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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]PP Even as it relates to physical abuse, I was told it needs to be severe, not shoving or grabbing, for it to make any difference. [/quote]

NP and my attorney (not DMV) shared that even in the case of a someone he represented who beat his wide in front of their children, he eventually got 50/50 because they went to court and the judge said that he didn’t beat the children so it was ok.

The only hope is to do a parenting evaluation, and pay for it out of pocket with a private evaluator, not a state provided one. My narcissist got his attorney to do one because he is hoping it will make me look bad. He isn’t yet aware that it will include extensive mental health testing for him. At most that will buy us a graduated custody plan and maybe 6-12 months of therapy and medical intervention for him (he has other things going for which he is not compliant with treatment which could also endanger the kids).

My final hope is that this drags out for so long that he loses interest in whatever he’s trying to prove and doesn’t ultimately want 50/50, or it goes long enough that my youngest is the age when our state begins to consider kids’ input. [/quote]

These parenting evaluations- called custody evaluations or ‘forensics’ usually end up being extremely disappointing to the normal parent and often backfire. These psychologists fleece people, and often write sloppy reports that are extremely hard to challenge. These evaluations are not recommended by pro child groups, and they can end up costing tens of thousands of dollars, and extend the litigation so more legal fees are paid too. Please do not recommend these to others. [/quote]

I’m the one who brought up parenting evaluations. In my case, my attorney and I selected the parenting evaluator and my STBX paid for it. This is not typical. His attorney suggested evaluators know for things such as favoring the more wealthy parent, favoring men, doing haphazard reports, etc. I knew going into the divorce that I would need an attorney well-versed in this process, my focus during my initial consults before hiring someone was to choose an attorney who really knew our local landscape of evaluators and (should it go to court) how judges respond to them. STBX has other diagnosed mental illnesses that he treats haphazardly, which may influence why he agreed to pay for the evaluation- he 100% hopes it will show me in a bad light.

If you don’t have an attorney who does this every week, the advice I’m replying to is very good and you do need to proceed with extreme caution. But if you have a choice between electing to hire a parenting evaluator vs taking the chance that your narcissist spouse will push a GAL or force an evaluator to be appointed by court, then you really need to be proactive and find an attorney who knows this process.

Once you’re in a divorce with someone like this, advice about what you avoid kind of goes out the window and it becomes more about making the best of truly horrible options. I cry or yell every day (when home alone) because it’s a hellscape.

I would have stayed in my marriage if I’d had the choice because it would have been an easier way to protect my kids. [/quote]

PP How do you best protect your kids in such a marriage? Do essentially all of the parenting? What if he plays with their minds and tries to turn them against you and dazzles them with unlimited screen time behind your back when he’s feeling in the mood to make up for the bad parenting the remainder of the time? [/quote]

Yes, I did basically all of the parenting. He popped in for the fun stuff but would literally leave a room when it got hard from the very earliest days. I mean like he’d take a long bathroom break just when our first was an infant and couldn’t calm down but also needed a diaper change and a bottle all at once.

I posted about my kids being extremely busy and mostly out of the house from a young age. Imagine the most time-consuming sports with bad reputations: that’s what they do. So they are rarely at home and spent lots of time with me in the car or on the road at competitions and surrounded by friends and their families (and normal parents), because STBX hated driving them and socializing with other parents. When they were home, he didn’t make much of an attempt to dazzle them with stuff like screen time. He does dazzle them with amazing special stuff from frequent trips abroad. It’s especially tough with the tween and teen girls because he gets collector stuff or fashion things before we get them here. But that moment lasts for an hour or so plus the day they show it off to their friends, and then they come back to me.

He went through a phase of trying to turn them against me but even the youngest came to me and said “daddy said the weirdest thing to me.” I have to be scrupulous about receiving that information in a neutral way. And when he mistreats them, it’s a fine line between validating their hurt vs talking trash about him. That’s why a therapist is important- they need space where they can put all that and where someone else can document it who is neutral and can see it from my child’s perspective and not mine.

It is a constant process of eating sh-t, if I’m honest, but if I do it right I think it will help. [/quote]

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