There are a number of conflicting psychological factors at play when a woman coming out of an abusive marriage makes custody decisions. One of the leading concerns expressed by women is the belief that their children will suffer if they don't have both parents in their lives. But a recent University of Illinois (UI) study, appearing in the August edition of the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, shows that decisions involving co-parenting are not always the best option. Despite this concern often being reinforced by prescribed divorce education classes, the UI study claims that the most important factor to consider in these cases is actually the prevention of further abuse. "Will the mother and father be able to co-parent without a recurrence of violence or controlling behaviors? That's the most important consideration in making child custody decisions," says Jennifer Hardesty, a UI assistant professor of human and community development. Nearly all of the women in the study had experienced some sort of abuse from their ex-partners after they had initiated separation, so this concern seems to be well founded.
While it is fear that usually leads to a woman initially filing for separation, complications arise when other emotions override her sense of self-preservation in favor of her children. "Fear was very important in the women's decisions to leave, but guilt over breaking up the family was more influential in making custody decisions," she said. Mothers are also influenced by anxieties that their children are in direct danger while in the custody of an abusive ex-husband.
These fears also extend to the courtroom, where many mothers dread the prospect of a hostile cross-examination almost as much as they dread their ex-husbands. "Get me into a courtroom where they're going to grill me and ask me questions and it's frightening. I don't like that grilling; it's very reminiscent of what he did to me for many, many years," said one study subject. "I didn't fight it. I did like I always do. I backed down," she continued. "I thought he was going to drag this out until I'm 100 years old."
Half of the women who participated in the study also believed that past abuses at the hands of their ex-husbands had not been properly represented in their custody battles. And in spite of a move to have abused women not attend conciliatory co-parenting classes, more than half had been directed to attend. "Many women talked about the influence of that class on their thinking about custody," said Hardesty. "They'd say, I can't restrict his involvement with the children because I know it's bad for the kids if we're not getting along and both involved in their lives." But as the study shows, co-parenting is not always the best option when there is a history of violence.
"So many people think that leaving the abuser means the end of the abuse; when children and custody arrangements are involved, that is often not the case," says Hardesty. "We need to know when there is too much risk for ongoing involvement and learn to tailor interventions, such as the post-divorce parenting class, to meet the different needs of parents with histories of violence," she concluded.
Source: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
