Hello Paula, Thanks for doing this. I'm pinning all my hopes on you having the magic answer so... no pressure
I'll try and be brief.
DH split fron his DD's mum when DD was seven (moved out at 8), she is now 13. We have been together for four years. We all rubbed along nicely for the first three years. DH was paying double the CSA advised amount of maintenance plus mobile phone, pocket money, laptop, half of uniform, school trips, othodontist work etc etc. Which everyone was fairly happy with because his ex didnt work (well, worked a small amount) and so she really pretty much needed the money to live. We had DSD here 50/50.
At the end of last year, ex got engaged, preganant by, and moved in with, her rather wealthy partner of three years at which point my partner said enough was enough with all the extras. I'm not sure and haven't asked exactly what his reasons were but I can gleen from our conversations that he no longer felt a responsibility to keep his ex (although clearly still wanted to support his dd), and also wanted to regain some rights over his own money and decide for himself if he wanted to spend money on things for his DD whilst she was here. He was also concerned (for good reason) that his DD saw him as a wallet and didn't want to continue sending that message. He dropped the CM to the reccommended amount (he has a good salary so this was no measly amount) and stopped paying for uniform etc. But continued to pay pocket money, mobile, laptop and orthodontist and assumed he would retain 50/50 contact.
At this point his ex had an all mighty melt down and said as he had made this choice he would no longer have their DD to stay here. Apparently she has always hated staying with her dad anyway and her mother was no longer going to sit back and have her DD miserable every time she came here.
There is a court order and DSD is happy here, (despite lots of missing mum and tears which would come on whenever her Mum called her here) the contact arrangement had always been in place and had worked well so we thought this wouldn't happen - we were wrong.
DSD sided 100% with her Mum, who shared with her all the gory details and embellished them to persuade DSD that her dad didnt love her anymore, has always been a shit dad etc etc.
Because of her age we have been told there is nothing we can do.
We now have DSD once a week on a Friday and every other saturday night but in reality this never happens properly as there is always a friend that has invited her to stay over. If she does stay here she inevitably brings a friend over so we/he don't really spend time with her. They've had a couple of "Daddy dates" which have gone fairly well). Her behaviour is awful, she has no respect for him or me, or anyone, and has even turned against my DD (5) who she has always called "sister" and has been extremely close to.
(Ironically the maintenance has gone back up to almost what it was anyway due to the tiny amount of time she is here i.e. no pro-rata. But this isn't about the money anymore)
sorry, I know I said I'd try to be brief!
Since this happened in December, I have done a lot of reading up on parental alienation and I have no doubt whatsoever that this is what has been occuring since they divorced (and possibly even during the marriage). It is a form of abuse and as far as I am concerned DSD has been subjected to it as a kind of grooming for a situation such as this. I wont go through everything because I'm sure you know what it is, but basically on any list of signs of parental alienation we could tick every single box with a very strong decisive hand!
So... my questions are:
1, Is parental alienation recognised by any mediators? Courts etc. that you are aware of? I'm not talking about the actual "Parental Alienation Syndrome" as a diagnosis for DSD, but more about the general behaviours of an alienating parent.
2, Is it 100% correct that her dad has no chance of winning back his contact time legally, due to DSD's age?
3, How can we support a rather unlikeable and extremely difficult DSD whilst retaining some kind of sanity and self respect?
4, How can I support my partner through this when he is extremely upset/ down/ stressed... but I am also very fragile over the whole thing?
5, What are the likely effects on my DD of her "sister's" behaviour?
6, Is there any point in DH trying to retain his rights as a parent and "parent" her when he does see her? Or should he forget it and leave that to her Mum now so as not to push her away even further?
I'm sorry Paula - what a long post