I was watching the webinar series where Dorcy Pruter is interviewing Dr. Childress
about his approach to dealing with parental alienation. The series is free to watch—you can get to it by going to Dorcy’s web site. While I got a lot out of the entire series, one section towards the end of the 3rd video entitled “Understand the Psychological Seduction of the Pathogenic Parent for the Child” provided me with a distinction that I think could be particularly helpful to those of us who have to deal with a continual stream of misinformation being fed to our kids when they are with the alienating parent.
This comes from the presumption that you are wanting to figure out effective ways of dealing with the situation rather than remaining passive. IMHO, just not retaliating is not enough. In my case, it only leaves my child with one type of information coming at her without anything to counterbalance it.
What Dr. Childress describes is a way of counterbalancing (as I put it) in a way that does not cause additional stress-but, in fact, helps relax and, as he puts it, “A way to orient a child back to what’s real and that everything’s OK”
He described 4 basic emotional “tones”, which are:
- Angry
- Afraid
- Happy
- Sad
Angry and afraid (anxious) are power and dominance emotions.
Angry tries to make the world be a different way.
(Afraid) Anxious makes everything important.
Here are the notes I took from what he said:
‘Happy is actually a dominant emotion as well.
Happy, though is the relaxed one. Happy and the facial expressions, the laughter all relaxes the “emotional spasms”.
When everyone’s all tense, the signal is Just relax—not a problem.
Just a relaxed tone. Everything’s OK. No worries.
Sitting around with my monkey friends-I know there’s no predator around.
How do know? Because everyone else is calm and relaxed. Happy indicates no threat.
If you come to me and you’re angry and I laugh at you I indicate you’re no threat.
A way to orient a child back to what’s real and that everything’s OK.’
When I think about the best times I have with my child, they revolve around a lack of tension; a lack of angry and anxious, which they get loads of from mom on a regular basis. In the beginning, before I started to get some knowledge about this, I would get anxious about all the ways I thought I had to combat what mom was saying. I am noticing though when I can be relaxed and happy to be around my child (which I am naturally) I love to spend the time, whatever time it is, and want to have that “vibe” when around me. With me, they can relax.
I don’t understand that in my country saying your ex is a narcissistic pathogen in court brings judges to see me as the alienating parent.He even has an offficial diagnosis.But my daugher lives with him and I am not allowed visitation. What to do?
Hi.
Please understand I am not a expert—I am a parent dealing with the same dynamic you are dealing with.
But from what I have been learning, saying what you are seeing yourself is not an effective idea. It is much better to document patterns of behavior. Dr. Childress describes this dynamic in terms of patterns of behavior that are clearly documented in the DSM-V.
What I have done is get a copy of his professional consultation in front of therapists who can possibly help. If they understand this and can see the behaviors your child is exhibiting and can offer a diagnosis, it gives the court much more to go on. I have heard many people saying the court is corrupt. It might be. There are no doubt NPD/BPD judges. But my experience so far has been that the court doesn’t have enough good information to act effectively.
It takes an a lot of patience.
I will tell you what I do- I record every interaction I have.
I keep detailed logs about anything I think may be an issue. My ex’s behaviors.
I am getting more involved with getting the attention of mental health professionals and seeing what I can do about getting the attention of lawmakers. Dr. Childress said early on that the only way we get to save our own children is by working to save all the children. If you haven’t already, please go visit his site. Watch his videos on this subject. He has a lot of good information there.
I really wish you all the best.