Just found out she already filed

[alice444]

Romeo- you ROCK. Good for you for sending what you did and leaving the rest of it out. You can always say it privately to us. And we all agree with you about her, the hypocrisy, etc .

That email you sent- well it shows you respect yourself, you are a mature adult who has only his DD's best interests in mind (which includes not rising to bait from X b/c that only hurts DD in long run when you bicker instead of dropping the rope), you have a lot of integrity and are conducting yourself with dignity and restraint. She ends up just looking silly and foolish the more she writes that kind of stuff and you do not respond or react to it. And it may increase for a little bit as she tries harder to get a rise out of you. don't bite. Continue taking your time to think and type out your thoughts before hitting send. You can always have 2 versions of the email- 1. for us here where you write whatever you're feeling and would "like" to tell her. 2. the one that you take all emotion out of before sending so it sounds exactly like this one did.

Bravo.

I think you've already got the guidelines down, so I'm writing them as much for myself as for you- before sending, check that whatever you write meets this criteria:

- does it express any emotion (not including saying you want what's best for DD without assigning or implying any blame)? If so, remove it.
- does it attack, defend, justify, argue, provoke, criticize, rant, rationalize, call names, accuse, blame or anything similar or provocative? Do you know already that the tone with which you wrote will make your X very angry or defensive (notwithstanding that they just don't like whatever facts you present or your unemotional stance on the situation)?
Remove it.
- objectively, does it have any sarcasm or passive-aggressiveness?
Remove it.
- If someone read what you wrote out loud to your friends, family, co-workers, your child (when she's older), a potential new boss, a potential new romantic interest, or strangers, would it embarrass you or make you feel silly, juvenile, ashamed or petty, make you want to immediately "explain" or defend/put its contents "in context", make you wish you hadn't sent it, or want to run and hide?
Remove it.
- does it have anything extra, not necessary, more than just the plain factual information and statements, worded as simply as you can, in a cordial manner?
Remove the extras

Now it should contain only facts and plain unemotional statements that you would not be ashamed to have the whole world read, that you will never regret writing, and that you can look back on and say "I conducted myself with maturity and dignity, even when the other person tried to drag me down into the mud" and feel proud for being the bigger person.

If I've left out any "rules", I'd love someone to pop in and add them!