Latest / It’s All Your Fault: High Conflict People / Bringing It to Life #3: Dealing with Parental Alienation
Transcript
- Speaker 1 (00:05): Welcome to, it's All Your Fault On True Story fm, the one and only podcast dedicated to helping you identify and deal with the most challenging human interactions, those involving someone who may have a high conflict personality. I'm Megan Hunter and I'm here with my co-host, bill Eddie. Hi everybody. We are the co-founders of the High Conflict Institute in San Diego, California where we focus on training, consulting, coaching, and educational programs and methods, all to do with high conflict. In this episode today, we are going to talk about alienation in divorce cases and separation. These are also called parental alienation or child alienation. We're going to take a listener question about this, and it's quite an extreme case, so hold on. But first, a couple of notes send your high conflict related questions to podcast@highconflictinstitute.com or on our website@highconflictinstitute.com slash podcast where you'll also find all the show notes and links. Speaker 1 (01:14): This is going to be a really interesting and fascinating episode, I believe because the topic of alienation seems to be one that is growing. And I know, bill, that you have put so much thought and research into this whole topic around alienation, which as we discussed in past episodes, seems to be growing in society. So in this episode, we'll pick this listener question and listeners, I just want you to know that after I ask Bill and read the scenario, and this is part of the bring it to life, we're going to bring this scenario to life and understand what alienation is, what estrangement is. Are they the same? Are they different? What do we do? Most importantly, what do we do either as professionals or as the parent involved in it or even as the child? So here's the question. I am divorced from a high conflict person who has narcissistic personality disorder. Speaker 1 (02:17): We share a 16-year-old son whom I have been alienated from. I won't go into the full history of the abuse from the other parent here, but things came to a head in 2022 when the other parent came to my home and ended up shooting my husband in front of our son and shooting into our house. Afterwards, the other parent took our son and wouldn't allow him visitation with me. I have been divorced since 2009 due to narcissistic abuse and have been being punished by the other parent ever since. My attorney says this is the worst case of parental alienation he has ever seen. My son has been physically violent with me and ran away from our house. We recently had the criminal trial and my son lied on the stand for the other parent. His father, who is the other parent, had kept him from me so that he can further manipulate and control our son so that he could stay himself, could stay out of prison. I do not have contact with my son anymore. My question is what do I do from here? So Bill, that's I'd say a pretty extreme situation and very sad. So let's just start with alienation. There's an allegation of parental alienation here. What is it and what do we do about it? Speaker 2 (03:45): Well, this is an extreme case, but it lays out several things that we want to address. Let's talk about alienation in general. When a child is alienated from a parent, they resist or refuse contact with that parent not because of something that parent in case mom has done. And by the way, I want to say we haven't met this person, we don't know all the details. So we're speaking in a general sense about this situation, which just sounds horrific. So if the son doesn't want to see the mom and sees dad as just wonderful and correct on everything and all of that, we call that alienation or parental alienation or child alienation. But I want to back up a little bit and say that's one possibility. A second possibility when a child resists or refuses to see a parent is what we call estrangement. And that means the parent who's being rejected has done something. Speaker 2 (04:54): If that were the case here, and there's no evidence of this, but if that were the case here, it would be because mom was doing something, mom was violent, mom was child engaged in child abuse, domestic violence or whatever, emotional abuse, and that was why the child was resisting contact. These are two kind of opposite reasons for children to resist contact. And it's a very controversial issue in family courts today around divorce because it does appear that more children are resisting contact. And what happens in court is there's a big argument over whose fault it is. Well, let's take a scientific approach rather than a blame approach and try to understand what may be going on with estrangement. Child resists contact because they're afraid of the parent, they're afraid of being physically abused. There may be too much emotional intensity. I've had several of those estrangement cases where a parent with a personality disorder is just too emotionally intense. Speaker 2 (06:06): For example, had a case with a father who'd been diagnosed with borderline personality disorder and he just constantly burst into tears, yelled, et cetera, and the son just was too intense and he wanted to be mostly with