Opinions on this please

[How to communicate after a contentious divorce...]

Hi

Ongoing issues related difficulties in shared/parallel parenting.  I'm slowly working towards spending more time with Son (see my posts from last year.  Mum is not keen for any extension, no holiday time yet etc, won't budge, Son is 4.5 yrs.

Today he was on the toilet, chit chatting away to himself (as they do) while I was hanging washing, he didn't realise I could hear him when I walked by.

He said "Mummy's house is my only real house, not daddy's, I don't live here and I was born at mummy's house".  (He was born in hospital, I was there)

Just wondering if anyone considers this to be quite a complex sentence/issue for a child this age to speak about in such a way?  I'm not a child psychologist, but anyone out there that may have insight, would welcome the opinion.

This is in the setting of Mum stating there can be no more additional time between Son & I because our Son would miss his Mum & half-sister too much.  No other reason given.

Currently have my Son alternate weekends Friday post Kinder - Sunday 14:30, she refuses to extend to 5pm, says it will not happen.

Obviously I'll be applying to court again soon, ho-hum, but any thoughts would be appreciated, particularly in terms of child developmental stages, ability to grasp, understand and repeat complex sentences etc...

Cheers

[jp617251]

Hi

Ongoing issues related difficulties in shared/parallel parenting.  I'm slowly working towards spending more time with Son (see my posts from last year.  Mum is not keen for any extension, no holiday time yet etc, won't budge, Son is 4.5 yrs.

Today he was on the toilet, chit chatting away to himself (as they do) while I was hanging washing, he didn't realise I could hear him when I walked by.

He said "Mummy's house is my only real house, not daddy's, I don't live here and I was born at mummy's house".  (He was born in hospital, I was there)

Just wondering if anyone considers this to be quite a complex sentence/issue for a child this age to speak about in such a way?  I'm not a child psychologist, but anyone out there that may have insight, would welcome the opinion.

This is in the setting of Mum stating there can be no more additional time between Son & I because our Son would miss his Mum & half-sister too much.  No other reason given.

Currently have my Son alternate weekends Friday post Kinder - Sunday 14:30, she refuses to extend to 5pm, says it will not happen.

Obviously I'll be applying to court again soon, ho-hum, but any thoughts would be appreciated, particularly in terms of child developmental stages, ability to grasp, understand and repeat complex sentences etc...

Cheers

[david]

Obviously mom is putting thoughts in his head. At 4.5 you can probably help him understand things clearer. I learned that listening to our boys when they told me something directly and validating their thoughts and feelings worked best. It is a process and not a single solution.
Eventually our boys learned that they could talk to me about anything and feel safe. If they talked to mom about things they never knew what she would do or say. They learned to stay quiet around her because of that.
Document the things you can so you can present such things in court. Keeping a journal with dates, etc may be helpful.
You could talk to him about when he was born and how you were in the hospital without saying anything about what you heard. Do you have pictures ? You can sit down and show him pictures of the wonderful moment he was born and tell him how happy you were.

[jp617251]

Hi David

Thanks for the reply, your suggestions are exactly what I did actually so its reassuring to hear your comments.  I know its a very tricky area to be in when thoughts/ideas are placed into a childs heads, just suggesting this happens can be fragile ground in the family court setting I think.  Your advice is great as it is focused on looking after the child first, which I totally agree with.

Cheers

[david]

When I first started this I was very careful not to show my hand with ex.
Example- say I showed them pictures of the hospital and their birth. If the boys told ex about it she would probably get nasty with them. In the beginning they didn't say anything to me about it. Eventually they opened up and told me of things that happened when mom got mad about something. I listened and validated. I never addressed it with ex. If she emailed me about it I probably would not reply. No matter what I would say she would twist it in someway to find fault in what I did. I saw no point to that. If she brought it up in court I would simply say I show them all kinds of pictures, births, birthdays, holidays, etc. and leave it at that.
It's a normal parent child thing to do and that is how I would treat it. Let her make it an issue in court and she will show the judge who the problem is.
I actually made a framed bunch of pictures of things we did together over the years one Christmas. I thought it would be something they could put in their rooms. They both decided to take it to their moms and put it in their rooms there. I honestly didn't think of that scenario.  She wasn't happy about that but the boys refused to bring them back to my place. They were around 8 and 12 at the time. I don't think they would have done that when they were younger.
They actually started bringing things they valued over to my place to leave because they insisted their mom takes their things, denies it, and much later they find it right where they put it before. I am talking weeks to months later. They found a solution.

