Having a child or children with an abusive ex-partner is always a very challenging situation unless the ex-partner never has contact with you or your children after your separation. Abusers can be men, and they can be women, however the vast majority of the time they are men. Abusers are often attracted to giving people: people who are willing to sacrifice their own needs and wants for the sake of others. In some relationships, when you have two givers, it works out well, because both people in the relationship give sometimes, but are also getting support and kindness from the other people. Not so with abusers! They are black holes of need, sucking up all of the support, love, patience, and kindness that you are able to give, and only demanding more when you have given up everything. Their need to suck you dry only increases the more you give, just like a black hole sucks in matter and light, only to grow bigger and more powerful, now able to suck in more matter and light! Exhausted and confused, people in abusive relationships often blame themselves (and are told by the abusers to blame themselves) for not doing enough around the house, not doing enough to meet their partner’s sexual needs, not doing enough to meet their partner’s demand for money, time, emotions, attention, and so on.
Abusers try to rule the family in the same way as a dictator rules a country: with power and control. If a dictator doesn’t like what one of their citizens are doing, they lock them up and have them beaten by corrupt police. In relationships, if an abuser doesn’t like what their partner is doing, they lock them up in the house by isolating them from their friends and family with jealous, false claims that they are dependent on them, and “gaslighting” them (making you feel crazy for behaving in normal ways, or telling you that you are misremembering things when you know something is true).
The abusers will use any means possible to control and manipulate you. As the saying goes, “all is fair in love and war,” meaning that there are no limits to what your abuser will do to control and manipulate you. They will verbally hurt you, psychologically destroy you, take your money, use the children against you, physically stop you from leaving, threaten to hurt you and/or the children if you try to leave or assert yourself, physically attack you, try to turn your friends, family and co-workers against you, and generally try to ruin you. They will always be willing to take the fight one or more steps further than you ever will, because they don’t care about the consequences of hurting you or the children, they just want to win every time.
Real abusers often have personality disorders, like narcissistic, borderline, and antisocial personality disorders. These are disorders that impact regions of their brain involved in empathy (i.e., caring for other people’s feelings), insight (i.e., understanding your own thoughts, feelings, and behaviours, as well as how your behaviours impact other people’s feelings), and emotional regulation (i.e., the ability to calm yourself down), making healthy relationships very difficult for them. Not all bad relationships involve people with personality disorders, and not all people who engage in abusive behaviours have personality disorders. In this article, I am providing tips for people who are dealing with abusers who have personality disorders.
Not sure if you are in an abusive relationship? Read this article:
https://canadianwomen.org/blog/warning-signs-abusive-controlling-relationship/
For most people, it is very hard to go up against abusive ex-partners in Family Court and in life in general, so there are some tips that can be helpful for getting you and your children through these difficult times.
1. Make sure that you look after yourself!
This is priority #1! Without good self-care, you will not survive any battle with an abusive ex-partner. Also, you will not be able to properly support your children if you do not look after yourself. Ever been on a plane? Remember the boring and repetitive “safety” presentation they perform at the beginning of each flight, explaining what to do in an emergency. Flight attendants always say that if the pressure level in the cabin drops quickly, you must put your own oxygen mask on before putting it on your children. Why? Because if you are unconscious, you are not going to be any help to anyone else on the plane, including your children.
In a similar way, you must look after yourself when dealing with an abusive ex-partner in order to look after yourself in order to look after your children. This may mean psychotherapy with someone registered with a professional college (in Ontario, only a limited number of professionals can provide psychotherapy, including social workers, psychologists, registered psychotherapists, physicians, and nurses). This may mean leaning on friends and family for support. It may mean reaching out to services in your area for support (see list below for services in the Peterborough/Lindsay/Cobourg/Durham regions), particularly Family Court supports. This may mean getting a lawyer who has experience working with victims of abuse (check to make sure that they have domestic violence training before retaining them).
2. Don’t play nice, expecting them to play nice!
One of the biggest mistakes I see over and over again in the dozens of family law and counselling cases I have dealt with over the years is that victims still expect their abusive ex-partner to be nice if they are treated nicely. NOT TRUE! Abusers either don’t care about other people enough to control their behaviours, or they may lack insight into how their behaviours impact others. Some abusers actually like seeing other people hurt – seeing others suffer brings them pleasure! They will not return nice behaviours with their own nice behaviours. If you are kind, generous and trusting of them, they will abuse your trust, be vicious in their attacks against you, and take advantage of your generous, giving nature. Don’t fall into their trap! But also, don’t be mean to them, because you will lose in a battle of who can be meaner!
Instead of being mean to them, which won’t solve any problems, you have to be firm and friendly with them. Set very clear boundaries and give them consequences if they violate those boundaries. For example, tell them to stop calling you all hours of the night or you will block their number. The first time they violate this boundary and call you late at night, block their number. Don’t waste time negotiating, giving them a second, third, fourth, fifth, chance, because they won’t ever be able to respect your boundaries. Block their number immediately. If they come to your house unwanted, call the police immediately. Don’t wait until they have broken down your door, gotten inside your house and can physically threaten you. Stand firm, set boundaries, and enforce those boundaries!