his mother, and that's what ended up, although she really reinforced having relationship with the father, which she made sure he boy went and spent time with father. So that's estrangement. Another case a father tried to strangle the mother, a new mother, a new spouse, and the child saw this 8-year-old girl saw this, and so she resisted contact with that father out of fear. Fear that maybe she'd be strangled someday. And people may not know, but strangulation is the greatest indicator for eventual spousal murder. It's like a 10 times better chance because it can happen so quickly. It doesn't involve finding a weapon or a gun or something. Speaker 2 (07:12): It'd just be so impulsive. And that's why we talk about personality disorders. So impulsive, so that's estrangement. Alienation on the other hand is when a parent is constantly badmouthing, the other parent may interfere with that parent's time and may basically undermine that parent's relationship with the child. And if they can get the child to be with them most of the time or even all the time, then this becomes more and more intense and the child really absorbs that parent's view of the universe. Now, I'd like to make an analogy that some people may find uncomfortable, but in terms of social dynamics, it makes a lot of sense. And that is that the child is experiencing what people experience in a cult where you have an emotional leader with messages about I'm the good guy, we're the good team, be with us. And the people out there in the world, you can't trust them. Speaker 2 (08:20): They're evil, they're horrible. So that intensely emotional cult leader defines the inside and outside of the cult. Well, that's similar to alienation where one parent is defining who's good and who's bad, and they make out the other parent to be evil. In the case you're describing Megan, the son, was so much on the father's side that when the father committed a terrible act sounds like shooting the mother's new husband. Fortunately, it sounds like he survived, but that the son would lie on behalf of the father. And frankly, that's not unusual because when a child is so alienated, they bonded so tightly with in a sense the cult leader that they will do anything for that person. And I have a new book coming out called Our New World of Adult Bullies, and I talk in there about primitive emotional power, which is something people don't see, but we get our emotions hooked. Speaker 2 (09:34): And I think this is a case of that primitive emotional power. So what happens, whatever you want to call it, and whether you like my analogy with a cult or not, the question is what needs to be done? So let me first talk about estrangement cases because historically in divorce, this is how courts have approached a resistant child. They assume that the rejected parent has done something wrong. They may have engaged in domestic violence, child abuse, emotional abuse, and so the child resists contact. Well, let's say it is a case of child abuse. Parents hit the child, kick the child. And so the treatment for that is first of all, getting the parent new skills to solve problems and to not be abusive, and then to have parent child counseling that step by step eased into, so the child feels comfortable being around the feared parent as the parent learns these skills and the child starts to get more comfortable with that parent. Speaker 2 (10:52): Maybe it's domestic violence and the parent has to go to a domestic violence program or weekly meetings for 52 weeks and step-by-step counseling with the child supported by the other parent. In a sense it's called reunification, but it's actually a new relationship because the parent is learning new behaviors. So that's how you treat estrangement, that's how courts tend to treat all resistance. Now let's look at alienation. The treatment for alienation is quite different because the problem isn't the rejected parent's behavior. It's being isolated from the rejected parent and being exposed to this repetitive badmouthing emotions and isolation interference by a parent engaged in alienating behavior. So the treatment for that is that the child is ordered back into the home of the rejected parent and has restricted contact for a period of time, maybe ideally it's 60 to 90 days. And during those 60 to 90 days, that parent is getting counseling on eliminating alienating behaviors and learning healthy communication, conflict boundaries, having emotional boundaries with the child, et cetera. Speaker 2 (12:25): When the child's back with this parent who isn't the cause of the problem, usually within 24 hours the child's back to their normal relationship. People are astonished by that. But if you understand how cults work, that's exactly the same thing is when people are in a cult, they have to be removed from the cult and then back with their family, back with their people, and then they become back to normal. And in my new book I talk about the case of Patty Hearst, which was one very much in the public eye in the 1970s. She was kidnapped by a cult that was antier and basically wanted a revolution and held up banks to fund themselves. And Patty Hurst, who was about 20 at the time, became an enthusiastic revolutionary while part of the cult while under their thumb, then