For private supervision matters, there are few options in Canada...one is an agency called Bartimeaus and they have a division called Leaps and Bounds. It is very important to do a background check on both the agency itself and the worker assigned. Also critical, is to have a procedure whereby you agree to the report at the end of each visit.
Remember, these people can play God over your life and may have agendas. In the case of Bartimeaus, be sure there is no conflict of interest with anyone within their agency.
Wednesday, 22 June 2011
Choosing a supervision agency
For private supervision matters, there are few options in Canada...one is an agency called Bartimeaus and they have a division called Leaps and Bounds. It is very important to do a background check on both the agency itself and the worker assigned. Also critical, is to have a procedure whereby you agree to the report at the end of each visit.
Remember, these people can play God over your life and may have agendas. In the case of Bartimeaus, be sure there is no conflict of interest with anyone within their agency.
Remember, these people can play God over your life and may have agendas. In the case of Bartimeaus, be sure there is no conflict of interest with anyone within their agency.
Sunday, 19 June 2011
Father's Day
I think the message from Dwayne is critical here...that the goal is for both parents to be a part of their children's lives...what concerns me is that courts play God with DNA,,,that is very concerning..if you are seeking sole custody, be very sure your heart is pure, your motive and intent in the right place..bcs life without a parent is a troubling existence for a child...consider every option, and let the hearts of your children decide...Therapists make a fortune analyzing what is right for children, but as a parent, you instinctively know that both parents are needed. If your spouse is suffering, help them find their way for the children and if you believe in God, reads the lords prayer....a little more accurate than lining the pockets of a greedy lawyer.
Happy Fathers Day!
June 19th, 2011 by Robert Franklin, Esq.Every Fathers Day I make a pitch for everyone reading to remember their dads with love. Fathers are indispensable to their children and today is the one day out of the year we’re urged to honor them. So much of the rest of the time seems to be spent doing the opposite.
But this year I think I’ll let Miami Heat star Dwyane Wade do the talking for me. This year saw the culmination of his successful fight to gain custody of his two sons and here’s his Fathers Day article that touches on that fight, and what his kids and his own dad mean to him (Newsweek, 6/5/11).
And while you’re reading his piece remember two things. First, recall all the things his ex-wife did to make contact with his boys hard or impossible. Second, remember what Dwyane said in court about her:
To me, Dwyane Wade looks like he’s got a big heart. That largeness of spirit will be there long after he laces up his NBA sneakers for the last time. Whatever his ex-wife may do, I know his sons will be better boys and better men because of it.
Happy Fathers Day!
But this year I think I’ll let Miami Heat star Dwyane Wade do the talking for me. This year saw the culmination of his successful fight to gain custody of his two sons and here’s his Fathers Day article that touches on that fight, and what his kids and his own dad mean to him (Newsweek, 6/5/11).
And while you’re reading his piece remember two things. First, recall all the things his ex-wife did to make contact with his boys hard or impossible. Second, remember what Dwyane said in court about her:
“I want both parents to be in their kids’ lives … S.L.(his wife) needs to get healthy.. .to get help dealing with whatever issues she’s dealing with .. . if she does that, she gets healthy, I want her to spend as much time with the kids as she wants to spend.”
D.T. continued, “I’m not trying to take my kids from her. I want to foster a relationship between both parents, where we have equal rights, hopefully one day we can make decisions together, and our kids can see us together as a parent team to know that we have their best interests at hand.”When you think about it, that’s a pretty good statement of the goals of the family court reform movement in a nutshell.
To me, Dwyane Wade looks like he’s got a big heart. That largeness of spirit will be there long after he laces up his NBA sneakers for the last time. Whatever his ex-wife may do, I know his sons will be better boys and better men because of it.
Happy Fathers Day!
Saturday, 11 June 2011
Suggestions to Not Encourage Parental Alienation
While we have little control over a person that will engage in alienation, bcs when you understand their psychology, it is their insecure needs to control and have power, we can think calmly and strategically. In a perfect world, you engage a mediator that comes highly recommended but if the situation becomes adversarial there are a few things you can conisder..
