Other Books by Bill Eddy
It’s All Your Fault! 12 Tips for Managing People Who Blame Others for
Everything (2008)
HCI Press
New Ways for Families in Separation and Divorce:
Professional Guidebook (2009)
Parent Workbook (2009)
Collaborative Parent Workbook (2009)
HCI Press
High Conflict People in Legal Disputes (2006, 2008)
HCI Press
Managing High Conflict People In Court (2008)
HCI Press
Splitting: Protecting Yourself While Divorcing a Borderline or Narcissist (2004)
Eggshells Press
The Splitting CD: An Interview with Bill Eddy (2006)
Eggshells Press
Working with High Conflict Personalities (2004, 2006)
(A Six-Hour Internet Course for Mental Health
Professionals at www.continuingEdCourses.net)
Copyright © 2010 by Bill Eddy
Published by: HCI Press, A Division of High Conflict Institute, LLC
7701 E. Indian School Rd., Ste. F, Scottsdale, AZ 85251, (602) 606-7628, (888) 768-9874
www.hcipress.com
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced by any mechanical, photographic, or electronic process, or in the form of a phonographic recording, nor may it be stored in a retrieval system, transmitted, or otherwise be copied for public or private use-other than for “fair use” as brief quotations embodied in articles and reviews without prior written permission of the publisher.
This publication is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information about the subject matters covered. It is sold with the understanding that the publisher is not rendering legal, mental health, medical or other professional services in this book, either directly or indirectly. If expert assistance, legal services or counseling is needed, the services of a competent professional should be sought.
Names and identifying information of private individuals have been changed to preserve anonymity. Most of the examples contained herein are based on real families, but details have been changed to protect confidentiality, and many examples include a composite of several individuals.
Eddy, Bill, 1948-
Don’t alienate the kids : raising resilient children while avoiding high-conflict divorce / Bill Eddy
ISBN-10: 1-936268-48-5
ISBN-13: 978-1-936268-48-1
First Edition: 2010
First Printing: April 2010
Second Printing: May 2010
Printed in the United States of America
Edited by: Megan Hunter
Designed by: Elle Phillips Design
Publisher: |
|
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Printed in the United States of America |
For my father,
C. Roland Eddy
A scientist and teacher,
whose joy of learning and sense of humor
have always been contagious.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Foreword
Introduction
PART I: Building a Wall (What to Avoid)
Chapter 1: High-Conflict Divorce
Chapter 2: Child Alienation
Chapter 3: 1000 Little Bricks
Chapter 4: Emotions are Contagious
Chapter 5: All-or-Nothing Thinking
Chapter 6: Mirroring Bad Behavior
PART II: Building a Foundation (What to Do)
Chapter 7: Teaching Resilience
Chapter 8: Reasonable Parent’s Dilemma
Chapter 9: How Family and Friends Can Help
Chapter 10: How Lawyers Can Help
Chapter 11: How Counselors Can Help
Chapter 12: The Future of Family Courts
Appendix A: Before You Go To Family Court
Appendix B: Yes, No or I’ll Think About It
Appendix C: Is Your Child Alienated?
Appendix D: Don’t Use “Force”
Appendix E: Evaluating Sexual Abuse Reports in Family Court
Appendix F: New Ways Parent-Child Talk
References
Index
About the Author
A NOTE OF CAUTION TO THE READER
This book addresses issues of High Conflict People and their high-conflict personalities. Knowledge is power. The information I provide is intended to help you be more successful in your interactions with people as an individual or as a professional.
However, this personality information can also be misused and can inadvertently make your life more difficult. Therefore, I caution you not to openly label people in your life, nor to use this information as a weapon in personal relationships. Before you go further, I ask that you make a commitment to use this information with caution, compassion, and respect.
My explanations and tips address general patterns of behavior and may not apply to your specific situation. You are advised to seek the advice of a therapist, an attorney, or other conflict resolution professional in handling any dispute.
The author and the publisher are not responsible for any decisions or actions you take as a result of reading this book.
Bill Eddy
FOREWORD
When I met lawyer, therapist and mediator Bill Eddy several years ago, I discovered we were comrades at heart. I had co-authored Stop Walking on Eggshells and the Stop Walking on Eggshells workbook about borderline personality disorder, and he had written High Conflict People in Legal Disputes for legal professionals. It was so validating to meet someone else with the same mission: develop innovative ways to help people understand personality disorders and develop skills for dealing with these high conflict personalities. Knowing how desperately divorcing people needed Bill’s information, I published (through my company Eggshells Press) Splitting: Protecting Yourself While Divorcing a Borderline or Narcissist (an expanded version will be available through New Harbinger Publications in 2011). Splitting was so successful we followed it up with a CD companion to Splitting; we also collaborated on several teleseminars about relationships with borderlines and narcissists.
