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First and foremost, if you were searching for information about Parental Alienation and Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS), it is likely that you may be personally concerned about these issues in your own family life. If so, it is vitally important for you to realize that the specific issues which appear in alienation cases are very different than those issues which arise in a divorce, even a contentious one, when alienation is not an issue. Below are a few examples which may help illustrate these differences.
It is well understood that visitation interference is a central theme in alienation cases, as are false allegations of abuse. If one’s attorney is not familiar with this, it becomes very likely that improper advice may be given, such as: “not making waves,” that the “kids will come around,” and “not to make an issue of a little bit of visitation being missed.” If alienation was not present in an ongoing divorce, this advice would very likely be appropriate. However, if alienation is afoot, such advice could likely begin an avalanche of loss in the parent/child relationship during and after divorce. Otherwise competent and experienced attorneys who are unfamiliar with PAS may make this error in advice and unwittingly enable such loss.
In the context of high-conflict divorce where alienation is present, it is well understood that false allegations of abuse against the Targeted Parent abound as a strategy to gain advantage in the custody dispute. If an attorney not intimately familiar with alienation is representing a client who has been wrongly accused of being abusive to his or her child, the attorney might recommend that the client agree to an Anger Management Course as a way to placate the other side and to convey to the court that the client is being responsible. Such advice is commonly given even though the client in question does not have an anger management problem. Similarly, the same advice may also be given as a means for the client to have supervised visitation, rather than have visitation revoked entirely. This scenario illustrates how if alienation was not present in a case, such advice could be sound under certain circumstances. However, if alienation is present, this advice could stigmatize that parent as an angry and difficult parent in the perception of the court when this is not the case and thus cause further injury to the parent/child relationship. Furthermore, such advice, perhaps resulting unnecessarily in supervised visitation, would likely send a message to the child that this parent is “scary” or inferior to the other parent. Why else would Mom or Dad need a supervisor? In other words, such advice would ironically act in service of rather than in resolution of the alienation.
To further illustrate the point, imagine that the court has ordered a Custody Evaluation or therapy for an alienated child. If a therapist, who is unfamiliar with alienation, were to be appointed, it is likely that they would take a position of support toward the child’s resistance to seeing the Target Parent and essentially treat that child as if he/she were the victim of domestic violence when that was never the case. Likewise, an Evaluator who is unfamiliar with alienation and PAS, would very likely take the child’s complaints about the Target Parent at face-value without ruling out bona fide abuse and negative parental behavior. Such an evaluation would yield recommendations supporting and even encouraging the alienation.
Finally, it is important to understand that dealing with alienation and PAS in divorce are very specialized areas, in both the legal and the mental health arenas. Therefore, it is vitally important to understand that these competencies should not be assumed in the selection of an attorney or mental health professional. Direct involvement in the training of both attorneys and mental health professionals regarding PAS, has created an acute sensitivity to the issues of professional awareness and professional competence concerning alienation in the context of divorce. If anything, one should assume that most attorneys and most mental health professionals are not familiar with parental alienation and Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS). This is a much safer operating assumption that the reverse. As a consequence of this state of affairs, consulting services to parents, their attorneys, and to mental health professionals has become the primary focus of my work regarding Parental Alienation and Parental Alienation Syndrome.
How Parental Alienation Affects the Legal Process
First and foremost, if you were searching for information about Parental Alienation and Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS), it is likely that you may be personally concerned about these issues in your own family life. If so, it is vitally important for you to realize that the specific issues which appear in alienation cases are very different than those issues which arise in a divorce, even a contentious one, when alienation is not an issue. Below are a few examples which may help illustrate these differences.
It is well understood that visitation interference is a central theme in alienation cases, as are false allegations of abuse. If one’s attorney is not familiar with this, it becomes very likely that improper advice may be given, such as: “not making waves,” that the “kids will come around,” and “not to make an issue of a little bit of visitation being missed.” If alienation was not present in an ongoing divorce, this advice would very likely be appropriate. However, if alienation is afoot, such advice could likely begin an avalanche of loss in the parent/child relationship during and after divorce. Otherwise competent and experienced attorneys who are unfamiliar with PAS may make this error in advice and unwittingly enable such loss.
In the context of high-conflict divorce where alienation is present, it is well understood that false allegations of abuse against the Targeted Parent abound as a strategy to gain advantage in the custody dispute. If an attorney not intimately familiar with alienation is representing a client who has been wrongly accused of being abusive to his or her child, the attorney might recommend that the client agree to an Anger Management Course as a way to placate the other side and to convey to the court that the client is being responsible. Such advice is commonly given even though the client in question does not have an anger management problem. Similarly, the same advice may also be given as a means for the client to have supervised visitation, rather than have visitation revoked entirely. This scenario illustrates how if alienation was not present in a case, such advice could be sound under certain circumstances. However, if alienation is present, this advice could stigmatize that parent as an angry and difficult parent in the perception of the court when this is not the case and thus cause further injury to the parent/child relationship. Furthermore, such advice, perhaps resulting unnecessarily in supervised visitation, would likely send a message to the child that this parent is “scary” or inferior to the other parent. Why else would Mom or Dad need a supervisor? In other words, such advice would ironically act in service of rather than in resolution of the alienation.
To further illustrate the point, imagine that the court has ordered a Custody Evaluation or therapy for an alienated child. If a therapist, who is unfamiliar with alienation, were to be appointed, it is likely that they would take a position of support toward the child’s resistance to seeing the Target Parent and essentially treat that child as if he/she were the victim of domestic violence when that was never the case. Likewise, an Evaluator who is unfamiliar with alienation and PAS, would very likely take the child’s complaints about the Target Parent at face-value without ruling out bona fide abuse and negative parental behavior. Such an evaluation would yield recommendations supporting and even encouraging the alienation.
Finally, it is important to understand that dealing with alienation and PAS in divorce are very specialized areas, in both the legal and the mental health arenas. Therefore, it is vitally important to understand that these competencies should not be assumed in the selection of an attorney or mental health professional. Direct involvement in the training of both attorneys and mental health professionals regarding PAS, has created an acute sensitivity to the issues of professional awareness and professional competence concerning alienation in the context of divorce. If anything, one should assume that most attorneys and most mental health professionals are not familiar with parental alienation and Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS). This is a much safer operating assumption that the reverse. As a consequence of this state of affairs, consulting services to parents, their attorneys, and to mental health professionals has become the primary focus of my work regarding Parental Alienation and Parental Alienation Syndrome.