1) Make sure you document everything and if you are concerned about your ex partner's need for control, keep a very detailed journal...chances are they are doing the same.
2) Do not engage, as hard as it can be, in any conflictual conversations and DO NOT, spar via email. These will become damning conversations in a courtroom. Someone with big incentive and the psychological imbalance that is the root of PAS, will leverage this in any way they can to gain control of the situation.
3) If you are unsure, in any way, of your legal counsel.....pause and then pause again. Do you homework, go online, find out the facts for yourself. This arms you with the knowledge to assess your legal counsel and then decide if you need to make a change.
4) If you decide to enlist a family assessor, that is not court appointed, be very thorough. Check their references, review their engagement contract carefully and make sure there is no bias. Might sound basic, but this person gains tremendous power and you need to be sure. Also get a good read of the overall costs and timelines. For some family assessors, like Dr. Peter Sutton, this becomes a cash grab from a family in crisis.
5) Stay calm, even when things go crazy, find a group of friends or family you can vent with...Remember the person focused on alienation is mentally ill in a very sneaky way..They are never your friend, their motivation is to win control of the children. At NO TIME can they be trusted...bad behavior is a pattern, write yourself a note to not engage, unless in a positive manner with respect to the kids, in any way with them.
6) Seek professional counseling for yourself. A situation where PAS starts to emerge, has the ability to push you to a breaking point that will surprise you. Consider joining a PAS association or group, these people have a range of experience and if nothing else, can tell you what not to do. It is through mistakes that strategies are created.
7) Stay close to the most important part of the process....THE CHILDREN. Encourage them to talk, to share their feelings and never betray their confidence....They are the ones you are really hurting..choosing between parents is excruciating for children and they should never have to do this. And of course, never disparage your ex partner to them. That will just confuse them more but the key is to lead with integrity, that can never be wrong.
8) If your access becomes supervised, consider having it video taped or have the supervisor do a summary at the end and both of you agree. Most important, if the supervision is through a private company, make sure your ex partner has NO relationship with them in any way. Search for any conflicts. This is critical!
9) Meditate and care for yourself. The rules of engagement of a PAS situation is intense and emotionally crippling. Exercise and disengage.
10) When in doubt, consult a professional. Keep yourself apprised of any new PAS cases that set precendent in the courtroom...Stay informed on all levels..
1) Make sure you document everything and if you are concerned about your ex partner's need for control, keep a very detailed journal...chances are they are doing the same.
2) Do not engage, as hard as it can be, in any conflictual conversations and DO NOT, spar via email. These will become damning conversations in a courtroom. Someone with big incentive and the psychological imbalance that is the root of PAS, will leverage this in any way they can to gain control of the situation.
3) If you are unsure, in any way, of your legal counsel.....pause and then pause again. Do you homework, go online, find out the facts for yourself. This arms you with the knowledge to assess your legal counsel and then decide if you need to make a change.
4) If you decide to enlist a family assessor, that is not court appointed, be very thorough. Check their references, review their engagement contract carefully and make sure there is no bias. Might sound basic, but this person gains tremendous power and you need to be sure. Also get a good read of the overall costs and timelines. For some family assessors, like Dr. Peter Sutton, this becomes a cash grab from a family in crisis.
5) Stay calm, even when things go crazy, find a group of friends or family you can vent with...Remember the person focused on alienation is mentally ill in a very sneaky way..They are never your friend, their motivation is to win control of the children. At NO TIME can they be trusted...bad behavior is a pattern, write yourself a note to not engage, unless in a positive manner with respect to the kids, in any way with them.
6) Seek professional counseling for yourself. A situation where PAS starts to emerge, has the ability to push you to a breaking point that will surprise you. Consider joining a PAS association or group, these people have a range of experience and if nothing else, can tell you what not to do. It is through mistakes that strategies are created.
7) Stay close to the most important part of the process....THE CHILDREN. Encourage them to talk, to share their feelings and never betray their confidence....They are the ones you are really hurting..choosing between parents is excruciating for children and they should never have to do this. And of course, never disparage your ex partner to them. That will just confuse them more but the key is to lead with integrity, that can never be wrong.
