Family court- abuse but I don't want to deprive son and ex

[7081R]

Does anyone have any advice or experience with family courts when there has been emotional abuse towards yourself but the ex is a good dad and you don't want to deprive your child or your ex of a good relationship.
Just some quick background info - I have been a victim of emotional abuse for a few years. I left ex Feb last year. The abuse towards me is continuing. It is mainly manipulation. I have suggested options to him for parenting arrangements and I think I'm being quite reasonable, every other weekend he picks DS up from school on Fridays and brings DS into school Monday morning plus an equal split over the school holidays. The reason for every other weekend is to eliminate myself having to do the handover. When ex sees me, he has no boundaries, he doesn't care who hears him yelling, even DS. There have been many time when he has screamed at me in public, he even screamed c**t at me in front of kids and felt justified because I wasn't listening to him. If I try talking to him I get nowhere and he shouts, if I try to ignore and leave the situation he gets louder and has even taken my car keys and blocked exits. Therefore, I cannot do handovers with him myself. We tried doing handovers through family/friends but he also puts pressure and stress onto them.
Instead of discussing and suggesting contact arrangements with me, he twists is and says things like 'who do you think you are telling me what to do', 'you're taking my son away from me' (I haven't stopped him from seeing our son at all).
I suggested family mediation and offered to pay for it myself. He doesn't want to and accused me of refusing mediation when he suggested it in the past (he never suggested it and I would never have refused it).
He had continued to harass me by email trying to get me to talk to him but in the sentences he calls me a cow, a b*h etc, telling me karma will catch up with me, I can't believe you're doing this to me. From day one I have wanted to talk to him for the sake of our son but I will not talk to someone who disrespects me like that. I used to because he made me second-guess myself (I still do) and thought I had to engage with him.
I felt I had no choice but to get a child arrangement order in place. I paid and applied for it today. I declared that there was abuse because it asked why mediation isn't possible. Apparently even if he did agree to mediation it's not allowed if there was abuse.

What I'm wondering is can I leave out the abuse that happened to me over the years and just focus on what's relevant to DS? All I want is for the courts to figure out the arrangements for DS because I've tried everything else. But because of the abuse, will they request the whole history from me even if it wasn't directed at my son? Can I just talk about the times where my son was around?

I want him to have regular contact with my son.

Also, could a stipulation be put in place to make ex have therapy for his anger?

Any similar situations?

Firstly stop calling him a good dad, he's not, he's a disrepectful arsehole. A good Dad would respect boundaries and not act the way he does towards you or anyone else in front of his child. Because he'd put his child first.
My Dad was pretty rubbish at being a Dad, but never said a bad word about my mother in front of me, and behaved himself around her.

You're right, he's not a good dad to be doing this. I probably shouldn't have said that. What I mean is that he is attentive to DS, he plays with him, teaches him, takes him places. But when he's in his obsessed mode with me, he has his loud outbursts. I don't know how family courts would deal with this situation because from most things I've read, access shouldn't be denied because it's within the child's best interest. But because of the abuse towards me, I don't know what they'd do. My son needs to see his dad

Right just tell the courts what they ask and want to know. Keep to the facts but tell them everything that he has done and let them make the decision.

You are right to get this and it is the only decision you can make to move on from it yourself. But now you have you need to trust it and allow them to make the right choice for your son with all the information that you can. Which means telling them everything

Thanks Quartz2208. It's going to be painful writing everything down from the past but if it's what they want then I'll do it. Going through his old voice messages, texts and emails is going to send my anxiety through the roof. I'm already very anxious thinking about it. But I have to do it. What I struggle with most is when he tells me that all he wants to do is be amicable for DS's sake. Making me feel like I'm being the unreasonable one. I know I'm not but he keeps saying these things to me. Like 'it didn't need to go this far and you know it'. I've applied for a non-molestation order too, to get him to stop sending me these emails

But you do know that it didnt need to go this far because you were being reasonable and offered him a sensible option. It hasnt gotten this far because of you - it is because of him

Yep, I know that. I just wish he wouldn't keep saying it because he makes me think everytime if I'm doing the right thing even though I know I am

Abusive behaviour towards you can cause harm to your child if he is exposed to or aware of it. It is damaging to a child's wellbeing to have one of his parents maligned or criticised and the father must stop this. The court needs to be made aware of the evidence of recent abusive communication and be given examples and you could ask for conditions to be attached to the CAO such as; communication only through a suitable parenting app, an order directing the father not to malign, criticise or in any way undermine you. You can also suggest that the father attends a parenting class/workshop. There are other support networks available to separated parents and a good place to start is www.resolution.org.uk.

His behaviour is damaging your ds. And will for a very long time. Similarly my life years ago. Ds is 28 and still has therapy for witnessing df's verbal abuse towards me. So much so a judge refused him any contact at all.. Stop underestimating how abusive he really is.