Do what's right for your daughter. You cannot appease a narcissist. It is pointless to even try. Some feed on attention, no matter if it's good or bad. Give her none. Except as concerns your daughter, practice saying "Please have your lawyer contact mine. Thanks."

You need to be very careful not to do anything out of frustration that can be used against you. Keep it all on record in text and email. Even make conversation notes if necessary but avoid person to person discussion as much as possible.

Find an outlet so you can maintain a zen-buddah like state. Good luck and sorry you have to go through this.

I can speak from my experience working for a divorce attorney in the US. Some may be relevant for you or may not. I say this to everyone, after I say, “try like mad to do in uncontested!”. One of the primary issues I have had with clients is that they don’t make an effort to help keep their costs down (causing crazy sticker shock when their “simple” divorce costs them $17k for their side only and they do stupid things to sabotage our efforts, like get in fights or brandish a firearm.

• Follow all your attorney’s instructions and recommendations throughout the case. You should have a contract of engagement with the attorney. Read it THOROUGHLY and obey it completely. Expect your attorney to do the same.
• Don’t be surprised if your wife tries to put a TPO (temporary protective order) on you and accuses you of abusing her or the child. This is scary as hell and infuriating. However, let your attorney handle it. Don’t try to deal with things behind your attorney’s back.
• Ask your attorney if they are going to scan the documents you provide to them and how they want them. They should tell you something like, “yes, a legal assistant will usually scan them by item number on the discovery request and then by date with the oldest in the back”. Talk on the phone to the legal assistant or clerk that tells you what they need. Try to do as much of the admin work yourself as possible. Offer to scan all documents yourself (if you can get to a kinkos or at work) in the exact same manner the admin/legal assistant would (so you don’t have to pay them $150 an hour to do it). Deliver the documents to them in a digital and hard copy of everything they request (with both the digital and the hard copies matching page for page).
• If the attorney asks for a list of items during Discovery process. Do not show up with a box of disorganized documents (uncollated, some stapled one way and others upside down or folded up), forward them a bunch of text messages, and forward them in 50 emails over the course of a week your bank statements and otherwise give them 20 hours of “what the heck is all this stuff” to deal with. Give everything your attorney asks for in a clean, organized (without notation or comments written on it, unless they ask for that), and complete manner. Also, speaking generally, unless your attorney asks for it, don’t give it to them. Every page you give them they have to look at. Everything you give them they have to try to sort out and organize in their files. Give them the proper and complete minimum in a perfectly organized (the attorney’s definition, not yours) and you will save a fortune!
• During Interrogatories, when the other side asks questions, provide your attorney with complete and coherent answers to each and every question. Don’t make them have a three hour long conversation with you to get answers.
• If you provide them anything absolutely unique, like old love letters, wills, or photos, be sure to get a receipt showing that they took possession.
• Do not send a bunch of emails and have dozens of calls with your attorney a week. Get your thoughts organized and have a single, calendared, productive 30-minute conversation and be done.
• Don’t delay. If you are given homework by your attorney, do it right away and thoroughly. As painful or irritating as it may be, do not put it off to try to get it all done the day before. Some things require long lead times, like requesting documents from banks or phone companies and cannot be done last minute. Plus, you want time to look at them yourself, make sure they are what you want, that they don’t disclose anything bad (so you can tell your attorney first), and that you can organize them for your attorney.
• Do not disrespect any of the attorney’s staff. If you have an issue with someone, address it with the attorney, not the staff member. Attorneys are very protective of their staff.
• If your attorney says to wait…wait.
• Appreciate that your attorney bills you by the minute. Don’t waste time complaining about your day or anything. Keep it all matter of fact and stay focused. They want you to be friendly and feel comfortable with them, of course. Just realize they are billing you for it.
• Do not lie to anyone, especially your attorney.
• Do not sabotage things by criticizing your wife on facebook or bad mouthing her to ANYONE, especially your kids.
• Do not start or continue any bad habits (drinking, cursing, forgetting to pick your kids up from practice, drugs, driving without a seatbelt, playing video games until midnight, going to strip clubs, etc.). Be upstanding and someone to be emulated.
• Do not engage in ANY romantic or sexual relations of any kind or even go to dating sites until the divorce is signed by the judge, unless your attorney says otherwise.
• Don’t spend $25k fighting over $10k.
• Realize that switching attorneys costs you more each time you do it. You want to be sure you have a very good reason. On the low end, it will cost you a couple grand each time you do it.
• Unless you are splitting a huge nest egg or you are after a big manimony payment, don’t burn yourself and your wallet up. Just don’t let yourself get screwed out of your child or some bull shit child support arrangement.
• Do not make your attorney wait. If they tell you they need an answer or a document by Tuesday, respond timely and completely (even if you have to call the bank or drive across town – make it happen).
• Again, do not lie!

Last edited by UserNada (October 16, 2020 5:50 pm)

Blue Bear and UserNada - That was great advice.  Thank you.  

Just to add on to my previous comments, narcissists will indeed go to obscene lengths to maintain control.  Here are two horrifying examples.

HORROR STORY 1:  My ex-wife had me arrested for fake allegations of domestic violence.  On what was the last planned family vacation, we had booked a beach house.  Right before the trip, she announced that she couldn't leave with the rest of the family because of work demands and would join the rest of the family midway through the week.  Where was she actually?  Climbing the highest mountain in the Rockies with her girlfriend.  It was a challenging climb, and she was covered in bruises when she arrived for the second half of the vacation.  She realized I had started talking to friends about the demise of our marriage and her sexuality, became furious and called the police.  She showcased all of her mountain climbing bruises to them, and I was arrested.  Mercifully, I had a pile of contradictory evidence (including text messages she sent to my family, GPS tracking through her iPhone showing her mountain hike, messages she passed on to me through my son saying she was "sorry" for what happened), and she then signed a request under penalty of perjury that she did not actually want me arrested and asked the prosecutor to drop charges.  The charges were dropped, and the arrest was expunged from my record.  I'm still traumatized by this.

HORROR STORY 2:  A male friend of a fellow straight spouse went through something similar.  The male friend's family dog started acting strangely, and went to attack him.  The dog went nuts, and he had to forcefully detach the dog, severely injuring it while his children observed.  Male friend's cheating wife used this to obtain a restraining order against the innocent husband because he was "violent":  no contact at all with the cheating wife, and only a once-weekly video call with his kids.  The dog died several weeks later, and the autopsy revealed that the dog had developed a massive brain tumor, which was almost certainly the cause of the dog's violent behavior.

Narcissists will stop at nothing when they feel threatened and are losing control.  They would much rather blame the demise of the marriage on "domestic violence" than their selfish behavior.  If your wife is becoming irrational, wacko, or starts attacking you, run away.  Get a place of your own so you have a place of safety.  I wish someone had told me to move out immediately after D-Day so I (and my children) could have avoided this trauma.

Last edited by Blue Bear (October 19, 2020 1:49 pm)