8) If your access becomes supervised, consider having it video taped or have the supervisor do a summary at the end and both of you agree. Most important, if the supervision is through a private company, make sure your ex partner has NO relationship with them in any way. Search for any conflicts. This is critical!
9) Meditate and care for yourself. The rules of engagement of a PAS situation is intense and emotionally crippling. Exercise and disengage.
10) When in doubt, consult a professional. Keep yourself apprised of any new PAS cases that set precendent in the courtroom...Stay informed on all levels..
Tuesday, 7 June 2011
More evidence on the seriousness of PAS
This article is a must read for parents embroiled in a dynamic whereby PAS is affecting their children...this is a phenomena that the medical world is taking very seriously.
©Copyright 2011 by Paula J. Caplan All rights reserved
Using a medicalizing label to mask child sexual abuse
Among the scientifically unwarranted and socially dangerous proposals that the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual-5 authors have not yet seen fit to rule out is the addition of something its advocates call Parental Alienation Syndrome. This is a medical-sounding term for nothing more than "She's a vengeful woman who's trying to make her children tell horrific lies about their father."
It is nearly always applied to mothers whose children are being molested by their fathers. Despite not yet being in the DSM, PAS has in some courts proven an astonishingly effective vehicle for deflecting the focus from the abuser and simply claiming that the woman must be lying, and coaching her children to lie, because she has the alleged mental illness of PAS. [1] The claim is that without cause, she wants to turn the children against their father.
What often gets short shrift, as a result, is even the consideration of the possibility that the children are truly being molested. Virtually everything that is sometimes a sign that a child is being molested - such as fearfulness when it is time for a visit with the abuser or vaginal bleeding or infection in a 2-year-old - is instead interpreted as further "proof" that the mother has PAS. In these two examples, through use of PAS, the child's fearfulness is cast as the result of the mother's efforts to make the child frightened of the father or terrified of not pleasing her by wanting the visit to take place, and the vaginal problems are assumed to be caused by the mother in order to provide fake evidence of the molesting. If this sounds far-fetched, it is not. I have both done research and consulted in court cases about this.
As Dr. Julie Ancis, who has conducted extensive research about such cases, has noted:
[Richard] Gardner [who invented PAS] claimed that many reports of [child sexual abuse] in the context of divorce cases were false allegations. In this connection, it is important to note that Bala and Schuman (1999) found that only 1.3% of mothers' allegations of abuse by their children's fathers were deemed by civil court judges to be intentionally false, in contrast to 21% of cases in which fathers had made such allegations against mothers. And Meier (2009) reports after reviewing the research that it is a mistaken belief that mothers' allegations in child custody proceedings that fathers have sexually abused their children are usually false. [2]
Gardner not only thought up this label but also condoned adults' sexual assaults on children and said that reports of child sexual abuse were elevated because sexually voyeuristic social workers made them. [1,2] Despite the fact that some judges have quite rightly forbidden the use of the term in their courts, it remains widely used in other courts and sounds more impressive coming from the lips of a testifying mental health professional than "She's just a lying, angry woman."
Ancis writes further:
Gardner's (1998) questionable ethics and clinical judgment are reflected in (but are by no means limited to) the following: (1) he recommends joint interviews with an accused father and child in which the father directly confronts the child about the allegation, and (2) he interprets a child's overt expression of fear of possible retaliation by the father as evidence of the child's embarrassment about lying rather than as possibly a valid fear of a truthtelling child whose father is abusive.
The construct of PAS is unscientific, composed of a group of general symptoms with no empirical basis....
