Parental Alienation is real. It destroys children’s mental health, their relationship with one of their parents and can causes them to dislike, disrespect or even fear the targeted parent.
Parental Alienation Awareness Day - 25th April 2023
Thee enemies of ‘Both Parents Matter’ try to convince the world at PA is a lie. That it does not exist. It is just a way for fathers to harassing and abuse mothers in court.
What it is in simply this. Many romantic relationships, sadly, end with powerful emotions. Where there are children involved its wretchedly common that one parent feels that the other does not deserve to have a relationship with their children. This feeling is far more frequent than there is any child-centred reason for stopping them seeing their father. And it’s usually the case that, immediately following a split, one parent, nearly always the mother, gets the children most or all the time. When it’s the other way around, the same thing may happen in reverse.
Natural enough that they will share their feelings about their former partner with the children. Sometimes explicitly, sometime even coaching them what to say, but it can be just this – that the children become aware of their feelings and adopt them.
Clearly if there is something so awful occurred that one parent can justify the exclusion of the other parent from their life, so be it. But if it has been ‘created’ by deliberate coaching, exclusion and bad mouthing of the other parent it can result in the child identifying with the alienator, a loved and loving parent and rejecting their other parent. This is clearly child abuse. These issues must be explored, sensibly and sensitively.
FNF runs meetings and support group for people affected by these issues. Please email greg.downing.trustee@fnf.org.uk for details.
For more information on the consequences of PA in adulthood: LINK TO PA RESEARCH
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