Now Bill has written another exceptional book, Don’t Alienate the Kids! He addresses the concerns of parents and professionals dealing with a difficult or “high-conflict” parent in divorce. For parents, this book gives a foundation for assisting a child during the divorce process – or at any time – without getting emotionally “hooked” by a high-conflict parent, whether or not they have a personality disorder. His information and tips can help any parent at any time.
Frequently, professionals involved with divorce decisions improperly become embroiled in the conflict between the parents, which can sway their judgment about what’s best for the children. Bill offers professionals guidelines on how to make these decisions with compassion and understanding. His new approach may, at first, be surprising. Once professionals understand that high conflict individuals require a different mindset, they realize the wisdom of Bill’s approach.
As a former therapist and mediator with an interest in high conflict personalities, Bill is probably the most qualified expert in the world to write about this topic. He knows how bad it can get on the front lines of modern divorce in family court, and how families can become endlessly split over their children. He writes about these issues with expertise and sensitivity, with tips for everyone, from parents, family members and friends, to counselors, lawyers and judges.
This book takes a giant step in its effort to calm the conflict over child alienation. His “1000 Little Bricks” approach gives hope and really spells out what parents and professionals can do to help the kids build a Foundation of Resilience, even during a divorce, for everyone’s benefit in the future. The ideas in this book may change how people get divorced for years to come.
Randi Kreger
Co-Author of Stop Walking on Eggshells: Taking Your Life Back When Someone You Care About Has Borderline Personality Disorder
Author of The Essential Family Guide to Borderline Personality Disorder: New Tools and Techniques to Stop Walking on Eggshells
Author of The Stop Walking on Eggshells Workbook: Practical Strategies for Living With Someone Who Has Borderline Personality Disorder
INTRODUCTION
I wrote this book out of frustration – and hope. It’s intended for parents, professionals, and anyone concerned about the next generation. It’s about two growing problems that overlap:
1. More and more children and parents are suffering from “high-conflict” divorces – unnecessarily. (When I speak of “divorce” throughout this book, I include the separation of unmarried parents, who face the same problems.)
2. Recent research suggests that “high-conflict” personalities are increasing in our society, and one of the contributing factors may be the life-long dysfunctional lessons children learn from high-conflict divorces.
Therefore, the information in this book is designed to assist parents and professionals in helping children learn skills for resilience for a lifetime – even during a divorce.
Frustration
For the past 17 years I have been a family law attorney – a Certified Family Law Specialist. I have represented clients in family court in many high-conflict divorces. Over time, in many of these cases, the children have become “alienated” from a parent. I use that term broadly to mean that the child resisted or totally refused all contact with that parent.
In some of these cases, I represented the “rejected parent” who the child didn’t want to see. In other cases, I represented the “favored parent,” who seemed to win the child’s loyalty and total agreement. However, in both types of cases, the children were stressed and unhappy, and learned dysfunctional ways of handing close relationships – ways which may negatively affect them for the rest of their lives.
I was frustrated in both types of cases. I had many restless nights, trying to figure out how to protect my clients and their children. The opposing parent would hate me. The opposing lawyer would criticize me. And the judge would frown and disregard much of what I had to say.
Out of about 400 cases I had as an attorney representing one party, approximately 40 included an issue of child alienation. Out of all the issues I handled in family court (child support, property division, custody and visitation, even child sexual abuse), I found child alienation to be the most frustrating – because it seemed to be based on nothing. There was no credible evidence, but lots of opinions. No one could figure out these cases, so there was a lot of blaming. Anger grew as everyone’s frustration grew – for parents, lawyers, counselors, and judges. This anger was contagious, and the children absorbed it as well.
I always intended to focus my law practice on divorce mediation. After 15 years of representing clients in family court, as well as handling about 1000 mediation cases, I finally stopped taking court cases. Some of my last court cases were alienation cases.
In one case, my client was the rejected father. His case had gone on for about 6 years, in and out of court, until his daughter totally stopped spending any time with him. At my last court hearing, the judge said there was nothing he could do.
In the other case, my client was the mother, who became the rejected parent. The father had been ordered into domestic violence treatment near the start of the case. Even though he had about one-third of the parenting time, he returned to court repeatedly seeking primary custody of their son. Even after the judge sanctioned the father once for a totally unnecessary hearing, he kept bringing the mother back to court. For ten years, the mother was the primary custodial parent. Then, after relentless pressure by his father, the son “ran away” to his father’s and stayed there. She gave up, exhausted.
Neither of these children had rejected either parent prior to their parents going to court.
The Wall of Alienation
Somehow, the adversarial structure of court focused on determining who was the “all-good parent” and who was the “all-bad parent.” The allegations went back and forth:
“The father must be abusing the child. That’s why she doesn’t want to see him and cries before his visits.”