Major professional bodies, including the American Psychological Association, have discredited PAS on the grounds that it is misused in domestic violence cases and that there is no scientific evidence of such a "syndrome." The more recent APA Online document Issues and Dilemmas in Family Violence (http://www.apa.org/pi/essues.html), particularly Issue 5, describes the tendency of family courts to miminize a context of violence, falsely accusing the mother of alienation and granting custody to the father in spite of his history of violence. The National Council on Juvenile and Family Court Judges' 2006 manual states that "parental alienation syndrome or PAS has been discredited by the scientific community" and "should therefore be ruled inadmissible" (p. 19). A number of prominent figures, including Dr. Paul J. Fink, past president of the American Psychiatric Association and president of the Leadership Council on Mental Health, Justice, and the Media, and Professor Jon R. Conte of the University of Washington Social Welfare Doctoral Faculty have also discredited PAS and its lack of scientific basis (see Bruch, 2001).
Because of the use of PAS as a tactic by many CSA perpetrators to influence decision makers and the court system, abused children have been placed in the hands of their abusers (Childress, 2006). It is estimated that "over 58,000 children a year are ordered into unsupervised contact with physically or sexually abusive parents following divorce in the United States" (http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/pas/1.html) and that PAS was used in a large number of these cases. [2]
The DSM-5 editors could at any time have already struck PAS from their planned additions but have so far chosen not to.
If this alarms you, and especially if PAS has been used against you, please consider going to dsm5.org before their June 15 cutoff date for input from the public arrives, and send them your concerns. Please urge everyone else you can think of to do the same. The DSM-5 authors will do themselves and the manual's reputation no favors if they include PAS, and they need to hear from people whom the label has harmed.
[1] Paula J. Caplan. (2004) What is it that's being called "Parental Alienation Syndrome"? In Paula J. Caplan & Lisa Cosgrove (Eds.), Bias in psychiatric diagnosis. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
[2] Julie R. Ancis. Parental alienation syndrome. http://awpsych.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1...
References from Ancis article quotations
American Psychological Association (APA). (1996). Report on Violence and the Family: Issues and Dilemmas in Family Violence. APA Presidential Task Force on Violence and the Family. Washington, DC: Author. Retrieved from http://www.nnflp.org/apa/intro.html.
Bala, N., & Schuman, J. (1999). Allegations of sexual abuse when parents have separated. Canadian Family Law Quarterly 17, 191-241.
Bruch, C. (2001). Parental Alienation Syndrome and Parental Alienation: Getting it wrong in child custody cases. Family Law Quarterly, 35(3), 527-552. Retreived from http://ezproxy.gsu.edu:3305/HOL/Page?handle=hein.journals/famlq35...
Gardner, R. A. (1998). The Parental Alienation Syndrome (2nd ed.). Creskill, New
Jersey: Creative Therapeutics, Inc.
Meier, J. S. (2009, January). Parental Alienation Syndrome and parental
alienation: Research reviews. National Online Resource Center on Violence Against Women, 1-17. Retrieved from http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/pas/1.html
National Council of Family Court Judges (2006). Navigating Custody and
Visitation Evaluations in Cases with Domestic Violence: A Judge's Guide. Retrieved from http://www.ncjfcj.org/content/blogcategory/256/302/
“Parental Alienation Syndrome:" Another Alarming DSM-5 Proposal
Using a medicalizing label to mask child sexual abuse
©Copyright 2011 by Paula J. Caplan All rights reserved
Using a medicalizing label to mask child sexual abuse
Among the scientifically unwarranted and socially dangerous proposals that the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual-5 authors have not yet seen fit to rule out is the addition of something its advocates call Parental Alienation Syndrome. This is a medical-sounding term for nothing more than "She's a vengeful woman who's trying to make her children tell horrific lies about their father."
It is nearly always applied to mothers whose children are being molested by their fathers. Despite not yet being in the DSM, PAS has in some courts proven an astonishingly effective vehicle for deflecting the focus from the abuser and simply claiming that the woman must be lying, and coaching her children to lie, because she has the alleged mental illness of PAS. [1] The claim is that without cause, she wants to turn the children against their father.
