Download Article As PDFOne of the most protective things a family law professional can do in an alcohol-related custody case is take the child out of the role of information source. Mediators, guardians ad litem, parenting coordinators, attorneys, and custody evaluators see it again and again: when a parent’s drinking is in dispute, the question of what’s really happening tends to land on whoever is closest to it, and very often that’s a child.
Children are the reason these cases matter most, but the parents are greatly affected as well. The parent being monitored may be navigating recovery, a trauma history, and the fear of losing time with their kids all at once. The parent raising concerns may be living with constant worry every time the children leave the house. Trauma, coercive control, and technology-facilitated abuse can touch every person in the family, and the safeguards that work best are the ones designed with all of them in mind.
At a Glance: What Family Law Professionals Can Do
The scale of the issue makes those safeguards worth getting right. According to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, an analysis of 2023 national survey data estimated that about 19 million children lived with at least one parent meeting criteria for a substance use disorder, and alcohol use disorder accounted for the largest share, affecting more than 12 million children.
To understand how these dynamics play out for each person involved, we spoke with Michele LaFemina, Clinical Director at Pathways Treatment Center. She’s a Licensed Professional Counselor, Licensed Clinical Alcohol and Drug Counselor, Approved Clinical Supervisor, and Certified Clinical Supervisor, with doctoral-level training and over 20 years of clinical experience in trauma, anxiety, grief, and relationship concerns. “In the area of high-conflict families, my interest in alcohol lies in the fact that its consumption does not only affect the individual consuming the substance,” she explains. She adds that this dynamic “may lead to changes in communication and relationships among family members.”
The CDC’s framework for adverse childhood experiences gives useful language for what’s at stake. Alongside abuse and neglect, the CDC’s list of ACEs includes features of a child’s environment that can erode their sense of safety, stability, and bonding, such as growing up in a household with substance use problems or instability from parental separation. Children in alcohol-related custody disputes often carry both at once, and ACEs are common: in CDC data drawn from all 50 states and the District of Columbia, 63.9% of U.S. adults reported at least one ACE and 17.3% reported four or more (MMWR, 2023).
The harm often comes less from any single argument and more from the role a child is pulled into. Known as “triangulation,” LaFemina describes it through a family systems lens. “The concept of triangulation is applied in family systems when a conflict between two adults involves a third person as a mediator, witness, messenger, or information provider,” she says. “Such a scenario results in a loyalty conflict, where a child faces a dilemma about betraying a parent by saying something truthful or betraying another parent by not revealing everything.”
Recent research backs this up at scale. A 2026 meta-analysis in Human Communication Research reviewed 49 studies with more than 23,000 participants and found a moderate, meaningful relationship between interparental conflict and children feeling caught between their parents. A companion meta-analysis in the Annals of the International Communication Association looked at 54 studies and found support for the long-standing family systems view that anxiety spreads through families when a parent recruits a child to help relieve the tension of ongoing conflict.
Every time a child is asked what Mom drank or how Dad seemed, they absorb a piece of an adult problem. LaFemina frames removing that burden as a developmental priority. “Eliminating the role of the child as the source of information is essential because it reestablishes the developmental boundary where the adults take responsibility for the adult information,” she says. “In such a situation, the child is not expected to observe his or her parent’s actions, decide what to report, and be concerned about possible consequences of the provided answer. Therefore, the child will have a better opportunity to establish relationships with both parents.”
There’s real reason for optimism here. In a JAMA Pediatrics study, adults who reported six to seven positive childhood experiences had 72% lower adjusted odds of depression or poor mental health than those reporting zero to two, and the associations held at similar strength across different levels of ACE exposure. A child who’s free to simply enjoy time with each parent has far more room for those positive experiences. As LaFemina puts it, “In particular, when it comes to kids, I am interested in protecting their childhood instead of having them take responsibility for the adult problem.” When objective results come from a device, the adults have the information they need and nobody has to ask the child.
It’s easy to overlook that the parent being asked to test may be carrying trauma of their own. Research compiled by the NIAAA’s Alcohol Research: Current Reviews notes that between 30% and 60% of people seeking treatment for alcohol use disorder also meet diagnostic criteria for PTSD. Add the prospect of reduced parenting time, and the start of a monitoring arrangement can feel threatening. For a parent who is genuinely working on their recovery, that fear can be one of the hardest parts of the process.
