Vee

‘I’ve got a lot of self-harm scars on my arms … I hadn’t self-harmed in ages when I met [Macy], but she asked about them … She was making me feel comfortable to disclose that stuff straight up, and at the time that felt good because people are not always very nice about it. And now I look at that and it doesn’t feel very good.’

Vee, late 30s, is autistic, has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and a medical condition that affects her spine and joints, causing severe pain. In her late teens and early 20s, Vee struggled with her mental health and spent short periods of time in a psychiatric unit.

A few years ago Vee and her partner, Macy, separated. At the time they agreed to share custody of their children.

However, a few months later, Macy re-partnered and began proceedings to remove the children from Vee. Macy and her lawyers argued Vee’s disability made her an unfit parent.

Three weeks before the first hearing Macy’s lawyers subpoenaed Vee’s GP, psychiatrist, rheumatologist and district health service. Vee said the lawyers were looking for hospital records from her teens and 20s.

‘I don’t think I quite realised at the time that [Macy] would actually use stuff like that against me.’

Macy’s lawyers asked Vee to have a psychiatric assessment and she agreed.

‘I knew that it wasn’t necessary,’ Vee said. ‘It was just an easy thing to sort of like go, “Yes, whatever.”’

The court date was pushed back and Vee became homeless for a short period. Macy began withholding the children and didn’t give Vee the opportunity to make alternate arrangements so she could spend time with them.

At court, Macy’s lawyers produced a GP report with handwritten notes on it. Vee said she saw the word ‘suicide’.

The lawyers then spoke to the judge who addressed Vee.

‘The judge questioned whether I was being truthful and whether I was trustworthy based on this word “suicide” and me saying that I wasn’t suicidal.’

The judge ordered another psychiatric report.

At first Vee refused but her lawyer advised to ‘just get it done’.

‘The experience of the actual assessment was really, really horrible … He asked me if I consent, and I was like, “I don’t. I don’t consent. I’m being forced to do this.” … And then he asked me about sexual abuse from when I was a kid. I had no idea that that was going to come up at all … That alone was very, very traumatic.’

When Vee saw the report, she was shocked to see the psychiatrist had described her as a ‘young woman of mixed-race appearance’. She couldn’t understand the relevance and found it racist. The psychiatrist said he believed she had ‘overstated her abuse’. While he didn’t think there was an issue with her capacity to parent, he said he couldn’t make an assessment because he didn’t see her with her children.

During this time Macy’s new partner started asking Vee about her diagnoses, accusing her of ‘faking autism’. Vee was upset by the accusation but more upset Macy had shared her private information when she had asked her not to tell anyone.

Macy’s lawyers began questioning Vee’s financial capacity.

‘She wanted to know had I applied for the NDIS, had I applied for Centrelink, had I applied for Legal Aid, had I got a job, was I studying, all of these things.’

Vee didn’t feel safe disclosing this information to Macy and asked her lawyers if there was ‘a safer way’ to proceed. There wasn’t.

Ultimately the judge agreed Vee wasn’t a risk, but accepted Macy’s lawyers’ arguments about ‘security and stability’.

Vee could no longer afford lawyers.

‘I just basically got bulldozed.’

Vee lost her right to shared custody and is only able to see her children a couple of days each fortnight.

Vee believes the Family Court process is skewed against people with disability and trauma.