An Experience of Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS)

What shocked me most was not my ex-wifes ability to be mean to me post seperation, but her need to influence my child to the point he didn't want to speak to me.   He eventually had to align himself with someone and as usual it was the custodial parent and her grandparents.

I know through what he was saying to me in visits that I was being denigrated by the people he lived with.  We have now reconciled and its growing and becoming better.  It took 6 months of sheer hell.   But the sheer horror and torment I went through was not something I would wish on anybody.  That sense of always coming last, my feelings didn't count, every little thing I did became a big crime, they would cancel visits at the last minute.  The feelings I was suffering were GRIEF & LOSS.  Except he hadn't died, I just couldn't see him.  It was like having a long term missing child.  GRIEF & LOSS AND MOURNING that never subsides.

I now realise that that his Mum and grandparents have no idea whatsoever how damaging alienation is to the child - and for the rest of his life.  The classic tell tall signs is when they say "It isn't us, It is the boy, he decided not to see you".  There is never any responsibility taken and it is all dumped on the child who naturally does what keeps him safe and that is to align himself with the alienating parent. 

It is like the child suddenly becomes a convenient tool to hurt the targeted parent with.  It is done subtly and very slyly.  My alienation started two days before xmas on the 23rd December. He rang to say "Dad I don't want to see you any more" and put the phone down.  This was so out of character as we had never had a wrong word, I'd never raised my voice to him or ever smacked him ever. 

The day before he rang we had had a lovely day together.  We went for a walk through a graveyard to watch some horse show and that was enough for his mother to deem me an unfit father.  Solicitors letters arrived with some outrageous claims and then I started to decline. Losing a child is one of the hardest things to handle. I was crying, missing him, deep sadness, screaming into that void that so many parents will know about if they have lost a child.  The ties that bonded us were being broken. 

Eventually I almost gave up, to totally abandon my feelings and love for him, but something was nagging at me, something a very wise old women of 93 said to me.  "A child will never forget someone that has once loved them".

I found out about PAS (Parental Alienation Syndrome) and educated myself. A lovely man  rang me and said " Keep going, don't stop, no matter how bad it feels or hopeless it feels, keep writing to him, try to speak to him, keep all attachments going". The way I was feeling this was impossible, emotionally I was on the floor, tired, broke, weak with emotional exhaustion.  A beautiful women called Deb helped me prepare court papers she gave time and support for free - Deb thank you.

I booked a solicitor who felt so sad about this case she gave me four free hours and added some further information to Debs amazing paperwork.  I submitted the papers to her solictor after walking into his office and walked straight through to his desk - he looked terrified. I said to him "why are you not recommending we all go for mediation", "don't you have a duty of care for my son, for a child, for me as a human (how naive was I) ...amazingly he said "so whats causing this to happen" when I explained he said I am so sorry I have to just do what my client (my exwife) says.

The next day she rang me and said can we meet with my son to talk before it gets nasty"????????

Nasty?...I was emotionally ruined and she was not even aware or concerned.  We met and my son was very sheepish (aged 12). He is a bright open and an emotionally intelligent boy, he said to me "dad can you and I not discuss this".  I agreed thinking he had been through enough.  I tried to speak to her privately about it and all she did was throw it back onto my son and took no responsibility at all.  Over the coming months he kept leaking his feelings to me and started to tell me what had been said when I was not seeing him - he was self-disclosing, although I DID NOT question him and just normalised the whole situation for him.

Children do not deserve this and either do parents. Good luck (whats luck got to do with it) ok I hope your situations and circumstances wok out for the best

It has been a rocky road back to seeing him and building a relationship. He stayed over for the first time last month.  The damage is there, and he occasionally tries to devalue me in fun, but in a different way.  We are going for counselling together there is a lot of repairing to be done.   I know he feels guilty and bad about this. 

This is sheer child abuse.  ABUSE that should be illegal, instead the family courts, solicitors (who use PAS for their own gain) the media, mediators, parents, magistrates and counsellors and psychologists seem to often misunderstand how Parental Alienation Syndrome works, the damage it does to children and how it is purpetrated by a parent.  This is not a gender issue both parents alienate and brainwash a child subtly and sometimes not so subtly.

This is a portion of my story.  I hope websites like this continue to help, support and encourage other people going through the same thing to cope and learn and have the strength to fight for their children.  Because if you don't fight for them, they just may believe you didn't care.

Never ever ever give up on them