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This is one of a series of lesson-7 articles
on how to evolve a high-nurturance stepfamily. This series extends
the concepts in Lessons 1-6, so study them first. These articles augment, vs.
replace, other
professional help. The "/" in re/marriage and re/divorce
notes that it may be a stepparent's first union. "Co-parents" means both
bioparents, or any of the
related stepparents and bioparents co-managing a multi-home nuclear
stepfamily.
+ + +
Demographers estimate that roughly 70% of the millions of Americans who
have one or more living
kids. The co-parents
and local court decide who gets primary (physical) custody of each minor child. Where
co-parents can't agree, a family-law judge orders the kids to live with their
mother or father, with primary, sole, or joint custody, based on their opinion of what's "in the best
interest of each child."
Conflicts about child custody,
visitations,
and
financial support can be
complicated and bitter be-cause of the primal bonds between most parents and kids, and the welter of
intense feelings, needs, and unresolved
that family separation and divorce
amplify and cause. Relatives and
stepparents can add their own custody opinions and needs, increasing
conflict complexity. Minor kids - with a daunting ar-ray of their own
needs - have little power,
and are usually caught in the middle.
This
three-page article explores what each person snared in typical child- custody disputes really needs, and
suggests options for filling those needs effectively. The
article...
-
outlines 12 basic premises about child
custody (below),
-
explores who
really makes custody decisions,
-
proposes three
goals for effective custody
arrangements,
-
defines
effective
child-custody arrangements,
-
proposes what typical
kids and
co-parents need
in a custody agreement,
-
outlines three common
types of
custody-disputes, and...
-
suggests 10
options toward permanently resolving
significant child-custody disputes.
This article assumes you're familiar with...
 Perspective
This article is based on
29 years' experience consulting with over 1,000
average divorced and re/ married me and women. Many were
struggling over child-related conflicts, like who should have legal
and physical custody. The word custody comes to us
from the Latin root which means "to guard."
The process of fighting over child custody is the same as with any
other family dispute - finding an acceptable way to resolve co-parents'
clashing needs and opinions. Custody battles can be specially complex and
acrimonious because they (a)
implicitly ask "Who's the better
caregiver?", and (b) they in-volve
the welfare of one or more beloved kids. Resolving these volatile disputes effectively
takes special
and knowledge.
This article exists because minor children in divorcing families and
stepfamilies need informed,
cooperative parental
to prepare for stable
independence. When divorcing co-parents can't agree on how to provide this
nurturance together, they invoke the legal system - which is inherently
adversarial.
Family-law judges apply complex federal and state laws to
decide who should be responsible to provide what child
nurturance how, and when.
Restated: when parents can't agree,
biased legal professionals who know little of the divorcing family try to
discern what each unique child needs, and how their caregivers should fill
those needs.
Because each child and family is unique and child-raising is more art than
science, custody, visitation, and financial support decisions must be subjective.
However, I propose that some
premises about custody disputes apply to all situations because they're based on primal human
These
premises affect effective resolution of any child-custody battle. See how
these compare to what your co-parents believe now...
Basic Premises
To clarify your
stance on child development and custody decisions, decide whether you Agree,
Disagree, or ? (aren't sure, or can't say) on these core
ideas:
1) Minor children of divorce or parental death have many concurrent
developmental and
family-adjustment needs. Each co-parent
has their own mix of primary needs.
Family nurturance
refers to filling all adult and child needs effectively, not just the
child's. (A D ?)
2) The are
at least
30 factors which
affect a family's
Some are instinctual
in heal-thy adults, and others are learned through
co-parents' childhood experiences and training. One key factor is the degree
of health, harmony, and shared purpose among caregiving adults. Divorce
indicates signif-icant co-parenting disharmony. Persons, families, and cultures
differ on which
nurturance factors are most important. (A D ?)
3) A co-parent who was well
nurtured in their early years is more
likely to provide consistently-effective family nurturance than an adult
burdened with
and
from early-childhood
and abuse. Kids'
and
are strongly affected by (a) their genetic inheritance, and (b) the
nurturance-level of their home and social environment before entering first
grade. (A D ?)
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4) Wounded, unaware adults repeatedly choose
wounded partners until
they admit and inten-tionally reduce their
wounds. This means that typical stepkids are raised by significantly wounded
bioparents and stepparents, and are at risk of
the
wounds. (A D ?)
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5)
Usually the co-parent/s in one
home are (a) less wounded and ignorant and (b) better able to fill
everyone's needs (1 above) than co-parents in the child's other home.
