Archive | 2012

Mothers capable of hating a child

Mothers are generally quite nurturing, and the easiest way to melt their heart is through a child. Even the most jaded of mothers will smile when a child does something cute. A mother’s instinct is to care for, love, and protect children– even a child they don’t even know.

However, there is a type of mother who is capable of displaying actual contempt and hatred towards a child (even one they claim they love).

All children act out at times, some worse than others, but a normal mother is able to separate the behavior of the child from the child’s core. So a rambunctious, difficult 8-year-old boy, for example, is viewed by most mothers as being a typical boy, but his core is never, ever attacked. Nor is he maligned, denigrated, or otherwise put down.

But mothers with a cold core conflate the annoying, frustrating, and perplexing actions of a child with the child’s worthiness as a human being. And mothers who are with a man who has a child from another woman will often take out any jealousy or contempt they have for that woman onto the child. Rather than viewing the child as an extension of the new man she’s with, it’s a constant reminder of the woman he was with before her.

This is extremely common, but rarely talked about. An emotionally healthy mother will go out of her way to make children– all children– feel accepted in her world. She’ll even sometimes neglect her own kids’ needs to meet the needs of the new child of the family.

If this is not happening, and she plays favorites with her children over her man’s from a previous relationship or marriage, that’s a serious problem. These mothers have rotten cores, and the damage they can do to a man’s children is not something to take lightly.

To reject a child is to abuse a child. 

Mothers who are capable of having contempt for children on any level are also capable of other forms of abuse. In order to hold hard feelings towards a child, a mother is missing part of her conscience. And if that moral compass is impaired, they are capable of doing anything. Bottom line: this is the type of mother who can look at a child in pain and feel………….. nothing.

So why do some mothers have this cruel resentment towards our little ones? It’s simple. It’s a outward display of a mother’s own insecurities, which are based on the child’s birth mother (her man’s ex-wife or ex-girlfriend), and the relationship he had with her. And the easiest target for her to take out her hostility is his child.

The thing that’s so sick about this is that a man didn’t even need to have had a good relationship with the ex. It’s the fact that he had one at all!

Don’t underestimate how powerful of a driver jealousy can be in a mother’s life. While most mothers can put aside their unhealthy, negative thoughts and deal appropriately and lovingly with their  man’s children, there’s a good amount of mothers out there who can’t.

Teaching a child to hate

A child in the midst of a brainwashing campaign is learning more than just to despise and think negatively of a parent. He or she is being taught how to hate in general.

If a child is taught to hate or have contempt for his or her own parent, they will start paying attention to the negative aspects rather than the positive. The child won’t notice the good traits or actions of the other parent, but focusses instead on anything that can be framed in a bad light. This is fueled and encouraged by the alienating parent because they do not want to hear the child talk about anything positive about the ex.

Teaching a child to hate is also teaching them how to be a negative person in general. And this takes years of therapy to eventually overcome, if it can be overcome at all.

If a child is taught to despise a parent over perceived personality or parenting “flaws” due to a hostile ex’s brainwashing, this outward hostility doesn’t just stop there. It also moves towards other people the brainwashing parent can’t stand (due mostly to jealousy or fear).

The best example is the targeted parent’s extended family. Not only is the targeted parent badmouthed and maligned, but in most cases so are his or her relatives (and thus the child’s, too). Enlisted in the demonization of the ex and the ex’s family also are any other children the brainwasher might have from another marriage or relationship. The lies never get hoisted only onto the ex’s child or children, they get spread like a manure spreader to every other member of the family tree.

But it doesn’t stop there.

Since most brainwashing parents are very insecure people, they dish out their feelings of disgust towards a lot of people in their lives. And who picks up on these feelings? The child who has to listen to it (the only children who can rise above the badmouthing are teenagers who who are harder to convince, especially over people they have known their entire life).

Over many months and years, a child can’t help but share the brainwashing parent’s beliefs and contempt. It’s hatred that’s been taught to the child, and instilled in their very core (and this isn’t severe child abuse?). You can think of this indoctrination as a hate bootcamp.

What happens next, over time, is these children see other people– not just the parent they’ve been taught is bad– through the abusive parent’s eyes. Labels are quickly thrown on people, and if the parent is a narcissist (view this post on narcissistic parents), watch out. Their kids will also absorb many of their toxic traits.

Don’t underestimate how closely our actions as parents are watched, and eventually mimicked, by our kids. If you tend to yell, they yell. If you beat them with a belt, they’ll lash out physically at others as well. If you lie a lot, don’t expect them to be amazing little truth tellers. So it doesn’t take much effort for a parent who’s hating an ex-wife or ex-husband to get his or her young child to join in fully on the hatred bandwagon.