As Dr. Julie Ancis, who has conducted extensive research about such cases, has noted:
[Richard] Gardner [who invented PAS] claimed that many reports of [child sexual abuse] in the context of divorce cases were false allegations. In this connection, it is important to note that Bala and Schuman (1999) found that only 1.3% of mothers' allegations of abuse by their children's fathers were deemed by civil court judges to be intentionally false, in contrast to 21% of cases in which fathers had made such allegations against mothers. And Meier (2009) reports after reviewing the research that it is a mistaken belief that mothers' allegations in child custody proceedings that fathers have sexually abused their children are usually false. [2]
Gardner not only thought up this label but also condoned adults' sexual assaults on children and said that reports of child sexual abuse were elevated because sexually voyeuristic social workers made them. [1,2] Despite the fact that some judges have quite rightly forbidden the use of the term in their courts, it remains widely used in other courts and sounds more impressive coming from the lips of a testifying mental health professional than "She's just a lying, angry woman."
Ancis writes further:
Gardner's (1998) questionable ethics and clinical judgment are reflected in (but are by no means limited to) the following: (1) he recommends joint interviews with an accused father and child in which the father directly confronts the child about the allegation, and (2) he interprets a child's overt expression of fear of possible retaliation by the father as evidence of the child's embarrassment about lying rather than as possibly a valid fear of a truthtelling child whose father is abusive.
The construct of PAS is unscientific, composed of a group of general symptoms with no empirical basis....
Major professional bodies, including the American Psychological Association, have discredited PAS on the grounds that it is misused in domestic violence cases and that there is no scientific evidence of such a "syndrome." The more recent APA Online document Issues and Dilemmas in Family Violence (http://www.apa.org/pi/essues.html), particularly Issue 5, describes the tendency of family courts to miminize a context of violence, falsely accusing the mother of alienation and granting custody to the father in spite of his history of violence. The National Council on Juvenile and Family Court Judges' 2006 manual states that "parental alienation syndrome or PAS has been discredited by the scientific community" and "should therefore be ruled inadmissible" (p. 19). A number of prominent figures, including Dr. Paul J. Fink, past president of the American Psychiatric Association and president of the Leadership Council on Mental Health, Justice, and the Media, and Professor Jon R. Conte of the University of Washington Social Welfare Doctoral Faculty have also discredited PAS and its lack of scientific basis (see Bruch, 2001).
Because of the use of PAS as a tactic by many CSA perpetrators to influence decision makers and the court system, abused children have been placed in the hands of their abusers (Childress, 2006). It is estimated that "over 58,000 children a year are ordered into unsupervised contact with physically or sexually abusive parents following divorce in the United States" (http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/pas/1.html) and that PAS was used in a large number of these cases. [2]
The DSM-5 editors could at any time have already struck PAS from their planned additions but have so far chosen not to.
If this alarms you, and especially if PAS has been used against you, please consider going to dsm5.org before their June 15 cutoff date for input from the public arrives, and send them your concerns. Please urge everyone else you can think of to do the same. The DSM-5 authors will do themselves and the manual's reputation no favors if they include PAS, and they need to hear from people whom the label has harmed.
[1] Paula J. Caplan. (2004) What is it that's being called "Parental Alienation Syndrome"? In Paula J. Caplan & Lisa Cosgrove (Eds.), Bias in psychiatric diagnosis. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
[2] Julie R. Ancis. Parental alienation syndrome. http://awpsych.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1...
References from Ancis article quotations
American Psychological Association (APA). (1996). Report on Violence and the Family: Issues and Dilemmas in Family Violence. APA Presidential Task Force on Violence and the Family. Washington, DC: Author. Retrieved from http://www.nnflp.org/apa/intro.html.
Bala, N., & Schuman, J. (1999). Allegations of sexual abuse when parents have separated. Canadian Family Law Quarterly 17, 191-241.
Bruch, C. (2001). Parental Alienation Syndrome and Parental Alienation: Getting it wrong in child custody cases. Family Law Quarterly, 35(3), 527-552. Retreived from http://ezproxy.gsu.edu:3305/HOL/Page?handle=hein.journals/famlq35...
Gardner, R. A. (1998). The Parental Alienation Syndrome (2nd ed.). Creskill, New
Jersey: Creative Therapeutics, Inc.