(A D ?) Common factors that affect this include:
Some
wounded caregivers use
(need) a minor child to fill their own primary needs for life-purpose, identity, security, stimulation, and social status and
acceptance. They deny this to themselves and others, and
may be specially bitter custody battlers.
Healthier caregivers fill their
elsewhere, and enjoy major
satisfaction from (a) living with their child/ren, (b) balancing their
main priorities (needs), and (c) patient-ly giving time and attention to help their
youngster/s attain healthy independence. (A D ?)
A co-parent who wasn't strongly
motivated to conceive and raise a child is less likely to want to
self-sacrifice for many years to nurture their kids. S/He may
raise a child more from duty, guilt, anxiety, social pressure, and/or
legal requirement than from a primal parent-child
There are
exceptions. (A D ?)
Some co-parents want to provide the
family-nurturance
factors more than other caregivers. This is shaped by personality traits +
+ personal
experience + wholistic health +
supports + competing distractions and needs.
Personality traits depend on (a) genes and
(b)
dominance.
(A D ?)
For various reasons, some co-parents
(a) have more effective-co-parent
traits, and/or (b) are less distracted
from caregiving by their personal and social problems than other co-parents. (A D
?)
Some co-parents are more open to
admitting they need local caregiving help (e.g. co-parenting education,
medical advice,
tutoring), selecting qualified help, and
accepting it than
others. (A D ?)
Recall: we're reviewing your beliefs about factors that affect which custody
option is best long term for a child of divorce and their nuclear
family...
6) Using legal
professionals to resolve child-related conflicts strongly suggests that...
So any court ruling
not requiring adult wound-recovery and improved
communication skills may force resolution of
current surface conflicts, but will
increase co-parent
and lower the
family's nurturance level. That raises the odds of eventual
re/divorce, and minor kids
false-self wounds. (A D ?)
Premise
7) At any
time, each minor child and each caregiver has a mix of conscious surface
needs (symptoms), and underlying
This mix dynamically determines their ongoing motives, decisions,
and behaviors.
Focusing on filling surface
custody
needs will probably not provide optimal long-term
child nurter- ance.
Adults usually can't
"see" their underlying needs until their
true Self
guides their other
personality
subselves. (A D ?)
8) Typical
child-custody battles are tangled in a web of other concurrent
and interpersonal conflicts between co-parents,
kids, and relatives. So
odds for lasting resolution rise when all adults...
-
are fluent in the seven
communication
and help each other...
-
separate their multiple problems,
-
to discern their primary needs, and...
-
focus on
satisfying a few at time.
Adults who aren't aware they're ruled by
find this hard or
impossible. Laws, attorneys,
mediators, and judges cannot solve this. (A D ?)
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9) Conflicts occur when two or more persons' primary needs
clash, and they don't know how to
as mutually-respectful partners. The best chance for lasting custody-conflict resolution
occurs when each co-parent is (a)
of their ex mate's, and the child(ren)'s primary needs, and
(b) genuinely values them as highly as his or her own needs
- i.e. when each co-parent has an
(mutual respect)
attitude.
Both conditions are most likely when co-parents' true Selves are solidly
of their
personalities. (A D
?) |
Premise 10) Every
child needs healthy
role
models to
develop clear gender-identity and successful adult independence and
relationships. In some key ways, the
most nurturing male cannot give his child what a female co-parent can, and
vice versa. Restated: every developing child needs stable, healthy, balanced
interaction with male and female caregivers. (A D ?)
11)
Co-parent teamwork-
and
child-related impasses result primarily from adults'
(a)
psycho-logical
and (b) shared ignorance of
communication basics
and
Using
legal force to re-solve child-related co-parent
conflicts is a clear sign of these two factors.
It will usually
increase family stress and co-parenting
no matter what the
court rules. Once
and admitted,
false-self wounds and communication ignorance can be intentionally
over time! (A D
?)
A final custody-related premise
is...
12) The first (pre-legal)
of divorce has
probably already significantly wounded each minor child
and hindered their development. So the best adult/s to nurture such
kids are clearly aware of...
-
each child's
status with
developmental and
family-adjustment
needs and wounds and...
-
their own needs and wounds; and...
-
are motivated to reduce
everyone's wounds - i.e. to provide a high-nurturance home for them all.
This suggests a rule of thumb:
co-parents who are (a) knowledgeable about
and (b) clearly in true
personal recovery are more like to nurture minor kids well than those
who aren't. (A D ?)
+ + +
Pause and stretch... What are you aware of now? Do you agree with these 12
premises? Do your other co-parents? Your attorneys and judge/s? Consider
learning the answers, if you don't already know.
