If you are divorcing a narcissist, it will be the most difficult battle of your life, particularly if you have children.
A narcissist is focused on winning at all costs as this is what fuels their ego. Often their priority in gaining child custody is not the welfare of the child, but rather, their own gratification in causing you pain.
This article explores how you prove your ex is a narcissist and the impact of narcissistic abuse on court outcomes. The most common questions we get when we have a client who is in court with a narcissist ex-partner are:. The Act defines family violence as:. The examples given in section 4AB 2 of the Act provides a list of examples that may constitute family violence, including coercion by physical and non-physical means, including assault, sexually abusive behaviour, stalking, the withholding of financial support, preventing a family member from making or keeping connections with his or her family and unlawfully depriving the victim of their liberty.
Proving that your ex is a narcissist can be challenging due to the insidious nature of coercive control and the subtle patterns of behaviour that it involves. It is only when one views the patterns of behaviour over time as a course of conduct throughout the relationship and beyond, aimed at coercing and controlling the victim, does it become clear that the behaviour constitutes family violence.
Having the above evidence does not guarantee a court outcome, but it does establish a pattern of behaviour by the narcissist which will strengthen your case, and it may increase the prospects of you achieving your desired outcome. This is because using the terminology narcissist and narcissistic abuse suggests that you have, without qualification, diagnosed your ex-partner with a mental health illness. We suggest that you instead focus your Affidavit on identifying and describing with specificity, the patterns of behaviour of your narcissist ex-partner towards yourself and others, that constitutes coercive control, including the effects of the conduct and how it made you feel.
