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Hello,
Has anyone had any experience of getting a hair strand test done on their ex?
I have an alcoholic ex who claims she hasn't been drinking for some years but she has lied and lied about this in the past so unsurprisingly no one believes her. I requested from the Court that she should undertake a hair strand test and they have thankfully ordered her have one. I really need one that goes back about a year or so but from Googling around some of them seem to be better than others?
Has anyone any experience of getting one done and if so where did you get it?
Thanks
You would need to use a court accredited company, im pretty sure they have a list that you could ask for, although I would have thought it would be up to her to organise it, or have you been asked to?
I'm not sure whether they would go back a year, it would depend on the length of her hair, they usually work on the premise of 1 cm for each month; a year would require 12 cms/5 inches. Have the court specified how far back they want the test to cover?
Thanks for your reply, that's good to know. No, the Court just said to organise it with Cafcass and left it at that. Thankfully she has quite long hair, although I wouldn't put it past her to turn up looking like Sinead O'Connor next time!
If that happens, you would of course make the court aware of her radical change of hairstyle! Who's going to pay for it? It'll cost about £350 I think.
She should be having to organise and pay for it herself and have been told not to cut or dye her hair in the meantime. It will have to be carried out by a company accepted by the court as well. If she doesn't comply then the court are likely to order she does it again.
She did have a letter from her GP stating that she says (key word there!) that she hasn't drunk for 3 years. In light of this the Judge actually said to me (quite bluntly) "Are you going to pay for it" to which I replied that I thought half/half would be reasonable. She said "Well you can pay for it and if it's negative then I'll make her pay for half of it" which I think is kind of reasonable. If it's negative then fine - I see it just as a way of ensuring that my son is being cared for properly. If positive then I don't know what they will do.
That’s the best way to look at it, don’t get bogged down in the unfairness, it will just make things harder to manage on a personal level.
If the result is positive, that t has been crossed... I doubt it will influence the proceedings and if you’re proved wrong, you could just make the point that where a child’s safety is concerned it’s right to make sure, apologise to her quickly, and move on.