"Gaslighting" Isn't "Abuse" for Child Custody Law Purposes

From Oregon Court of Appeals Judge Ramón Pagán, joined by Judges Robyn Aoyagi and Jacqueline Kamins, Wednesday in Estens v. Wells: [In a child custody hearing, w]itnesses testified to an incident in which mother took the child on vacation to Hawaii and claimed to father that she had been bumped from her flight, requiring her to return the child late. Mother's boyfriend testified that she had not been bumped from the flight. Mother was also found to be evasive about details of the child's medical care. She denied, but then later admitted, that she had cancelled or skipped medical appointments. The parties also testified about text messages between mother and father where mother had greatly exaggerated the number of times that child had attended a particular extracurricular activity in what appeared to be an attempt to have father help pay for the activity. In its decision, the trial court explained that one of the factors it was considering was that mother had abused father: "Another factor that I may have skipped over is the abuse of one parent by the other. There has been no allegation of abuse. However, I find that Mother's communication with Father and the testimony amounts