The emotional cost

Judith* has seen her son once in the seven years since she split with his father because he sided with him. She has no faith the current system can do anything about it. Stu Hunt reports.

In reality I’ve probably lost my son forever.’’ In seven years Judith has had almost no contact with her son after splitting with her husband. The courts allowed both parents equal access but things turned out very differently.

‘‘My counsellor told me that it would be easier to deal with if my son had died as there would be some finality to the situation.

‘‘But to have him out of reach every day is heart-wrenching.

‘‘I’ve had heaps of counselling and I cried every night for two years.’’

When Judith and her ex-husband split she said it was traumatic; she just packed the car and left. Her son was 10 at the time.

After 25 years together, Judith says it took her a long time to leave the situation.

‘‘I was getting no respect from either of them. It was like a codependency, both of them weren’t able to deal with the situation so they became one entity.

‘‘He couldn’t split himself away from his father’s views.’’

She says when she left her son was trying to defend her and saying don’t be so horrible Dad and all that kind of thing.

‘‘I moved just around the corner to a girlfriend’s house and I lived there for six months but the two of them ganged up together.’’

‘‘My husband instead of saying ‘your mum and I haven’t been getting a long for a long time etc ... you know these things happen; you need to see your mum’, it was just a block.’’

Judith says that she was banned from going to the house by her exhusband and told that her son would see her if he wanted to, but he was not going to make him.

Eventually the matter ended up in Family Court where both parents were deemed fit to have day to day care.

Judith’s son was old enough to choose where he ended up.

‘‘I think he felt he had to look after his father so he chose to stay in the family home. Because I’d left it was like ‘you need to come back to us’.’’

Judith said that from the start her son was defiant and held to the line ‘if she’s not going to come home to live with us then I’m not going to see her’.

When she went to pick him up for the first visitation he refused to go.

‘‘At 10 years old he was 5’6’’ and there was no way I could control him. He ended up kicking the tail-lights in his father’s car he was that angry.’’

She said it all became about the ‘‘us’’ factor – ‘You’ve done this to us’.

Judith sought legal advice and she was told she could send the police to pick him up.

‘‘I thought do I really want to put him through that?’’ She didn’t.

Judith’s son still has contact with everyone else in the family, he still sees her mum and talks to her sister.

‘‘It’s just me he won’t have anything to do with.’’

Judith has remarried and she has seen her son once in the past 7 years. She writes to him every month and sends him birthday and Christmas cards ‘‘just like any mother would’’.

‘‘But to step back and have not have any communication with my child is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do in my life.

‘‘Not only did I have to deal with the struggle of getting out of an emotionally damaging relationship, in order to do this, I had to lose my son as well. It is so unfair.’’

Judith would like to see change to prevent this happening to others

She said it’s the lack of options in the system that are the most frustrating.

‘‘Its really difficult because you have one person manipulating the child, how do you stop that? I don’t believe there’s anything the legal system can do about it.’’

Ultimately she feels there needs to be some consequence for the partner who doesn’t follow the court ruling.

She believes that regardless of who has day-to-day care, both parties should agree what is best for the child and that should be the governing agreement.

‘‘That’s where there’s a huge misconception. People who say they have day-to-day care think they have every right to be the person who decides absolute what happens to the child.

‘‘Both parents should have a say regardless of who they live with – over important decisions in their life.

‘‘Parents putting the child ahead of themselves, amicable discussion, putting their own agenda aside, all parents should have to do that.

If they can’t do it amicably Judith says there should be mediation available to sit down and discuss it as adults.

‘‘As it is this isn’t enforced.’’

The sting in the tail is that child support is calculated on how many nights each parent has the child.

‘‘I’m paying 100 per cent of child support because I have no nights a year so financially and emotionally I dip out.

Judith says she has had to accept the situation is outside of her control.

‘‘Once a young child has been alienated against the other parent, it is very difficult for this manipulation to be undone. The child ends up believing that the views of the manipulator are their own.’’

‘‘Its really difficult because you have one person manipulating the child, how do you stop that? I don’t believe there’s anything the legal system can do about it.’’