Like Seeks Like Round Two Or Didn’t We Learn That Psychological Evaluations Are Scary?

Some people turn up like bad pennies over and over again. Theresa was one of those people. Not surprisingly, her reconciliation with Jeffrey had not resulted in the picture-perfect marriage she had deluded herself into believing was possible. Nothing could have been further from the truth.

Jeffrey and Theresa had managed to play nice for about three months. But of course, they spent another three months playing nasty before Theresa came to see me again.

I’m familiar with Theresa, and her drama, a bit better by this point so I was prepared for a certain amount of histrionics. But even I was a bit dumbfounded by her story this time. I was expecting more of the “he’s a super bad man and I’m a saint” stuff (which I did hear) but this story went way beyond what I had anticipated. According to Theresa, her 7-year-old son, Abel, shared a room with Jeffrey’s 9-year-old son, Junior. Allegedly, Theresa walked in one morning to find both boys naked in the same bed in a compromising position. She told me that she held her cool and waited to talk to each of them about what happened. Junior denied that anything had occurred, but under slight pressure Able admitted that Junior had undressed him and done “things” (that I won’t repeat) to him. I was a bit shocked. Theresa was more than shocked; she was furious. She confronted Junior. She confronted Jeffrey. She called child protective services. She called the police. Then last but not least, she called me. Once again the divorce was on.

On to round two, which makes the first look passive. The anger and resentment were through the roof. Theresa described her confrontation with Jeffrey about his son’s behavior in the most painful way. “I told him what Able told me and all Jeffrey did was laugh. I told him to be serious and repeated the story and he stood up and screamed in my face that I was a liar. He told me to take my lying bastard and leave his house.” As time went on the conversations between Theresa and Jeffrey became more and more caustic. Theresa accused Jeffrey of not caring about his son’s aberrant behavior and even condoning it. Jeffrey was convinced that Theresa was coaching Able to say these horrible things.

Theresa moved into an apartment and took their daughter with her. She wouldn’t allow Jeffrey to be alone with their child and wouldn’t allow Junior anywhere near her. She was absolutely convinced that if Jeffrey had their daughter he would allow Junior to do unspeakable things to her. You can only deny a parent access to their child for so long before they finally get a lawyer and attack. Eventually we ended up in Court arguing over temporary custody of the little girl.

On that fateful day in court the battle lines were drawn. Each attorney launched attacks against the other side and deflected assaults against their own client. Mud and other filth were flying that day. As each detail of the alleged incident came out, the judge’s eyes grew wider and wider. Miniature sexual predators preying on their step-siblings? Fathers refusing to acknowledge something is wrong? Again and again I assaulted Jeffrey’s character. Witness after witness testified that something seemed wrong with this situation and that not addressing aberrant sexual behavior in small children is dangerous. At the end of the day, when the smoke was clearing, it seemed that I would emerge triumphant. The judge seemed inclined to grant all of my requests. Theresa would keep their daughter and Jeffrey would get supervised visits while we sorted out the rest of the divorce. Victory seemed assured. That is…until Theresa opened her mouth and ruined it. When asked what she thought should be done to protect her daughter, she answered (as we had agreed she would), “I think that I should be the one that designates her primary residence and Jeffrey should have supervised visits for now.” If she had stopped there, we would have won. But she couldn’t stop; she had to continue. “And Jeffrey and Junior should have a psychological evaluation done on them to figure out what is wrong with them.”

We won on most of our points. Theresa got the girl and Jeffrey got supervised visits. Theresa and Jeffrey got ordered to attend counseling sessions with both of the boys to determine what really happened. Had she not suggested it, the judge probably would not have ordered it. The temporary orders could have been leveraged into final orders that got Theresa exactly what she wanted. Instead she gave Jeffrey another bite at the apple by giving him a new person to listen to his side of the story.

Unlike the last psychological evaluation that Theresa requested, this session would be with a counselor who was ordered by the court to dig into what happened and prepare a report to the judge with recommendations. And he did just that.

Theresa and Jeffrey met with the psychologist separately and with each of their children. The psychologist asked hard questions. He refused to accept avoidance. He poked and he prodded and then he reported.

“Theresa exhibits characteristics of self delusions. She appears to believe that she is saint-like. When confronted with her mistakes or errors she refuses to acknowledge them.” Apparently the psychologist saw through Theresa’s halo and was able to pinpoint how she justified her sainthood. “Theresa has a loose grasp on the truth. She appears to be perfectly willing to adapt, change or even fabricate events to achieve her goals.” That was the high point of the report. “It is my opinion that the incident reported by Theresa regarding the alleged sexual abuse of her son by Jeffrey’s son did not occur.” The therapist went on to state that, “After meeting with both parents and both boys it is my opinion that Theresa saw the children innocently in bed together and created the story. She then went on to coach her son as to what to say and attempted to coach Jeffrey’s son.”

At this point all of my hard work was undone. Jeffrey hadn’t forgotten my savage attacks on his character in the courtroom, and armed with this new material his attorney began maneuvering in for the kill. Theresa learned the hard way that people who live in glass houses shouldn’t be secretly crazy…or something like that.