When parents take steps to end their marriages, the default arrangement for children should be shared parenting. Psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, lawyers, and judges can help parents avoid irreparable harm.
What is Parental Alienation?
Parental alienation is a situation in which one parent uses strategies – sometimes referred to as brainwashing, alienating, or programming – to distance a child from the other parent. The alienating parent programs the child to despise their other parent by criticizing the alienated parent and interfering with their relationship. For example, perhaps the mom tells her child that their dad does not love them or want to see them, or a dad tells his child that their mom prefers her other kids with a new partner over them. Accusations can be mild, or they can become incredibly severe. This distorts the perception of the child of the alienated parent, regardless of how great their relationship was with that parent before.
When is Alienation Most Likely to Occur?
The alienation occurs when the child begins to mimic the hatred of the alienating parent towards the other parent – the targeted parent. Ultimately, the child believes the viewpoint of the alienator because in order to provide support to this parent, he or she must do so. The choice for the child to not emotionally support this parent is not something the child has learned to do since birth. Parental alienation has occurred with the child as the instrument of destruction against the targeted parent. At some point, the child completely and wholly adopts the viewpoint of the alienated parent about the targeted parent, making the cycle complete. The child is then without any empathy towards the targeted parent and sees them only in the eyes of the alienating parent.
Effects of Parental Alienation
Parental alienation profoundly affects both children and alienated parents. Children of PA are at an increased risk for future trust and relationship issues, depression, and substance abuse. For a rejected parent, the pain is excruciating. Children who are alienated from one parent may experience increased anger; have heightened feelings of neglect (or even have their basic needs actually neglected while being caught in the middle of a fight between parents); learn a destructive pattern that they pass on to others; take on a skewed view of reality and become prone to lying about others; become combative with others due to learning an “us versus them” mentality; see things as very “black-and-white”; and lack empathy.
Parental alienation has never been accepted by the medical or scientific communities as a disorder or syndrome. This can make it really problematic when it comes up in courts of law as part of custody considerations. Regardless, parent alienation sadly exists and can damage not only relational health, but the mental health of the child as well.