How monitoring is designed shapes how it feels. Random, surprise testing built to catch a parent in a mistake tends to heighten anxiety and defensiveness. Monitoring built around an agreed-upon structure gives a parent the chance to show consistency over time and to build a record of their commitment. Soberlink’s roots are in the addiction recovery space, where it was developed to empower people in recovery, and that philosophy carries into family law. An expert consensus paper published in the Journal of Addiction Medicine found full agreement among the panel that testing should happen at agreed-upon times, and it emphasized that the purpose of remote testing is to monitor recovery progress and act as a deterrent rather than to catch someone in the act.
Outcomes in treatment settings reflect that approach. In a 24-week study conducted by the OMNI Institute with Aware Recovery Care, every participant who completed the study reported that their substance use had decreased and that their family relationships had improved since starting the program. For a parent in a custody case, that same structure means monitoring can help identify patterns, support real progress, and give them a credible way to demonstrate that they’re committed to getting better.
The parent who isn’t being monitored often carries a quieter kind of trauma. Many are still processing the end of the relationship itself, and on top of that, they’re now expected to hand their children over to a parent whose drinking has frightened them. LaFemina describes the position these family members are placed in. “Family members may find themselves trying to prepare for unpredictable behavior or even trying to decide if what they hear from the individual is real.”
Reliable information can ease that burden considerably. Jenn, a parent who uses Soberlink, has described it as her “security blanket”. The real-time notification that comes with each result gave her reassurance during parenting time, and features like facial recognition and tamper detection meant she didn’t have to worry that there were ways around the system, which was a real concern for her with other options.
Coercive control has moved quickly from clinical vocabulary into everyday family law practice, and alcohol-related cases are a place where it can show up from any direction. LaFemina defines it broadly. “Coercive control is based on a strategy of controlling the other by means of manipulation with information, threats, accusations, or limitations,” she says. “In the context of an alcohol problem between parents, it might include one of them hiding or twisting information about actual drinking, but it may also consist of making baseless accusations of drinking as a tool to discredit or control the other parent. What is important from a clinical standpoint is the pattern of behavior, not who is accusing who.”
That focus on patterns matters because misreading a case carries real consequences. A 2024 article in the Family Law Quarterly names parents’ lawyers, GALs, custody evaluators, mediators, and judges as the professionals handling these disputes, and argues that when they fail to distinguish coercive control from mutual conflict, custody arrangements can unintentionally leave children and parents in unsafe situations. A 2025 review in the Journal of Social Welfare and Family Law adds that post-separation tactics such as weaponizing child arrangements are too often labeled as high conflict when they’re actually strategic efforts to continue a pattern of abuse.
When the alcohol question goes unanswered, children can end up as tools in the dispute. A parent might pressure a child to blow into a device on their behalf, send a personal breathalyzer along with the child and ask them to record the other parent using it, or coach the child on what to say about the other household. Each of these puts a child back into the watching and reporting role that research links to loyalty conflict and distress. LaFemina notes how lasting that role can be: “And for the child, growing up under all of this pressure may instill the need to observe what is going on between the parents.”
A professional-grade system with facial recognition like Soberlink removes the reason for any of this. When identity is confirmed at every test and results go directly to the adults who need them, there’s no role left for a child to play.
For a parent with an alcohol use history, that history can become a permanent source of leverage. Every late pickup or missed call can be framed as evidence of drinking, and without objective data, the parent has no way to prove a negative. LaFemina describes the toll of living under that kind of open-ended suspicion. “Chronic uncertainty can result in a state of hypervigilance,” she explains. “The parent could start spending all of his/her time searching for signs, noting routine activities, revisiting the conversation, or expecting the next allegation because he/she will never be sure that it’s all done with. This continuous state of vigilance can lead to anxiety, disrupted sleep, inability to concentrate, and exhaustion.” Neuroscience research supports her observation; an influential review in Nature Reviews Neuroscience identified heightened threat attention and hypervigilance as one of the core processes explaining why uncertainty about future threats is so disruptive.
Objective data gives this parent answers. A steady record of compliant results shifts the conversation away from accusation and toward verified information, which protects a parent who is doing the work. And for a parent who is still struggling, consistent data surfaces patterns early, so the people supporting them can respond with help instead of escalating conflict.
Coercive control can also run toward the worried parent. A parent who is concealing or minimizing their drinking may offer shifting explanations, question what the other parent saw, or turn the concern back on them. LaFemina’s list of warning signs is a practical tool for any professional conducting an intake, a mediation session, or a GAL interview. “Some of the warning signs might include constant changes in the explanation, pressure to question what was seen with one’s own eyes, accusations that get worse every time boundaries are set, or a sense of impossibility of presenting any information that would solve the problem.”
