January 2012Monthly Archives

Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS)

Divorce can be messy not just in terms of monetary compensation or dividing of property but also in terms of the relationship between the parents and the children because of a disorder called parental alienation syndrome.  It was a child psychiatrist who invented that term in the 1980s. This happens when you go through a divorce and then your child will begin to belittle and insult you without good reason as a result of your spouse influencing your children. It’s nasty when you get insulted by others. It’s even worse when it’s your own child. 

Your spouse will be brainwashing the mind of your child against you. It can happen through body language, verbal language, facial expressions, tone of voice, and even humiliation. Imagine the emotional damage parental alienation syndrome does to your child. 

Parental Alienation Syndrome can happen to you for various reasons.

Here are some of those reasons: 
Your spouse wants you out of their life completely. By losing your only connection to your spouse, your child, you’ll be erased from their life.
Your spouse thinks that you are unworthy of your children.
Your spouse is possessive and jealous and does not want to share your children with you.
Your spouse wants to use your children as bargaining tools in exchange for your money and property.

These reasons can effectively turn your child against you. Your spouse can withhold or limit visitation to your kids. He or she can make evil remarks about you in the presence of the children and even make untrue allegations of abuse.

Through these tactics, the kid feels he or she must choose one parent. They cannot have both parents. 

Experience has shown that when a child is subjected to these mind games, the children will likely side with the alienating parent. They actually believe the evil remarks or allegations of abuse done by you. Another reason why this happens is to gain approval from that alienating parent. You can see that parental alienation syndrome can be quite a terrible situation to handle. 

Parental alienation syndrome can be mild or severe but either way it has alarming effects on the child. The child gets in the middle of the war between the parents. The saddest part is that is that you are one the most important people in your child’s life. 

Psychiatrists would recommend that the child should foster good relationships with both parents even if they are divorced. The troubling part is that courts do not recognize parental alienation syndrome as valid evidence. This means you can’t use this argument to get some control over your child against your spouse. It’s hard to get concrete evidence on this matter.