In an ongoing investigation into the Family Court, Jane Phare looks at the effects on children when they are drawn into adult conflict, and the long-term implications.
West Auckland barrister Judith Surgenor has pretty much seen everything in the 25 years she’s worked in the Family Court as a ‘lawyer-for-child’. She’s seen children coached and manipulated; she’s witnessed them seeing their parents slog it out in court; she’s listened to kids “pouring their hearts out and crying”.
“It’s horrible sometimes. "
Surgenor despairs at the length of time some children have to endure the conflict. She gives an example of being appointed as lawyer for a baby, a case which finally ended when the boy was 15. His father couldn’t take it any longer, she says. The mother was constantly undermining the care arrangements, or refusing to let the child go to his father’s.
“The dad would have to make an application [to the Family Court] to get him back and away it would go. It was just horrendous.”
Auckland clinical psychologist April Trenberth says there’s a stack of research on the long-term effects on children who are stuck between warring parents or caregivers. Take your pick: mental health, social, behavioural and emotional issues; anxiety; depression; a higher risk of substance abuse and addiction. And without good role modelling, children can have difficulty establishing healthy relationships in the future.
Trenberth thinks most parents are aware of the effect their behaviour is having but their own emotions are so strong they just keep going. And those strong emotions are sometimes directed at her. She’s come to expect abuse from angry parents. Most of it’s online these days but after one serious threat she was forced to involve the police.
She’s aware that being quoted for this series on the Family Court will bring a fresh wave of abuse. It goes with the territory, she says, and it’s the same for judges, lawyers and other specialists who work there. Mix high emotions - anger, distress, helplessness, frustration – with the thought of losing a loved child and it’s understandable the stakes are high.
But after 25 years of experience in the Family Court, Trenberth is willing to speak out, so convinced is she that clinical psychologists have a specialist part to play in helping warring parents move past a stalemate. She knows the poor outcomes that face kids with parents embroiled in entrenched conflict if it’s not sorted.
Children can become emotionally withdrawn, anxious, act up at school or become alienated from a parent, she says.
“When one or both of the parents are not okay, then the child can’t be okay either no matter how lovely their new step-parent is or how many ponies they have.”
Trenberth’s job, and that of her peers, is to produce a specialist report to help the judge decide, in the face of opposing parental views, how care of the child is arranged. Not everyone is happy with what those reports say.
Some will complain that the psychologist didn’t “listen” to the child. Psychologists will in turn say what the parent is really complaining about is that the child didn’t say what they wanted them to say. In other instances, a child might tell one version to a parent but tell the psychologist a completely different story. That again leads to complaints from parents.
The court’s role is to figure out whether a child is resisting a parent because a parent has been abusive or if the other parent is somehow influencing the child, or both, Trenberth says.
“That is probably one of the most vexing situations in the court. It becomes a ‘he said, she said,’ battle and can be difficult to prove.”
‘I could have handled it better’
His voice breaks at the memory of it, an emotional father reliving a nightmarish time when the Family Court, lawyers and his ex-wife seemed to control his life, and access to his children.
Will* begins his story in a matter-of-fact way. It was some years ago, that nightmare; he’s had time to reflect on his part and what he could have done better.
He’s got on with his life, has a new partner and now has 50/50 care of his teenage children. But the memory of the years-long battle, protection orders, supervised visits and the anguish of being estranged from one of his sons for nearly two years is still raw.
His ex-wife took out two protection orders, which meant he didn’t see his children for months due to long delays between hearings. One son found the whole ordeal so distressing he stopped speaking to his father. And the process was enormously distressing for his own parents who, during a lengthy period of restrictive supervised visits every second weekend, could not see their grandchildren. They were years of sheer hell, he says.
“A lot of fathers in this situation just can’t face it, drop out, find a new partner, lose all contact with their kids. It gets too hard, they’re angry, I just think that’s extremely sad for the kids.”
If he has one regret, it is that his children were affected “hugely” by the acrimony. There are still signs of those effects today, he says.
“I can see they’ve had some real trouble because kids want their parents to get on and they want their parents to love each other, in some way. When it’s torn apart it tears the kids apart.”
