Child Custody False Allegations - Laying a Trap

The child custody evaluation process can be long and painful especially if parents are in high conflict. High conflict parents already don’t like each other but when they can’t agree on who should raise the child, where the child should live and any of the other day-to-day activities of the child then the wheels may come off altogether. When a high conflict parent feels trapped they may resort to lying about the other parents character just to gain the upper hand. But what if you were expecting that?

It is far more common than you might imagine that parents find themselves faced with false allegations when going for mediation or evaluation. The two problems it throws up in your way are:

It creates a new issue that you must address head-on.
It takes your focus off of your agenda and makes you focus on their agenda.

But what if you could set yourself up to diffuse the issue as soon as it arose? Wouldn’t that keep you focused on your agenda? Of course it would. And wouldn’t it be much better if the false allegation came full circle and caused the same problems for the other parent that they attempted to force onto you? Of course it would.

While I generally despise people who create problems for others, I have no issue with the problem causer getting a taste of their own medicine. I believe that if you go looking for trouble, don’t be surprised when it finds you.

Here is the trap. Before you head off to mediation, evaluation, or any other event where issues are discussed, make sure you email the other parent with the concerns you know you both have. Ask for input in how to solve the problems and ask if there are any other issues you missed. Leave out one or two obvious ones that are triggers for them. They get to remind you that you are an idiot that needs to be reminded of the issues and in a perfect world, they could also suggest a solution.

This where you get to spring the trap. When you get to mediation or evaluation, the accusation gets made. You pull out the list of issues you agreed on while everything from pencils to the type of toilet paper might be listed, there are no allegations of misconduct on your part. If this is such a big problem why is it not mentioned along with the pencils and toilet paper? The court can figure this out. Now the parent making the allegations is focused on an different agenda. They are left to explain why these allegations were never mentioned.

I have no empathy for them. If they had taken your email seriously and offered a solution they wouldn’t be in this situation now.