Meier, J. S. (2009, January). Parental Alienation Syndrome and parental
alienation: Research reviews. National Online Resource Center on Violence Against Women, 1-17. Retrieved from http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/pas/1.html
National Council of Family Court Judges (2006). Navigating Custody and
Visitation Evaluations in Cases with Domestic Violence: A Judge's Guide. Retrieved from http://www.ncjfcj.org/content/blogcategory/256/302/
Sunday, 5 June 2011
The delicate balance of estrangement and alienation
Here is a great article written by Cathy Meyer...her perspective is enlightening..
The Difference Between Estrangement and Parental Alienation Syndrome
Have your children been alienated or did you behave badly?
Parental Alienation is defined as the deliberate attempt by one parent to distance his/her children from the other parent. An example would be the mother who shares too much information about the father’s affair with the children in a covert attempt to cause the children to harbor ill will toward the father.
A mother or father may wish to alienate the children to pay back for the pain experienced due to an unwanted divorce. They may attempt to alienate the children due to mental illness that keeps the parent from putting her/his children’s best interest before their own. The reasons parents participate in Parental Alienation are numerous and costly.
On the other hand, estrangement follows multiple conflicts and blowouts between parent and child, says relationship expert Irina Firstein. "There are extremely hurt feelings," she says. "There are feelings of betrayal and of disappointment."
The father who leaves the family for another woman, neglects time with his children and dismisses the harm done to his children is likely to become “estranged” from them. It is fair to say that no one responds positively to poor treatment, least of all children.
PAS results from a parent actively working at causing hard feelings between a child and parent. Estrangement results from a parent behaving badly toward his/her children which, in return causes the children to cut off contact.
It isn’t uncommon for a parent who is estranged from his/her children to blame the other parent of PAS. It is easier to blame others for bad behavior than to accept and acknowledge bad behavior.
How does one tell the difference between a parent who is a victim of PAS and one that is estranged due to bad behavior? The behavior of the parent during the period of alienation or estrangement is a good indicator of what is truly going on in the parent/child relationship.
Behaviors Common to an Alienated Parent:
A parent who has been alienated from his/her child will continue to pursue a relationship with the child. The parent will attempt to communicate on a regular basis, will send emails and cards. The same parent will use the court system to fight the alienating parent and retain their legal rights to a relationship with their child.
The alienated parent is not a parent who gives up or gives in. David Goldman is a good example of what an alienated parent will do in response to the alienating parent. His son was taken to Brazil by the mother who refused to return to the United States and pursued a divorce in Brazil.
The Brazilian courts gave the mother custody of the son and David’s ex wife remarried and her, her family and new husband used their status and influence to keep David away from his son. David spent five years fighting in the Brazilian courts and finally regained custody of his son. No battle was too big, no expense too great for this father who had been alienated from his child.
Behaviors Common to an Estranged Parent:
The parent who is estranged from a child due to his/her own bad treatment of the child has a “wait and see” attitude. They don’t pursue a relationship with the child because in their mind the child is the one responsible for mending the relationship.
The estranged parent will find it hard or impossible to view the situation from their child’s perspective. They don’t see their own behavior as playing a role in the problem; they feel entitled to behave badly with no repercussions.
More often than not it is the estranged parent that I come into contact with in my business. These are people who go months at a time without contacting their children because they are wrapped up in an affair and spending time with the other man/woman or busy building a new life post divorce. They don’t understand why their children aren’t waiting with open arms when they do find time to fit them into their schedule.
One man in particular comes to mind. He never went to a school function, refused to enter into counseling with his children when the therapist suggested and spent six years with minimal contact with his children. According to him though his ex-wife is guilty of parental alienation.
His words when asked about his children’s anger toward him were, “it is what it is, I can’t change it, I can only hope they come around one day.” The truly alienated parent would be jumping through hoops to try and reconcile with his/her children. The estranged parent can’t do such a thing because doing so would mean admitting and taking responsibility and the relationship with the child is not worth the discomfort that would come from acknowledging the damage they did to the parent/child relationship.
