- Any such conversations with the children should be age-approriate.
- Be aware that your calmly presented logical reasons are likely to be overwhelmed by the other parent's intense pressuring, emotional blaming, skewed perceptions and distorted history. This means you would need to regularly monitor what they express and appear to be feeling since you have someone actively trying to undermine your efforts by any means possible.
- Be aware too that the children may feel they're at fault, that they somehow caused the conflict, separation and divorce. (Yes, it may be about them and custody, but they aren't the cause!) They might not even be able to express those feelings or be able to put them into words. You need to regularly assure them that separation and divorce are adult matters, not their fault at all and they shouldn't be put in the middle, they should just be kids.
Likely your stbEx is already running a disinformation and distortion campaign against you, a virtual war for custody, control and punishment. If you have
Stop Walking on Eggshells, read the section around page 192. False allegations and blocking contact with the children are typical weapons used against us.
I agree that you should try to have the children with you when she is served, if possible. There is a slight chance she might calm down before she next has the children. However, beware... . She is very likely to try (again) to make you look worse than her.
Can you keep the children until the court issues a parenting schedule? That's hard to do if you work since (1) you two have equal but unspecified rights as parents and (2) without a court order stating otherwise it's potentially a free-for-all. For example, if you have the children, great. But when you go to work, the children have to be somewhere, school, daycare, sitter, relative, etc. All stbEx has to do is locate them, walk in and take the children. It may be a free-for-all between you two, but without a court order no one else can trump the parents. And most likely the police won't help you to get them back unless you have a written order from the court listing a schedule or stating you can do it.
