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Transcript

Divorced Dads: Child Refusing to Visit You? Don’t Make This Mistake · Children, Divorce & Family Psychology with Dr. Bill MacLaney

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: If your child has started saying, I don't want to come over, there's one mistake I see divorced parents making all the time.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: And it usually comes from a place of good.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Dr.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: Bill McLeaney, and I'm a clinical psychologist.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: And a significant part of my work involves families where a child has become resistant to, or in some cases, completely disconnected from one parent after a separation or divorce.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: We call this visitation refusal.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: In about 75% of the cases, the father is the one being rejected by the child while the rest are with the mother.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: In either case, the parents can carry a tremendous amount of shame and guilt along with this, and maybe even difficult to talk about.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: They show up at family barbecues and they don't have their children on their visitation days, and they struggle to explain what's happening.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: I want to help you stop that distance from growing and get you back to spending quality time with your child.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: But to do that, we have to start with what not to do, because that usually the part that catches the parent off guard.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: When this first starts, it usually doesn't look like some major family crisis.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes it's a teenager saying, I'm not going.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: With a younger child, it may look completely different.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: They start crying when it's time to switch homes, clinging to the other parent, saying that their stomach hurts, or suddenly finding a reason they can't go.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: And with older kids, it can be easier to explain away.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: They have too much homework, something's going on with their friends, they don't feel like coming to dinner tonight.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: Different ages, different behavior.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm paying attention to the same thing.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: Why has spending time with this parent suddenly become much harder?
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: Because you don't want to turn every potential visit into a fight.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: So a lot of rejected parents do what feels like the reasonable thing.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: They say, okay, I don't want to pressure you.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: We'll skip this weekend and we'll try again next time.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: If that happens once, I'm not terribly concerned.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: What concerns me is when I don't want to go starts to become the plan.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: Because taking your child seriously and letting your child decide whether a relationship continues are two different things.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: If your child suddenly doesn't want to spend time with you, I want to know what happened.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: Something about this has become difficult for them.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: And when you're the parent standing in the middle of it, trying to figure out what this is, it can be really hard.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: You're upset.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: Your child is upset.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: The other parent has their own understanding of what's happening.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: And frankly, your child may not be able to explain it very well either.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: They just know I don't want to go to dad's.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: And this is where families can get into trouble.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: Because if nobody really understands what's driving that resistance, the easiest solution is to keep avoiding the things everybody is fighting about.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: Fine, don't go this weekend.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: We'll try again next weekend.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: Then next weekend comes and a child still doesn't want to go.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: So you skip that one too.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: And in that moment, it works beautifully.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: The argument stops.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: Your child calms down, everybody gets a little relief.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: The problem is that the relief can actually strengthen the avoidance.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: Think about anything you've ever been anxious about and put off.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: You don't do it and you immediately feel better.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: Well, your brain notices that too.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: Kids' brains notice it too.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: So if going to dad's feels uncomfortable and refusing to go makes that discomfort disappear, refusing becomes a little easier next time.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: Then another visit gets missed.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: Then another and another.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: Dad texts a little bit less because he doesn't want to pressure the child.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: The child answers a little less because that distance is becoming familiar.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: And three months later, dad is sitting in my office saying, I don't understand how we got here.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: That's why I want parents paying attention earlier.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: Not because one miss visit means you have some enormous psychological problem.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: But time by itself does not repair a strained parent-child relationship.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: And if something has been made being with you difficult six months apart doesn't automatically fix whatever happened.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: In a lot of cases, it just gives the distance six months to become more normal.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: Now, this is usually where parents ask the question, you're asking right now.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_00: Well, what am I supposed to do?
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: Make them come anyway?
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: The answer isn't quite that simple.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: If your 14-year-old is having an absolute meltdown in a driveway and saying, I'm not getting in that car, I'm not telling you to pick up the 14-year-old and throw him in the backseat.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: That doesn't repair anything.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm also not comfortable with the other extreme, which is, okay, you don't have to see dad until you feel ready.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: Because how long is that?
