DID and child custody/access.

by **intentional~breather** » Wed Jul 27, 2011 2:20 pm

We have not shared our diagnosis with anyone but professionals at this time, save for on here. The exposure is terrifying for us....

There was a separation from the husband, who was abusive, when the youngest was 12 days old. She has never seen him after that day. He has never tried to get any access, until 3 months ago when we were served with papers. He is asking for supervised access for the time being with the goal being that he have her every other weekend and alternating holidays after some time of supervised access has gone by.

We have been to court twice now....(which is a HUGE thing in itself, the one who is best suited to appear in court does not like to leave the house) We are at the stage of "disclosure" now, and the judge has ordered that a children's lawyer/guardian become involved so as to make an "objective" opinion on the now almost 6 year old. Interesting though, for almost 6 years NO ONE, including all the specialists, therapists, and child protection services themselves have EVER found reason to be conerned about the children and our method of raising them....(there are 5 children, girl 24, girl, 22, girl 18, boy 17, and girl almost 6).

Here is the issue....Once the children's lawyer became involved, a 15 page questionaire was given to us to be filled out. It asks, VERY specifically, about mental health, (our primary diagnosis is DID, throw in C-PTSD, OCD, and 2 us are alcoholics, which we are working on volantarily, with great effort. Might we also include that the children are completely unaware of most of these things, including the alcoholism) These froms ask for information on addictions, mental health hospital stays (the lst time we were in the hospital was for an eating disorder in the early 90's) and we must include the professionals name, where they work etc....the deadline for the to be filled in and filed with the court is AUgust 2nd. Our therapist is going to spend some time with us on Friday to complete it. However, we are terrified (already expressed to our therapists) about him having access to this information and other strangers having it as well. It has led to some pretty desperate thinking.....

Have any of you had to deal with anything simular? Has exposure been terrifying for you? Have you been in a custody case where your diagnosis has been brought to light? Anyy thoughts appreciated.....they would have to be better than what we are coming up with on our own now....thank you.

Hm. This pending disclosure sounds very painful for you. Is your custody of your child in any way at risk?

To me, all the other mental health issues are just part and parcel of the DID. All of you has DID; the other issues are present only in dissociated parts of you, so that greatly dilutes their impact and hence relevance. That you have adult children who are mentally healthy (?) speaks to your fitness as a mother despite your having DID. When did it come to light? You have always had it, and arguably you are a more fit mother now that you know you have it. Have any of your children been assessed for symptoms of a dissociative disorder? Children of a parent with DID do have a higher risk of DID than the population in general. However, the studies that report this are based on diagnosing DID in parents of persons with DID, rather than on diagnosing DID in children of persons with DID. This is important because it means that the index persons were children of parents with undiagnosed DID.

Is the father of your youngest also the father of the older children?

by **Una+** » Wed Jul 27, 2011 4:42 pm

I think it would be a wise defensive move to get a copy of these articles, and have your therapist write an evaluation of how you compare to the mothers in this study. I sense that you are high functioning, perhaps far above the level of the "nonclinical control mothers". Note that all the dissociative mothers in this study had problems so severe that they were inpatients or day patients.

Dissociative mothers' subjective experience of parenting.
Benjamin LR, Benjamin R, Rind B.
Child Abuse Negl. 1996 Oct;20(10):933-42.
Abstract:

This study examined to what extent the symptoms of dissociative mothers interfered with their parenting and their subjective experiences of mothering. A group of 54 dissociative inpatient or day-patient mothers, 20 nondissociative inpatient mothers, and 20 hospital staff mothers were screened for Dissociative Disorders using the Structured Clinical Interview for Dissociative Disorders (SCID-D). They were then asked to fill out a self-report questionnaire on various aspects of mothering. This questionnaire, the Subjective Experiences of Parenting Scale (SEPS), examined 14 parenting characteristics: parenting partner support; relative support; abusiveness towards the child; extent to which symptoms interfered with parenting; constructive parenting traits; supportive versus hurtful discipline; extent of showing affection; ability to express affection; attachment behaviors; cognitive distortions; regulation of anger; self versus mother in parenting; subjective experience of mothering; and actions to promote the developmental growth of the child Dissociatives presented significantly more negative parenting behavior and related attributes than staff controls on 13 of the 14 parenting characteristics. Compared to nondissociative patients, the dissociative cohort presented poorer parenting behavior and related attributes on 9 of the 14 characteristics. Overall, the dissociatives experienced more problems with parenting attitudes and behaviors than either comparison group. Dissociative mothers manifested affective, behavioral, and cognitive difficulties in parenting.

The parenting experiences of mothers with dissociative disorders.
Benjamin LR, Benjamin R, Rind B.
J Marital Fam Ther. 1998 Jul;24(3):337-54.
Abstract:

This article presents a qualitative analysis of the experience of parenting of mothers with dissociative disorders. This analysis was performed to complement the quantitative analysis of problems of mothers with dissociative disorders that Benjamin, Benjamin, and Rind (1996) presented previously. They found that the functioning of these mothers, as well as their subjective experience of mothering, was poorer than that of either clinical or nonclinical control mothers. Our goal was to provide a clearer, richer picture of their problems in parenting. Using the mothers' own words, we describe how the five symptom areas of dissociation (amnesia, depersonalization, derealization, identity confusion, and identity alteration) impeded their parenting efforts. We conclude with a discussion of the necessity of addressing parenting in the treatment of client-mothers with dissociative disorders.

by **intentional~breather** » Thu Jul 28, 2011 4:24 am

Una+ wrote:Hm. This pending disclosure sounds very painful for you. Is your custody of your child in any way at risk?