[livednlearned]

Hi jp617251,

It sounds like classic parental alienation. There will be more like this, and it won't always come to the surface where you can address it directly.

Have you read anything by Dr. Craig Childress? He offers a theory as to why BPD parents are prone to alienation tactics. And if you haven't already, it might be a good idea to read Divorce Poison by Richard Warshak. Bill Eddy's Don't Alienate the Kids is also excellent. The last two offer how-to tips that are very helpful in counteracting the alienation.

Dealing with parental alienation requires some counter-intuitive skills so most of us have to learn from the pros how to offset what can amount to a kind of brainwashing.

It's good that you are catching this when your son is young. I didn't learn about all this until my son was 10 and was able to undo some of the damage. Starting earlier would've been even better, like you are doing with your son.

LnL

[mswho]

When my son was about that age he used to refuse going to daddy's. He used to cry and hold the door handles not to go to daddy's. Those times were such heartbreaking for both side.

But to be honest:

I have never told my son about his dad any negative things. I always supported his father and his rules on him. But still it took him almost another 4 years to go to daddy's without crying or a problem. He is 9 now and he still says (well actually only yesterday right before the sleep after coming back from his daddy he told me that) he wants to spend more time in this house and less in his daddy's. He says this (mommy's) house is his real one. Daddy's house is only for a day night. And our custody says every july dad has a right to take him full month and my son is now all freaked out about it. I told him he could go to daddy's country and finally meet the other side of the family and it would be very excited. he wasn't interested. I told him how great it would be if those two take a long trip together to daddy's country like man to man, he wasn't interested. After all he said: Mom I love you. I love my daddy too but I wanna be with you more. Oh well, What could I say more? I kissed him good night and he fell asleep.

The more years pass by the more they grow and the more they grow the more they will see the picture I guess...

peace...

In addition to this,
I realised whenever he comes from his dad he was all negative and giving me attitude. It took me to talk to him and find out about it couple of years that it was his father whenever our son visits him, he would talk about me like saying that "your mother is a lier, she is full of hate etc etc"
Because of not being able to talk to his father (or most likely he was too scared to tell his father to stop talking about mommy) he used to come with attitude and it used to take 2 freaking weeks to calm my son down. then again daddy time! so... .Now he is aware of everything. He sees me I am not talking any negative about his daddy he feels peace next to me. and that is why he still doesn't wanna spend more time with his dad that's what he says... .(he is still scared of his daddy to say stop I don't wanna hear all this)

[david]

My boys used to say I was abusive and evil.They once waked into my house and said in unison, "We hate you and never want to see you again. We want to live with mom." That first year was the toughest.
Counter intuitive example. I was sitting in a chair and our youngest came up to me to tell me I was evil. I stood up and put my arms out like Frankenstein and chased him around the house. He loved it and from that point on he wanted me to be the evil daddy monster. It totally defused the bs from their mom.
They used to say I was mean and always punished them. Once I went to get a coffee at a wawa. The boys stayed in the car and I could see them the entire time. I purchased them an icee. They were playing on their devices so they didn't look up when I approached the car. I opened the drivers door and put my hand with the icee into the car. In a stern voice I said, " I bought you boys an icee and you better like it. If you don't I will punish you like you've never been punished before." They both looked startled but within a few seconds they understood and a smile came on both their faces. That summer they asked me to punish them many times.

[jp617251]

Hi

Thanks for the insight's and recommendations, I have read quite widely on the subject, including Eddy, Warshak - valuable resources. 

To be clear, my impression is that Mum becomes highly anxious when even contemplating the thought of our Son being away from her, this has been the case since our separation and was the key reason I approached court for orders so that some 'official' boundaries could be implemented, which they were.

The argument she gives is that she could not agree to any further additional time because Son will miss her, and her Daughter - his half-sister.  I don't feel this is reason enough to prevent additional increases in time spent with me.

I really don't think there is a great deal of malice involved (and prefer to see it that way to be honest), this seems to be more about Mum's fear/anxiety. 

This has happened in the past only once, at a stressful time (property settlement).  I didn't broach the subject last time, felt it was better to avoid any potential for conflict.

