This is the first part of a series of articles dealing with common dirty tricks that high-conflict people (HCP) and abusive personality disordered individuals (APDI) commonly play in family court. In Part 1, we will take look at the ways in which these women abuse OurFamilyWizard as a way of drawing you into further conflict and craziness.
OurFamilyWizard
Dr. Tara J. Palmatier recently posted an informative article about OurFamilyWizard, an innovative and effective tool for managing a parallel parenting relationship with a high-conflict person. I have experience with OurFamilyWizard. Some of the more enlightened judges in my practice area fairly regularly order parents to communicate and exchange information through OFW when the parents have been involved in a protracted and highly-conflicted custody dispute. I’ve also used the tool to deal with my own children’s father and step-mother. OFW can be a refreshing relief for those of us who must remain in contact with a high-conflict parent or step-parent of our minor children.
So what’s the downside?
It’s not that the OFW tool itself is flawed, but as in all things, the determined HCP (and aren’t they all determined?) can find ways to abuse and manipulate the tool to further “game the system.” You’ve all heard the “No Contact” directive, and OFW is designed to help you maintain that boundary to the greatest extent when you share minor children with a high-conflict ex. You know how hard No Contact can be, in spite of best intentions and earnest effort. The HCP just has a way of crashing through that boundary even when you have the knowledge and skills and tools (like OurFamilyWizard) available to you.
Games People Play
Sadly, I’ve seen HCPs use the OFW tool to draw their victims into further conflict and unwanted communication in various ways. For instance, the HCP might claim her password suddenly stopped working and she can’t log in or claims to have lost internet access (a modified damsel-in-distress ploy designed to avoid the OFW restriction and play the helpless waif at the same time). The HCP will almost certainly use OFW to post memorandums that are inflammatory, hostile, untrue and generally designed to elicit a heated response from the other parent.
I’ve seen these manipulative people post doctor’s appointments an hour before the scheduled appointment, assuring the notice will not be seen in time for the other parent to participate. I’ve seen HCPs post important appointments or events on the wrong day or at the wrong time, seemingly intentionally, to keep the other parent from participating in important events. HCPs have been known to schedule their time with the kids on the other parent’s days or schedule birthday parties or other types of activities during the other parent’s time with the kids—and then post these things on OFW, as if to taunt the rational spouse.
That’s not to say OFW is not a very valuable tool—it is, there’s no question about it. Although the high-conflict, disordered parent will likely try these tactics, if you know what to expect in advance, you can be prepared and you can guard against taking her bait and being suckered back into the drama. The beauty of OFW is that every single interaction with the program is logged and that will be helpful in court. But beware: having everything logged is essential in defending yourself against false claims about your behavior, but it may not be very helpful to prove your ex is a crazy, manipulative s0-and-s0.
Remember Your Primary Objective
Your high-conflict ex will certainly claim that she was trying to use the tool as it’s intended; she’ll claim mistake, innocence, ineptitude, etc., and it’s hard to prove that her cumulative errors are intentional and designed to sabotage the effectiveness of OFW. When you approach the judge with all of these manipulative “errors,” believing that you’re painting a clear picture of how disordered your children’s mother is, the judge is likely to simply conclude that OFW hasn’t corrected the issues it was meant to correct , at which point the judge may very likely discontinue its use. The HCP has accomplished her goal!
You’ll recognize her manipulations as part of a pattern that typifies her character and you’ll probably be eager to point it out to the judge to as another example of the HCP’s self-defeating, self-destructive behavior. But wait! Whenever you’re in litigation, you must always keep your hierarchy of objectives in mind.
Always weigh the upside and the downside, keeping in mind your most important goal—extricating yourself from the crazy vortex that surrounds your chaotic, disordered soon-to-be-ex. If exposing all of your ex’s shenanigans on OurFamilyWizard is likely to lead the Judge to abandon its use, that’s not such a great result for you! Although your HCP may be gaming the system, there’s no question that OFW will get you closer to No Contact and it will help you maintain those all-important boundaries, so long as you’re prepared for her dirty tricks. Meanwhile, the evidentiary value of her OFW tricks is relatively small—presumably you have a stockpile of outrageous events from throughout your marriage to present in Court.