Or: “Her mother must be alienating her. That’s why she refuses to see me.”
Or: “The father must be alienating the child. That’s why he refuses to see the mother.”
Or: “The mother must have done something to make the child estranged from her.”
The court process was all about who put the wall up between a parent and the child.
“It’s all his fault. He has only himself to blame. I’ve done nothing wrong.”
Or: “It’s all her fault. I have been a loving parent while she just spews vituperative venom against me.” (Yes, these statements are drawn from real court documents.)
The whole battle over picking the “all-good parent” and the “all-bad parent” was a long, drawn out tug-of-war until one parent lost. Most of the time it was the rejected parent. But sometimes, the rejected parent won a change of primary custody and the previously favored parent left the city, the state or the country. (Yes, I saw each of these happen.) Or attempted to commit suicide, as occurred in more than one case.
It has become an ugly contest.
It’s not a gender issue…
It’s not about who has custody…
What Alienation is Not
From all of these experiences, I learned a lot about what alienation is not:
• It’s not a gender issue: I have represented fathers and mothers who were the “rejected” parent.
• It’s not about who has custody: While most rejected parents have been the “non-custodial” parent with less parenting time, I have represented several custodial parents who became the rejected parent.
• It’s not just a defense against child sexual abuse allegations: Child alienation is an issue in over 20% of contested custody cases at court, yet child sexual abuse is alleged in only about 2-5% of contested custody cases.
• It’s not just a defense against domestic violence allegations: From my experience, perpetrators of domestic violence engage in more alienating behaviors than victims of domestic violence.
• It’s not just a defense against child abuse allegations: I have seen cases where one parent had abusive behaviors and the other parent had alienating behaviors. I also know of cases where a parent with abusive behaviors also engaged in alienating behaviors, and the other parent had neither abusive nor alienating behaviors. I learned that abuse and alienation are independent sets of behavior.
• It’s not a common symptom of child abuse or domestic violence: Most abused children are not alienated. Most love their parents, but want the abuse to stop. Many fear their abusive parents and are very careful not to upset them. Most would never say they hated the parent or would risk running away – behaviors I have seen much more common in alienation cases.
• It’s not caused by one disparaging remark or incident: From my experience, alienation is a gradual process which may begin before separation, but mostly grows during the divorce process.
So, if alienation is not about the above common theories, then what is it?
Learning About Child Abuse
I was a social worker for many years before becoming a lawyer. My first job out of college was as a social worker in New York City. In 1981, I got my Masters in Social Work degree, and I counseled children and adults for much of that decade. Many of them had been abused.
In the 1980’s, child abuse, especially child sexual abuse, was starting to be taken more seriously. Some of my clients were teenagers who had been sexually abused and some of my adult clients had been sexually abused as children. Some cases were extremely shocking. Others seemed mild, but the long-term effects were still quite damaging.
Learning About Family Systems
In 1980, as I was in training as a family therapist, I learned that families are like a system – like the solar system – in which everyone has a pull on everyone else. Each family’s “system” of relating is influenced and maintained by everyone in the family – but in different ways. Usually, everyone in the family system is blind to their own role in reinforcing problems and blind to their potential role in solving problems.
My job as a family therapist was to help enough members of the family system to shift their behavior, to change the whole family for the better – especially for the benefit of the children. That was the only way that family problems could really be improved. No one person could really change, unless most in the family changed. Children’s behavior was often the result of unresolved issues between the parents. This was rarely obvious on the surface.
I learned that other family members (grandparents, aunts and uncles, etc.) were hidden parts of the family system as well, and could have a powerful influence over the problems on the surface. And, of course, therapists, teachers and others involved with a family also became part of the family system. Everyone reinforced the problems (in hidden ways), so they needed to reinforce the solutions.
During the 1980’s, I was also volunteering as a mediator with community mediation programs that resolved conflicts between neighbors, landlords and tenants, and businesses and consumers. They had similar dynamics, with everyone contributing to the problem and/or the solution.
I really liked mediation and decided to pursue it as a career, but there were no paying jobs available. I noticed that lawyers were getting paid to do mediation, so I decided to go to law school. When I graduated and passed the bar in 1992, I set up my own Law and Mediation office. I also decided to practice family law in court for a couple years, while establishing my mediation practice. I ended up taking court cases for 15 years.
Learning About Divorce Disputes
My social work background was really helpful in my law practice, as many cases involved substance abuse, child abuse and/or domestic violence. However, I never heard of Parental Alienation Syndrome until I was practicing as a lawyer in the 1990’s.
