Going through a divorce is one of the most difficult things that you can ever go through. In fact, a divorce doesn’t only leave you with financial loss, but it can lead to emotional and psychological scars. It’s rarely easy to go through such. In addition, it gets worse when there are children that are involved. The worst is when your partner starts turning your children against you in an effort to discredit you during the divorce proceedings. If you’re worried that your former partner is trying to turn your children against you, then you’re dealing with what’s known as parental alienation. If you’re dealing with this type of situation, you’re not alone. This is why you should keep on reading to find out more.
What is Parental Alienation?
You’d be surprised to find that this is a term that has been around since 1985. Child psychologist, Richard Gardener, used parental alienation syndrome to describe the effects of children that were exposed to such behavior. Many parents including myself have had to deal with the other parent who uses negative strategies like alienating and brainwashing to distance their children from the other parent.
When it comes to this type of behavior, the accusations can be mild. In other cases though, they can become extremely severe. The resulting effect is your child’s perception of you becoming distorted. Sometimes it can even change a once-great relationship to become bad. The fact is that the parent-child relationship will suffer.
Signs of Parental Alienation
Sometimes, you are just frustrated with your former partner. In certain instances, you are not aware that what you’re doing is detrimental to your child and the relationship that she should have with her other parent. If you’re doing this unintentionally, you should learn to know what the signs of your actions are. These can be summarized below as follows.
- You find yourself divulging sensitive and unnecessary relationship details to your child. Things like affairs or related matters.
- When you prevent your child from seeing their other parent by telling them lies such as that the other parent is busy or uninterested in your child.
- By creating unnecessary boundaries between your child and the other parent.
- Planning activities when the other parent is meant to be busy with your child.
How Does Parental Alienation Affect Children?
Research suggests that the children of parents who use alienation as a strategy to win their love in favor of the other parent suffer a great deal. In fact, if you’re a parent who believes in alienating your child, your child can grow up to behave similarly to you. The following are some behavioral effects of you alienating your child from her other parent.
- She may experience a lot of anger.
- You’re likely to heighten her feelings of neglect.
- She can learn destructive patterns that she generally passes onto others as she grows older.
- Her view of reality becomes skewed.
- She can become combative towards her alienated parent and other people in her life.
- She can lack empathy as she grows older.
In summary, if there’s any parental alienation that is taking place due to a divorce, then it’s always important for you to understand that the effects will most likely be felt by your kids more than anyone else. It’s also important to know that there isn’t any abuse that’s taking place. The last thing that you want is to have your child living with an unstable parent. This can aggravate the situation more for your child. It’s essential to know that your child is safe at all times.
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