Why Did the Father Try to Take Custody of the Severely Disable Child from the Mother

I have been standing outside courthouses from just before the noon lunch hour to just after it ends, as well as for the last hour of business--in other words, when people enter or leave courthouses. I don't just stand there; I wear a shirt or sweatshirt that says one of three things on the front: "High Conflict Divorce is Child Abuse," or "Emotional Abuse (Coercive Control) is Very Damaging."

On his days off from work, my son joins me. We normally hold signs that reiterate the message, but a couple of signs add another message, "It Should Be Illegal. Focus Laws on Family Mental Health."

In St. Helens, Oregon, a lawyer approached us to hear what we were saying. In Hillsboro, a defense attorney wanted to know what the next lawsuit issue was that he had to prepare to defend his clients from. In another rural Oregon town I won't disclose, a woman rushed up the stairs to the courthouse door. She paused when she saw my son and me.

"God sent you," she said.

She was a devout Christian, obviously, but she also had a serious child custody issue she was facing. She made the human mistake of having sex with someone who was not a good partner. She became pregnant and gave birth to a severely disabled child with a chromosomal abnormality other than Down syndrome. She still gave the child all she had and became his full-time caretaker. Then, after three years, the father sued her for sole custody of the child in his home county, three hours away from where she lived. She had to find someone to care for her child and drive the distance to file her response, which she had to draft without  an attorney's aid. She had no money. She was her child's full-time caretaker. 

I gave her a copy of the workbook (https://www.amazon.com/How-Heal-Workbook-Survivors-Documenting/dp/B0GMQBP8R8) I wrote to help her focus on her mental health and document her case for a court case.

No one pays me for what I do. All I receive is the gratitude of people like this woman, who are desperate and who don't know what to do. Just to remind any reader who has not read my other blogs, I won a high-conflict child custody battle so thoroughly that the judge ordered my ex-husband to pay 90% of my attorney's fees. Such wins are very rare.

I have only earned a little bit of money from what I do but such responses like the one I received from this woman tell me that what I am doing is greatly needed.

Attorneys and therapists are very expensive, but if we want children in these situations to grow into healthy, happy, and functioning adults, we need to help families. Children who grow up in chaotic and abusive families are much more likely to develop mental health issues such as addiction, criminal behavior, or merely repeating the dysfunctional relationships their parents put them through.

Prisons are expensive. 

Most housed people find homeless people annoying, but talk to them, and you will find many who suffered from traumatic childhood.

Since our country's elite prefers not to pay taxes to provide mental health services for the majority of people who can't afford to pay for them, what can society do? 

I think there is a cheaper way to provide mental health services. I could not afford my own therapist during my family's child custody battle. I could only afford to pay my attorney and some of my children's therapy bills, so I had to work on my mental health on my own.

Fortunately, my family's court-ordered parenting time coordinator and my children's therapists told me about a lot of mental health skills and resources I did not know about before, such as Nonviolent Communication and Dialectical Behavior Therapy.

I bought workbooks and watched YouTube videos on these topics.

Readers who have read my other blogs will know that I am also a generational child sex abuse survivor. I struggled with depression, anxiety, and low self-esteem for decades. But when my family's child custody battle was over, I realized I no longer struggled with these problems.

Why not teach parents mental health skills before they marry or have children, and again before and after divorce and separation? Help parents know what healthy behavior looks like and sounds like, so they can work on being healthy too.

And document which divorced or separated parent is working harder on their mental health by having them communicate by parenting app or email. A social worker can examine the emails and try to help parents work out their problems. If this doesn't work, then parents have really good documentation for a court case.

No parent should have to struggle alone through a high-conflict child custody battle without mental health support, like the mother with a severely disabled child, my son, and I met in this rural Oregon town.