top of page

Do I Need to Force my Kid to Go?

Updated: Jan 4

If the child is 16 or over? No. If the child is 15? Probably not. If the child is under 15? You better have some backup if you don't.


In a nut shell, when kids get older they may thank the parents for forcing access to the other.


For context, this wouldn't apply if there is truly a horrible parent in play. I don't mean where one is more strict or too soft than the other or general parenting disagreements, but rather when there is a history of abuse against the child, as found by a judge or CAS or some third party... that would be different.


Anyhow, on with the soapbox...


There's plenty of case law that says not only is a parent expected to foster a relationship between the child and other parent, but they are also expected to force the child to go, even over strong protest.


This will ruffle the feathers of just under half the parents here. For completely understandable reasons. But I wanted to convey a real life story that I know...


The person's kids are 15 and 16 now. And for years their Mom and Dad were "high conflict". You name it - it happened, police, CAS, vacation motions, motions to change, etc. etc. The one thing that didn't happen was withholding of the kids. Despite everything - they kept to the schedule (prob under strong advice of counsel for the most part). So there were times exchanges happened over protest.

Mom told Dad early on that the daughter was afraid and visibly shaken at the thought of going to Dad. Dad never saw any evidence of that at all and asserted it was all made up for all the usual reasons.


There was a period of time where they didn't want to go to Dad and wanted to stay/live with mom. There was a time where they wanted to live with Dad and asked him to "fight for them" to live with him.


Years later their Mom and Dad get along better than ever. The conflict is well behind them, and they truly support each other and ... well they just never disagree with each other. They take turns letting the other take the reigns and recognize each other's strengths and weaknesses and admit to their own mistakes as they unfold.


Their daughter admitted that she was scared years ago; but not "visibly shaken" scared. Makes sense. Dad was the harder one (enforcing rules, would discipline etc). Some fear of the parents repercussions to bad behaviour is normal. So that much was true at the time. But a year or so later she wanted to live with Dad so that adds context.


Dad explained that there were times that Mom forced her to go to Dad, and times Dad forced her to go to Moms but was wondering how she felt about that now looking back at it. Did they do the right thing.


"Yes". She understood these things :

  • If they had not forced her, she would be missing out on some things today. The relationship that she has with Dad for vacations and emotional growth and discussions. And with her Mom for all the wonderful things that Moms bring to the table, passionate about doing everything for her.

  • She understands that while she thought at the time she was right in her refusal to go to the other, she realizes now that she didn't have proper understanding of what parenting was.

  • She would have struggled today with the guilt if they had allowed her to push either parent away. For context, like many teens, guilt is a big thing for her - guilt over her parents have led her to do significant self harm in the past.

In short she's thankful that her Mom and Dad, despite the conflict of the past, did force her to maintain a relationship and time with the other parent.


Of the plethora of mistakes Dad and her Mom made; thankfully giving her the choice was not one of them; so today she's got two supportive parents not just one.


What kid in the world doesn't want two parents? They didn't rob her of that.


To clarify - this post was within the context of both parents fighting for time with the kids, not where one disengages or makes woefully inadequate attempts to encourage access. It's meant to shed some contextual light onto a situation where one parent doesn't want to send their 8 year old because they don't want to go for some reason, and the other parent is accusing them of not holding up their end of the deal/order by forcing the kid and is engaging in attempts to get the child to go with them (be it on the doorstep, or texting from the car or whatever).


132 views0 comments

Recent Posts

See All

Comments


Law

STAY IN THE KNOW!
Get Notified when a new Post is Published.

Thanks for submitting!

bottom of page