Children have a right to have a relationship with both parents.
Having solid relationships with both parents leads to the best positive outcomes for children post-divorce.
I believe all that to be true, and there is ample research to support it. I also believe we are missing the point.
If the ultimate goal is the best outcomes for children, and having a relationship with both parents can facilitate that, at what point did we decide that 50 / 50 parenting time was the only way to accomplish that?
Establishing and maintaining solid relationships with both parents actually has little do with the amount of time being spent with each parent. It’s about quality over quantity.
There are plenty of examples in the lives of children where they have close, encouraging supportive relationships with people who are NOT responsible for their daily care and decision making. Grandparents, relatives, coaches, to name a few.
But “parents have the right to spend time with their children!”
It’s interesting to me that the pushback is consistently framed from the perspective of the “right” of the parent with no mention of the immense RESPONSIBILITY that comes with that “right”.
The responsibility to make decisions that are in the best interest of the child.
The responsibility to provide the child with all necessities (physical, psychological, emotional, social) required to facilitate and encourage healthy growth and development.
The responsibility to NOT DO HARM.
How does a parent’s lack of ability to fulfill these responsibilities impact their right?
As far as I have seen, it doesn’t.
If you have a parent who does not have the capacity to fulfill these responsibilities, the next logical course of action would be education and awareness.
Yet for those of us dealing with a high-conflict, maladaptive, abusive other parent, education and awareness does not go over well. They know better than everyone else, they are doing better than everyone else, and no one gets to tell them otherwise.
What happens to the child then? Based on what I am seeing, we basically throw up our hands and say, “well, too bad for the child. They are still their parent. And still have a right to time with the child”.
So now the child is spending time in a less than ideal environment. Both relationally, and quite likely physically. And in an environment that is going to cause long-term harm. (Quite the opposite of the positive outcomes we were looking for).
The child begins to express to the protective parent that they do not want to go spend time with the other parent.
For a child to express they do not want to visit or spend time with the other parent is a BIG deal. It’s not something they express lightly and something that significantly hurts them emotionally and psychologically.
Children have a biological, instinctual drive to attach to both parents. It’s not a choice. It’s a neurobiological instinct. If they start expressing they don’t want to spend time with a parent there is ALWAYS something to look at.
It is a clear sign that something is amiss – a rupture in the attachment relationship – as Dr. Gordon Neufeld calls it.
The rupture can be due to a multitude of reasons. Maybe the child doesn’t feel safe. Maybe they realize the high-conflict parent cannot meet their needs. Maybe they are being neglected or overtly abused by them. Maybe all three. And yes, maybe, there is rupture because the protective parent is undermining and speaking poorly about the high-conflict parent.
No matter what the reason, there is work to be done to repair the rupture in the relationship. And regardless of the reason for the rupture, the work is the responsibility of the parent with whom the rupture is.
So yet again, we have a responsibility placed on a parent with either no capacity, or quite frankly no need, want or willingness to make that repair. The child will be expected to “figure it out kid!”. To get on board, and get in line. Because it’s the parents way or NO way.
I have to wonder how operating primarily from a “rights” lens would work in the employment world.
You hire someone to do a job. They have a responsibility to meet the needs of the role they are hired for. They can’t fulfill those responsibilities, so they go on a performance plan (education). They don’t do well with the education, nor believe they need it and continue to not fulfill their job responsibilities.
What would the next step be?
I imagine they would be fired from that role they were hired for fairly swiftly.
I find it hard to imagine ANY employer just shrugging their shoulders with a nonchalant “well, this is who we have in the role- too bad for us. I guess we will just have to make do”.
Yet that is EXACTLY what is happening to our children.
No one is saying co-workers can’t continue to have a relationship with someone who was fired because they could not fulfill the required responsibilities of the role.
Equally, in theory, the child can still have a relationship with the parent who cannot meet their needs.
But does having a relationship require 50 / 50 parenting time? Does it require 50 / 50 decision making?
It does not. If optimal long-term outcomes for children are achieved through having a relationship with both parents then let’s do that.
Let’s support the children in having a relationship in way that keeps them safe, and in a way that does not cause them further harm.
There is a way to do it. It requires thinking outside the box. Maybe dismantling the box entirely. It requires not jumping to the assumption that children are lying. It requires putting the expectation of parental “right” aside and looking at the situation from the lens of the child. It requires not categorizing children as possessions and property. It requires dissolving the default idea of 50 / 50 parenting time and finding another way.
It requires actually putting the child first, giving that child a voice, and making decisions that truly ARE in the BEST INTERST OF THE CHILD.
It’s not enough to have all the right words in all the right legislation. Child’s right to safety, child’s right to not be abused, parental right does not trump child safety, parents are required to make decisions that are in the best interest of the child, etc., etc., etc.
The right words in black and white legislation mean nothing when they are not implemented nor used to inform decision making.
Decisions that are devastating our children.
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