Don't wait for instruction, take action!

Don’t sit and wait, be empowered to take action!

It can be frustrating and emotionally draining waiting for your ex or their lawyer to tell you what they need from you to resolve your dispute. It could be days, weeks, or months and you still don’t know what you need to gain access to your children. It seems like a nightmare that you are trying to wake up from to stop the pain of your reality.

The other parent’s words preventing you seeing your children, replay over and over in your mind such as;

“The children are not safe with you”

“You can’t look after the kids with your alcohol and drug addiction”

“I don’t want the kids around your family as they are toxic”

You may think, that is not true, or if it is true that you should still get to see your children.

The key is to show how you are taking proactive action to reduce the risk of any harm coming to your children.

You can pre-empt what you think they need and make it happen, so you reduce further delays.

What might that look like?

In order to satisfy the other parent or the court, you need to think about what actions you can take to demonstrate your willingness and commitment for eliminating or mitigating the risk.

1. “The children are not safe with you”

Will you mitigate or eliminate that risk?

Mitigate that risk by assessing if you have a violence order taken out on you preventing family violence or a no content order. You can go ahead and do courses that the court recognises such as anger management, men’s behaviour program, women’s behaviour program, circle of security or parenting after separation program. This can save you valuable court time if you have these courses completed prior to your court date.

Eliminate that risk by committing to supervised visits for 3 months to show that the children are safe in your presence and children can build a relationship with you. Doing the courses above will also go in good stead to show your commitment to your children.

2. “You can’t look after the kids with your alcohol and drug addiction”

Will you mitigate or eliminate that risk?

Mitigate that risk by doing a hair follicle and urine test to show clean results prior to spending time with the children.

Eliminate that risk by giving up alcohol and drugs providing 3 months worth of clean hair follicle and urine tests. Engage with a drug and alcohol counsellor to gain ongoing therapy to keep you on track to abstinence. Join a rehabilitation program or alcoholics anonymous.

3. “I don’t want the kids around your family as they are toxic”

Will you mitigate or eliminate that risk?

Mitigate that risk by committing to being there with the kids when they visit extended family for a 2hour visit ONLY, where you can set guidelines of no bad mouthing or arguments in front of the kids. You can be present to manage the conversations to steer conversations back to being civil, respectful and calm. Further commitment can be made to not leave kids with extended family on their own.

Eliminate that risk by committing that your family will not be able to see the children for a period of 12 months whereby it can then be assessed at that time if applicable to move into mitigation phase above.

Your proactive approach to taking action instead of waiting on instruction from your ex or their legal team or the court of what you need to do, can reduce delays and provide assurance that you want to commit and invest in changes to gain time with your children.   

Divorce Coaching can help you plan your actions and keep you accountable to meet deadlines, improve communication and reduce conflict.

Author Cheryl Duffy -

CDC Certified Divorce Coach^®

Divorce Conflict Coach

Conflicted Coparenting Coach

Accredited NMAS Mediator

Accredited Family Dispute Resolution Practitioner

Parenting Coordinator

Mental Health First Aider

www.thedivorcecentre.com.au