Why We Need Coercive Control Legislation and
What Should That Legislation Contain?
I care about coercive control family violence because my family went through it in the form of a protracted child custody battle. I obtained court orders for my children to have therapy and for my ex-husband and me to work with a Court-Ordered Parenting Time Coordinator. Unfortunately, the legal system works very slowly, and my ex-husband was able to slow it down further. Moreover, even when I had therapists in place, my ex-husband frequently refused to follow their orders. This left my children in emotionally abusive situations for years before I could obtain proper help for them from the legal system. My son, who stayed with me but had to keep visiting his father for years, developed Irritable Bowel Syndrome, which is a stress-related disorder. My daughter, who chose to live with her father and with whom I had very little contact for a year and a half, developed Borderline Personality Disorder, which is a common mental health disorder among people who have experienced prolonged or severe child sex abuse.
I need to explain that I, Virginia Jones, the author of this article, am a former psychiatric nurse, so I am familiar with psychiatric diagnoses and mental health treatments.
My family's story, which fills twenty file boxes of emails, legal documents, and my daughter’s hospital discharge notes, began in February 2007, when my son’s stepmother tried to force him to look her in the eyes and repeat her criticisms of me back to her. My son has a superpower—Asperger’s Syndrome. It is very hard to manipulate him. He refused to do what his stepmother ordered and remained on her bad side until our family’s court-ordered parenting time coordinator allowed him to stop visiting his father five years later.
My daughter, however, is a people pleaser who cares deeply about what others think of her. After she chose to live with her father in 2012, my contact with her dropped to almost zero almost immediately. Nearly two years passed before I had regular contact with her again. By then, a judge ruled in my favor in the lawsuit her father filed against me to take custody of her from me permanently, and restored my contact with her.
Over the eight years of coercive control to which my ex-husband and his second wife subjected my children and me, my son developed Irritable Bowel Syndrome, which is a stress-related disorder. My daughter, however, developed Borderline Personality Disorder, which is common among survivors of chronic, long-term child sex abuse.
But my family was not the only family subjected to coercive control during long-term child custody battles. I know both a child sex abuse survivor and a domestic violence survivor who lost custody of their children to the men who abused them. They could not afford the lawyer, court-ordered parenting time coordinator, and family systems therapist who helped me regain contact with my daughter and at least partial custody of both my children.
Unfortunately, the judicial system's slowness and high costs cause disruptions and losses in family relationships. And children suffer. Both children and parents suffer. We need another way.
What We Need for Divorced and Separated Families
First, this is just a proposal meant to start a conversation. We need fathers, mothers, domestic violence victims, domestic violence advocates, judges, social workers, therapists, and especially experienced parenting time coordinators to all be a part of the conversation, along with lawmakers and attorneys.
Because not all parents and not all jobs are equal, 50/50 time sharing in parenting plans should not be assumed to be automatic. Separating and divorcing parents who differ in their opinions about parenting time should first work with a social worker to come up with a mutually agreeable plan. The social worker's first concern should be the family's mental health. If parents still disagree, they can present their case to a judge, either with or without the assistance of lawyers. There should be no delay in parents appearing before judges because this leaves children in a bad situation for an extended period.
The First Step is Prevention of Mental Health Problems
1. When people marry, become parents after marriage, or become parents without being married, they will be required to take classes on how parental conflict can traumatize children, classes on Nonviolent Communication, listening skills, and mindfulness and/or similar practices that have been scientifically validated to calm stress and the wounds of trauma, such as centering prayer.
`Therapists and researchers are careful not to offend anyone's religious sensibilities, so they tend to recommend mindfulness. I frequently experienced such extreme stress while I was going through the extended years of conflict with my ex-husband that I could not meditate mindfully. Fortunately, I had converted to Catholicism and had learned centering prayer in the process.
When I was too stressed to sleep during the years of conflict, I lay awake praying over and over, breathing in, "Please God," breathing out, "help me be strong."