The battle over abuse versus alienation was a surprise to me. (“The father’s an abuser.” “No, the mother’s an alienator”). Because of my background, I could see there was a lot that parents and professionals in the family court system misunderstood about children and abuse. Because of my training in family systems, I knew that families weren’t as simple as “the abuser” versus “the alienator.”
However, as I began practicing family law, it became clearer to me that parents are not usually equal when there is abuse in a family – more often only one parent is an offender (child abuse, domestic violence, substance abuse, etc.) and the other is not. Some divorcing parents had high-conflict personalities (which I will explain in Chapter One), while others did not. From my experience and my surveys of family law professionals, I believe that half to two-thirds of high-conflict families have only one parent with a high-conflict personality who is driving the dispute, while the other parent is mostly acting reasonably and just trying to protect the children from the high-conflict parent.
However, because families operate as a system, everyone adapts and reinforces problems in hidden little ways. Even reasonable people would over-react and reinforce problems. I realized that the problem of a child rejecting a parent wasn’t all one parent’s fault or all the other’s. And it wasn’t always fathers who were rejected, and it wasn’t always mothers who were favored. I represented both about equally.
However, I realized that my clients who were the rejected parent were in a real bind. When they were understandably angry toward the other parent or the child, they made things worse. While they usually weren’t the cause of the alienation, they reinforced the alienation without realizing it.
When they did nothing and cooperated with the child’s rejection (“if you really want me to stop seeing you, I’ll stop”), nothing ever got better. When they supported their child going to individual counseling, the alienation continued. When they went to “reunification” counseling with their child, the alienation continued. As the rejected parent, they were blamed for all of these failures. Yet everyone in the family system seemed to reinforce these problems.
Even my clients who were the favored parents didn’t really win. They were also very frustrated, defensive and at times depressed. I remember one judge railing at me about my client, the mother, after the child said she didn’t want to see her father:
“Mr. Eddy, I know what your client is doing. She’s telling the child negative things about her father to alienate the child.”
I responded: “Your honor, my client is trying to be very careful not to say anything to the child against her father. Since she was criticized for discussing the case with the child four years ago, she has been very careful not to say anything negative.”
And I believe she was being very careful. But the alienation didn’t change, and the judge gave up. While my client was favored by the child, everyone else (the father, the father’s attorney, and the judge) blamed her for being a despicable person (along with her lawyer - me).
Professionals in the Family System
I started realizing that the problem was bigger than just the parents. Lawyers sometimes contributed to the problem. They often made extreme and emotional arguments in court that devastated one or the other parent. As a lawyer, I learned early on (after temporarily losing a custody battle), that I couldn’t just say that my client was doing a good job. I had to attack the other parent as doing a horrible job. I learned that’s what worked in the adversarial process of custody battles.
Judges sometimes contributed with their anger at the parents and made extreme orders in an effort to gain control – such as supervised visitation or no contact – while an investigation labored on for weeks or months, to see if allegations were really true. They criticized one or both parents. They tried having long hearings. They tried having short hearings. They tried ordering counseling, ordering lawyers for the children (Guardians ad litem), ordering psychological evaluations. They made threats. They fulfilled threats. But children remained alienated or became even more alienated.
Even counselors seemed to contribute to the problem at times. Each parent’s counselor would report that his or her client was really great and had no problems to work on. For example:
The mother’s therapist: “The father just doesn’t understand how hurtful he has been to the child. The mother is merely trying to protect the child from his negative behavior and poor judgment. She is doing a good job.”
The father’s therapist: “The father has a lot of insight into himself and frankly I can see no behavior on his part that is causing the child to resist seeing him.”
Then, of course, individual child therapists are often ordered for the child in these alienation cases. Everyone hopes or expects that the individual child therapist will be able to turn the child’s attitude around, then the child and the rejected parent will reconcile. Sometimes, these individual child therapists work valiantly to be supportive of both parent’s relationships with the child. But sometimes they succumb to agreeing with the child’s rejection of one parent. They agree that the child is realistically estranged from that parent, and that this is a reasonable position for the child to take. For example:
“The boy is so angry with his mother that I wouldn’t even recommend a joint session with the mother yet. The boy needs to stop being so angry at what she has done first. She should work on herself to be more accepting of his negative feedback about her new relationship.” She worked on herself, but the boy never stopped being angry with her, so nothing ever changed and the boy stopped seeing her.
“The daughter despises her father. He is an embarrassment to her. She doesn’t want him coming to her school. She feels he does not respect her. If he respected her, he would stay away until she feels more comfortable with him.”
In some cases, the judge would wait until the child’s therapist said the child was ready to spend more time with his or her other parent. Of course, this never happened.
