On the Cook/ Brinkley Divorce Battle
This week, the following column by Andrea Peyser appeared in the NEW YORK POST:
Crazy couple's a kick, if they don't kill each other
By ANDREA PEYSER
These crazy kids just can't keep their hands off each other.
Christie Brinkley and Peter Cook. The white- tooth glamazons go together, like Botox and hair weaves.
A year after I thought we'd seen the last of the aging, controlling sex addict and the aging, controlling supermodel who divorced him, the Cook-Brinkleys, I'm afraid, have become a nagging social disease. They're not done yet.
"He'd do anything he can to harm Christie's reputation and somehow suggest he isn't the scumbag pervert he's been painted to be," lawyer Joseph Quatela, of Christie's legal team, told me after the pair signed off on Part II of their divorce.
"Peter Cook believes she is so angry with him and that her hatred for him will exceed her love for her children," responded Cook lawyer Steven Kuhn.
And you thought your divorce was nasty?
I can now report that the horror story goes back at least to Dec. 10, when, Christie's side claims, Cook used his own daughter, Sailor, to "lure" her mother to the Ross School early, asking for Mom's help with the dress she wore in a Christmas concert.
But when Christie got to Ross, a process server was there to hand her an inch-and-a-half-thick stack of legal papers.
Cook, 50, wanted to drag Brinkley, 55, back to the Riverhead courthouse as if it were a nymphet-stocked high school. He was furious that Christie caused son Jack to miss a class trip to Egypt by neglecting to hand over his passport in time. You go to the Bronx Zoo, these kids jet off to the Mideast.
What followed next was slapstick. An angry Christie handed the papers back to Cook. Then, witnesses said, Cook threw the stack squarely at Christie, hurting her back, and prompting her to file a report with the East Hampton police.
Cook, who was not arrested, claims it was Christie who threw the papers at his chest. (Cook's lawyer says he has "no idea" whether Sailor took part in the events.)
The next thing Cook did was put his own children, Jack, 14, and Sailor, 11, on his witness list. That means the kids could have been called to testify against their own mother in a court of law.
"We think he will do anything and everything to damage Christie, including using his children as pawns," lawyer Quatela told me.
Lawyer Kuhn agreed that Cook put the kids on the witness list, just in case. "Things happened in the presence of the children," he said.
There's more.
Christie shot back with the claim that Peter violated their divorce settlement by allowing women to set foot on his boat, Sweet Freedom, while the children were passengers. Both sides agree that Peter's gal pal, Suzanne Shaw, was a frequent boat guest. "It was a technical violation," Kuhn allowed.
But Christie's folks claim Peter encouraged the kids to lie to their mom, playing a game called "Hide Suzanne" whenever Christie might come in contact with her.
There also were vicious e-mail tirades Cook leveled at Christie. Cook's side doesn't deny this, but says the war of words escalated only after Christie ignored Cook's e-mails to her.
This was Cook's response to an e-mail sent by Christie, asking him to take their kids for flu shots.
"No!" wrote Cook. "If you want to poison perfectly healthy children by vaccinating them, you can poison perfectly healthy children!"
Said Kuhn, "Reasonable parents would differ on whether healthy children should have it."
Things got so crazy, the judge in the case ordered Cook to refrain from angry e-mails. He also forced Christie to respond to all of Cook's messages.
In the end, Kuhn insisted, "She didn't win. Not by a long shot!" He insisted Cook got a few more days with his kids.
Quatela countered, "He sought to take control of the passports, impose anger management, get counsel fees and find Christie in contempt. He got none of this."
A word of advice: Don't be too rich, too pretty or famous, even in a D-list kind of way.
These kooks need each other. They ought to get back together.
Who else would hang out with either one?
Cook on 20/20
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfGNfdYQw74
~~~~
I recently emailed my reply to Ms. Peyser which I want to share here:
to: andrea.peyser@nypost.com
Dear Ms. Peyser:
Normally I really enjoy your columns. I don't always agree but for the most part you are on target. Of course you've hit on a subject close to me, as a counselor of 100s of women in relationships with pathological men such as Destructive Narcissists who has been there myself; I have to say this time you're dead wrong.
First let me define what a Destructive Narcissist is, outside of the bland DSM-V definition. Health Narcissism is a part of every adult. It makes us take care of ourselves, dress well, eat healthy and so on because of self-respect. Destructive Narcissists however, are ruled by overwhelming self-love. In brief:
- All destructive narcissists are cases of arrested development.
- The destructive narcissist has a pathological need for all attention in every context he finds himself in.
- The destructive narcissist has a transcendent sense of entitlement.
- The destructive narcissist's pathological need to have it all leads to his existence of being pathologically envious.
- The destructive narcissist is a predatory animal.
- The destructive narcissist is a chameleon.
- All destructive narcissists are parasitical.
- Destructive narcissists love to project their faults on to others
- Destructive narcissists love to play martyr
- Destructive narcissists consistently rewrite & revise history
- The destructive narcissist can steal virtue and substance from her profession or from belonging to certain clubs or organizations or charities. Service professions are very attractive to malignant narcissists. So is Religion. As is Parenthood.
- In every situation the parasitical destructive narcissist is preening himself.
- We are only objects to the destructive narcissist.
(from http://narcissists-suck.blogspot.com)
To vilify Christie Brinkley along with her ex-Peter Cook, is playing right into his hands. Narcissists, once exposed for the soul-less emotional and sexual vampires they are; such as in the Cook/Brinkley divorce; become vindictive. They will do things to provoke a reaction from their exes and then point at them saying "see! she's just as bad as me!"
Additionally, Destructive Narcissists lack healthy boundaries. Apparently, it was well spelled out in their divorce and custody/ visitation decree for Cook not to have other women around their young children. Cook could have cared less. In fact I would suspect he used the children to play "I'm a good Dad" around whatever new targets... er, girlfriends he had.
Cook's obvious damage control in his interview with Barbara Walters only cemented my opinion that he's probably a Destructive Narcissist. Concerned with his image only, while Brinkley remained concerned for the well being of her children and her privacy. Even her ex, Billy Joel (somewhat narcissistic himself in my opinion) never had or has a bad word to say about her as a parent.
This entire recent court drama was of Cook's making. To put himself at the center of attention, to play martyr, to smear poor Ms. Brinkley, his probable anger at the public sympathy she received... it was all about Cook all over again. Brinkley asserted her rights masterfully and I can almost guarantee you haven't heard the last of Cook dragging her back to court for some nonsense.
Worst of all Ms. Peyser, you spoke as if this was an anomoly. I can assure you it's not. Thousands of women spend hours and substantial money with their narcissistic exes in the court system trying to extricate themselves and their children from the grip of a pathological man like Cook. It is all too common. And destructive narcissists love the drama this creates. In fact they feed on it by causing all sorts of delays and new charges to keep the drama going. Therapist's offices are loaded with women suffering severe emotional, psychological and even sexual trauma and PTSD from relationships with men like this. It's as much of a scourge as Swine Flu or Cancer... causing immune system problems, permanent PTSD, disability and even driving some victims to suicide to escape from it.
They don't need each other. Cook is trying to lock Brinkley in, using the children, in a cycle of pain, accusation, guilt, fear and stalking-by-court. I have seen it time & time & time again.
I would be happy to have coffee with Brinkley any time she'd like and would be proud to be seen with her. She's a class act stuck in a rotten situation with a pathological man.
This is a golden opportunity to educate the public about this. It's no joke. It's serious, life altering and the cause of women & children suffering in silence because of those who make light of it.
Thank you,
Barbara
http://abusesanctuary.blogspot.com
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