Mentally ill daughter tries to regain custody of her children

[Maizie]

Our daughter is 41 years old and has two daughters aged 6 and 9 whose legal father, a Native American, passed away last year.  They have tribal membership through him.

Our daughter has had a diagnosis of bipolar disorder for a few years, but everyone who knows her well believes there is something else wrong.  After attending NAMI meetings and reading "Stop Walking on Eggshells" and other books I am pretty certain she has BPD - I suspect from childhood, when she had many issues.

After her husband died, the family came to live with my husband and myself.  Our daughter had frequent over-reactive fits of anger and a strange sense of reality that often did not match the actual facts.  She was addicted to social media to the point of neglecting her children's needs and said horrible and hurtful things to them and me.  However, she seemed to get her sense of identity through the girls and clung to them, insisting they all sleep in the same bed.  She hated a babysitter that they loved. 

We tried to get her to seek mental health counseling, but she refused to admit that there was anything wrong.

Following a family argument in February she caused herself harm and the police were called.  She was involuntarily committed, but the psychiatrist at the Crisis Center saw nothing but bipolar disorder and she was released without a change of meds.  She has no insight into her worsening mental state and says the rest of the family is crazy and that we all lied so that we could steal her kids.

Our County Juvenile Court gave temporary custody to my husband and myself with a path for our daughter to get the children back.  The girls are thriving and doing well in school.  However, our daughter has returned to the Indian Reservation and involved the Tribal Court in the custody battle.  In 12 days there will be a hearing for her Motion For Sole Custody.  Because of the Indian Child Welfare Act she can legally do this.  She says that we are no longer her family.  That she will change her name and contact information and we will never see our grandchildren again.  We fear for their safety if this happens.

In order for me to advocate for the children I will have to tell the Judge, in our daughter's presence, that I believe she has a mental illness that is causing her to make some very bad decisions not in the girls' best interests (e.g. she has now married a registered sex offender).  I am worried that saying this in front of her may cause her to harm herself again, but do not know any other way to handle the situation.

[incadove]

Maizie that sounds so scary, the possibility of losing contact with your grandchildren.  I agree with you that being determined and doing whatever is necessary to keep that from happening is important.

I wonder if warning your daughter that you will have to testify in this way, would prevent her from going through with the court case?  As you said, it will be painful for her to hear those things in public, and letting her know in the least accusatory way possible, and explaining your true motives of protecting your grandchildren from possible dangers, might be a disincentive for her to walk into court.

At the same time maybe reach out to her with offers of support in whatever way you feel comfortable, in case her own situation is not so good.  Also showing that you are still on her side in some ways may lessen the impact of what you are telling her you may do.

She may cut off contact with you because of the message, but that sounds better than cutting off contact with her having the grandkids.

Good luck with whatever you decide to do.

[GaGrl]

What legal representation do you have? Do you have a lawyer experienced with Tribal Court and can strategize with you?

[Maizie]

Gagrl,  thank you for responding.  We have just hired a lawyer who is experienced in the tribal court (hard to find), but does not know about mental illness.  I will be strategizing with him although it will be mostly over procedural issues.

incadove, thank you for responding also - with some great ideas.  Our daughter has already basically cut us off, including blocking us from her Facebook page.  I did manage to get onto her page and see that she has a Go FundMe site to raise money for legal representation - but no one has contributed.  She has no job and no income except when we help her.   She so bitter about losing her children that she is at war with us.  I offered for her to come home and we all go to family counseling, but that evoked a vicious reply.  If I warn her that I will talk about her mental illness in court I believe she will just get her psychiatrist to say she only has bipolar disorder so she can "prove" that we are lying once again to steal the girls.  Like so many others I just wish that we could get her the help she needs, but realize that is not possible.

[sweetheart]

Hello Maizie,

What a difficult and complex situation for everyone involved.
I am no legal expert at all, but what struck me is that you said your daughter is now married to a registered sex-offender. Certainly here in the UK that would prevent children being returned to their parents. Children Services here would also have grounds to remove a child if that information came to their attention.

Perhaps the way around the situation if indeed you believe that your daughter's mental health issues are being missed and minimised, (and I can really relate to that with my h, now he has a really enlightened P who has kept him in hospital long to begin to realise just how v unwell he really is, but this took a number of years of serious chaos to get where we are now) is by highlighting that her husband is of potential risk to your grandchildren were they to be returned to their mother.
Do you think this would be an option, or CPS involved at all?

[livednlearned]

How awful  You must be beside yourself with worry and sadness.

Even though these are your grandchildren, I wonder if Bill Eddy's "Splitting: Protecting Yourself From a BPD/NPD Spouse" would be helpful. You can order it from Amazon -- he's a former social worker who began practicing family law and recognized that many high-conflict divorce and custody battles involved some kind of personality disorder.

I'm curious to hear your response to sweetheart's post about the stepfather being a registered sex offender. Does your lawyer intend to focus on this?

If your daughter is BPD, it is likely that she has split you black and there is not much that will influence her to flip back at this point, especially during a custody battle.

Many of us have also discovered that the actual diagnosis is not nearly as powerful as the patterns of behavior, and documenting those behaviors can go a long way to persuading the court. I learned that the judge is considered the supreme witness, and sometimes, if there are questions about the documentation, a judge will let out some rope and give both parties a chance to demonstrate what is best for the kids. I don't know how Tribal Court works ... .hopefully it considers the registered sex offender status and mental health issues to matter.