So, consider whether exposing her gamesmanship on OFW outweighs the potential of having the tool removed from your tool belt. Her goal is to get you to engage in more conflict; your goal is to steer clear of conflict and minimize contact. OFW will still help you disengage from the conflict and drama if you know the tricks that she’s likely to play and if you steel yourself and prepare to let her taunts and barbs bounce off of you.
Be Self-Reliant
Finally, here’s one more pointer that will help counter the effectiveness of such underhanded chicanery: To the greatest extent possible, do not rely on Crazy to feed you information about your kids. You should independently have a relationship with their doctors, schools, therapists, friends’ parents, coaches, etc. You can get all or nearly all of the information you will need about your children’s appointments, practices, school events, birthday parties, etc. Get the information directly from the source, rather than being sucker-punched by disinformation from their mother. It is the responsible and mature way to be involved in your children’s lives and narrows down their mother’s ability to exclude you.
Please check back soon for the second article in this series, which will focus on other dirty tricks exes employ in high-conflict custody cases and how you can best protect yourself and your children.
I had the same experience – my ex complained about OFW so much the judge withdrew the order to use it. I now use ReadNotify.com
Having independent relationships with the school, doctors, etc. is excellent advice. Besides getting the facts (rather than the HCP’s version of reality) they will have an opportunity to experience dealing with both parents, and will likely be an advocate for the rational parent in the inevitable custody evaluation.
Hi, wanted to add another thing that is relevant even if you are not using a system like OFW.
Always pause before hitting send. SO and I had a pretty intense conversation last night…he nearly walked into a situation which the BPDX could have milked for about…oh…10 more years till the youngest is no longer a minor.
It was a case where he took his eye off the ball and tried responding like she was a normal person.
We have a rule in our workplace – if the subject might enrage, then get someone else to check it before you hit send. So all emails/letters raising issues that are potentially volitile are read by another to make sure that you have not left any chinks in the armour.
It is a rule that nons and non-nons need to live by.
Yep! I write what I want to say, then my GF judiciously edits it… 😉
I’m in need of some advice/wisdom from all you dads out there that would care to help me out. I just got off work and I’m at a loss. I set rules for my ex to only contact me via email. I’m taking her to court to get my child support lowered since I have a medical illness that’s never going away. She decided to pose the question that she would let me off the hook for child support if I’d sign over the rights to my son.
Before this I was having my lawyer do what she can to get my visitation set up again. The ex, time and time again was setting up barriers to not have to hand him over to me. I don’t know the right way to handle this and my parents just say “she’s evil what do you expect.” Anyways any help at all would be very appreciated. I’m gonna go try and get some sleep, I know she’s going to turn the dial up even more come tomorrow. Thanks.
Easy answer. Forget it. Even if she signs something saying you don’t have to pay child support, she can go right back into Court and get it whenever she wants. The Court will not enforce a permanent waiver of child support, because it is presumed to be not in the child’s best interest. So unless you trust her to never return to Court, and why in the world would you, she has suggested you give up rights to your child for nothing. Signing over full custody to her would also be subject to later Court challenge by you, but don’t expect a Judge to be favorably impressed with a parent who would do such a thing. This “offer” can only make your situation worse.
She is just trying to derail your attempt for mandatory visitation. Stop communicating with her, and work through your lawyer.
(The only way you can permanently avoid child support obligations is if you give up all rights to your child at the same time your child is adopted — generally by a step-father.)
I must agree with K. your answer must stand as NO! I had the same card played on me by my wife and her lawyer. when we were fighting for custody, she said to me that if I let her go back to her mothers house with the kids she would agree to a fair child custody order and not seek for child support. well I agreed thinking that the fighting what stop between us….well it didn’t and I can safely tell you that she never keep her word and some months later has took me for child support. little did i know that by law mom’s can at any time file for child support even if there was a stipulation…my advice is to stick this one out and wait for a much better deal. you may even get the child support lowered and not have to give any rights up..I regret ever making that deal and it bites me in the ass every day since!! good luck to you