Third-party monitoring changes that dynamic. When results come from a neutral system with facial recognition, tamper detection built into the device, and a Compliance Department standing behind the data, the other parent can’t talk around them. The worried parent no longer has to rely on their own observations or on the other parent’s word, and that alone removes much of the room for manipulation.
The field is increasingly recognizing that technology can extend controlling behavior after separation. Colorado’s recently enacted HB26-1309 is one example; its definition of domestic violence names technological abuse alongside coercive control, economic abuse, stalking, and other forms of harm. Professionals everywhere can benefit from thinking carefully about how the tools they recommend might be used inside an already strained relationship.
Research on co-parenting apps offers a useful parallel. In an evaluation published in Family Court Review, researchers concluded that while these apps offer real benefits like centralized information and record keeping, some apps or features can inadvertently fuel conflict, encourage litigiousness, or become technologies of power and control. A 2026 qualitative study in Violence Against Women found that every participant described managing communication through these apps as demanding significant mental and administrative effort. LaFemina’s guidance applies directly to monitoring tools. “A tool that is supposed to reduce conflict cannot become a new source of issues.”
Children can be drawn into technology-facilitated control even when they aren’t the target. Research summarized in a 2024 study in Law, Technology and Humans describes cases where children and their belongings were used as channels for control, including spyware installed on a child’s device and children being asked for a parent’s passwords. Even when children aren’t directly involved, they feel the strain. “When a parent is always tense, defensive, or worried about the next fight, they will be emotionally unable to attend to their child,” LaFemina says, “who will often detect conflict between the adults in charge of their care.”
Some app-based monitoring tools give the parent who isn’t being monitored control over the testing schedule. In a high-conflict case, that design can turn monitoring into a form of harassment. A parent can trigger random tests at unreasonable hours, change test times without warning to create a record of missed tests, or push for repeated lab testing as a way to keep the other parent on edge. LaFemina explains why that unpredictability is so damaging. “When conditions that one parent is expected to meet are changed unilaterally, the problem becomes the loss of predictability and control,” she says. “This can result in anticipatory stress for one person mainly because the rules are changing constantly.” For a parent in recovery, that kind of stress works directly against the stability they’re trying to build.
The same design flaw can cut the other way. When an app lets the monitored parent adjust their own testing times, they can quietly shift tests around the times they plan to drink, leaving the worried parent with results that look reassuring and don’t reflect reality. Photo and video-based apps can introduce another problem, where a monitored parent floods the other parent with submissions to review and verify. Without limits, that volume becomes its own form of pressure, and it places the job of policing the process on the parent who is already most anxious about it.
LaFemina’s answer applies to both parents. “The key here is to make the process neutral. There needs to be accountability, and neither parent should be in the position of manipulating testing.”
For mediators drafting agreements, GALs making recommendations, parenting coordinators managing ongoing disputes, and attorneys advising clients, a few practical questions can help confirm that a monitoring arrangement protects children and stays neutral between parents.
Soberlink was built around the principle LaFemina describes: accountability without giving either parent a lever to pull. Every Soberlink arrangement begins with a Monitoring Agreement that covers the testing protocol and how results are handled, and both parents agree to it before a schedule is put in place. There’s no random testing. With Level 2, the Monitoring Agreement covers a set daily schedule. With Level 1, testing follows parenting time according to Soberlink’s scheduling guidelines. Either way, the structure is settled in advance, so neither parent can use it to surprise, pressure, or evade the other.
The integrity of each result comes from features built into the system. Facial recognition confirms that the person testing is the monitored parent, making it nearly impossible for someone else, including a child, to test on their behalf. Tamper detection built into the device flags interference. Results arrive in real time, and Soberlink’s Compliance Department, a team of professionals who monitor, document, and escalate results when needed, stands behind the data if anyone needs it explained. Soberlink also offers resources that help co-parents and the professionals supporting them work together on the arrangement from the start.
For the parent being monitored, that means a fair, predictable way to show their commitment. For the parent raising concerns, it means answers they can trust without having to police the process. And for the kids, it means they get to go back to being kids.
Trauma, coercive control, and technology-facilitated abuse can feel like three separate challenges, yet they share a common thread. Each one thrives on uncertainty, and each one can reach every person in the family. Family law professionals are well positioned to change that by recommending arrangements that keep children out of the middle, give the monitored parent a fair path to demonstrate progress, and give the concerned parent reliable information instead of constant worry.
If you’d like to see how this works in your own practice, book a Lunch and Learn with a Soberlink Family Law Expert. We’ll walk through monitoring options, Monitoring Agreement structure, and how Soberlink supports professionals across mediation, GAL work, parenting coordination, and case strategy.
