# Therapy Session Brief — 29 April 2026 Factual summary of the current co-parenting situation. Add emotions/feelings on top as needed. --- ## Where I'm at right now I'm in an extended escalation cycle with Akemi over child support and shared expenses. Today I sent two messages — one to Akemi (financial), one to her mother Ani — and have already received hostile responses to both. I've chosen not to respond further. I'm sitting with a bigger decision about whether to move from offering 2/3 of shared expenses to a flat 50/50. --- ## The current arrangement - **Custody**: 50/50 (7/7 per fortnight) — in place ~2 years - **Child support**: ~$900/month (Services Australia assessed — corrected to 7/7 in late Feb 2026) - **School fees**: I'm paying 100% (original private agreement was 50/50) - **Shared extracurriculars**: I offered 2/3 in Feb 2026 as a transition gesture during her separation ## Historical financial context (relevant for emotional load) - 6-year legal battle to get my exit from the company - ~1/3 of exit paid in tax - $250K paid to Akemi privately — not legally obliged - Original child support agreement: $2,500/month for 6 months OR until she got full-time work - I continued at $2,500 for ~1.5–2.5 years (well past agreement) - Then $2,000/month for years - Now reduced to government rate (~$900) since Feb 2026 ## What's happened in the last few weeks **21 Apr** — Akemi sent long voice messages claiming there was a "91% agreement" because of income disparity. No such agreement exists in writing. She also dismissed my $80 silks reimbursement claim with vague counter-claims, no specifics. **23 Apr** — She missed Smilla's hospital appointment (Smilla on crutches 5-6 weeks). Said she "completely forgot." Asked me to rebook. **27 Apr** — She asked for $160 for speech and drama (her 91% rounded down). I sent a separate message about the missed hospital appointment. She responded with: - Denial and contradiction ("It wasn't missed I told you I couldn't get to that appointment") — directly contradicting her own message from 4 days earlier ("Did not get to it. Completely forgot.") - Counter-attacks: my food choices, accusations that I leave Smilla at the beach/forest while I surf or bike - Shaming: "Don't feel all righteous" - Minimisation: "It shouldn't concern you this much" **28 Apr** — Akemi's mother Ani sent me a long message in Portuguese asking why I'd "drastically reduced support" and saying I'd "broken our agreement, going back on my word." She framed it warmly and said her hope of us reconciling was now gone. **29 Apr (today)** — - I sent Akemi the financial message: $120 (2/3 of $180), noted $80 silks remains outstanding, food adjustments confirmed, $120 transferred. - She responded with three messages in 3 minutes: doubled down on 91%, formally rejected silks debt ("I don't owe you anything"), denied agreeing to 2/3, invoked "Shannon paid 70%", called me "not a bogan that doesn't care", said "I really don't understand how you think you can get away with this." - Set a unilateral deadline: "It's 91% until end of financial year." - I sent Ani a brief response declining to discuss financial details. - She replied: "WHY DID YOU DRASTICALLY REDUCE THE SUPPORT?" in caps, criticising my "formal" reply as "lawyered up." - I sent a brief factual answer about Services Australia assessment, "different circumstances." - She replied with a passive-aggressive farewell: put my "deep love" for Smilla in scare quotes, said the family doesn't need my involvement ("she has her mother, grandparents, uncles, cousins"), diagnosed my factual brevity as "great resentment in your heart against Akemi", closed with "continued success in your company." - I'm not responding further. ## Patterns observed 1. **Escalation cycle when boundaries hold**: Akemi sends polite request → I hold position calmly → she escalates with character attacks, threats, lawyer mentions, then quiet → I hold → she sends another barrage. Repeat. 2. **Practical help offered/rejected pattern**: Whenever I've offered concrete help (rental search, financial planning, school fees, 2/3 split, sitting down with budget) — she has accepted briefly, then withdrawn the moment a financial boundary held. 3. **Vague counter-claims to neutralise specific debts**: I name a specific amount she owes ($80 silks). She says "I've paid for other things you haven't" — never with specifics — and dismisses the debt. 4. **Blocking communication with Smilla when upset**: Documented incident on 21 Apr — couldn't reach Smilla after I pushed back on the 91% framework. Suspected pattern. 5. **Now extended to family**: Her mother is now advocating for Akemi's position. Long warm relationship is cooling now that I'm no longer paying beyond legal obligation. ## Schema activations I'm noticing - **Self-sacrifice**: pull to "fix" Akemi's financial situation, even though she's rejected every offer of help - **Subjugation**: pull to comply with her directives about my household (food, schedule), to keep peace - **Unrelenting standards / "not good enough"**: hooked by "low integrity", "bogan", "righteous", "great resentment in your heart" — the diagnoses of my character - **Fear of conflict**: pull to keep responding, keep explaining, keep softening — even though silence is the appropriate response - **Fear of being alone / losing connection**: relational cost of family relationships cooling ## The truth I keep coming back to > *"It is never my job to make someone feel better or in a certain way."* I noticed today that there's nothing I can say to either Akemi or Ani that will produce the outcome they want, because what they want is for me to pay 91% (or $2,000) again. Once I accept that no message will "land well," I free myself from trying to engineer the right words and can just decide what *I* want to send (or not send). ## The decision I'm sitting with The 2/3 offer for shared expenses was a transition gesture made in February 2026. It rested on implicit good-faith reciprocity. What's happened since: - She rejected rental help, financial planning, every offer - She formally dismissed the silks debt I'm owed - She's calling me low-integrity, bogan, resentful - She's invented a "91% agreement" that doesn't exist - She's setting unilateral deadlines The 2/3 wasn't received in the spirit it was offered. 50/50 is the standard fair default. I'm asking myself whether I should move to 50/50 — but I've decided not to act on this for 1-2 weeks, because: - Anything I do this week will look reactive - Decisions made when the nervous system is activated wobble later - I want this decision to come from values (50/50 is fair), not from anger ("she deserves it") ## What I want to work on in this session - Holding the boundary without absorbing the schema hits (especially the "resentment in your heart" diagnosis from Ani — that one landed) - Being able to grieve the cooling family relationships without falling into "I should have stayed accommodating to keep them" - Distinguishing between "values-based 50/50" and "reactive 50/50" in how I'm thinking about the decision - The discomfort of choosing silence when every social reflex says "respond, explain, fix"