No Una, this we are certain. However, the possiblity of supervised access is real (not for months yet, but real jsut the same. Apparently in Canada, even when a father has been absent for a number of years, and has proven to have all his ducks in a row, the courts will "bend over backwards" to faciltate some type of relationship between parent and child"

To me, all the other mental health issues are just part and parcel of the DID. All of you has DID; the other issues are present only in dissociated parts of you, so that greatly dilutes their impact and hence relevance.

Agreed.

That you have adult children who are mentally healthy (?) speaks to your fitness as a mother despite your having DID. When did it come to light?

One of the children, the 18 year old has been diagnosed with Bi-Polar 1. She is medicated and doing well. The other children are either in University or University bound, all well adjusted, productive citizens. (save for perhaps the drama that comes with teenaged girls)

We first entered therapy when there were MANY stressors going on. A terminally ill grandmother that we were taking care of in her home, an abusive husband who seemed to get worse by the day, etc....Our system, for lack of a better word, crashed. This was about 10 years ago. The diagnosis came much later, and with a Master's degree in Social Work, we did not want to admit that there was a much bigger issue than C-PTSD.

You have always had it, and arguably you are a more fit mother now that you know you have it.

This is so very true!

Have any of your children been assessed for symptoms of a dissociative disorder? Children of a parent with DID do have a higher risk of DID than the population in general. However, the studies that report this are based on diagnosing DID in parents of persons with DID, rather than on diagnosing DID in children of persons with DID. This is important because it means that the index persons were children of parents with undiagnosed DID.

They have not been assessed, but we feel confident that this is not the case. This is not just our opinion, it is that of a few friends who also work in the mental health field. As I mentioned, none of them are even aware of the alcoholism. We have very effective people for parenting, and since we have now become more co concious, the one things we all agree on the the safety and well being of the children...

Is the father of your youngest also the father of the older children?

Yes, he is.

-- Thu Jul 28, 2011 12:28 am --

Una+ wrote:I think it would be a wise defensive move to get a copy of these articles, and have your therapist write an evaluation of how you compare to the mothers in this study. I sense that you are high functioning, perhaps far above the level of the "nonclinical control mothers". Note that all the dissociative mothers in this study had problems so severe that they were inpatients or day patients.

Dissociative mothers' subjective experience of parenting.
Benjamin LR, Benjamin R, Rind B.
Child Abuse Negl. 1996 Oct;20(10):933-42.
Abstract:
This study examined to what extent the symptoms of dissociative mothers interfered with their parenting and their subjective experiences of mothering. A group of 54 dissociative inpatient or day-patient mothers, 20 nondissociative inpatient mothers, and 20 hospital staff mothers were screened for Dissociative Disorders using the Structured Clinical Interview for Dissociative Disorders (SCID-D). They were then asked to fill out a self-report questionnaire on various aspects of mothering. This questionnaire, the Subjective Experiences of Parenting Scale (SEPS), examined 14 parenting characteristics: parenting partner support; relative support; abusiveness towards the child; extent to which symptoms interfered with parenting; constructive parenting traits; supportive versus hurtful discipline; extent of showing affection; ability to express affection; attachment behaviors; cognitive distortions; regulation of anger; self versus mother in parenting; subjective experience of mothering; and actions to promote the developmental growth of the child Dissociatives presented significantly more negative parenting behavior and related attributes than staff controls on 13 of the 14 parenting characteristics. Compared to nondissociative patients, the dissociative cohort presented poorer parenting behavior and related attributes on 9 of the 14 characteristics. Overall, the dissociatives experienced more problems with parenting attitudes and behaviors than either comparison group. Dissociative mothers manifested affective, behavioral, and cognitive difficulties in parenting.

The parenting experiences of mothers with dissociative disorders.
Benjamin LR, Benjamin R, Rind B.
J Marital Fam Ther. 1998 Jul;24(3):337-54.
Abstract:
This article presents a qualitative analysis of the experience of parenting of mothers with dissociative disorders. This analysis was performed to complement the quantitative analysis of problems of mothers with dissociative disorders that Benjamin, Benjamin, and Rind (1996) presented previously. They found that the functioning of these mothers, as well as their subjective experience of mothering, was poorer than that of either clinical or nonclinical control mothers. Our goal was to provide a clearer, richer picture of their problems in parenting. Using the mothers' own words, we describe how the five symptom areas of dissociation (amnesia, depersonalization, derealization, identity confusion, and identity alteration) impeded their parenting efforts. We conclude with a discussion of the necessity of addressing parenting in the treatment of client-mothers with dissociative disorders.

Thank you for these articles, your imput is appreciated.

-- Thu Jul 28, 2011 12:32 am --

Incedentally, we are unaware of how we screwed up the reply/posting thing, but we have somehow managed to incorporate our responses into your quote, apologies.....

High functioning parent perhaps, computer literate, we are most certainly not

by **Una+** » Thu Jul 28, 2011 3:02 pm

intentional~breather wrote:we have somehow managed to incorporate our responses into your quote

To respond piecemeal, just insert

Code: Select all: [/quote]

into my quote, then after your response insert

Code: Select all: [quote]

to resume my quote.

DID and child custody/access.

DID and child custody/access.

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