Fighting Parental Alienation
The best way to deal with a situation involving parental alienation is for the alienated parent to take immediate legal action to ask for either a change in custody, an order enforcing visitation, an order of protection, and/or other legal remedies. The longer the parental alienation is allowed to go unrestrained, the harder it is to stop the programming of the children against the alienated parent. When parental alienation exists for a substantial period of time, it is often necessary to reestablish the relationship with the alienated parent through a family therapist or psychologist helping de-program the children with regard to the negative feelings and attitudes they have against the alienated parent.
Parental Alienation and Child Abuse
Parental alienation is a form of child abuse. The long term effects of parental alienation upon children are still being determined by psychologists and therapists. However, I have personally been involved in numerous cases representing individuals who have been alienated from their children. A common factor in many of these cases is, once undergoing therapy, the children come to realize they really don’t understand why they dislike or don’t want to spend time with one of their parents. Through therapy the children can be made to realize the alienated parent really loves them, and has done nothing wrong. In these situations the alienation can be overcome and this parent can re-establish his or her loving relationship with the child. The problem with the therapeutic approach is it can be a long drawn out process. For it to succeed, the alienation by the alienating parent must stop and there is no guarantee that it will work.