Kids develop into adults through a combination of their own inherent nature (DNA) and nurture (parenting), but when they’ve been marinating in false feelings of hatred for a decade or more, it’s extremely difficult to reverse even for an experienced therapist. The damage to their psyche is tremendous, and the perpetrators of this abuse are committing an evil act.

Teaching a kid to hate is child abuse, and the only remedy for these young and innocent victims is to remove them from that abusive home. Unfortunately, this is a major uphill battle to undertake, as family courts, CPS, and child therapists today simply don’t understand this form of abuse.

Mental child abuse is the most common form of child abuse in America, and the most difficult to stop” – BrainwashingChildren.com

When your finances prevent you from getting legal help

Is money keeping you from protecting your child?

Is money preventing you from helping your child?

Many parents faced with an ex who’s assaulting their parent-child relationship feel helpless, and think that taking legal action is too costly. While it can indeed be expensive, it can also end up costing you nothing… and the alternative is simply not acceptable, which is the continued emotional abuse of your child.

If your child is being abused in a campaign of parental alienation, you need to get legal help. Many decrees have standard language addressing badmouthing the other parent or discussing other adult matters, but many do not.

Here’s an example from a Texas decree:

Minimize Exposure to Harmful Parental Conflict
The conservators agree that any discussion regarding the child(ren) will not occur in the presence of the child(ren). The conservators further agree not to discuss any any conflicts that may be occurring between the conservators with the child(ren).

Family courts are aware that many parents will drag their kids through the divorce drama, so most have standard language like the above depending on what county and state you’re in.

If your decree doesn’t have such language, it needs to be inserted. Consult an attorney, who will be able to advise you on how to add this (usually called a “Motion to Modify,” which is a written request to the court to change a prior order regarding custody, child support, etc) to your decree.

But before you take the legal route, consider getting CPS involved first. Although CPS doesn’t deal with many parental alienation cases, you could get a caseworker who does understand this form of abuse (sadly most CPS caseworkers do not). Be prepared from blowback from your ex, but don’t let that stop you from taking every effort to protect your child. I suggest having some audio or video evidence to back up your call to them. Being that abusers frequently abuse on multiple levels (see this post), the caseworker could end up discovering abuse that you were unaware of.

Then, it’s time to find a good attorney. If you’re a father, find a male attorney, and if you’re a mother, find a female attorney. Why? Because sexes tend to side with and have a better understanding of each other.

Call at least five or six attorneys. Since an attorney’s job is to fight for the best interest of children, make sure you mention that your child is being abused. Any good person/attorney is not going to say, “I can’t help you” just because later in the conversation you mention that you don’t have the money immediately available.

There are many options for paying attorneys that you and your attorney can agree to. Don’t be shy in suggesting one or more of these. In most attorneys’ eyes, some money now or over time is better than no money at all.

Here are some ideas and tips:

  • Don’t go with big-name law firms. Go with the smaller firms or independent lawyers as their odds of needing you as much as you need them are pretty good
  • Dig deep: use your credit card, sell some possessions on eBay or Craigslist, take out a home equity loan, downsize your $30,000 car, borrow money from a friend or relative, etc.
  • Suggest bartering if you’ve got some talent, skills, or a product that could help the attorney
  • Your attorney should advise you that you’ll be suing the other parent for attorney fees (as he or she is the guilty party, and the reason for the legal action in the first place).

With the divorce rate as high as it is and the amount of parents that are unable to control their emotions, parental alienation is a common problem. And in the mind of a parent who’s capable of abuse, the best way to hurt the other parent is to turn the child against them.

There’s always a way to legally help your child who’s a victim of parental alienation. Lack of money is no excuse for not fighting for your child.

Bonus tip: Remember, if your decree has any wording addressing keeping the child out of conflict, your legal efforts should be an easy fight for your lawyer because he or she would be likely setting up a contempt hearing. Get as much evidence as you can, including therapist notes, audio/video evidence (complying with the law, of course), other witnesses, etc. The more evidence, the better.

Mentally abusive parents frequently abuse on other levels

What keeps a parent who is capable of damaging a child mentally and emotionally from damaging them physically or sexually as well?

Not much.

Parents who are mentally abusive lack the ability to control themselves. Which means they’re unable to contain their emotions, which then spills into doing what’s right for their child, which is sheltering them from harm– any harm. A parent who is OK knowing that their child is suffering (especially over lies that the parent creates) is a toxic father or mother, and toxic fathers and mothers are bad people who have few limits on what they’re capable of doing. 

What I’ve noticed in my own experiences and in the experiences of blog commenters is that parents who can harm kids on one level frequently harm them on others, too.

These “manure-spreading” parents are capable of damaging kids across the spectrum of child abuse: physically, mentally, sexually, medically, and educationally. To be fair, few toxic parents damage via all of the five categories.