It worked. I always calmed down and fell asleep.
Therapists and scientific researchers stay away from religion because people have different ideas about religious beliefs and practices, and feel offended if someone suggests they try a religious practice not their own. I think we may get better compliance with therapeutic practices if we allow people to use practices from their religion that heal trauma. For example, mindfulness is derived from Buddhism. Yoga, which also involves mindful breathing and is derived from Hinduism, also heals trauma. So do Native American traditional dances and sweat lodge ceremonies. And for people who don't want to engage in a religious practice, walking in nature and noticing beautiful sights, whether it is a waterfall, a tree, a wildflower, or a mountain, and practicing awe as you gaze at the beautiful sight, will help you heal from trauma. Growing up, I had many happy events, but I also endured much trauma. I learned early on that I felt better when I spent time in nature. I eventually became a wildlife and fisheries biologist — work I absolutely loved. Unfortunately, permanent jobs were rare, so I studied nursing and became a psychiatric nurse.
2: All separated and/or divorcing parents with minor children who separate or divorce should be automatically required to communicate about parenting issues, parenting schedules, and any changes to parenting schedules through a parenting app and/or email. Parenting apps can be used for emergencies or communications that require a response within minutes, such as when a parent is late to pick up or drop off children for visitation. Emails allow parents to be more detailed and precise in their communications. The reason parents will be required to use parenting apps and emails is to allow third parties to examine their communications for conflict behaviors.
3: During separation and divorce, all parents will be required to retake classes on how parental conflict can traumatize children, to relearn or strengthen their Nonviolent Communication (NVC) skills, how to listen more empathetically to both their children and co-parent, and how to calm the agitated mind through mindfulness and similar practices, including yoga and centering prayer.
4: All counties should hire social workers to work with separated and divorced families, who can examine emails and text messages between separated and divorced parents to identify situations involving conflict. The social worker should be able to communicate their findings to the parents and require the parents to retake classes in Item 3. If the conflict between parents continues, the social worker reviews the emails to determine which parent is more responsible for family problems and conveys this and her documentation (the parent’s emails and parenting app messages to a judge, who can then rule on which parent appears to be more responsible for the conflict in the family. The parent who is more responsible for the conflict will have their parenting time decreased, their child support share increased, and will work one-on-one with the social worker about specific problems and retake classes on mindfulness, NVC, and listening skills, while continuing to communicate with their co-parent on parenting issues via the parenting app and email. If they are not able to improve their communication and relationship issues, they may have their parenting time further decreased, and child support further increased. If they noticeably improve their skills, their parenting time can be increased, and child support can be adjusted to reflect this increase.
5. Judicial decisions need to be timely—made within one month, so children do not remain in a bad situation for a long time.
6. Parents who cannot improve their behavior can still see their children in visitation supervised by a family systems therapist. If the family systems therapist believes the dysfunctional parent is improving, they can recommend to the family’s social worker or judge that the parent's parenting time be increased, and child support can be adjusted accordingly.
7. If the family systems therapist thinks the parent is not improving or is mistreating the child or the therapist, they can terminate the parent’s right to see the child, but they must give the parent a three-month warning before they terminate a parent’s right to see a child. This termination will also increase the parent’s share of child support.
8. If a parent has their parental rights terminated, they can appeal if they work hard to improve their mental health and communication skills and are able to demonstrate that improvement to both a social worker and their judge.
9. Family situations are better coordinated if families keep working with the same social worker and judge.
9. Examples of coercive control in separated and divorced families occur when parents criticize or harass their co-parent by demanding frequent schedule changes or trying to take away a co-parent’s vacation, holiday, or birthday time with children. Another example is when a co-parent harasses the other co-parent with health-related issues. For example, my ex-husband sent me numerous emails the evening after I got out of surgery on my elbow, and I was on a bed rest order.
10. Wealthy families can still work with private lawyers, therapists, and judges as they always have. This law is intended to address the problems faced by families that can’t afford therapists and lawyers.
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