The overarching
premise here is that your odds of making optimal long-term custody decisions go
way up if you co-parents (a) know what you each believe, and (b) compromise
significant
conflicts! For
more perspective, review this article on selected co-parent
attitudes.
Before exploring your resolution options, let's examine a vital question:
Who's
Really Running Your Lives?
My clinical experience is that most parents who
(a) are guided by their
and (b) know how to communicate
effectively usually don't
divorce. Those that do divorce usually work out cooperative custody arrangements without lawyers, mediators, or an article like this.
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So if you're
divorced and have serious co-parenting conflicts, then one or both of you
co-parents (and any new partners) are probably dominated by a
well-intentioned
If so, that has major
for all of
you. |
Co-parent
offers an effective way to
if
this is so, and what to do if it is. For a preliminary check, use this
comparison and this self-evaluation
worksheet
and see what you learn. If you're skeptical, study this true
example, try this safe
exercise, and read my
letter to you.
The rest of this article assumes
that you've assessed for significant false-self wounds, and
con-cluded (a) "I and my ex are probably not psychologically
wounded," or (b) "one or both of us are wounded, and we want to learn more and evolve a
personal healing plan for all our sake's."
Now - let's use the
premises above to define...
What Is Effective Child Custody?
As the U.S. Constitution
defines core principles that guide (vs. define) the laws of our society, I
propose that there are guidelines
which apply to all custody situations - including yours. What
follows is based on my 40 years' study of human growth and behavior, and
30 years' study
of divorcing families and stepfamilies. Again - you may or may not agree
with these ideas, but your descendents depend on you to have some
clear ideas on "effective custody"...
In what follows, custody
arrangement means...
-
all written and verbal, legal and informal
custody rules and responsibilities that all involved adults agree to,
and...
-
what you co-parents and
children actually do.
Your actions will match your
agreements if the arrangement was well deliberated, respectfully
negotiated, and all kids' and adults'
are acknowledged and
validated enough.
Premise: the
main goals of an
effective child-custody arrangement are to:
raise or maintain the
in and between
kids' co-parenting homes, and...
raise or maintain the
of (a) all
minor kids living in both co-parental homes, and (b) each of the
active
bioparents and stepparents, while...
strengthening, vs. stressing, the
health, safety, and stability of local society, and conserving it's
resources.
How does this compare
with your definition of key child-custody goals? In my experience, most
people, including family-law professionals, focus mainly on the child's
welfare. Typical deliberations and court orders fail to give equal weight to
the primary needs of everyone who lives in the child/ren's two homes.
How can divorcing
co-parents and any new partners reach these three goals together if you (a)
don't trust,
respect, or
like each other, and
(b) have trouble communicating
After
30 years'
professional study of family dynamics, I believe - you can't,
unless "somehow," you co-parents become self-motivated (vs.
court-ordered) to...
-
become aware of what
you and
each child needs, over time, so
you each want to...
-
heal your
and learn
while you adults...
-
identify and get the
you need, in order
to...
-
help each other
many competing
needs, responsibilities, and goals every day.
|
Implication:
unless all your caregivers want to (a) accept specific
for the
minor kids in your care, and to (b) give high priority to the
four things above as a
each dependent child (not just those in your custody dispute)
are at major risk of false-self wounding and a life of frequent
unhappiness or
and
unrealized potentials. |
Another implication:
as long as you co-parents and
attorneys stay narrowly focused on trying to win child-custody
disputes rather than on improving your
nurturance level -
you'll probably escalate your
conflicts. This is like fighting bitterly over roof repairs while
termites are destroying your home's foundation.
Bottom line:
your child-custody arrangement will be
effective
long-term
if all your
co-parents...
-
your true Selves
to
your
personalities (Project
and you all...
-
accept your
stepfamily
and what it
(do Projects
and
and you all...
-
learn how to
effectively
conflicting
adult
and
(Project
and...
-
you all
want to give high priority to overcoming any
to forming an
effective nurturing
(Project
and...
-
you all focus
on raising your stepfamily's
long term,
not on winning and/or on one or more children.
Pause, breathe, and notice your reaction
to this summary. Notice the absence of "hire a stepfamily-unaware attorney
to force your needs and values on the other co-parent/s."
For more clarity, let's explore several
of these factors: co-parent motivations, and what each adult and child
probably needs..
Continue
with a definition of effective custody, a look at your
motivations,
and what your kids and co-parents each probably need in this situation...
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Updated
March 06, 2010
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