In one such case, I wrote a letter to the child’s therapist, who was not used to treating children in family court cases. He had immediately taken sides against my client, at the request of the child. In my letter, I quoted research and tried to be friendly and understanding of his lack of knowledge about how to handle such cases. He wrote back a letter angry with me and stating that I totally misunderstood his intentions in the case. This correspondence made it into a court hearing, and the judge made a finding that I had been too “adversarial” in writing my letter to the therapist. Even I was part of the problem!
1000 Little Bricks
Out of all of these experiences, plus a lot of reading, attending seminars and having sometimes heated discussions, I came to the conclusion that no one parent or single professional can solve this problem – because I realized that the wall between a child and one parent is not built by just one parent or just one event or disparaging remark.
I now believe that the wall of alienation is built with at least 1000 little bricks, which have come from a “perfect storm” of three Cultures of Blame:
1. The family’s Culture of Blame when a high-conflict parent is involved
2. The family court Culture of Blame when one or more professionals get emotionally “hooked”
3. Our society’s rapidly escalating Culture of Blame, which contributes to alienation and also affects children’s personality development
These three Cultures of Blame repeatedly teach children three bad behaviors, which they absorb:
All-or-nothing thinking
Unmanaged emotions
Extreme behaviors
I think of these three bad behaviors as little bricks which add up over the weeks, months and years, to create and reinforce alienation in close relationships for many children in divorce. When children are exposed to enough of these bad behaviors (bricks), their unconscious solution to the family conflict is to absorb an all-or-nothing view of each parent – one “all-good” and one “all-bad.” They express their feelings with great intensity and often have uncontrollable outbursts against their rejected parent.
Extreme behaviors become normal, as parents yell at each other in front of the children at parenting exchanges. Lawyers argue for extreme measures (no contact or total custody reversals). Counselors say that it is reasonable that a child has rejected a parent (realistic estrangement), so just accept it. And judges make extreme orders (no contact, total custody reversals) or just give up.
Hope
Despite all of this, I have hope! I believe we have the knowledge and potential to turn the corner and change these Cultures of Blame into Cultures of Learning Skills. We just need enough reasonable people to learn the skills – and teach them to the kids. These three big skills are:
Flexible Thinking
Managed Emotions
Moderate Behaviors
These are the skills for handling a rapidly changing world and an unknown future. They are the key skills for close relationships, decision-making and leadership. Children who learn these skills will have unlimited potential, because they will be able to handle problems without becoming overwhelmed or distracted by blaming others. The children who learn these skills will be the problem-solvers of the future.
So how do we do this? First, we all need to really understand that the problem isn’t about bad parents, but about bad behaviors – many people’s bad behaviors. Then, all of us need to be involved in working on the solution. No one person – parent or professional – can prevent or repair alienation. It has to be a change in these cultures (family, court, society) surrounding the child.
What really give me hope are three new developments:
1. Abusive cultures can change. For example, a recent comprehensive study by the U. S. federal government showed that child abuse reduced between 1993 and 2006 at a rate of 23% for physical abuse, 33% for emotional abuse and 44% for sexual abuse. Unfortunately, the economic downtown since 2008 has increased child abuse once again – but we now know that we have the ability to make a large scale change for the benefit of children when enough people work at it.
2. Brain research has new discoveries about how children learn. In this book, I will explain some very new discoveries which can be used to help parents help their children develop skills for resilience, rather than alienation.
3. Cognitive-behavioral therapy methods are having success in changing people’s behavior. Even some people with personality disorders can change, by learning small skills in small steps with lots of structure and encouragement. Some no longer have a disorder. (Personality disorders are rigid patterns of distressful thinking, unmanaged emotions and behavior problems dating from childhood. Examples in Chapter 1.) By recognizing that many people going through the legal system have these disorders, courts can require efforts to learn skills, rather than focusing on shame and blame. By recognizing these disorders, courts can become more effective at understanding who can change and who can’t, which is essential in the protection of children.
For these reasons, I have hope. But as I will explain in this book, it is urgent that we work together to help children learn these skills now. The future of our society may depend on it.
If You Are a Reasonable Parent
If you are a reasonable parent going through a separation or divorce, or are considering separating, this book is designed to help you avoid experiencing a high-conflict divorce. Even if neither of you is a high-conflict parent, the actions you take and the ways you deal with your children can unintentionally teach them high-conflict behaviors which can become part of their personality development for a lifetime.
If you are a reasonable parent who is separating from or divorcing a parent with a high-conflict personality, you need to be careful not to fall into some very common traps. When someone is violent, makes false statements, or otherwise engages in extreme behavior, it’s easy to over-react or under-respond. Instead, you often need to do the opposite of what you feel like doing.
In this book, I will explain ways of dealing with a high-conflict parent while teaching your child resilience at the same time. Remember, actions often speak louder than words.
