Basic Protocols for Calming Divorce, Custody and Visitation Conflicts

By learning from experience, I am trying to arrive at a set of basic 'protocols' (as I call them) that can be used in most high-conflict custody and visitation cases.  The idea is to reduce or eliminate much of the wasted effort and wheel-spinning that can take place as parents jockey for advantage.  Not that there aren't important tactical considerations in these cases -- there are!  I'm talking about protocols like the following:

1.  Don't talk with the other parent during exchanges of the child
2.  Communicate with the other parent only by email, except for emergencies
3.  Pickup of the child for visitation is by the parent whose time is beginning.
4.  Exchange of the child(ren) should be done curbside in front of the other parent's house, with the parent in the car staying in the car.  (This works for children who are safe to walk between the street and the front door.)

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