“Like I'm Invisible”: IPV Survivor-Mothers' Perceptions Of

Journal of Family Violence https://doi.org/10.1007/s10896-019-00063-1 ORIGINAL ARTICLE BLike I’m Invisible^: IPV Survivor-Mothers’ Perceptions of Seeking Child Custody through the Family Court System Ellen Gutowski1 & Lisa A. Goodman1 # Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2019 Abstract This qualitative descriptive study examines the perspectives of 19 mothers who survived intimate partner violence (IPV) and sought custody of one or more children through the family court system. We explored these mothers’ perceptions of the nature of court processes from start to finish, their understandings of the impact of court processes and outcomes on their well-being, and their recommendations for improvements to facilitate a process that is sensitive to survivors’ experiences with IPV. Mothers interviewed in this study described an experience that was largely invalidating and distressing, compounding the adverse effects of IPVon their well-being. Qualitative content analysis yielded six clusters: 1) survivors must enter into a court environment that implicitly presumes the absence of trauma, 2) survivors face obstacles to getting their stories of abuse across and heard, 3) survivors experience harmful and helpful interactions with court professionals, 4) survivors endure distress in the courtroom, 5) survivors suffer psychosocial consequences outside of the courtroom, and 6) survivors make recommendations for an improved custody process that is sensitive to experiences of IPV. Results paint a picture of a family court system that has the potential to cause grave, lasting harms to survivor-mothers who are separating from abusive partners. Keywords Intimate partner violence . Domestic violence . Child custody . Family court . Child abuse It is well-established that the period after separation is the in child custody proceedings (Johnson et al. 2005; Kernic most dangerous for survivors of intimate partner violence et al. 2005;MeierandDickson2017;Saundersetal.2012, (IPV); that is, physical, sexual, psychological (Centers for 2016;Saundersetal.2013), and that the process of seeking Disease Control and Prevention 2018) and/or economic child custody through the family court system can entail con- (Adams et al. 2008) harm by a partner or spouse. During siderable difficulties for survivor-mothers aiming to protect separation, IPV survivors face an increased risk of threats, their children, such as custody outcomes that jeopardize the stalking, and violence, with extreme cases ending in murder safety of themselves and their children, or secondary victim- (DeKeseredy et al. 2017). Also, because IPV and child abuse ization from court professionals (Khaw et al. 2018; Laing often co-occur in a single home and at the hands of a single 2017; Miller and Manzer 2018;Riveraetal.2012; Slote perpetrator, separating from an abusive partner may present an et al. 2005; Zeoli et al. 2013). escalated threat to the safety of children (DeKeseredy et al. Despite evidence that family court can be a distressing 2017). At this vulnerable time, when survivors experience experience for survivors, existing research on the topic has challenges to their physical safety and psychological well-be- yet to examine how survivors with varied custody outcomes ing, many enter into the family court system seeking to protect perceive the nature of family court processes, the effects of themselves and their children from further abuse. Yet, a grow- these processes on their well-being, or their recommendations ing body of scholarship indicates that IPV is often minimized for improvement. This study set out to address these very questions through a qualitative investigation of the experiences of IPV survivors who were in the process of seeking * Ellen Gutowski or had sought custody of one or more children through family [email protected] court. As there is a dearth of information on survivors’ positive experiences with seeking child custody, we were particu- 1 Department of Counseling, Developmental, and Educational larly interested in soliciting examples of both positive and Psychology, Campion Hall, Boston College, Chestnut negative experiences from participants. To frame this Hill, MA 02467, USA JFamViol exploration, the next section both describes the growing body (Saunders et al. 2012) found that holding patriarchal norms of quantitative research on how family courts respond to IPV was related to a number of misconceptions about custody and reviews emerging, predominantly qualitative research that and IPV and subsequent recommendations that were explores how IPV survivors perceive this process and its unsupportive to survivors. Further, the authors’ research on consequences. court evaluators specifically, demonstrated that the likelihood of recommending arrangements that would increase a child’s contact with an abuser was associated with a range of miscon- How Does Family Court Respond to IPV? ceptions about IPV and custody, such as the belief that IPV is not an important factor to take into consideration when making Although survivors enter into family court hoping that profes- a custody or visitation determination (Saunders et al. 2013). sionals will see the abuse and respond accordingly, research This belief runs contrary to existing research that demonstrates using court record reviews and surveys of professionals dem- both the increased likelihood that when IPV is present, chil- onstrates a pattern of under-detection of IPV in the family dren are victimized themselves, as well as the long-lasting court system. For example, mention of IPV is often omitted harms that children face from being exposed to IPV, such as from case files, even in cases with externally documented increased adjustment problems and worsened mental health evidence, such as from police reports (Kernic et al. 2005)or (e.g., Graham-Bermann et al. 2009; Levendosky et al. 2013). court mediation records from custody disputes (Johnson et al. Finally, in a nationwide investigation of 238 published 2005). Even in those cases where IPV is noted, it may be opinions regarding abuse and custody, Meier and Dickson minimized. Saunders and colleagues (Saunders et al. 2013) (2017) found that abuse allegations were frequently surveyed 465 custody evaluators and found that, in response discredited based on the concept of parental alienation, the to a case vignette involving severe IPV, close to half (47%) of notion that parents may allege abuse to estrange the children evaluators recommended joint legal custody with full physical from the other parent (Harman et al. 2018). Importantly, this to the mother, and another 30% recommended joint legal and claim of parental alienation influenced custody outcomes dif- physical custody. Among evaluators who recommended visi- ferentially for men and women: fathers who alleged alienation tation arrangements in response to the case vignette, unsuper- were much more likely to win custody than mothers who vised visitation granted to the perpetrator was the most fre- alleged alienation. Moreover, fathers were more likely to quently recommended arrangement (47%). In another survey win custody even when their allegations of alienation were study, judges, private attorneys, and evaluators recommended not credited or resolved by the court, while mothers who al- that known abusers receive physical custody between 17 and leged alienation but were not credited were more likely to 21% of the time (Saunders et al. 2016). have their children removed from their custody and placed Two factors help explain this widespread under-detection with the father. These findings provide dramatic support for and minimization of IPV in family court. First, abusive part- bias against women who allege abuse, resulting in the mini- ners may distort information, distracting from the abusive dy- mization of their abuse experiences as a factor that influences namics that are present in the relationship (Miller and Smolter custody determinations. 2011; Watson and Ancis 2013). For example, in one study examining the perceptions of 109 attorneys, most of whom primarily represented IPV survivors, participants indicated How Do IPV Survivors Perceive Family Court? that abusive partners frequently sought to portray their former partner as psychologically unstable (White-Domain and Given existing quantitative research demonstrating how fam- Phillips 2016). Similarly, in studies on survivors’ perspec- ily courts may minimize or discredit abuse in the context of tives, participants indicated that their abusive ex-partners IPV, the growing collection of studies on survivors’ subjective made attempts to cast them as Bunfit^ parents (Miller and accounts indicating overall negative perceptions of their fam- Manzer 2018; Watson and Ancis 2013). Abusive partners ily court experiences is unsurprising. Several clear themes may also make counterclaims of abuse for the purposes of emerge from these studies. First, qualitative accounts of IPV retaliation (Miller and Smolter 2011). When both parties make survivors’ perceptions of family court indicate that many feel allegations of abuse, judges and evaluators face the near- that they and their children are unprotected. In one impossible task of sorting out questions about relative respon- Massachusetts-based study of 40 mothers going through cus- sibility for acts of violence. tody proceedings, the majority of participants felt that they A second potential reason for the minimization of IPV in and their children were unsafe from post-separation abuse, family

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