Bill Eddy has created a useful strategy for dealing with people who have difficult personalities, called the “BIFF” response. Read more about that here: https://www.highconflictinstitute.com/biff-responses
3. Protect your children!
Abusers have no boundaries when it comes to getting what they want. Most people would not want to purposely hurt their children in order to get their way, because most people care about children and want them to be happy and healthy. Not so with abusers. Either they lack the self-control to protect children from their abuse, or they don’t care about the children enough to protect them, or they want to hurt you so badly they don’t care who they have to stomp on to get at you. Abusers will often make false allegations against you: “they are alienating the kids from me,” “they are keeping the children from me,” “they don’t want me to have relationships with the kids,” “they are too controlling,” “they are trying to turn everyone against me.”
Remember, the things that abusers say aren’t true – they are saying these things to try to manipulate you. If they are abusive, they will try to take advantage of your good nature, your kindness, your desire to get along by making you feel bad for protecting the children from them. When you stop the other parent from seeing the children, that is called “gatekeeping,” kind of like you are standing at a gate and deciding who gets through the gate, and who the gate is closed to. There are two kids of parents that protect their children from the other parent by gatekeeping: 1) Parents who gatekeep to hurt the other parent, but the gatekeeping doesn’t actually protect the children. This is “inappropriate gatekeeping.” 2) Parents who gatekeep to protect their children from abuse or harm. This is “appropriate gatekeeping” and is what you will need to do to protect the children, even if the abusive parent is saying that you are alienating the children from them or being a controlling parent. It is appropriate to stop children from seeing an abusive parent because abuse is harmful to children. It causes mental and physical health issues for them. It makes it hard for them to concentrate and do well in school. It makes it hard for them to get a good night’s sleep.
There are many options to allow the abusive parent to still see the children, but prevent them from being exposed to abuse. You can ask for supervised visits, either by a trusted family member or a supervised access centre. You can have video call visits (e.g., Zoom, Facetime, Messenger, etc.). You can have the parent and child play video games remotely together (e.g., Fortnite, Minecraft, Roblox). You can limit the amount of time the children spend with their abusive parent (e.g., daytime visits only, one overnight only). You can have the visits occur in a public setting. Talk to a lawyer, social worker, or family mediator to talk about what all of the options are for ensuring the safety of your children when they are with the other parent.
4. Be open and honest with the authorities about the abuse!
Many people in an abusive relationship have contact with police, counsellors, child protection workers, family court and other authorities. It is very important that you tell your story to the professionals involved in your lives. If the neighbours call the police, tell the police officers about the abuse if they are called by you or the neighbours. If you have to go to family court, make sure you mention the abuse in your court documents (e.g., application, affidavits, answers to the other parent’s affidavits). If the Children’s Aid Society worker comes to meet with you, make sure you tell them about the abuse.
All too often I see people in abusive relationships lie to police officers, counsellors, and Children’s Aid Society workers about the abuse. Sometimes they downplay it (e.g., it wasn’t that bad, I wasn’t hurt). Sometimes they excuse the abuse (e.g., they were just tired, they were drinking, they were stressed). Sometimes they outright deny that any abuse has happened. Victims of abuse lie to these authorities for a lot of different reasons. They may be afraid that if they tell the truth, the children will be removed from their care. They may be afraid that the abusive parent will get the children if someone finds out about the abuse. They may be in denial of being in an abusive relationship. They may lie to protect the abuser, because even though the abuser treats them poorly, they still love their abuser and don’t want to hurt them. They may be afraid of the abuser’s reaction if they tell the authorities and worry about their own safety.
It is really important to push past all of these reasons and look at the big picture. You won’t lose the children if you tell the truth about the abuse – in fact, you are more likely to get in trouble with the authorities if you lie about the abuse, than if you tell the truth. If they think you are hiding the abuse, they may not trust that you can protect the children from the abuse. These professionals can be strong allies in helping you manage your ex-partner and can provide powerful evidence in family court, influencing the judge’s opinion about the abuse. If you tell the police about the abuse, they will create a record (police report) that you can access at a later date that describes what happened, which you can use in family court to promote your point of view and help you protect the children.
Do not believe the other parent’s threats that the children will be taken away from you if you tell anyone about the abuse!
5. Know the risks of separating from an abusive partner!
Separating from an abusive partner is the time when women are at most risk of physical harm and death by murder! Take the risks seriously! Tell family members what you are going through. Reach out to friends for support. Connect with local services and professionals that can help protect you, like women’s services, counsellors, lawyers, family mediators, and so on. Don’t think that you can manage the risk alone or by ignoring the risk. If you take steps to protect yourself, and your ex-partner doesn’t become violent with you, you’ve only lost a few minutes or hours of your time. If you don’t take steps to protect yourself and you are assaulted or murdered, the consequences can be severe! Also remember that protecting yourself means that you are also protecting your children.
The number one thing that you can do to protect yourself and your children is to have a safety plan and to follow it in times of danger. Here are some resources and services to help you safety plan:
a) https://www.cleo.on.ca/sites/default/files/book_pdfs/plan.pdf
b) http://www.neighboursfriendsandfamilies.ca/i-want-to-help/safety-planning.html
c) https://www.ontario.ca/page/womens-issues
f) https://womensresources.ca/
g) https://cornerstonenorthumberland.ca/
h) https://ywcapeterborough.org/
i) https://www.thedenisehouse.com/
This is not a list of all of the services in your area. Feel free to contact Jonathan for more information: paynterj@hotmail.com