Need to Set Limits With a High Conflict Person? Give ‘Em Your EAR®.
When dealing with high-conflict people in close relationships or at work, it is especially important to set limits on their unrestrained aggressive behavior, yet to do it in a way that doesn’t make things worse.
Boundaries in Separation and Divorce
Boundaries in Separation and Divorce © 2016 By Bill Eddy, LCSW, Esq., CFLS When parents start living in two separate households, they need to redefine their boundaries, especially in regard to the children. There are many boundaries that people generally don’t think about when everyone lives in the same home. But after separation, boundaries need to be defined, discussed and decided. The following are some standard practices that seem to work. Physical Households At the time of separation, there is often a period of time when one parent moves out of the family residence and the other parent remains in it. This can be a time of confusion in many areas of life. However, it is important to clarify as soon as possible whose residence is whose. Even if both parents own the house, it often helps to identify it as just one parent’s residence while the other parent stays somewhere else in his or her own residence. Then, each parent has their own residence and no longer should have access to the other residence, except by agreement with the parent in the residence. In a sense, one parent is the “tenant” in the previous family residence, even though both parents are still the “landlords.” Thinking this way will help in several areas: Entering the house: Landlords are required to give notice, such as 24 hours, if they are going to enter the home of a tenant. Parents should take the same approach. Agree 24 hours in advance, if the other parent plans to enter the house for some reason. However, it is common to agree on shorter notice if both parents agree. The general principle is that each person is in charge of their own residence. This can also mean changing the locks, so that there are no surprises and expectations are clear. Picking up personal property: Just because these are now separate residences, it generally does not give the parent in the house the right to move or throw out or pack up the out-parent’s personal belongings. The best approach is to schedule a time (or times) when the out-parent will come to pick up belongings and agreed-upon furniture. The other parent can be present, in which case it often helps to have a neutral third person there as well, to help keep the peace if there are disagreements over who gets which items. If there is a dispute, the items should stay put until they can be discussed and agreed upon at another time. That avoids any physical tugs of war over specific items. Selling the house: If both parents are co-owners of the house, then they must both be involved in making decisions about a sale. For more details on this, see the book Divorcing the House by Laurel Starks, which gives lots of helpful suggestions for navigating these issues. Parenting Decisions Each parent gets to make the decisions for their own household regarding rules, activities, supervision, bed times, etc. While parents may offer suggestions to each other, they are only suggestions. It’s up to each parent what suggestions they want to use, if any. This is part of the principle of “flexible thinking” that is emphasized in New Ways for Families, a skills training method for co-parents after separation and divorce. Each parent runs their own household their own way. Children learn that there is more than one way of doing things. Contact with the Children Contact with the children when they are staying at the other parent’s residence can be a tricky issue. When co-parents have good communication and the children feel secure with both of them, this is often easy to handle. Parents say that the children can call the other parent at any reasonable time. Reasonable means that they can’t call the out-parent when they are supposed to be doing homework or chores or an activity with the in-parent. Likewise, in cooperative co-parenting families like this, the out-parent can call and talk to the children most of the time, as long as they can accept that it’s not a good time sometimes. Some families schedule regular phone calls, so that the children can be available and schedules can be planned around the call. This might be on Tuesday and Thursday evening between 7:00 – 7:30pm, when children have several days without seeing the other parent. If they see each parent every 2-3 days, or if the child is very young, then this may not be necessary. Daily scheduled phone calls often become disruptive and are discouraged in most cases. In families with difficult communication, phone calls with the children while at the other parent’s home can be an area of dispute. Therefore, many parents simply have an agreement (or sometimes they are court-ordered) to not have phone calls with the children at all while they are at the other parent’s home. This relieves stress on the children because they don’t feel caught in the middle. This is a clear boundary that’s easy to remember regardless of what the parenting schedule is. Contact with the Co-Parent This is also an area of cooperation in some families and high conflict in others. If there is on-going tension between the parents, many agree to simply communicate by email except in emergencies. Many court orders in high-conflict cases say that the parents should only communicate by email. Many courts order parents to communicate via Our Family Wizard (www.OurFamilyWizard.com), which keeps track emails so that parents are more respectful and issues of parent communication can be reviewed if necessary later on. Another helpful method of communicating by email is to use BIFF Responses. These are kept: Brief, Informative, Friendly and Firm. This method can also be used to keep in-person communication calm. Discussions with the Children Each parent should be able to discuss anything with the children without restriction. Some parents say that what happens in their home is none of the other parent’s business. This is true in terms of decision-making, but children should not be