One thing I also learned in my own case is to offer the judge solutions. People with BPD have a hard time with this, so coming forward with solutions can cause things to tilt your way. For example, maybe you tell the judge that yes, it's important for the kids to have a relationship with mom, and to also experience their culture first-hand, through her. So (as an example) you suggest that the kids visit with mom at the tribal community center on Saturdays, where it is public, for 6 hours, once a week. Sex offender is not allowed to attend. Maybe add that this is something mom can do for a year and then reevaluate to see how things are going. This is a conservative approach that, in some ways, buys the judge time. He or she can kick the can down the road because there is a reasonable, fair solution.

You will have no problem executing the solution. Whereas your daughter will struggle. She will feel controlled (people with BPD tend to have a hard time with this), and won't like having light shone on her parenting.

She may cancel repeatedly. Or take them somewhere not specified in the order. Or bring the sex offender. All of this will be documented.

For those of us with partners who were not diagnosed BPD, and who were clearly mentally ill, targeting their illness did not seem to help. Even when there is a diagnosis, it requires an expert witness to explain to family law courts why BPD is problematic. Otherwise, it can look like we are stigmatizing mental illness. Same goes for substance abuse. The way around this is to focus on behaviors that have directly impacted the kids (like losing custody, or marrying a sex offender, or emails that might reveal problematic parenting, or invitations to counseling that are refused).

Another possibility is to include a motion for your daughter to undergo a psychiatric test using the MMPI-2, an objective evaluation. There is another one specifically used to look for PDs, but I can't remember the name. PPI or something... .

Basically, invite the judge to look at the documentation you have, and propose a solution that lets him or her see even more, through different possibilities like psych evals, supervised visits, counseling for the kids.

And one last thing that is specific to BPD custody battles. Try to have consequences for non-compliance. For example, if your daughter brings the sex offender to the visits, the visit is called off and you can take the kids home. Or if your daughter removes the kids from the premises, you will contact law enforcement, and will make a motion to modify the order. 

[GaGrl]

My understanding of Tribal Court is that they have a strong concern for ensuring that children grow up within the culture. It would probably be wise to proactively to into Tribal Court able to show your plan for doing that.

[Maizie]

Hi sweetheart, unfortunately the sex offender issue does not seem to be a problem in that state.  I asked the police in the nearest city about it and they said that so long as the mother knows that she is bringing a sex offender into her family it is not illegal and they can do nothing to stop it.  Also he is the younger grandchild's biological father - she was born out of wedlock.   However I do think that this will be my first line of defense with the judge.  The new husband is also mentally challenged from having fetal alcohol syndrome, has obsessive compulsive disorder and multiple personalities, is an alcoholic and drug user, and we know has hit our daughter (although she refuses to acknowledge the latter).  He has never been able to get a job.  We believe that it says something about our daughter's mental health state that she has associated with and now married a man like this.  She believes that bringing him into a regular family will help him become "normal".  To me that is delusional thinking and dangerous for the girls.

Hi livednlearned, I will try and get Bill Eddy's book.  Thank you for your recommendation.  It is interesting that you suggest focusing on patterns of behavior rather than the mental illness.  I think I should try that, although I have wondered about asking for a psychiatric test.  Our daughter is quite high functioning when talking to people and has fooled several psychiatrists so far!  I like the idea of suggesting solutions to the judge, but feel that visitation is not the answer.  The reservation where our daughter lives is 1,500 miles from our home where we have the grandchildren.

Hi Gagrl, the tribal and cultural issues could be the big ones for the judge.  It is possible that he could say the girls have to come back to the reservation, but not be given to our daughter, i.e. put into foster care with tribal members.  I run a non-profit organization on the reservation (completely separate from our daughter) and am trying to get character references from folks that I work with.  I will point out to the judge that I have many connections with the tribe and a lot of relevant books, CDs and movies that the grandchildren can see/hear.

[GaGrl]

My friend married a woman with Tribal membership, and their children spent 6 weeks on the reservation with relatives each summer. Perhaps something like that would work.

[Maizie]

Gagrl, that is an idea that might work.  There are ceremonies on the reservation each summer, but the main one coincides with the first week of school in our county.  The fact that we refused to go this summer caused a major problem with our daughter.  We were afraid that once the children were on tribal ground they might be detained there against my will.  Perhaps we could arrange something with both the tribe and the school next year.

[livednlearned]

Family law court wants parents in the lives of their kids.

Court says it's about doing what's best for the child, but in my experience, that almost always means (at least at first) keeping the kids involved with the parents, no matter what. There seems to be a very high tolerance for bad behavior and a lot of second chances. I think court believes a parent's love for the child will pull them out of whatever bad behavior they have.

I imagine with Tribal Court, that logic is even stronger. Plus, wanting to keep kids in their culture.

In some ways, the way to get the court to tilt your way is to already be on the same page with the judge. If you show good faith that you want the same thing for the kids, it may paint you as a problem solver. A peer to the judge, in a way. Your recommendations may not be fully adopted, but they could signal to the judge that you get what's at stake.

Except you know that your D and her husband are not safe. That means crafting a solution that gives your D a chance to show she is as committed to getting her kids back as she says. People with BPD tend to have a hard time matching actions with words. My ex asked for a lot of things but when it came down to demonstrating consistent, reasonable behavior, he just could not do it. Even easy things.

That's why it's helpful to understand the judge as the supreme witness. Offer something that shines a lot of light on the pattern of behaviors that you know are there. The longer your D's behaviors spend time in the light, the better. The more reasonable the actions your D must take, the better. This gives the judge a good long look at what you already know.

People with BPD have a hard time following custody orders. Even when the stakes are high, even when the orders are reasonable, fair, and easy to do.

Ask the judge to postpone his or her final decision until after a year trying whatever solution you think might work. If you can, include the consequence for non-compliance. An example might be, if she does not have a psychiatric evaluation done within 30 days, then unsupervised visitation will not take place.