Advice: ggrr52 writes - We’ve Had Enough!
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Having discovered this blog, I don’t know whether I feel relief that other couples are having a similar experience to us, or dismay that you expect it to go on indefinitely… I recently married a man who has a “PEW.” I have to tell you that I am a psychotherapist who chooses not to work with BPD if I can help it — not for 50 minutes — and not for pay — and here I am dealing with it all the time.
My husband had been separated for 3 years, and divorced for one year when he met me. The moment his PEW sighted me on her radar, from 2000 miles away, the toxic phone calls and emails to my husband began and go on to this day (even during our honeymoon). The content of these, and the arguments, ‘conversations’ my husband recounts, are eerily similar to yours. If she did not have his two children, 9 and 11, he would certainly never see her again. He has tried to make boundaries many times: no communications about anything other than the children, but she always crosses them on some pretext and soon escalates into the same tired list of accusations of ‘outrages’supposedly commited by my husband, and after Christmas when we had the children, by me, too.
We decided last week that we had had enough. We wanted to set up a new system of communication whereby we would appoint an intermediary who would handle it all, so we would never have to talk to her or read another email again. She would be told she could not contact us, except in extreme emergency regarding the childrens’ health and safety. All professionals (teachers, doctors, therapists) would contact my husband directly. We would give a dedicated cell phone to the children so that they could talk to their dad. My husband contacted his attorney with this idea, and he told him that the court would take a dim view of using an intermediary, as it does not show good co-parenting. I am so very disappointed.
I wonder if you have any suggestions?
Thanks!
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ggrr52,
Welcome! It appears you’ve had the “lightbulb moment.” No matter your experiences and expectations regarding your PEW, there is a great measure of relief in knowing that you are not alone.
While we will always say “listen to the advice of your attorney - he is a trained professional” - I will take exception to his assessment of your plan. However, know that he knows better than I just how the court may view your idea and we still make choices in our own situation with our mind on how the court will see things. It’s a tightrope we walk almost daily. We don’t respond to emails that have foul language, accusations, or anything else that has nothing to do with the children. If we receive emails with such viciousness, we ignore the viciousness and only respond, succinctly, to the matter affecting the children. We rarely talk with PEW on the phone, except on matters affecting the children. One cross word - we hang up the phone on her. If she goes off on a matter unrelated to the children - we hang up on her. At child-exchanges, there is no idle chit-chat, any discussion is related to the children only. We don’t interfere with her parenting when she has custody of the children (extremely difficult) and we don’t allow her to interfere with our parenting when we have custody of the children. The biggest key: DO NOT ENGAGE THE BORDERLINE on matters unrelated to the children.
What you’re discussing is called Parallel Parenting. The link provides some wonderful insight into the differences between co-parenting and parallel parenting.
Ten Tips for Successful Parallel Parenting
- Maintain an attitude for non-interference with your child’s other parent. Neither parent has influence or say over the actions of the other parent.
- Carry on a business-like attitude; use common courtesy.
- Do not plan activities for the children during the other parent’s time. It may be better for a child to miss an event than to witness conflict.
- Stay focused on the present.
- Stay oriented to the task at hand.
- Keep your children’s best interests in mind.
- Remember the goal is to keep conflict to a minimum.
- Follow up in writing all agreements and discussions regarding the children.
- When communication and/or negotiation is necessary, use a neutral third party to assist you.
- Keep an open mind.
Unfortunately, it is simply impossible to co-parent with someone who has Borderline Personality Disorder. I might suggest that sharing the article linked above with your attorney might give him a deeper insight into the struggles you face with the BPD ex-wife and how it can more effectively be managed, with the benefit of the children in mind. Many attorneys simply don’t know about or fail to fully understand the disorder, so it is up to their client to educate them. Any successful efforts to reduce negative interaction with the borderline ex-wife will be beneficial to everyone.
Share the article with your attorney. In the meantime, try implementing certain portions of your plan that won’t be looked upon unfavorably by the court while you work with your attorney to move in the direction of parallel parenting. For instance, have a third party read the e-mails and write out the things you should respond to, that way you don’t have to see the name calling or viciousness, but can deal with the real issue at hand. No one has to know that the third party is the one reading the e-mails since you are responding to them appropriately. This will save you a ton of headache and frustration, but make sure the original e-mails are saved in case you can use them in court to show her true actions.
No family should have to put up with the terrorism that is put upon them by someone with Borderline Personality Disorder.
Our best wishes to you.
~LM
January 24th, 2008 at 8:14 am
I’m not surprised your lawyer said it wasn’t good co-parenting, both he and the courts are likely to miss the fact that co-parenting isn’t practical in our case.
What gets me is the person who isn’t cooperating, the Pew, isn’t being chastised by the court. You are searching for a way to reduce conflict and practically parent and your lawyer is pointing out that it doesn’t seem cooperative on your part, well duh, what about on her part, why is that OK?
My ex is constantly finding ways to reduce visitation or short me from what the court ordered, but this is of no concern to the court.
My view is there is a winner and a looser, most often (not always) the woman wins residential custody and the looser NCP must put up with whatever BS the winner dishes out.
Thanks for introducing the Parallel Parenting Concept, I would guess that most people in the divorce industry are unfamiliar with the concept.
Your idea of a ghost reader to relieve the stress without appearing to be uncooperative is creative and practical.
I’d point out that there are many forms of parenting terrorism from people who haven’t been diagnosed with BPD.
January 24th, 2008 at 12:32 pm
jq75,
So true. The primary parent is completely in charge and can do no wrong. For instance, when PEW decides she doesn’t want to drive to the exchange point, she doesn’t, and the court actually asks, well why didn’t Dad then drive all the way to PEW’s house if he really wanted the kids? Um, so does that mean we can just decide not to return the kids to her and she would be expected to drive 4 hours to get them? Yea, doubtful, but that’s how the court sees it.
Funny that you mention terrorism, as our next post will respond to this exact feeling. I honestly never thought of a PEW (or other high conflict personality) as a terrorist, but that is EXACTLY what they are.
March 21st, 2008 at 11:26 pm
Funny isn’t it, JQ75 claims his ex is out to get him but if his hate blog against other bloggers is any indication of where he is mentally Id say she has a good point..
Check it out for yourself
http://megs-blog-war.blogspot.com/