Parental Alienation Syndrome is dangerous to the emotional well-being of children and the continued parental bond with a parent. It is too often used as an excuse by bad parents to justify to themselves the results of that bad parenting and hurtful behaviors toward their children.
In both cases innocent children suffer due to the inability of a parent to put the needs of their children before their own needs and if, as a parent you can’t do that then maybe you don’t deserve a relationship with a child who is only looking for what any child has a right to expect, love, consideration and valuation from a parent.
A mother or father may wish to alienate the children to pay back for the pain experienced due to an unwanted divorce. They may attempt to alienate the children due to mental illness that keeps the parent from putting her/his children’s best interest before their own. The reasons parents participate in Parental Alienation are numerous and costly.
On the other hand, estrangement follows multiple conflicts and blowouts between parent and child, says relationship expert Irina Firstein. "There are extremely hurt feelings," she says. "There are feelings of betrayal and of disappointment."
The father who leaves the family for another woman, neglects time with his children and dismisses the harm done to his children is likely to become “estranged” from them. It is fair to say that no one responds positively to poor treatment, least of all children.
PAS results from a parent actively working at causing hard feelings between a child and parent. Estrangement results from a parent behaving badly toward his/her children which, in return causes the children to cut off contact.
It isn’t uncommon for a parent who is estranged from his/her children to blame the other parent of PAS. It is easier to blame others for bad behavior than to accept and acknowledge bad behavior.
How does one tell the difference between a parent who is a victim of PAS and one that is estranged due to bad behavior? The behavior of the parent during the period of alienation or estrangement is a good indicator of what is truly going on in the parent/child relationship.
Behaviors Common to an Alienated Parent:
A parent who has been alienated from his/her child will continue to pursue a relationship with the child. The parent will attempt to communicate on a regular basis, will send emails and cards. The same parent will use the court system to fight the alienating parent and retain their legal rights to a relationship with their child.
The alienated parent is not a parent who gives up or gives in. David Goldman is a good example of what an alienated parent will do in response to the alienating parent. His son was taken to Brazil by the mother who refused to return to the United States and pursued a divorce in Brazil.
The Brazilian courts gave the mother custody of the son and David’s ex wife remarried and her, her family and new husband used their status and influence to keep David away from his son. David spent five years fighting in the Brazilian courts and finally regained custody of his son. No battle was too big, no expense too great for this father who had been alienated from his child.
Behaviors Common to an Estranged Parent:
The parent who is estranged from a child due to his/her own bad treatment of the child has a “wait and see” attitude. They don’t pursue a relationship with the child because in their mind the child is the one responsible for mending the relationship.
The estranged parent will find it hard or impossible to view the situation from their child’s perspective. They don’t see their own behavior as playing a role in the problem; they feel entitled to behave badly with no repercussions.
More often than not it is the estranged parent that I come into contact with in my business. These are people who go months at a time without contacting their children because they are wrapped up in an affair and spending time with the other man/woman or busy building a new life post divorce. They don’t understand why their children aren’t waiting with open arms when they do find time to fit them into their schedule.
One man in particular comes to mind. He never went to a school function, refused to enter into counseling with his children when the therapist suggested and spent six years with minimal contact with his children. According to him though his ex-wife is guilty of parental alienation.
His words when asked about his children’s anger toward him were, “it is what it is, I can’t change it, I can only hope they come around one day.” The truly alienated parent would be jumping through hoops to try and reconcile with his/her children. The estranged parent can’t do such a thing because doing so would mean admitting and taking responsibility and the relationship with the child is not worth the discomfort that would come from acknowledging the damage they did to the parent/child relationship.
Parental Alienation Syndrome is dangerous to the emotional well-being of children and the continued parental bond with a parent. It is too often used as an excuse by bad parents to justify to themselves the results of that bad parenting and hurtful behaviors toward their children.
In both cases innocent children suffer due to the inability of a parent to put the needs of their children before their own needs and if, as a parent you can’t do that then maybe you don’t deserve a relationship with a child who is only looking for what any child has a right to expect, love, consideration and valuation from a parent.
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