If You Are a Divorce Professional
If you are an experienced divorce professional, you know how bitter high-conflict divorces can be. You also know how they can seriously impact the children. However, you also may have strong feelings about the two big theories of alienation: Child Abuse versus Parental Alienation Syndrome. I want to encourage you to have an open mind in regard to the recent personality research and brain research discussed in this book, which sheds new light on how we can handle alienation cases more successfully in the future.
If you are a new divorce professional, this book should help you avoid making some common mistakes – whether you are a lawyer, judge, therapist, mediator, collaborative professional, or other related professional. If you are a graduate student considering a career working with families of separation and divorce, you will have a clear advantage by being up to date on the science and legal issues presented here.
If you are an advocate for victims of child abuse or domestic violence, or an advocate fighting for victims of parental alienation, I encourage you to take a fresh look at what I explain in this book. You have made contributions in the past and can make more in the future. However, it is important that you are well-informed about alternate theories and can demonstrate that you have considered them in helping any particular parent or child. The most calm and knowledgeable advocates are the ones who are most credible in family courts and with parents – especially on the controversial subject of child alienation.
This Book
Part I of this book explains how to avoid the dynamics of high-conflict divorce and child alienation, including a discussion of the Parental Alienation Syndrome, child abuse and the proposed theory of “1000 Little Bricks.”
Part II focuses on what we can all do – as parents, family and friends, counselors, lawyers and family court judges. Since I am a counselor and a lawyer, and I give seminars to judges, I am in a unique position to talk about how everyone can – and must – practice the same skills to build a foundation of resilience for children of separation and divorce. Rather than fighting with each other over the problem, we can immediately become part of the solution. I end with my view of the most constructive role for family courts in the future.
This book focuses on helping your child or children build resilience during a divorce. If you are looking for a book for yourself on navigating a complete divorce with a high-conflict other parent, including strategies for court, you should see my related book: SPLITTING: Protecting Yourself While Divorcing a Borderline or Narcissist.
I have written this book in a conversational tone, because that’s how I am and I want it to be easy to read for parents and non-professionals. However, I also wrote it for professionals, so some of the information may seem technical and not of interest to everyone. Feel free to read what interests you and skip over what does not.
To make the chapters easier to read, I put all of the references for facts, figures and other’s ideas in the back of the book. Much has been thought and written by others, and they deserve the majority of the credit for the information presented in this book.
Examples
Throughout this book I give lots of examples of alienating behavior, alienated children, and ways to teach skills of resilience. Most of these examples are based on real families, but details have been changed to protect confidentiality, and many individuals are a composite of several parents and children with similar problems.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
First of all, I thank the many parents who have been my clients in high-conflict divorces and on all sides of the issue of child alienation. You have allowed me to learn from your painful experiences, and you have taught me to keep going in efforts to protect your children from harm.
I especially want to thank my wife, Alice, who is a therapist and whose encouragement, wisdom and good nature keep me going. I write knowing that she will be my first critic, so it better be good and it better be practical. I thank her for our low-conflict marriage.
I thank Megan Hunter, my business partner with High Conflict Institute, for pushing me to develop these theories, write books, develop programs and give seminars to professionals interested in managing high conflict disputes. Her insight and confidence has moved these concepts from a hobby to serious work that seems to be meeting an important need.
I thank Michelle Jensen, our Program Coordinator for High Conflict Institute, who is just starting a career combining social work and law. Her new energy and insights are helping us assist divorcing families with our New Ways for Families program. I also thank Mark Baumann, family lawyer, for his insights and great editing suggestions.
I want to acknowledge my mother, Margaret, my role model who influenced my life in the direction of social service and compassion for others, well before her untimely death when I was 23. I want to acknowledge my stepmother, Helen, a role model of creativity throughout my adult life, who has kept painting and volunteering even up to age 98.
Most of all for this book, I want to thank my father, Roland, for raising me to be interested in the science of human behavior. Even though he was a chemist, his curiosity about why people act the way they do motivated me to try to find the answers. His book about the brain, Oceans of the Mind (2003), helped inspire me to learn more. He especially taught me to have flexible thinking – that science is not exact, and that we must always have an open mind to new information. At the age of 95, he continues to inspire me with his writing, teaching, learning and sense of humor, and I thank him for it.
An Open Mind
I hope everyone will read this book with an open mind. The subject of child alienation has been a highly controversial issue for 25 years or more, and it’s easy to fight about it. But it seems to be growing as a problem in divorce, and it seems to be growing as a problem for the future of our society. It’s time to really understand what it is, how to reduce its impact, and how to prevent it from occurring in the first place.
The “1000 Little Bricks” theory is new and certainly not perfect. It is based on our new awareness that children’s brains absorb almost everything that goes on in their environment – their family’s culture, the family court culture, and society’s larger culture. Cultures are contagious!