Going into bat for the child
Trenberth and other specialists who work in what can be an often highly charged forum say parents are often complicated and have issues of their own.
“It doesn’t take as much to make them feel rattled or unsafe or insecure or frightened as it does another person. They tend to go on emotions rather than logic.”
Parents often do not realise that some of the alarming things children say are actually reflecting themselves, Trenberth says.
“The parent goes in to bat for the child, which they are supposed to do, thinking that the other parent is causing the child to feel and behave this way. It is very hard for many parents to step away and to see that they are actually contributing to the child’s distress.”
Children can suffer from attachment issues when their loyalty is pulled in different directions, she says. That dilemma becomes too untenable which is often why children take sides. She thinks the Family Court plays an important role because people generally respond to the court’s authority. But she also thinks psychological support is vital to help people in entrenched positions.
Trenberth and three of her colleagues have undergone specialist training, known as “resist-refuse dynamics”, from a mentor in the US to help in extreme cases. Called Fit (Families in Transition) Families, the therapy concentrates on what the child needs, and changing thoughts and patterns of behaviour from ‘My ex is an incurable narcissist so it’s useless to try to deal with him’ to ‘I need to do my part to make peace for my child,’ she says.
Work it out, don’t go to court
A former lawyer-for-child has this advice to separated parents: “Work it out, it might not be perfect but at least you’ve made that decision. If you go to court you will have no control over it.”
The lawyer, who does not want to be named, says she’d advise parents and caregivers to be civil to each other and avoid making negative remarks about the other party. Children should be encouraged to spend time with the other parent, and should not have to answer difficult questions afterwards. Children become scared about saying they’ve had a good time at the other parent’s home, she says, and become wary about what is safe to talk about. If one parent is blocked from seeing a child, or walks away from the fight in the end, the child feels abandoned.
“It’s not good for the child. They might have heard stuff like ‘your father never asked about you’, or ‘your father never took you away’. And they believe that all their lives.”
Then when they get older and hear the other side of the story, that creates anger and resentment.
The lawyer warns that acrimonious behaviour will taint every future special occasion – birthdays, Christmas, graduations, weddings - and will have an ongoing effect on children’s lives.
Past hurts get in the way
Court-appointed counsellor Helen Aish, who has spent more than 30 years working with couples, asks warring parents to focus on one question: “How can we make this work for our children?”
She regularly comes across couples who have been caught up in lengthy court battles, sometimes as long as 10 years. Often it’s past hurts that get in the way of settlements.
“People say things that are unreasonable and they know they’re unreasonable, but they’re so hurt they just come bursting out.”
Samantha de Coning, lead mediator for Fair Way Resolution which handles much of the Family Court work, says mediation can help de-escalate conflict, avoiding the need to fight it out in court. De Coning says sticking points often include how much time parents want to spend with their children.
“For separated parents, it’s a change from having your children full-time and having that expectation that you will be always there for special things - Christmas and birthdays, good nights and bath times. That loss and that grief is what underpins all our mediations, no matter who decided to leave.”
Will has some advice for other separated parents going through the same anguish now: avoid going to court; try mediation, and if that doesn’t work, try it again. Focus on what’s best for the children. Limit communication to precise messages and don’t rant; focus on keeping yourself happy and well.
“It’s a period of turmoil where everything is changing. I lost the house, my wife, lost my job eventually and lost my kids for a while. Because you are going through that you feel panicked and want to get things sorted as soon as possible..”
In hindsight, Will says, his panic and his determination to resolve things quickly didn’t help.
“I was one of those parents who just went, ‘Oh my God this is so unfair, how is it possible for this person to say this and all their friends are now saying this and they don’t know what they’re talking about.’ And you just end up writing screeds of stuff and sending it. I think I pushed my (ex) wife into a corner.”
*Names have been changed to protect identities
Read the whole series
Part One: Why the Family Court is a war zone
Part Two: Experts warn of the damage to kids
Part Three: The wish list: How to fix the Family Court
Jane Phare is a senior Auckland-based features and investigations journalist, former assistant editor of NZ Herald and former editor of Viva and the Weekend Herald.