Smart Parenting During and After Divorce: The Pitfalls of Taking Matters into Your Own Hands

Enlist the Help of Professionals

Your first way of checking whether your reasons for doing something that contradicts a court order or reduces or eliminates contact with a parent who has visitation rights is to discuss your plan with an attorney who knows something about family law. Discussing your plans with an attorney who is not a family lawyer is risky. If you get bad advice and act on it, you most likely will still be to blame in a judge's eyes. Just ask the mother of a young child who was told by an attorney who did not specialize in family law that she could move from New York to California, only to be served with a writ of habeas corpus demanding she return to New York. She lost custody of the child immediately on her return. The fact that her lawyer, a friend of the family and not a family lawyer, told her she could do it did not matter to the judge. If you think your child is being abused or neglected and stop visitation because you fear the child is in danger, seek consultation with a professional who knows something about child abuse, and call the child abuse hotline to ask whether the behavior and signs you are seeing suggest that your child is being abused or neglected.

If you terminate visitation with the visiting parent because your child says "it's boring," or doesn't like the food, it is likely that your behavior will not be viewed as being in the best interests of the child. Likewise, if you terminate visits because the co-parent owes you money, you are on shaky ground to say the least.

Do not take any form of "self-help" without contacting someone who is very familiar with the legal system, or with the signs and symptoms of abuse, if that is the issue. You might very well be creating more problems for yourself. At the very least you will be distracting the court from the issue that has raised your concern by giving the other parent an opportunity to make an equally strong complaint about you.

Quick Tip

You might think you have the most reasonable excuse in the world to defy a court order, but when you do, you run the risk of being held in contempt. Get legal advice before you do anything that violates the court's orders.

When You Suspect Abuse

When you consult professionals about abuse, be very cautious. Get something from them in writing stating the reasons why they think the child has suffered some sort of abuse or neglect. There are good professionals and bad professionals. How do you tell the difference? A good professional will not always be so quick to accept your side of the story, and may want to contact the other parent as well. Obviously, there are times when the child may have marks or bruises that are consistent with abuse, and time may be of the essence. There are also situations in which contacting an alleged abuser may result in reprisals against the reporting parent and/or child. Any professional who sees your child and concludes that there is a possibility that the child has been abused is mandated to report the suspected abuse to the appropriate state agency. Be wary of any professional who examines your child, concludes the child might have been abused, and then tells you to call the state agency.

Your local hospital may have a special unit that examines potential child abuse. Your pediatrician should be familiar with the signs of both physical and emotional abuse or neglect. A mental health professional is not always the right person to contact if your very young child (under four years or not verbal) is showing bumps or bruises that you think might be from abuse. If your child is not old enough to provide a detailed verbal account of what has gone on, a medical doctor who knows the physical marks consistent with abuse is the better person to contact first.