police got involved, she was arrested and she had adopted the values and then she stopped having those values. Speaker 2 (13:42): And this is 40, 50 years ago, and she never ever returned to those values. But for the period she was under the influence of the cold. She was a revolutionary and she ended up going to prison for armed robbery and things like that. Fortunately, no one was killed. So that's the analogy, and I can talk more specifically about this case, but that's the basic idea that you have to have a different approach. The step-by-step approach to overcome alienation doesn't usually work because there's still influence by the alienating behaviors of the favored parent. And over and over again, we've seen failures to treat this, and it's sad because it's so treatable. So that's my brief explanation of alienation. Speaker 1 (14:37): Thank you, bill. I know there's a lot there, but you've broken it down into a clear, more simple or less complicated way to look at it. And I'm thinking of that step-by-step approach. You mentioned this child or the children will be in a state of confusion, I would think during that time and probably provide, they'll get a lot of stress during that time. Well, Speaker 2 (15:01): What's interesting is it's stressful to make that transition because the child is built to resistance to that parent. But once they're in that parent's care, they're around that parent intensively and there's some four or five day camps to reintegrate the child with the rejected parent. Like I said, within 24 hours, they usually back to their normal relationship because they've been just relating to this bully story of the parent and not the real parent. And so there's more and more research now about successes with that, but there's a lot of resistance to that because it seems like the child is terrified to go with the other parent and then when they're with that parent, they're fine. And this isn't that different from you've got a 4-year-old going to a daycare center or something and the child doesn't want their parents to let go, and the parent's like, oh, I'm so nervous, the child must hate it here. Speaker 2 (16:07): And I was director of Seattle University Childcare Center for three years in a former life many years ago, and I had that. And I remember one mother, she said, I'm really nervous about my child. She seemed so upset here. And they said, well, tell you what, give me your child. Let me hold your child. She seems to trust me and you leave the building and she's going to cry while you leave the building, but tell her goodbye, you'll be fine. And then I want you to go around the edge of the building and look in the window in about 10 minutes. So I calm the child down, we go to the group she's in, she's happily playing, and 10 minutes later I see mom looking through the window, kind of scratching her head, seeing her daughter having a wonderful time. So it's anxiety about a feared situation that goes away in the real situation. And that's what we see with alienation. When the child's in the real situation with a parent who's usually pretty normal, then they become normal. But it's that transition. And a lot of professionals, certainly a lot of favored parents aren't willing to go through that transition to where the child's there and they learn skills and you reintegrate the favored parent so that 90 days later you start having a normal balance and the parents often share 50 50 after that. Speaker 1 (17:42): So I do have a question bill, and it's about the isolation in a cult, right? The occult leader typically will isolate their cult members, and the more you're in isolation, the more you can influence that person. And I think what you're saying here is once that child is taken out of that isolated environment where they're so controlled and manipulated and they're exposed within 24 hours or so, start having just unique exposure to the rejected parent, they see that that parent is not so evil. Does that make sense? This isolation piece? Speaker 2 (18:23): Yeah. It's like really two different people. There's the story of mom as whatever bad person this father has told the son, and then there's real mom. And those are two totally different stories. The story of mom is all or nothing. Mom is evil. It's emotional, it's dangerous. I'm your hero. I will save you from evil mom. And you have to think about this father that he came over and shot mom's new husband is, I have never heard of that. That's an extreme, extreme case. I'm so glad that he survived that. But this person is out of control. This person is impulsive. This person has all or nothing thinking this person lacks and just verbally the son being exposed to that. But that's very much like a call is the story I talk about Patty Hearst, they were armed robbery. If this son is going, Hey, my dad shot my mom's new husband, Hey, that's cool. There's something severely wrong here, but that's how bad it gets in a cult. And that's I guess how bad it can get in an extreme alienation case that the child really goes with the aggressive person and is blinded to the reality. Speaker 1 (19:50): So the prescription then is one of having a dose of and a quick shot of penicillin, so to speak, where the penicillin is the rejected parent. As long as that