Having said that, Mum's anxiety did not ought to mean that our Son should not spend more time with Dad I feel (and vice-versa in the opposite situation), rather, I feel that we ought to access some joint counselling by way of a parental coordinator (or similar), who can assist us in finding ways to manage & move forwards (emphasis on Mum learning to accept and cope with changes as our Son grows older).

There does seem to be an all or nothing attitude present whereby there is no offer of any discussion about moving forwards, e.g. Primary school starts next year, I'd want to be looking at having our Son from end of school Friday to beginning of school Mondays from then, also to look at one overnight in the week at some point, and also to have some holiday time during school holidays - currently all of this is off the table as far as Mum is concerned.

Thanks again for your input.

[david]

Write your schedule out on paper. Have all the holidays, school days, Extended holidays, etc all spelled out. Courts like parents to figure this out. If you go to court and only one parent has a reasonable plan that is the plan they will most likely follow.
Extended holidays, Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter, usually have an odd number of days. I split those holidays 50/50 and rotated the odd day from year to year.
As our boys got older my ex had more and more difficulty dealing with them. She looked good when they were totally dependent on adults. She could/can not handle different points of view. When our boys got old enough to start to express their ideas/opinions she became nastier and nastier towards them. Eventually they coped by staying away from her and not talking to her about anything when they were with her. They are 18 and 14 now and she really has no relationship with either.

[livednlearned]

my impression is that Mum becomes highly anxious when even contemplating the thought of our Son being away from her, this has been the case since our separation and was the key reason I approached court for orders so that some 'official' boundaries could be implemented, which they were.

I really don't think there is a great deal of malice involved (and prefer to see it that way to be honest), this seems to be more about Mum's fear/anxiety.  

I wonder if she is having a hard time with your son's individuation in general. Being 5, he will want to individuate and be his own little self, separate from mom in a safe way, with lots of reassurance that she will be there for him while he begins to explore and take risks and whatnot. It's one of the developmental reasons kids historically go off to kindergarten at this age -- they were considered ready to be away from caregivers for extended periods. Being BPD, she will likely struggle to provide this reassurance in a developmentally healthy way (instilling fear in him about attempts to separate in healthy ways).

Perhaps having him grow up AND spend time with you is becoming more and more difficult for her, and she is trying to keep him close in response.

Does she respond to validation? Done skillfully, she might feel reassured if her feelings of fear/anxiety are acknowledged. Or, if her BPD is such that she requires praise, perhaps find something genuine that she is doing well for your son, and let her know?

Whatever it is, it's good to decide how much you are willing to continue in this way, because there is always a chance she will want more.

As for her all-or-nothing thinking, that is unfortunately relatively typical for someone with BPD. If she is flooded with feeling, problem solving will be a challenge, and giving up control will be out of the question. Many here find that we need to work with the courts in order to get more time with our kids, sadly.

[jp617251]

Apologies for the late response & thanks once again for all comments.  Livednlearned, your comment around Son's individuation is spot on I feel, unfortunately, that validation only leaves her either wanting more, or feeling empowered to the point of excess where she then is quite derogatory towards me, its such a fine yet unpredictable balance.

I've arranged mediation once again as I think its worth trying first, I'll also work on scheduling and per-empting any issues that I can foresee developing over the next weeks and months.

Thanks so much for all contributions.

[ForeverDad]

Holidays... . I'm sure your state or county has a standard schedule for holidays.  Usually the parents have to alternate the holidays as the year progresses and then the next year they've got reversed holidays.  For example if she had Independence Day last year then you get it this year and she gets it next year.

Of course not all listed holidays will be ones you and your ex observed.  Review the list and have the court record which holidays apply and which get dropped.  For example, our court struck out Hanukkah and Kwanzaa since they didn't apply to us.  (Yes, my ex sabotaged my impending winter vacation one year because she claimed the list assigned her Kwanzaa.  In court she stated she felt it was a Jewish holiday, showing how little it meant to our family.)

Reasonable parenting time... .  There will be times you want longer weekends.  What if your family is having a Sunday event and you have to leave them just as it starts?  What if an event or activity you want to participate in, a weekend at a park, a ball game in another town, only works if you don't have to return early just for the exchange?

Although my court set temp orders giving me alternate weekends, I admired one aspect of it since I got a 72 hour weekend, from Friday 6 pm to Monday 6 pm.  In time, once he was old enough for school and court picked up on the issues with in-person exchanges enabling confrontations, it meant I could effectively pick up from school on Friday and return him to school on Monday.