Keep the Conflict Small! (With Managed Emotions)
© 2015 Bill Eddy, LCSW, Esq. Whether you’re having an argument with a family member, friend or co-worker, it’s easy nowadays to make little conflicts way too big. All around us are repeated images of people arguing and losing control of their emotions – in emails, on the Internet, in movies and on TV – especially in the news (do you know what so-and-so said about you-know-who?) Not only is this unnecessary, but allowing conflicts to get large can be harmful to important relationships, increase the anxiety of those around us (especially children) and lower one’s status in other people’s eyes. For example, in a recent article in Parade Magazine about the steps to becoming a successful entrepreneur, the author-expert Linda Rottenberg wrote: “The most important step is to manage your emotions.” (“An Entrepreneur Should Never Be a Daredevil,” November 2, 2014) In a recently-reported study about children’s brain development, child psychiatrist and researcher Jeffrey Rowe said the first five years of life are critically important to forming proper brain connections. “If you can’t control yourself, can’t control your emotions, you can’t pay attention to the outside world.” (B.J. Fikes, “Money, brain size linked,” U-T San Diego, March 31, 2015) This article has some suggestions for keeping conflicts small by managing our emotions. Managed emotions are a big part of our skills-training methods, New Ways for Families® and New Ways for WorkSM, and may be more important in today’s world than ever before. Try to Avoid This A Family Feud: An argument in a couple: “You always leave your socks on the floor.” (That’s a little conflict.) “You’re such a slob.” (Now it’s a judgment about the whole person.) “You men, you’re all alike – irresponsible and self-centered!” (Now it’s about a whole gender.) If another family member came into this argument at this point, he or she would probably take gender sides and the conflict could easily get much bigger. A Workplace Conflict: Some people clean up after themselves in the lunchroom and others don’t. Joe is a cleaner-upper. ”Look at this banana peel and sandwich bag, just left behind.” (A problem to solve.) “Why do I always have to clean up for everyone else!” (Now it’s about being a victim of everyone.) “Maybe I should go someplace to work where I’m appreciated!” (Now it’s about quitting – ending the relationship.) A Divorce Dispute: Parents have to discuss a change of schedule: “I’ve got an opportunity for this coming Wednesday night – can we switch so I see the kids Tuesday or Thursday?” (A common problem to solve.) “I’ve told you a hundred times, I’m sticking to our Agreement, with no exceptions. 100%. The kids need absolute stability.” (Now we’re slipping into all-or-nothing thinking. Doubtful that it’s been a hundred times. However, rare cases do require no changes, because of extreme manipulation or violence in the past.) “In fact, I’m going to take you back to court to reduce your time with the kids, you f—ing jerk! You’re the worst father/mother in the world.” (Oops. Guess the children’s stability isn’t the issue after all.) Try This Instead In all of the above examples, the speaker quickly went from a simple problem to solve into all-or-nothing thinking and intense emotions. We refer to these emotions as unmanaged emotions, because they don’t get the person what the person really wants: respect, peace and quiet, a happy relationship, or whatever they were looking for. Now they have a bigger problem to solve and probably feel helpless or victimized, and distracted. Remember what the brain researcher said above: You can’t pay attention to the outside world when you’re busy reacting. So how can you manage your emotions in situations like this? 1. Regularly remind yourself to keep the conflict small. Ask yourself: “Is this really a big deal?” “Can this problem be solved by making a proposal?” “What is the smallest issue here? Let’s start by solving that.” “What are my choices here? I always have choices.” 2. Regularly give yourself encouraging statements. This will help you feel less defensive and less likely to over-react to other people’s behavior or emotions: “It’s not about me!” “I’m doing fine! I don’t have to prove anything here.” “I can take a break!” “I can handle this. No reason to lose control.” Emotions Are Contagious This all might seem very easy to do while you’re reading this. But actually it’s harder to do when other people aren’t managing their emotions, because emotions are contagious. There seems to be at least two reasons for this impact on our brains. Amygdala responses: We have two amygdalae in our brains; one in the middle of each hemisphere. The right amygdala quickly reacts to other people’s facial expressions of fear and anger, and instantly starts a fight, flight or freeze response. Apparently the left amygdala responds more to threats in writing. You can see the protective response happening when someone else over-reacts – it’s usually sudden and extreme, and sometimes shocking in an office or in a meeting. But our prefrontal cortex (right behind your forehead) can over-ride the amygdala and say: Relax, it’s not a crisis. And the amygdala quiets down. This comes with practice – lots of practice telling yourself what’s not a crisis. This is a lot of what adolescence is about: figuring out what are real dangers that need fast all-or-nothing action and what are just problems to solve rationally. Mirror neurons: Apparently we have neurons in our brains that fire when we do something AND when we just watch someone else doing something. Is seems that it’s a short-cut to learning – our brains are constantly getting us ready to do what others are doing. It may be a part of our group survival skills that we’re born with. Better to quickly run or fight or hide when others are doing so, rather than risk getting isolated and not surviving. But these responses can also be over-ridden – once you know about this. (So now you know about this.) But it also