parent has moderate behaviors, flexible thinking takes accountability and can have moderate behaviors, would that be accurate? Speaker 2 (20:13): In other words, the case has to be investigated, and this case sounds extreme. So if son resists contact with mom, you got to figure, did mom do something ever? Well, most cases you've got one person that's extreme and one person that's reasonable. Sometimes you have two extreme people, but in this case, that doesn't sound like there's a history of mom beating the child or emotionally screaming all the time at the child reasons. The child would resist mom and the child's been away from mom for, what's that, at least two years, something like that. And so you have to make sure mom's okay. Mom's usually okay in this case. And so you put child with mom without dad's influence for a period of time. That's why the step-by-step doesn't work is you keep getting mom and the story of mom mixed up and the child's getting programmed. Speaker 2 (21:14): And I want to really say this isn't a conscious thing. I really think people engage in alienating behaviors because of their personality and they may be born with it, early child abuse or indulgence, all of that. I don't blame people. I want to solve these problems. And sometimes they require time away from that parent for 60 to 90 days so that the child really can get back to the reality that's hard to do these days. Judges are uncomfortable doing that. Lawyers are uncomfortable, therapists are uncomfortable, and yet that's what works. If you would say, well, my 20-year-old daughter's in a cult and doesn't want to talk to me and I'm her mother or her father, what should I do? They don't say, well, we're going to have one hour visits once a week with you, and I'm sure she'll turn around. No, that's the thing about cults, like you said, they're isolated. They get cut off contact. That's a key part of how this stuff works. It's primitive emotional power, which only works if you can prevent contact with the other real person. Speaker 1 (22:28): So let's take a short break and we'll come right back and we'll dive into the question. Speaker 1 (22:41): All right, we are back. So let's talk about this particular question and bring it to life. So we have this divorced couple. We have a 16-year-old son with alienation happening. The mother is the rejected parent. A lot of abuse. Going back to 2009 when the divorce occurred, 2022 is when the shooting happened. And after that point, the other parent, the dad took the son and wouldn't allow visitation with the mother. So let's break this down. The son's been physically violent with mom, has run away from mom. So how do we apply what we've been talking about the last few minutes? Speaker 2 (23:24): Well, what I would recommend, which is a long shot, is that the son go with mother without contact with father for let's say 60 days, and that the mother have worked on their relationship with the son probably in a psychiatric hospital for a month or so. And I want to say this because I had a case like this years ago when I worked as a clinical social worker in a psychiatric hospital. Now it wasn't as extreme, but here's the dynamics that seemed to make a difference. This was a boy who was bigger than his mother, and I believe actually he, I think he was 15 and he would hit his mother and they were having conflicts. The parents were divorced, he was angry about divorce and said, I want to live with dad. He was living with his mom who he was hitting. And then mom had him admitted to psychiatric hospital work on this behavior problem. Speaker 2 (24:31): He was getting into fights with other kids. He was bigger than other kids. And it was like, now's the time we got to deal with this. So people are offended that I recommend a psych hospital for this. I do because it worked. In this case, the boy was in the hospital about 30 days. He had activities and he had to restrain himself. He got in fights with other kids and he had consequences, and he learned to restrain himself. He had sessions with his mother at the hospital and they worked on their relationship, how to communicate if he's upset about something and he learned how to live, he learned good values. But here's the key. As then they started having meetings with dad and then dad and mom and the boy. And what dad became able to say is, you're not going to live with me no matter how badly you treat your mother, you're not going to live with me. Speaker 2 (25:35): We're going to have Wednesday overnights and alternate weekends, but your behavior is not going to get you to live with me. And the boy got the message. The father was firm with that message, and the mom was firm with that message. And like I said, it was about 30 days in the psych hospital. He's released living with mom, getting along with mom. They still have family counseling, and dad was supportive of that. There was no court involvement there. The divorce had already happened a year before. In this kind of case, you're going to have to get court involvement. You've got an out of control father who needs to be in a treatment program if not in prison for a while because of shooting the husband, the new husband. So think of all this in terms of dynamics. Don't think of this in terms of good guys