Act When Necessary, or Do Not Act At All.
So, your spouse attempted suicide months ago and you are going to try to use at trial for custody. You think your spouse had something evil to do with the death of the family pet last year and you hired an expert to testify about it at trial to try to get custody. Anything and everything traumatic that may have happened that might be a leg up for custody must be addressed time proximate to its occurrence or it is worthless to litigate if no government agency intervened, i.e., Child Protective Services, ASPCA, etc.
With all the time that passed and the children stayed with that spouse and you did not file an emergency application, you are silently saying no danger to the children was present or that you are neglect in failing to protect them. Oh, what is that? You think there still is? Then why didn’t you take action then? No money for counsel fees to do anything? Well, then it could not have been so bad or you would have found the money.
With the passage of all that time, if there was a danger and you did not act, you are guilty of inadequate guardianship and maybe the children should not be with you (who did not step up the plate to protect your children). And clearly after the passage of so much time and the children are fine, there is no danger for the Court to stand up and take notice of at trial.
Of course there are exceptions to everything, but they are very rare.
If your lawyer did does not explain this to you, then you need a new lawyer who puts you before billings.