by The Parenting Centre | May 19, 2023 | General
With so much of my work involving post-separation co-parenting, I am constantly struck by the outrageous amounts of money people spend on lawyers. I’ve talked before about how counter productive it is for children and how the money could be better spent in other ways.
For today, I want to focus on WHY lawyers fees are so ridiculously high? And the bottom line, from the lawyers I know, is that “that’s the going rate”. Clients expect these exorbitant fees and are willing, if they have the money and can’t get Legal Aid, to pay them. Why do we as a society tolerate this money gouging by the legal profession?
I am a clinical psychologist and a lawyer. Even in America, where law school is incredibly costly and takes three full years post graduate, it takes more years and costs more money to become a psychologist than a lawyer. So why do psychologists charge less than lawyers? Because the “market will bear” exorbitant lawyer fees. But do we as humans have to buy into this narrative?
In America some lawyers would justify their fees based on the expense of law school. Even though, as seen before, that argument has more holes than Swiss Cheese, it certainly is not a viable argument in Australia. It doesn’t cost more to become a lawyer in Australia than to work in many (most?) professional capacities requiring a degree and a license or registration.
Years ago I got a phone call from a family lawyer who asked if he can provide some information about a mutual client. I said I’d be happy to listen but he needed to know that I would notify my client that we talked. He laughed and said “oh, she will know because I will bill her for my time”. It never crossed my mind to bill the client for my time.
$800/hour for a lawyer seems exorbitant because it is. Until the public collectively refuses to accept this, we cannot expect the legal profession to self-regulate. If you are using a lawyer ask them to itemize their expenses and you can even ask them how they can justify the enormous expense.
This take everything you can get mentality pervades capitalism, and no where is it manifested more clearly than it is with lawyers.
by The Parenting Centre | May 19, 2023 | General
I’ve been thinking a lot about a metaphor that has probably been used by others. It’s a way of thinking about the impact of our early childhood experiences has on our understanding of the world and our understanding of who we are.
We are born as perfect; by definition, we are the perfect manifestation of ourselves (because we are the ONLY manifestation of ourselves). Then we are given a packet of information from other people (mostly parents) that we carry around everywhere we go. The packet tells us things about the world (“the world is beautiful”, or “the world is a scary place” or “hard work pays off” or “everyone gets screwed”) and it tells us things about ourselves (“you are awesome”, “you are stupid”, “you deserve to be celebrated”, or “you deserve to be hit”). NONE of these things are about us – they are about the person saying them. We aren’t smarter if someone thinks we are smart, and we aren’t dumber if someone thinks we are dumb. But that’s the only packet of information we have, so we carry it around. And we use it as a “reference” when we think about the world and, most importantly, when we think about ourselves and how we expect to be treated.
It’s important to understand how significant and all encompassing this is. All the ways we think about the world and about ourselves come from someone else.That means, well intentioned or otherwise, we are experiencing things based on our packet of information that we didn’t create and that says way more about the people who did than it says about us.
If we can think of this as a “packet” we are carrying around our entire lives, it is super empowering. Because it isn’t, and never was, about us. It’s something we’ve been carrying and we don’t need to carry it anymore. We can re-define everything we believe about the world and everything we believe about ourselves.
We can set down the packet and give energy to seeing the world, and ourselves, in whatever way WE choose
by The Parenting Centre | May 19, 2023 | General
Recently, I was driving home from getting groceries. I was stopped behind a van at a stoplight. I could not see who was driving, but I noticed at least one child passenger. The light turned green but the van didn’t move. I know I have sometimes gotten distracted and not noticed a light changing, so after about 15 seconds I gave a very short “courtesy beep”, and the van started moving.
Less than a kilometer later, the van driver put on the left directional signal to turn and slowed down but did not turn. I went to go around on the right and the van swerved in front of me, across the right lane, almost causing an accident. I pulled over with my heart beating fast. The van just turned and drove down the street.
While I calmed down, I thought about the child in the van, and about role modeling. What did they learn from watching their parent (I assume) almost cause an accident because, I guess, they were offended that someone reminded them that they didn’t notice the light changing to green? And my thoughts expanded to thinking about traditional parenting and the state of humanity in our culture. Even aside from “road rage” some drivers will speed up to prevent you from entering their lane, and will get angry at you for going too slow. I don’t think there is any animal species that tries to hurt other members of its species for no reason. No benefit accrued to this van driver by almost causing this accident, but I imagine their ego is so fragile from the way they were raised that they felt there was an “affront” that they had to “revenge”, even if it could have cost someone (including their child) serious injury or death.
As I resumed my trip home I thought about that van driver being a child, and probably observing their parent doing similar juvenile and dangerous behaviors. And now they were handing this “legacy” of anger and recklessness to their own child.