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: A week, three months, a year?
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: If you ask a child when they're ready, the answer will end up being inevitably never.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: At some point, we've stopped giving a child a little room in a difficult moment and started avoidance to determine whether the parent-child relationship continues.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: And those are very different things.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_00: If this is helping you understand what may be happening underneath the resistance, give the video a like and subscribe to the channel.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to be doing a lot more on divorce, parent-child relationships, and how to catch these problems before they become much harder to repair.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: So there is a third option, and you start treating it like a relationship that needs some attention.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: Now, what is actually causing the resistance?
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: That's going to be different from family to family.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: There may be anxiety around moving between the two homes.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: There may be anger towards dad that never really got worked through.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_00: The child may feel caught in the middle.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: Dad may be doing something that's making the relationship harder without realizing it.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: There may be pressure for coming somewhere else in the family.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes there are several things happening at once.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_00: This is also why I'm cautious when a father comes in and says, I know exactly what this is.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: My ex is turning my child against me.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_00: Parental alienation.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: Well, perhaps that can happen.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: But if we decide that's the entire explanation before we've looked at anything else, we can mix things that are actually fixable.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: What I want to understand is this.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: What is getting between this child and the parent right now?
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_00: That's the useful question.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't expect dad to somehow sit at home and figure this out all by himself.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: That's another reason I wish families got help earlier.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: When you're emotionally involved, it's difficult to see the whole picture clearly.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: You've got your version of what happened.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: The other parent has theirs.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: Your child has theirs.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: Part of my job is helping sort through all of that and figure out what is actually keeping the relationship stuck.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I would much rather do that when dad is saying, My kid has started fighting me on Wednesday night dinners.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: More than he tells me, my child hasn't spoken to me in a year.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: Because earlier on, we still have contact.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: We still have a relationship to work with.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: We can figure out what is creating the resistance and start changing it before being a part becomes the new normal.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: Notice what I'm saying here.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: The goal is not to prove that the child is wrong.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's not to prove that dad is right or mom is right.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: It's not necessarily to get everybody back to the exact parenting schedule tomorrow.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: The goal is to restore the relationship.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: Depending upon what happened, dad may have some things he needs to change.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: The child may need help working through anxiety or anger or some other issues.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: There may be pressure between the two homes that needs to come down.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: And if the relationship has become very damaged, you may need to rebuild contact more gradually than pretending everything is fine and jumping straight back into a full weekend together.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: But we're still moving towards connection.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_00: That's the part I don't want the rejected parent to lose.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: Giving your child a little room during one bad moment is not the same thing as stepping out of their life until they decide they want you back.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_00: I've seen fathers do that because they genuinely thought they were being respectful.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: Then months go by and now they're scared.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: And once dad gets scared, sometimes he swings all the way in the other direction.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: Now there are five texts, then another phone call.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_00: Why aren't you answering me?
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: Why are you doing this?
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: After everything I've done for you.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: Or dad starts trying to convince a child that mom is the problem.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_00: Now with every interaction with dad, it feels heavy.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: So I don't want you disappearing, but I don't want you chasing either.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: I want the relationship addressed.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: And if you don't know how to do that, which again, a lot of parents don't by the time they're in the middle of this, that is exactly when getting the right help can make a difference.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: Because the earlier we can understand why your child is pulling away, the more we usually have to work with.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_00: So if your child has started resisting time with you, whether that's a teenager saying, I'm not going, or a younger child melting down every time it's time to switch homes, don't dismiss it.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: And don't simply start removing more and more contact either.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: The sooner you can understand what's making that relationship harder for your child, the more you have to work with.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're in New Jersey and this is already happening in your family, you don't have to try to sort it out on your own.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: This is the kind of work we do at Compass Psych Service.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: Reach out to our office and we can help you figure out what's driving the resistance and what needs to happen next.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: And if you haven't watched my video on the seven warning signs that a child may not be handling divorce well, watch that next because resistance to parenting time is often part of the larger pattern that starts much earlier in the visitation refusal.