A selection of published articles

Parental Alienation Defined
NPRA Newsletter, Volume 1, Issue 3, Summer 2007

Parental alienation is when one parent makes it their mission to alienate their child from the other parent. I have discovered in every case I have worked on since 1994, the child and the alienated parent ultimately suffer the most.

A child internalizes this dysfunctional triangle and what results is mistrust. Children often times question authority and disrespect the parent who is being alienated. Further, this can potentially instill issues concerning loyalty. As the child may believe loving the alienated parent is not safe and thus is bad. These are all essential ingredients that are vital in raising a healthy child; trust, loyalty, understanding and respect.

Sometimes the alienated parent is forced to cancel visits, which is detrimental to the child and teaches him or her things as: a parent’s word is not sacred and authority figures can be unreliable, irresponsible, inconsistent and untrustworthy. As the child is growing up, they formulate a fixed belief that unreliable behavior is acceptable and begin to reciprocate similar behaviors toward that parent. As a result, the relationship between the parent and child becomes superficial and the child transfers this behavior onto future relationships.

The courts do not know how to address parental alienation and have a view, which is based on an old traditional value system of favoring the mother, when often times the father is clearly the more competent parent. Fathers are left in complete bewilderment and devastation when they realize their parental rights are extracted from them. Often times the unresolved issues following the divorce can lead a parent to alienate the other parent as well as displace their feelings of hurt, anger and resentment onto the child.

This can only be repaired through sanctions made by the courts to the parent who is alienating the child from the other parent. The court system requires reformation. To accomplish this, new judges need to be employed who possess a set of beliefs and who can be objective and sensitive to both parents. Besides this, placing the needs of a child first is a significant start to reformation.