While she was away the father applied for a parental order which gave him majority care of the children.
In his judgment last month, Judge Adams said the mother's dismay at the parenting order - done without her knowledge - and getting into heated disputes that "misfired badly" had resulted in police interventions, criminal proceedings that were not upheld and reduced and supervised contact of her kids.
She was also trespassed from the children's school.
Her "hyper vigilance" over concerns over the father's parenting also resulted in her calling Oranga Tamariki 40 times over two years - the biggest number of callouts a social worker told the court she had ever seen to one family, according to the judgment.
The father's "over-anxious reactions" to the mother's "impulsive behaviour" resulted to her only being allowed limited and supervised contact with her children, the decision says.
Judge Adams acknowledged that the court system failed to set this case to better rights at an early stage when it came to light that the earlier parenting order had been made without taking into account a more "balanced history". This included that they had previously worked together well and that the father had previously been unconcerned over the mother's parenting.
He said because the issues were not addressed quickly they had been overtaken by the mother's extreme views and impulsive behaviour exacerbated by her parental disempowerment and the father's histrionic tendencies.
He noted both parents had over-reacted to events.
But despite the parents' behaviour, he deemed both to be "safe-enough" parents who individually had much to offer and that the children were happy and healthy kids who "miraculously" seem unaffected by the upheavals that had tormented both parents.
Judge Adams dismissed previous parenting orders which had led to the mother only seeing her children under supervision in an effort to "wipe the slate clean" and awarded them split guardianship. He also apologised to the mother for her painful experiences of justice in New Zealand.
"Now it is apparent, I think what happened to (mother) has been unfair and unfairly prolonged," the judgment said.
The judge also chose not to pursue the father's alleged breaches of the earlier parenting order so they could have a "new beginning".
In setting out the new shared parenting orders, he gave strict instructions of how and when the parents were allowed to communicate with each other and ordered they attend couple counselling.
The parents would care for the children on alternate weeks and the children were not allowed to leave the country until 2023.
While restricting the children from leaving New Zealand for more than two years was "unusual", he felt it was necessary so the parents could develop good co-parenting communication rather than risk the mother taking the children overseas and not returning them.
However the mother told the Herald she had no faith in the court system which she alleged had allowed her ex-partner to breach the court orders and feared it could happen again given there had been no consequences.
She now planned to appeal against the court's decision not to allow her to take her children back to their birth country and her support network claiming they were being detained here against their wishes.
The father told the Herald the documents were private and declined to comment.