Therefore, I am addressing the information in this book broadly – to parents, professionals and anyone concerned about the future of our society. Hopefully, this book will help us to be more self-aware, so that we don’t alienate the kids, but teach the kids skills of resilience instead – through our contagious reasonable behavior as well as our words.
PART 1:
_________________
Building a Wall
(What to Avoid)
Suppose when parents separate or divorce, they are given a pile of 1000 little bricks. They can use these bricks to build a wall against the other parent, or they can use these bricks to build a foundation of resilience for their child. When they build a wall, the bricks they use are all-or-nothing thinking, unmanaged emotions and extreme behaviors. When they build a foundation of resilience, the bricks they use become flexible thinking managed emotions and moderate behaviors. There are many people today who will help parents build a wall or a foundation. The problem is that we’re all blind and we don’t know which one we’re building. We have to become informed and self-aware.
High-Conflict Divorce
The couple had a vicious fight that resulted in the mother getting custody of their young daughter. They had continuing battles, as the child grew older until she ultimately reached the age of majority. The father, however, never got over his anger. When the daughter announced that she was going to get married, the father offered to not only pay for the wedding, but also to throw in an extra $10,000 to the daughter if she did not invite the mother. The daughter took the offer. (Borof, 2003, p. 3)
This example is typical of the fallout from a “high-conflict” divorce. Many sources agree that up to one-third of divorces these days are high-conflict. This means that one or both parties are stuck in fighting over something – usually the children – for years. There are repeated court hearings about extreme behaviors: substance abuse, child abuse, domestic violence, lying, hiding money, false allegations of abuse and parental alienation. There is lots of blame, without positive change. Families are caught in a spin cycle of high-conflict behavior.
In high-conflict divorce, emotions are high and often increase over time. For some parents, simmering anger turns into yelling rages at parenting exchanges, anger at family members, anger at professionals, and yelling or running out of court hearings. There’s angry emails, angry voicemails, taping phone conversations, videotaping “bad” behavior – even going on YouTube and the news to prove how bad the other parent is. Of course, these actions make things worse, not better.
These emotions are also contagious, as family members, professionals, news reporters, and even children get swept up in emotionally taking sides – bitterly questioning the intelligence, sanity, morality, ethics and competence of the other parent and professionals involved in the case.
Of course, you’ve known about high-conflict divorce for years. You probably thought it was just an unavoidable fact of modern life. But if you’re considering a separation or divorce, you probably think you are going to avoid this. I want to help you do that, but you need to have your eyes wide open to the many little ways that you can accidently create a high-conflict divorce.
Over the past decade, sources from the Wall Street Journal to family court judges say that high-conflict divorces have increased. Well-known family law researcher, Janet Johnston, and colleagues (2009) said:
About one fourth to one third of divorcing couples report high degrees of hostility and discord over the daily care of their children many years after separation… For about one tenth of all divorcing couples, the unremitting animosity will shadow the entire growing-up years of the children… [O]ver a span of two decades, more than five million children will be affected by ongoing parental conflict; for two million children, this condition may well be permanent. (p. 4)
The long-term effects of high-conflict divorce are becoming obvious when the children become adults. Suddenly, this isn’t just a problem we can ignore any more while other families go through it. The children of high-conflict divorce are having problems that will eventually affect everyone. Something must be done, and it must be done soon.
High-Conflict Parents
High-conflict divorces are driven by one or two “high-conflict” parents. Over time, these often turn into cases with an alienated child – a child who intensely rejects one parent. The case at the beginning of this chapter is a perfect example of a parent using the three “bad” bricks or “wall” bricks of a high-conflict parent:
All-or-Nothing Thinking
Unmanaged Emotions
Extreme Behavior
The father wanted the mother to be totally excluded from the wedding. He wasn’t willing to just avoid her at the wedding or briefly say hello. His solution was all-or-nothing: She will not participate – at all!
His anger was still so unmanaged that he couldn’t get over it years after the divorce. It drove his decision to exclude his ex-wife from the wedding. And his behavior was extreme. He offered his daughter $10,000 to keep the mother away.
Of course, we don’t know how the mother behaved over all of these years. Perhaps her actions were equally bad or worse after their separation or divorce. On the other hand, she may have been a reasonable parent just trying to protect her daughter from her ex-husband’s anger and high-conflict behavior.
From my experience over thirty years with divorcing families, and from my surveys of divorce professionals, I would say that half to two-thirds of high-conflict divorces include one high-conflict parent with the above characteristics and one reasonable parent, who has been walking on eggshells for years.
Why Do People Act This Way?
Why would someone act so extremely? If someone is a high-conflict person (HCP), then he or she may have a personality disorder. If so, this means that they are stuck – that these characteristics are part of who they are.
I believe that about half of HCPs have a personality disorder and about half have some of these traits, but not a full personality disorder. This means that they are still difficult, but may respond more easily to approaches designed for people with personality disorders.
