As a Life and Divorce coach, I am sometimes misunderstood and misjudged.  Over the years that I went through a high conflict divorce, I brought myself out of a deep dark place and into a life of joy and happiness.  I have successfully shown many others how to do the same and focus on finding their way beyond what has happened in the past and to the life of their dreams  I’ve been able to help many people, but not everyone.  Some people want to stay stuck.  If an individual wants to stay stuck in something bad, there is nothing I can do.  There is also nothing a psychologist, lawyer, or judge can do either.  They may try, but ultimately they will have to leave you behind and move onto helping the people who are willing to do the work that will get them where they want to be.

I work mostly with people in the Family Court System.  These are parents who find themselves in a high conflict divorce situation, getting beaten to a pulp (legally) by the confounding judge, who is unable to understand what the heck it is that drives them to do the things they do.

I understand domestic violence.  I understand parental alienation (which is not the same as Parental Alienation Syndrome).  I understand Domestic Violence Organizations.  I understand Father’s Rights Groups. I understand the parent who lives under a microscope for years in family court proceeding after family court proceeding.  I understand the legal community.  I understand the psychologists.  I understand a lot of what happens in Family Court.  I understand how people got into the mess they have gotten themselves into.  Understanding all these things does not mean that focusing on them will make anything better.  In fact, putting a focus on what is wrong in Family Court can be a huge waste of time and hurt you in achieving your custody and parenting time goals.

There have been times when I have either lost a client or lost a client’s respect and trust  when I have had to tell them that they and their attorney are putting too much emphasis on domestic violence in their family court case.  I have also angered parents when I’ve had to tell them the parental alienation syndrome argument won’t get them far.  An honest statement like that mistaken to mean that I don’t believe parental alienation happens.  I know it happens.  I have even experienced it for myself.  It happened to my youngest son and I, at the hands of a manipulative father, but my son and I are closer than ever now because I always trusted him to know truth and to figure out what was happening.  I did what I could, left alone what I could not do, and put my energy into waiting for my son to be ready to restore our relationship.  I had faith that I had raised him in a way in which he would see truth, and now, we are closer than ever.  He does know the truth and bears some scars.

It was a long journey from my naive beginnings in family court.  I went from being blind sided by the nastiness of Family Court to getting to where I am today.

More than believing in parental alienation, I believe that co-dependence, childhood trauma and unhealthy relationship patterns are likely the underlying cause of on-going family court nightmares.  A good psychologist should tell you that as long as there is one strong parent, your child can overcome the trauma, regardless of what your ex throws at you.  I have seen this to be true.  In my own case, I stopped being the victim of domestic violence and stopped adding to the drama.  I wanted a better life for my children and myself.  That meant that I would have to pull myself up by my bootstraps, get healthy, and work with the professionals in the Family Court System at their level.  They were not going to listen to me if I only spoke to them when I was at the point of hysterics.  I was never heard when I screamed and swore at them, and you won’t get far with that either.

They were also not going to allow me to educate them.  These were educated professionals and in their eyes, I was the one who was uninformed.  If I was so smart, how come I couldn’t put an end to this conflict for my family?  Why did they have to make decisions about my children?  They could not understand and I was not able to make them understand.  I found them to be obstacles in the way of me being able to move on with my life.  They were also, definitely,  hindering my children’s development, but they would not have ever wanted to hear that.  Over the years I came to realize,  that they were not the answer to the problems and they should not be my focus.  Instead, my focus needed to be on myself, and my children.  That is when I began to turn that ship around, and in doing so, I freed myself and my children of those professionals forever.  No more obstacles.  No more hindrances.

This is what I help my clients as well.  Please don’t think that means that this can happen overnight.  It is a process.  I help my clients through that process, but they determine the pace, I cannot.  I connect with many clients through a free consult, but not every consult turns into a client.  Some people think I am nuts and they never come back.  They do not want to give up that crutch of family court.  That is sad because most people come to me due to their frustration with how the Family Court is not helping the situation, but is instead, making it much, much worse, but when told that they may need to take the focus off of family court professionals and onto their healing and gaining skills, they don’t want to refocus their energy inward.  It is a lot of work to explore what has happened to you, and it is painful and ugly to peel back the layers of who you are you, and so some people cannot stomach it.

Think about this for a minute.  Maybe it will make sense to you and maybe it won’t.  I can only put it out there and hope that you can make some sense out of it.  When you are a victim of domestic violence and look to the family court to help you with it, that is your focus.  If you keep your focus there, and run to and fro, in search of professionals who will understand, that is taking your time, energy and money away from having the life you want.  You may think that you cannot have the life you want, but I am here to tell you, it is just not true.  You are the one keeping your life and your children’s lives in the family court.  Your ex may stay there, and he or she may use it against you, but if you really get yourself strong, stay confident in your truths, and put your focus outside of the court, you will see miracles happen.  The people I see who beat this system at its own game, refocus on their life and their children and slowly shift their thoughts and energies away from their nasty ex and the confusing court people, are the ones who succeed in getting saving their children from an imprisoned life.  The people who latch on to their domestic violence experience or try to expose parental alienation will find that  they ramp up the conflict, get more deeply embedded in the Family Court System, and feel more and more stuck over time.  I am not saying that domestic violence or parental alienation should be tolerated or ignored.  I am not saying that at all.  What I am saying is you cannot push those memes the entire time because there are only certain ways to successfully use those arguments in family court.

Not everything involved with the conflict is related to domestic abuse or parental alienation.  Some things are communication issues and related to how you speak to or correspond with you ex.  Some issues are related to those Mars-Venus, male-female issues, too.  Some issues have to do with the stage of development your child is in, as well, and so you need to really consider what is driving the conflict for each particular issue that arises.  You cannot blame everything on domestic violence or parental alienation because the professionals don’t always have any recourse, even if they do recognize those issues are present.  You still have the court orders you have and their roles are limited as far as what action they can take.  You are the driver of a family court battle,  not them.  You want to make sure you are focused on which direction you want to go and where the journey will lead.  If you know your desired destination, you cannot go around in circles.  That will not get you there.  Instead, map out how you are going to get there and come hell or high water, keep traveling in that direction and don’t stop until you get there!

This post may anger some people and intrigue others.  It’s hard to really explain it all in one blog post!  If you are interested in finding out how to free yourself of the family court, as much as possible, please contact me through High Conflict Central.  I’d love to consult with you to tell you more.  There is nothing more rewarding for me than to see a client who grasps these concepts and takes their life and their children back!

Susan