Venting about your ex? Consider this first.
“Your father is always late.”
“Your mother is so toxic.”
“Your father does this on purpose.”
“Your father is trying to keep the family apart.”
While these comments are negative, there are many other negative comments that parents can make on a pretty regular basis. Prior to a divorce or separation, when these comments are made, a parent can defend themselves within the home and family. There still may be a veil of negativity, but when considered after a separation these venting comments go uncontested and this can have devastating impacts, namely Parental Alienation Syndrome. This is where kids turn their backs on parents and deny themselves the presence of an otherwise loving parent. The worst I have seen this is a parent applying social pressure to the child to claim they were inappropriately touched in an attempt to maintain custody. This is child abuse, plain and simple.
Today we will consider these comments from a child’s eye-view, but before we do we need to recall two of the Divorced Child’s Bill of Rights. (Mentioned in a previous blog)
2. The right to a continuing relationship with both parents and the freedom to receive love from and express love for both.
3. The right to express love and affection for each parent without having to stifle that love because of fear of disapproval by the other parent.
Both rights have everything to do with a child’s comfort level with a parent. In modern terms this is Attachment. Think of this as the feeling of safety and comfort we have with other people. In our first year of life our sense of safety forms and then our sense of attachment to each parent takes shape. While there are four types of attachment only one is secure, the other three represent anxious or fear-based attachments. Fast forward to our adult years. Running in the background of how we relate to others are our attachment styles. Have a secure attachment to females and you will relate safely to females in adulthood. Have a secure attachment to males and males can be safe in adulthood. Families of origin teach us how to be in relationship; in short, the skill of marriage is taught early in childhood. Attachment is flexible and therefore fixable, but it takes hard work if it forms poorly. Who would want this for their child?
With all of this in mind, recall the negative comments that we began this post with. What do children hear in the emotional tone of the comments? Do they hear things that build a secure attachment to the parent that is being spoken against? If they dearly love a parent who is being treated very poorly by the other parent, what do you think happens to their attachments? Their attachment is at risk. But it gets worse.
Let’s say a male child, who has a strong bond with their father, hears their mother and sister (influential females) over and over again bash the father. What then becomes of his attachment with his father and then what about his sense of maleness as he grows up? It isn’t a stretch to see that a young boy growing up in this situation might begin to loath his own maleness, and in his adulthood have some emotional turmoil about his identity as a man. The same can exist for females if the situation was switched.
There are multiple and complicated ways attachment can work. And while it can be fixed later, is that really a justification for continuing negative treatment of the absent spouse today?
Remember that communication is 90% non-verbal, therefore, choosing words wisely isn’t enough. Children deserve two loving parents in their lives. Negativity can be internalized, or they can feel unsafe expressing love about the absent parent in front of the negative parent. Both situations impact the child negatively.
The end of the story is also of interest. When children grow up and are in their early to mid-twenties, when their pre-frontal cortex matures, they begin to think for themselves. They often begin to wonder “Why did Dad/Mom disappear?” Maybe they reach out and find out that the parent was rejected and chose to stay away to not make things worse. At this time the child can reject the previously accepted parent as they see the impact the negativity had on the child and family.
We are forced to ask if this 10-15 years of parental alienation is preventable and worth it? Most parents are so caught up in negative feelings due to some aspect of the divorce (sometimes deserved and other times exaggerated) but the reality is, if children are exposed to this negativity it makes relationships difficult with both parents in the short and long term.
What can be done? Catch our next blog on grief and forgiveness.