It helps to understand some of these traits, but it is important not to tell someone you think they have a personality disorder. They may become very defensive and angry with you, as defensiveness is a common characteristic of those with personality disorders and those just with traits.
Personality disorders appear to be growing in our society. Over the last few years, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) sponsored a study which concluded that about 20% of the general population of the United States meets the criteria for a personality disorder. They broke down their results into age groups and gender. I will give the percentage results below, but it is important to know that there is a lot of overlap, as some people may have more than one such disorder.
The five personality patterns that most commonly appear in high-conflict divorces are the following, in my opinion. You can see why they constantly get into conflicts with those closest to them:
Borderline HCPs: | They have extreme mood swings - friendly and loving one minute and angry and blaming the next. They are preoccupied with fears of abandonment. When they feel abandoned (even if they aren’t), they can become enraged, vindictive, and sometimes violent. They can be highly manipulative – mostly to avoid abandonment or to punish someone who they feel abandoned them. Sometimes, they make false statements and spread rumors. They often “split” people into all-good or all-bad in their eyes. The NIH study said that 5.9% of the general population meets the criteria for borderline personality disorder. The gender results were 53% female and 47% male. But remember, many people may have some traits of this disorder some of the time, but not have the full disorder. |
Narcissistic HCPs: | They can be very arrogant and preoccupied with themselves. They try hard to be seen as superior and very important. They seek constant admiration and praise, and get angry when they don’t get it. They can be highly manipulative, and very disdainful and demeaning to those around them. When they feel insulted or disrespected (even if they aren’t), they can become enraged, vindictive and sometimes violent. They may make false statements and spread rumors to regain a sense of control when they feel powerless and inferior. They also engage in “splitting” those around them into superior and inferior people. The NIH study said that 6.2% of the general population meets the criteria for narcissistic personality disorder. The gender results were 62% male and 38% female. Almost 40% of those with narcissistic personality disorder meet the criteria for borderline personality disorder as well. |
Paranoid HCPs: | They are very fearful and suspect that other people want to manipulate them or hurt them. They often imagine that others are conspiring against them. They are mistrustful and expect that people close to them will betray them sooner or later. They will sometimes attack others first (verbally or physically), in order to prevent being attacked themselves by surprise (even though no one was planning to attack them). The NIH study said that 4.4% of the general population meets the criteria for this disorder. The gender results were 57% female and 43% male. |
Antisocial HCPs: | They can be the most dangerous and uncaring. They often enjoy other people’s suffering, and like to dominate and be in control. They don’t care about the rules of society. Instead, they just want what they want and they will do anything to get it. They are chronic liars and lack remorse. They can be highly manipulative and often persuade others that they (the antisocial HCPs) are victims, when in fact they are perpetrators of bad behavior. They view people as powerful or as suckers, who deserve what they get. Violent revenge or causing other people suffering is often seen as justified in their eyes. The NIH study said that 3.6% of the general population meets the criteria for this disorder. The gender results were 74% male and 26% female. Approximately 20% of those with borderline personality disorder and narcissistic personality disorder also have antisocial personality disorder. |
Histrionic HCPs: | They are generally over-dramatic and very intense. They constantly are talking about being a victim of this or that, and can go on and on about dramatic details which may or may not be true. They are attention seekers and once they have your attention they don’t like to let go. They look to others to solve their problems. They are prone to lots of exaggeration – of facts and of emotion. The NIH study said that 1.8% of the general population meets the criteria for this disorder. The gender results were 51% male and 49% female. |
Throughout this book, I will avoid the term “personality disorder” in describing these patterns, as I believe that half of HCPs don’t have these disorders but just some traits of these disorders. What is important is to understand their possible patterns of behavior so you can deal with them, not deciding if they have a disorder – which you can’t do without extensive training.
It’s also important not to think of these characteristics as defining a whole person. People with personality disorders or traits can be high functioning in society – such as in their work – while they are very difficult in close relationships. They can have the full range of intelligence, from very low to very high. So when someone is referred to as “a borderline” or “a narcissist,” it’s like calling someone a diabetic or a painter or a Californian – it’s just one aspect of the person.
“Splitting” People
For decades, mental health professionals have recognized that many people with these personality traits “split” people into “all-good” and “all-bad.” In their eyes, the “all-good” people can do nothing wrong - they have no negative qualities. And they believe that the “all-bad” people can do nothing right - they can’t think of a single positive quality about them. They don’t just think this way – they feel it intensely, as though they were at war with the bad people.
The following is an excellent description of this splitting process by psychiatrist, Jerold J. Kreisman (1989). It is most commonly identified with borderlines, but I have seen this with all HCPs in high-conflict disputes: