Dreading the post-visitation shakedown

When your child is dropped off with your ex following your weekend or other multi-day visitation, a brainwashing parent will usually give your kid(s) a post-visitation “shakedown”.

The goal of the parent doing this is to extract all the details, looking for those that put the other parent in bad light.

The poor child knows the parent wants to hear only the bad (nevermind that he/she just learned how to, say, ride a bike for the first time during this visit). So the child states the case the alienating parent wants to hear, often exaggerating or even lying.

How do you combat this? You can’t, mainly because you know it’s going on but you can’t prove it. Moreover, you simply can’t control the other parent’s behavior. So what you do is not think about the “shakedown” event. As long as you’re being the best parent you can be and do not engage in the awful behaviors the alienating parent is, you’ll come out fine in the end. And the child will remember the campaign against you eventually, and how fraudulent it was.

This, in turn, turns into the brainwashing boomerang.

It’s a shame what parents will do following a child’s time with a parent. The attempt to strip the bonding moments down and label them something different is without question child abuse.

Because time with you is damaging, of course!

I’m experiencing in my case severe programming in a desperate attempt to sever my son’s relationship with me. One of the things my son’s mother does is place him into counseling after every father-son time we have. That’s right, usually the very next Monday or Tuesday after the Sunday evening exchange he is placed into child therapy. This has been going on for many months now.

It’s very frustrating to see my 9-year-old son go from a highly enjoyable visit with me (my tactics in fighting back the brainwashing are slowly working, thank God), to being dropped into counseling.

I set myself an appointment with the child therapist a day after my son was placed there, and the therapist said there were no issues in my son’s nearly 3 weeks with me.

So why was he brought in? Counselor couldn’t answer.

I believe that his mother thinks that time with me is harmful to him, that my being in his life is harmful to him, and that the way to “recover” from the awfulness of spending time with a (unwilling to be acknowledged by her) loving father is to get help from a therapist.

Unfortunately in my case the therapist is completely clueless to the brainwashing mother is doing– so clueless that he denies any active brainwashing is going on! Just some “influencing” in my son’s mind. By whom? I ask? “Perhaps a parent”… Please… This after the countless stories I’ve told him and the video and audio tape showing my son’s anguish. It’s a “he said; she said” thing according to him.

When an ex places your child in counseling after nearly every visit with you, what message is that sending the child? That being with you is not a normal, OK thing. That obviously something not good or harmful certainly happened to the child during that time.

It’s sick.

If this happens to you, you need to be assertive in standing up to the child therapist on what exactly it is he or she is treating. See what codes are being documented on the billing to the insurance company. Sit in on sessions like I have, and take good notes. There are many incompetent child therapists out there.

In my case, the therapist didn’t have much to say, and even prevented me from seeing the progress notes when I asked to see them– he needed to see legal proof of my rights to see them. Can you imagine any divorce decree where a parent is specifically denied access to medical records? Amazing.

My battle is just beginning with that incompetent child therapist. Never assume that a therapist knows what he/she is doing and isn’t aligning with one parent over the other. Get your own trusted child therapist always.

If a parent says to the child “Honey, I miss you so much, only 40 hours until I see you,” what is that telling them?

First, it tells them that there’s a mental clock counting town the time until “freedom” occurs. Until the misery of having to be with the other parent is over. It’s simply not healthy for parents to use such countdowns.

My son’s mother does this. Just yesterday it was “40 hours.” Not 2 days, mind you. 40 hours.

What she should be doing is asking him what he’s doing, to support those things, and then say “have a blast tomorrow, I’ll talk to you then.” Period.

So if your child mentions “only 35 hours until I see Mom,” you know what’s going on the the parent’s mind.

When your child is with you but talking on the phone to their other parent, one tool the parent uses to lessen the value of your child’s visitation at your home is to tell them great stuff that awaits them back home.

The past two visits, my son has been reminded of both a horse purchase and a fish tank purchase. “Aren’t you excited to come back and see your new horse?” “This aquarium is so amazing, don’t you wish you could see it?”

You’ll see other variations such as:
1. Parent telling the child that he missed his friend’s birthday party, or some other function
2. Parent telling the child how much he’s missed, multiple times, to make the child feel guilty about being away
3. Parent acting as though the stay is terrible for the child, saying things like “everything will be alright, Charlie, you’ll be home in just two days and things will be fine again.”

Tips to combat this pointless behavior from the parent who’s lashing out?

Have a normal, fun time with your kids. At the end of every day of your visitation ask them, “What did you enjoy doing most today?” And take a few pictures and videos every day. Post them online, or somewhere that the child can see them. Make the actions memorable, which will be far more powerful than the other parent pulling down the child’s enjoyment with you using words.

The alienating parent will try one or several of the following tactics:

1. Keep the child on the phone for a long time
2. Inquire in a negative spirit how the visit is going. Instead of “tell me what you did today,” the sentiment more like “Are you doing OK?” “How much do you miss me?”
3. Tell the child about a big surprise awaiting him/her upon their return
4. Tell the child how much the parent misses them, that the time apart is very difficult

At the time I just thought whatever, she’s just letting me know he’s not feeling well. Oh well, we’ll get through it.

Only later after lots of research on the topic of brainwashing of children did I realize that this is a commonly used tactic by ex’s who don’t want your son or daughter around you.

Your only solution is to do what I did, tell them thanks for the update, and reconfirm the pickup time. If your ex suggests no visitation because of the illness, politely inform them that you will take care of the child (and are open to medical solution suggestions), and that to deny visitation would raise the matter to a new level.

Sidebar: Keep in mind you’ll have to judge the entire situation: If the child is indeed quite sick, would you want them to be around your healthy house? A good technique is to speak to your child and gauge the extent of their illness over the phone.

I then asked “Why, Charlie?”

“Because I’m concerned.”

I said, “Concerned about what?”

“Um, because you’re going to take me away from my family.”

“Charlie, you know we’re going to have a blast as usual when I come and pick you up, do you not a great time usually with me and the kids?”

“Um, not really.”

Mind you, he has a fun time around me and my family. I take pictures and videos to document this for the upcoming trial. It’s very difficult to hear your son become distant from you and even say that he doesn’t enjoy being around you. You know it’s his mother’s programming, but it still hurts.