and bad guys. Speaker 2 (26:36): I see alienating behavior as mostly unconscious and it's mostly emotional and it's T transferred emotionally. It's primitive emotional power. So what we have to do is look at how do we treat each person and how do we get everybody on track? The father's going to end up in prison for life. If he doesn't get some kind of treatment for this behavior, he is going to kill somebody someday. The son is going to be violent with women, and someday he may kill somebody. Get the family some help now and don't turn it into arguments over dis alienation exist and stuff like that, which as people are arguing a lot about these days, it exists and we have to treat it and we can, and there's no bad guys. We just have to take the steps. So that's my recommendation, Speaker 1 (27:29): Really fascinating. I mean, what really happens in cases with alienation is the alienating parent is the gatekeeper often, right? Yes. And to have someone with those extreme, that extreme thinking and behaviors being the decision maker for that child and the gatekeeper for that child, you just see where this kind of all rolls downhill and the poor children end up in a great deal of turmoil and pain and perhaps lifelong. I mean, we all have heard of cases that don't turn around. So Bill, let's talk about the child. What would you say the likelihood of someone, a young man who is 16, 17 years old and has been dealing with this for more than half of his life, if he can get some help, let's say it's not a psychiatric hospital, but it's maybe some type of counseling, if he's just with the rejected parent who now is in his life and access to the other parent is limited or non-existent, what are the chances of healing and having future healthy relationships and healthy behaviors? Speaker 2 (28:44): Well, I think the key is getting the previously favored parent involved in counseling with the child. So we don't want to teach the child all or nothing thinking as an answer to all or nothing behavior. And that's what alienation is, is the child adopts a parents all or nothing view of the world and of the other parent. We don't want more high conflict parents. So the healthiest thing is for the parents to learn skills, to support each other and to steer away from all or nothing thinking and for the child to learn, Hey, it's not your fault. This is stuff that just goes on, but it's you. You're influenced by it. And to realize it and to learn a healthy balance, the goal is balance. And I believe that almost everybody can learn that. There's some people that can't and they may need to be really restricted. Speaker 2 (29:44): But what I'm most excited about is when I hear stories of alienation that's been addressed, and now you've got kind of 50 50 parent and the child likes both his parents or her parents that you can have that, and that's so important. So to heal the child, they need to experience that. And if one parent just can't support moderate thinking, moderate behavior, moderate emotions, then they may have some limited time. They should still have contact, still have a relationship, but that's the healthiest thing for the child to have healthy exposure and not to draw out these cases. That's one of the worst things as alienation cases bill, during the court process, as I said in a prior podcast, I think we should spend an intensive month figuring out these cases and not put kids through two or three years of childhood, figure it out, get everybody some help and get a balance in the child's life. And it's possible. We just, people have to be more educated about all this stuff. Speaker 1 (30:56): Absolutely. That's fantastic. Bill, I know there's so much of this going on, so hopefully this will be helpful to you. Our listeners, Speaker 1 (31:10): Please write in any questions you have or thoughts about what we've talked about today. We're going to put links in the show notes to Bill's book. Don't Alienate the Kids Raising Resilient Children while Avoiding High Conflict Divorce, and also his new book coming out in June, 2024, called A New World of Adult Bullies. And I did also want to just mention something that we're starting new in May called the Conflict Influencer Circles. The first one is for Stepfamilies, and it's just a four week, one hour a week course where you can learn how to become a conflict influencer within your own stepfamily. So we'll put that link in the show notes as well, and next week we'll continue our Bring It to Life series with a listener question related to belittling and bullying within a team in the academic environment. In the meantime, send your questions to podcast@highconflictinstitute.com or submit them to high conflict institute.com/podcast. We'd love it if you told your friends and colleagues about us and grateful if you leave a review. Until next time, keep learning and practicing these skills. Be kind to yourself and others while we all try to find the missing piece. Speaker 1 (32:30): It is All Your Fault is a production of True Story FM Engineering by Andy Nelson. Music by Wolf Samuels, John Coggins and Ziv Moran. Find the show notes and transcripts at True Story fm or high conflict institute.com/podcast. If your podcast app allows ratings and reviews, please consider doing that for our show.