The Sun can reveal children taken through forced court care orders rocketed by a shocking 34 per cent from 7,550 to 10,130 last year.