(0:00 – 0:14)
Hello and welcome to Family Law Matters. I’m Dr. Michael Mantell, joining Bonnie Rabinovitch Mantel, the managing partner and owner of the Primus Family Law Group. Hi, Bonnie.
(0:15 – 0:21)
Hi, Michael. How are you doing today? Doing well, thank you. How about you? I haven’t killed anybody yet today.
(0:21 – 0:35)
Well, that means that court-ordered counseling has not been necessary for you, huh? Not recently. Good. Since I mentioned court-ordered counseling, like the way we did that? I do.
(0:37 – 6:42)
Let’s talk about that, court-ordered counseling. Lots of people are seeking help for emotional disorders these days, distress, making themselves upset and so forth. The court steps in and says, you need to have counseling.
What conditions does that take place? I don’t want anybody out there to think that the court’s coming into your home and telling you what to do. There has been a lot of constitutional debate as to whether or not the court has the right to order anybody into counseling or any such thing, because if it’s for the parties, parents, adults, that can be problematic. But what the court has decided is that they do have the right when requested to order or when there’s good cause.
So, there’s situations where parents are getting divorced and maybe they’re involving the children unwittingly in the case. They’re discussing adult issues. They don’t have proper boundaries, or they have anger issues, or they have some tendencies.
Let’s say there was a domestic violence issue. The court will routinely, in such situations, order the parents into counseling. Now, they can only order them up to a maximum of a year, and then they also have the caveat, unless released by the therapist, because obviously we have to give some judgment and autonomy to the therapist professional that’s now been ordered to see either individually the parties, very rarely together.
That is not something that happens in divorce court, is them having to go together. So, the court will look at the situation, and if there is good cause, they will order the parties into individual therapy. They can also order the children into therapy.
Children, as we’ve discussed, Michael, many times on these at Family Law Matters, they are going through the breakup of the relationship with you. They are going to have emotions. They are going to have feelings.
They may act out. Their grades may slip. They may have behavioral issues at school because they’re just overwhelmed, is the word I’m looking for.
And so, the court, in recognizing that, usually on an application by either party, or maybe both parents agree that the children need therapy, and then the court will make sure that they get those services. I also want to touch on some other services that the court can order. There are several programs online and in person that the court can order people into.
They are parenting courses, co-parenting courses, high conflict parenting courses, and there are also kid courses to teach the kids how to cope with what’s going on. There are also regional services. If your children have ADD, ADHD, or are on the autism spectrum, or have an IEP at school, or an IOP at school, these are all situations that can come about either generically, naturally, it’s just part of the situation, or as a result of going through this divorce, separation, custodial process that the court can order everybody to be participating in.
So, it doesn’t necessarily have to be a therapist, or a licensed medical professional. You have so many now programs that the court is trying to make available to parents and children going through the process of a court proceeding. Some parents use this against the other parent.
So, one parent will say, you know, he or she is out of his mind, they’re abusive, they’re verbally abusive, they’re upsetting the kids, and he or she needs psychiatric or psychological help. And then an evaluation is used to determine if that’s proper. What if that evaluation comes up and says, I’m sorry, ma’am or sir, no, they don’t need, they don’t require therapy, the court can take that position as well, can it? Absolutely.
The court, the court is a judge, right? It’s not a therapist, they don’t have therapeutic training. So, they will defer to the experts. That’s why they have the ability to order the experts be involved is because they understand they have a limited time with these parties.
And with the information that is being given to them, which, as we know, in family court is a lot of he said, she said, it’s not like there’s a lot of empirical data that’s coming out, it’s mostly I think he’s narcissistic, or I think she’s got borderline personality disorder. And so, you get a lot of that and the judges have to ferret out the allegations for the, you know, from the true concerns. And so, they will defer to the professionals.
Now, one thing that’s nice about that is if a neutral has come back and said, no, party A is not the crazy one, actually, party B is slightly the crazy one, right, it’s going to have a lot of impact on custodial arrangements, because the judge wants help in making the right, the best decision possible. There is no right, forgive me, I misspoke, the best decision possible. And so, they’re going to rely on these experts to give them information, data, and empirical information so that they can make the best decision possible.
(6:43 – 7:15)
And the bottom line is that the courts want to be sure that people get the help that they need to go on living a healthy life, particularly when it comes to young children. But it’s not just for them to go on and live. It’s for also, they want them to get the help they need to be productive parts of their children’s lives, foster their children to be thriving.
Right, right. Well said. As I’m sure that your clients know, you always say it well.
(7:15 – 7:53)
Bonnie, if people have questions about court-ordered counseling, or psychological help, or psychiatric evaluations, they want to talk to you about that. How can they reach you? They can reach me directly at 619-574-8000, and they will be put on my calendar for a free 30 minute phone consultation to see how we can help, how we can direct, or they can reach us online at www.PrimusFamilyLaw.com. There’s a form they can fill out, and we will reach back and put you on my calendar for that phone consultation.
(Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Go Unlimited to remove this message.)