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Name: Buttercup88 New Member   Title: emotional abuse

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to get the court and judge to accept that emotional abuse is occurring? Basically my 4 yr old is being forced, against her will, to "visit" with her abusive dad one day every two weeks. She cries and screams not to go, and when she returns back to me she cries and snuggles and recently she has told me they yell alot at that house. She has now also told teachers at school that daddy tells her she will get in big trouble if she tells me what happens at daddy's house. (this comes after the teacher talking to FACS about my child telling her that she doesn't want to go to daddy's because it is scary there) All of a sudden now she is being threatened....but the court, FACS, will not get involved, FACS merely called him and told him to be more careful.

Any thoughts, suggestions, comments would be really appreciated. Has anyone gone through this and could share their story? My child is the most important thing in my life and I want to protect her, but I am finding the court system increasingly for the benefit of the dad, and not the best interest of the child.....very disappointed in the system.

Name: gwin New Member

Well, it is a far jump from the information you've provided to the response thus far (there is obviously a reason the dad has his child 1 day out of 2 weeks!). Abuse in any form, even if 2 days a month is too much. To a 4 year old, scary means scary and you should be concerned. So, if you feel that you are being supportive of her dad otherwise and deeply want to believe that they would be good parents to your child (and that you realize that your child knows the difference between someone telling her to eat her veges and someone being mean to her) then her telling her teacher that her daddy said not to tell is red flag. But in the end the advice is right - you should want to make the visits work and support them - to add though, to that end you are also morally required to make sure they are not abusing her so you CAN do just that. I hope this helps,

Name: madalex Member

The end of your post is very amusing. The father of your child gets to see his daughter on only one day out of every 14 and yet, somehow, this means the system is set up for the benefit of the father. Utterly ridiculous!

That being said, I imagine you force your 4 year old to do lots of things (like eat her vegtables and go to sleep at her bedtime), but that does not mean abuse is occurring.

I am sure that your child would prefer to be with you and not visit her father. And because of that (and because of your attitude towards her father), transitions are difficult. But, 4 year olds don't get to decide those things. They need to have relationships with both their parents, even when one of those parents yells occasionally.

What you can and should do is the best you can to encourage your child to spend time with her father and to minimize the disruption of the transitions when she is going to be with him. Instead of trying to find ways to put an end to the visits, you need to rise above your own feelings towards your ex and help your daughter be excited about visiting the only father that she will ever have.