Alternative parenting may not the best way to get obedience and a feeling of dominance and control, but MAYBE if we raised children differently we would not have a society of people who are so chronically insecure that they feel the need to protect their egos even if it is at the expense of the safety of themselves and others.
by The Parenting Centre | Feb 9, 2023 | General
Traditional parents will sometimes demand that their children say things like “I’m sorry” when the parents feel the child has done the “wrong” thing. Of course, if the child does this it is just about power and compliance; it is not an actual apology.
This got me thinking about what IS an actual apology. What does it mean when we say “I’m sorry”?
Sometimes when a child says “I’m sorry”, even if it wasn’t coerced, and then repeats the “offending” behaviour, we think they must not really be sorry or they wouldn’t have done it again. I think it is not so black and white.
Aside from the fact that habits are hard to break, so habitual behaviours are unlikely to just come to a complete end without a few “slips” there is a deeper aspect. It’s one thing to understand that someone is offended by our words or behaviours and then to say, and maybe genuinely mean, “I’m sorry” if we say those words or do those behaviours. But it is another thing to understand WHY the person is offended.
For example, if someone says “Hi, Bob” and I tell them that is really upsetting to me, they will probably try not to say it and if they do and I get upset, they will, genuinely, apologise. But if I have explained to them that when I was a child someone would always say “Hi, Bob” before they flogged me, they will be more likely to understand and to not repeat it in the future.
The implications for parenting are these: 1) Don’t demand an apology, since even if you get it you aren’t actually getting it; 2) Don’t assume that if the behaviour is repeated it means your child wasn’t really sorry and 3) If your child does something that bothers you, explain to them WHY it bothers you. It doesn’t necessarily mean they will stop or they will say, or be, sorry, but it makes it much more likely.
by The Parenting Centre | Jan 5, 2023 | General
Once upon a time, there was a couple that lived in a beautiful house. One day they noticed that some of their door frames in the house were shifting and weren’t closing properly. They called in a door frame specialist, who worked all day and fixed the frames so the doors were working again. But a few days later, the frames started shifting again. Then the couple noticed that there were cracks in some places in their inside walls. They called in a wall specialist, who fixed the cracks and painted over them. But a few days later, the cracks started to re-appear.
One day, the couple had a friend over, who was a builder. They told their friend about the problems they were having with their doors and walls. The friend checked the house out and told them the doors and walls are not the problem; they are symptoms of the REAL problem, which was their house’s foundation was not stable. No matter how many times they fixed the doors or repaired the cracks, the house would shift until its foundation was stable.
In our world we often tend to blame children for problems. They have no power and, usually, no money, so they are an easy target. In my profession, we often look at children who are acting out as “broken doors” or “cracked walls” and spend years trying to “fix” them. But things won’t really change until the foundation is solid, and the foundation for children is their parents.
It’s pretty simple – 1) When children are insecure they tend to manifest it in their behavior (“act out”). 2) When parents are not communicating, not happy or in conflict, it exacerbates insecurity in children. We can send our children to years of therapy, punish them or try other behavioral techniques, take them to social skills groups, have them check in with the guidance officer at school, and even drug (oops, “medicate”) them. Sometimes things might seem better for a short period of time, just like the newly installed door will work for a little while. But the only way to address the issue is to repair the foundation (or, metaphorically, move to a new house). And the only ones who have the power to repair the foundation are the parents.
by The Parenting Centre | Jan 5, 2023 | General
I have written extensively, here and elsewhere, about how family court is a destructive process for children. What children need emotionally and developmentally is for their parents to get along, and family court positions parents as enemies and pits them against each other. It is exactly what children do not need, and they are often traumatized by court and its’ aftermath well into adulthood.
When parents separate their children are going through a major transition, and that’s when they need their parents the most.It is a time for parents to unite, not to be driven apart. Our adversarial system provides the opposite answer to what children need. Parents are often devastated by their separation and of course they are vulnerable, scared and often angry. But it is a time to recognize the other parent as an ally, in being the person on earth who loves your child(ren) as much as you do.
In that context, why couldn’t we conceptualize parental separation as a child protection issue? Children are going through a major transition and could potentially suffer significant trauma. They need protection, love and support; not conflict. What if we saw children of separation as children “at risk”, and if parents needed extra support from a government agency, they would turn to this proposed department of child safety.
I have believed for many years that court is the wrong place for parents who desperately need to come together and instead are being torn apart. With the increasing popularity of “Parenting Coordinators” and with some psychologists (finally) focusing on post separation co-parenting as part of their practice, there are resources available to support families. When our relationships end we need support ourselves and certainly can use external resources to help support and protect our children.
Even if people felt the need to preserve family court for certain dire situations (such as domestic violence) why can’t we have a “primary” system focused on collaboration, cooperation and respect, instead of fighting?
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