have any of your DH´s or SO´s reduced their visitation voluntarily?

[soundofmusicgirl]

So, my DH had a meeting with a T yesterday and he came out of that meeting saying that he got confirmed what he long thought. Namely that his sons visitation in our home is hurting them because BPDxw is punishing them and abusing them for the fact they come to our home and spend time with their father.
My DH drew the conclusion that it will hurt them more coming to visit us then just not visit  us.

I asked him what he thinks how he would like to implement this new knowledge.

Have any of your SO´s or DH´s decided to suspend visitation because of BPDxw´s abuse of the kids?

I am not sure how to guide or help my DH. I have long understood that my SS´s are being punished and manipulated and abused for any contact they desire to have and have with their father. But I was hoping that now they are getting older (they are 10 now) they will be able to form their own opinion and also since we get them for longer periods now that it would still be beneficial to them. They usually do enjoy their visits with us greatly and they make a lot of progress during their time with us. But it is true that before and after each visit BPDxw thoroughly works them over to create as much anxiety, stress and chaos as possible for them.

[livednlearned]

Have you read any of Dr. Craig Childress's work? He might be a good person to call and discuss that advice with (he's in California, I believe). He would look at those behaviors and the T's suggestion from the perspective of parental alienation.

My T is excellent, and even so, there have been times when frankly she was wrong. She is not a child psychologist, and sometimes her advice is the complete opposite of what my son's T recommends.

Also, my T is not a lawyer. She gave me advice that made my L do back flips   because it would have set our strategy back a football field.

My 2 cents: Bio mom is going to abuse the kids no matter what they do. She is a bully, and she is bullying them, and minimizing the visits to see you is not going to change that. If you take H's therapist's advice to its logical end, then the only way to remove the anxiety, stress, and chaos for them is for H to go for full custody  

[Sunfl0wer]

LNL, stated it perfectly.

Just want to say though that when I was with ex, we had exact issue.  Yet SD began abusing us too.(in addition to moms emotional abuse)  It all made sense to me after listening to all the youtubes on Craig Childress.  SD was originally exhibiting mom's NPD as she was running mom's agenda and sabbatoging things with us as a way to connect with mom or be loyal to not loose mom.  Yet, then over time it changed to her demonstrating her own ODD or ASPD stuff.  (She began wanting to kill us to escape the conflict she was having.)

Yet, her child therapist, who actually was trained also a court mediator for children's cases, actually told dad to let go of his daughter, and send her to mom, and let her reject dad for now.  His thought process was that D would attach strongly to mom without interruption of the bond, but as she hit her teen years, she would rebel against mom and turn to dad, but only if dad had removed himself from the conflict by giving her to mom, could D fantasize about him being a good dad.

Honestly, even though at the time the T seemed to make the most sense, after reading Childresses stuff, that really makes way more sense.

The child T was excellent in so many ways.  I am still shocked he gave advice to give up SD to mom.  At the same time, the way things existed, there really was no way that she could stay safely in our care.  She was determined to sabatoge herself with us to prove we are "bad." (She had even staged and planned to get committed.  T knew it was a staging of stuff she did, not a real crisis.)

I had wished I read about Childress and had his help.  But I also know we already spent so much in court that doing it all over again with court woulda likely caused us all to have a nervous breakdown, idk if we could fight for her anymore really.  Maybe if we felt secure we could carry through Childresses plan and get time for the child to heal without influence of mom, like at least 3 months, but I just didn't see that happening.  (Also, child knew better than to express to folks she hated dad or such extremes, she knew she wouldn't be taken seriously, so she presented more balanced than she was.  Until you read her emails or such of her wanting us dead.)

[soundofmusicgirl]

livednlearned... i have read bits and pieces of Dr. Childress. Is there something specific I could read from him to help with this and to help my DH?

I agree that bio mom will abuse the kids no matter what. My hope was and is that SS´s visits in our home are a bit of a respite for them (of course currently court order says that they need to call mom every day they are with us, which makes it hard for them to "detach".

[livednlearned]

I haven't read Childress's book, the part I'm thinking about is where he states (on his blog) more time with the non-disordered parent is advised for a child subjected to PA behaviors. I'm guessing that runs throughout his recommendations.

What does your H think about his T's advice?

[bravhart1]

If disordered mom is allowed to run dad off, because she feels threatened by the boys love for their dad, what's next?

Grandparents? Aunts, Uncles? I see this disorder running rampant in situations where the pwBPD "wins".

It is my opinion that alienation due to mental illness should not be allowed to run the show.

We had PA going on in spades. The courts listened to the T's (3) and took custody away from mom for four months. She pitched a fit but it was ordered. After four months she was allowed supervised visits if she met certain criteria, she must be in therapy and agree to a parent coordinator to over see our case as it is very complex due to her behaviours and getting a custody evaluation every time she went off the books was getting expensive and excessive. (We've had three).
Mom won't agree and has not seen SD8 for over a year. SD for her part btw (who is still in therapy) was doing much better until mom began sending messages through school friends. Now SD is pretty much back to carrying water for moms dysfunction. So it remains to be seen if SD could be mentally healthy if mom would have stopped and gotten help, or if she is going to end up with this same behaviours. She already shows a lot of manipulation, attention seeking behaviours and the black hole of need, and want.

Good luck. Lots of us out here with the same situation. It's all very unfortunate. What a shame.