Supervised Contact is a form of domestic abuse.

No you chose not to see your children she can show them she offered access and you declined. You not the courts did this. Now you have set yourself an incredibly hard task. She will never back down as she sees yuou as not caring enough, maybe she even views this as abuse.

My ex has indirect contact once a month he either uses it or he doesnt that is his choice. Two mnths in he has used it once. Who do you think the children blame, I''ll tell you now it aint me I am here day in day out roviding everything and taking all the deserved credit.

The court order states "I chose not to have contact".

I pointed out at the time that this was not accurate but the judge insisted that if I refused supervised contact that I was therefore choosing not to have contact.

I repeated on 2-3 occasions that I wanted contact but the judge was not prepared to enter this in the court order.

My wife after the hearing paid for a complete transcript which she now shows to relatives and friends to say that I chose not to have any contact with the children.

In turn I tell them that this is not the case and that I will see my children tomorrow if the law permits me to see them under the same terms as other divorced/separated fathers.

Never lose sight of the truth whatever the personal costs are for you and your family.

disneybunny wrote:

The system is designed to protect the children, nothing in life is perfect. I still think that calling it abuse is an over reaction.

It is very badly designed.

Denying a parent contact with their child for no real reason, and enshrining that in law, is abusive. It is difficult to think of anything much more abusive, actually. We have seen much evidence on this forum that this is a routine occurrence in the UK family court system.

In Australia, up until the 70s, it was routine social policy to forcably adopt indigenous children - to remove them from their parents, and foster them into white families. This was considered to be "in the best interests of the children", as it would integrate them in to the modern culture. It is now, of course, recognised is barbaric beyond belief - but, at the time, accepted without question. It is amazing, really, what people can be conditioned to believe is acceptable - all of those destroyed lives. Ironically, Australia is now miles ahead of us in terms of family justice.

DrDaddy wrote:
It is very badly designed.
[/quote]

Part of the trouble is that it is not designed. It is the current stage of an endless process of change driven by ideology, political expediency, consolidation of judicial practice, single issue campaigning and random chance.

The "best interests of the child", for example, which people are so fond of quoting to justify their own actions, was introduced with the sole purpose of denying mothers equality.

I remain unconvinced, however, that a designed system would be any different or better.

I wouldnt compare seeing my children to "sitting on the back of the bus"

I would say that I very much admire your principles, and I share some of the hatred of the "system" having supported my partner through a whole year and 3 months of it -however I would walk over hot coals for both my children and my future step daughter, and would not give them up for these principles.

One of your posts earlier refers to the fact that your ex wont accept the loss of face - perhaps not, but then to give up any form of contact with your own children on a point of principle such as the issue of contact centres - which would probably only have taken months to resolve throught eh court system - as flawed as it may well be - isnt something I can envisage a lot of parents doing.

"Never lose sight of the truth no matter what the personal costs are for you or your family" - it cost your children their dad, and that would be a very sobering thought for me.

Fantastic principles James that''ll be a doozy that conversation explaining to an adult kid one day that you never saw them again because you were mithering over the finer ethical points of feeling abused by the British family legal system.
Life ain''t fair mate it''s ***** in fact.
You''d better learn that this game is well and truly bent in the womans favour.
So you can throw your rattle out your pram and not want to play it but isn''t that actually condoning the institutionalised child abuse by family courts because with your method of dealing with it all you''ve got is a 4 and 6 year old kids who never get to see their Dad again.
Your hypothesis for dealing with this one is fundamentally flawed.
You keep one thing in your sights that''s that the kids deserve to know you.So what have to do is take them on at their own game you scheme and connive and anything they throw at you you disprove.They put up the hurdles you have to jump em not because it''s right or fair it ain''t.It''s called self sacrifice and you do it because eventually they can''t put up any more hurdles because you have proven them to be unreasonable and that the allegations are unfounded.
I don''t know why you have such a poor understanding of women they will never admit they are wrong so if you go head to head your fecked that''s why you outflank em.
You have to let em think they have got it their way.I guarantee if you see the kids with your family swallow your pride within the year you would have them kids unsupervised.
I just think it''s more important to put two little kids above your ego and the ethical points of an argument.
I tell you now the minute you got married and had kids you fecked yourself.That £100k you think is yours ain''t and them kids you think you''ve got equal rights for you ain''t either and that''s how it works.But you can''t punish the kids because your pxssed off that you shot yourself in the foot by getting married.
You''ve both dug in for a war of attrition if you don''t let her save face the only victims are the kids.
Wise up.
All the best
HRH

James,
In January I saw my daughter after 4 months of not seeing her. When I first saw her I was in tears for a few minutes. It was like a reunion. I felt so ashamed that I had cried in front of two strangers. Its hard on the male ego.
Its now June and now i get to see my girl at a choice of locations outside away from a contact centre. By early next year I should be in a position to bring her home.
Losing face, ego, dignity for a short period of time says one thing. That you will sacrifice that for your own kids.
Judges will start telling your ex where to go by the 3rd, 4th Directions hearing. Just be patient. You will not need to ask, you will be given.