Examples
A parent who is physically or sexually abusive is also mentally abusive. Comments are made such as:

“Look what you made me do, don’t tell anyone about this or else…”
“This is your fault because…”

Name calling also goes hand in hand with these forms of abuse.

Here’s the thing: You can’t have a physically or sexually abusive parent who isn’t also mentally abusive. Any attack on a child’s body also is an attack on their mind.

To restate something important, not all parents who are mentally abusive are physically or sexually abusive. However, they have the potential to be, and too frequently are.

Bottom line? Once someone’s an abusive parent in one of the categories, they very often abuse on one or more of the others.

[If you are curious about the use of the terms “medical abuse” (also known as Munchausen by Proxy) and “educational abuse,” click the respective links…]

 

A vital technique in combating parental alienation

quote

 

Children who are regularly in therapy are usually abused

I got some insight from a Child Protective Services worker here in Texas the other day. She told me that kids and teenagers that are regularly in counseling or therapy usually have one or more parents that are abusive. Most of the time, kids that are in counseling are there due to bad parenting of some sort (there are exceptions, of course).

I believe that kids placed into counseling regularly are the product of parents that are passing along their own issues. Emotionally healthy parents generally don’t have kids who are so out of alignment that they need regular, ongoing professional therapy. Kids who are exceptionally difficult even with outstanding parents need correction and adjustment from their parents, not from an outsider who is at a complete disadvantage.

I look at my own situation: my son is placed into counseling every month at least once with a psychologist (who unnecessarily told my son about my book on mental child abuse. Causing yet more confusion to my son) by his mother, and my son is with his mother the vast majority of the time. His issues are his mother’s. One of my son’s “issues” is the fact that I wasn’t there at his birth.” Yes, a matter where he wasn’t even consciously aware, is an issue 12 years later. It’s deplorable. When I ask Mom why he’s in counseling she only will say “He won’t tell me; he just says he wants someone to talk to.”

“Abusive parents frequently will use counseling as a deflective shield to what they’re doing to their own child; it’s a cover for their own abuse. For who would question a parent who’s seemingly trying to “help” their child with counseling?” – BrainwashingChildren.com

The sad irony is, the people that should be in counseling aren’t, while the innocent children are. It’s almost as if the parents are conditioning their child to get used to their abusive behaviors…

 

 

Visitation fabrication

Visitation FabricationOne lie that many brainwashing parents do to their children is making up completely fictitious stories about why the ex did not appear  for, or appeared late for, visitation drop-offs or exchanges.

In my case, I told my son and his Mom that I wouldn’t be able to pick him up for consecutive weekends ahead of time. Funny thing is, I actually figured his Mom might bring him to the normal 4pm Friday exchange location anyway. Sure enough: she did. The next time I saw my son, he mentioned that Mom has been taking him on those Fridays to the exchange point in order to wait on me. He said that he was “confused.” Of course he was– confusion between my words of “I won’t be there on these weekends” and Mom’s act driving him there in order to wait on me, knowing full well that I won’t be there.

This is another sad example of parental soul-destruction leveled onto children. To take pleasure in watching your children absorb with heartache the lie that the other parent doesn’t care enough to show is very sick.

Here are some examples of how these mentally abusive parents operate:

SITUATION #1
You are 5 minutes late.
MEANING GIVEN BY YOUR EX TO YOUR KIDS
You don’t really care that much about seeing them. If you did, you would never show up late.

SITUATION #2
You need to move the time back 30 minutes due to traffic, work, etc.
MEANING GIVEN BY YOUR EX
Ex shows up at original time and explains how inconsiderate you are to be 30 minutes late.

SITUATION #3
You let ex know you’ll be out of town for a weekend or month.
MEANING GIVE BY YOUR EX
Ex shows up at your weekends’ normal time and place with your children, and informs your children that their Mommy or Daddy must not love them very much and doesn’t want to see them.

Parents willing to do this are completely OK with seeing their kids suffer. Instead of building the little tikes up with excitement, which is what nurturing parents do, these bad exes would rather plant a mean lie into their kids’ heads in order to poison the relationship to their very own parent.

So it’s important to always talk about any missed or late drop-offs or exchanges with your kids. Mention how you’re sorry you’re a bit late, and the reason. If you’re gone for a weekend or more, let them know ahead of time, and also address it when you see them again. Ask them directly, “You haven’t waited at all where I didn’t show up, have you?”

You’ve got to be assertive but calm with issues like this involving your brainwashed children. Once your ex pulls this harmful maneuver, you also need to tell your children this:

“Son, if you ever show up and I’m not there at all, know that there’s a misunderstanding or a missed phone call or something. As I would never not pick you up unless it was something big or was a big misunderstanding.”

And if your children have a cellphone, instruct them to text or call you if they are ever waiting and it seems that you won’t show up.

Remember, you need to be assertive in these matters around your kids when they’re in the midst of a brainwashing campaign.