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Can anyone give me any advice on how to 'de-program' my two brainwashed kids who are now in their thirties and whose mother announced she would alienate them from me when they were teenagers and has done an expert job of it. The two kids had a bad time of their mother just running off with another man in their early teens.
They knew there was no justification for their mother doing that and the kids had been close to me and had been aware of how I always put my family first and had made a good home environment for all of us & they knew their mother had simply vandalised it without justification.
below is a synopsis.
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My parental alienation story is interesting. My wife ran off with another man 19 years ago, without really having any 'justification' as she was just one of those irresponsible, feckless, selfish sort of individuals.
As she felt very guilty she conjured up extreme & violent aggression and an entirely imaginary claim of domestic violence & my (completely non-existent) control freakery.She was so incoherent with rage it was impossible to talk to her during the divorce proceedings. It was obvious her behaviour was caused by her very abnormal 'emotional landscape' as she had emotional damage from a dubious childhood.
This imagined rage encouraged her to engage in every possible form of harmful, spiteful behaviour during divorce proceedings. One of these was to spit venomously at me that she intended to alienate our two daughters, then 12 & 15 from me. I had no idea what this really meant or might lead to. I had always been quite close to my two kids.
The 12 year old apparently expressed a wish to live with mum & new boyfriend. The 15 year old daughter with me. There was no disagreement between my ex or me about custody issues or financial issues.
But, after two years of my eldest daughter living with me she was persuaded to engage in a 'moonlight flit' to then go & live with the mother. I made no complaint as I respected my children's apparent wishes entirely. Silly me ! My children were actually being busily brainwashed by their mother.
Both children were then prevented from seeing me. When they telephoned me or I telephoned them they were told to get off the phone as my ex was always magically expecting an incoming call from someone else !
Despite me making every possible attempt to build a relationship over the ensuing years with my daughters, they both remain totally 'distant' but seem completely unaware their behaviour is making it impossible to relate to them in a normal manner. There is the 'appearance' of a normal relationship, but the reality is they are totally distant & alienated (in their own heads) from me.There is virtually never any communication of any sort from them in my direction. Any communication only comes from me & they make sure it is as limited as possible. My eldest daughter lives abroad & doesn't even tell me when she visits the UK so I can see her.
Any communication at all has to come from me & it is pretty much ignored by the eldest daughter (now in mid 30's), and Although the youngest (early 30's) lives only ten minutes away, contact is almost zero as both 'kids' have the same huge 'emotional' vacuum as people brought up to be taught to repress their feelings and relationships with other people. It comes across as similar to autistic like behaviour, if you like - but they are not autistic though. They both now are married with & have toddlers too.
On those visits to the UK I know about, the eldest keeps contact to a ludicrous minimum. On her last month long visit to the UK when she was staying just a few miles away from me, I only saw her briefly just once for a hour for a tea time stilted conversation session as endless excuses had been produced to prevent contact. On numerous previous visits to the UK I have not even been aware she was in the UK !
My two adult children seem completely unable to be able to form anything resembling a normal relationship with me. Despite my best efforts at trying to maintain a relationship, it becomes increasingly impossible when faced with the seemingly immovable brick wall of the brainwashing they have been burdened with.
Half a lifetime has gone by but the alienation is total and is still being constantly re-inforced by the mother continuing to prop up her false construct of a belief system to enable her to cope with her own guilt. It is also clear from what the two kids have said that their lives with the mother & stepfather were distinctly unhappy and neither of them are exactly thrilled with their mother's behaviour. They are not very close to their mother.
This is a clear demonstration of how parental alienation can cause huge amounts of harm in the adult lives of those children who are targeted by this wicked behaviour.
It might be worth considering going to Relate - certainly go for a first session yourself to see what they suggest, and then you'd need to see if your children would be prepared to go as well (you'd probably have to pay for them to encourage them to go) - certainly worth speaking to them to see if they think they could assist.
I have spoken to Relate and a thousand other people, many psychotherapist types. They all say only one thing. All you can do is 'be there' for your kids & wait until they grow up & have kids of their own - then they will change because they will understand things a bit more etc etc.
I have 'been there' for them & have waited for them to grow up & even for both to have kids of their own. It hasn't made a blind bit of difference.
I have soaked up a fair bit of knowledge about psychology, but still remain clueless about what to do. Interestingly, at some point, when my ex first left me for no apparent reason, I realised she was 'emotionally ill' and behaving irrationally. I fought to get her back and we both ended up spending a year with very high powered psychotherapy at the Tavistock Institute in London - started by Sigmund Freud I think. It's a very high powered place dealing with all sorts of psychological problems.
My ex was very repentant at that time & promised never to run off & be unfaithful again. But ten years later, she latched onto a bloke with more money than me & thought 'Bingo' & ran off with him. The second time she performed the same trick I wouldn't even contemplate having her back in my life even if she was the only other human being on the planet. She just disgusted me so much.
So, what I really need is a really knowledgable psychologist who knows all about how people are brainwashed and who also knows how to unbrainwash them, to tell me how to proceed !
Brainwashing is a powerful and evil procedure. Just look at the ISIS idiots. ISIS are busily brainwashing a continuous stream of new recruits into believing it is a bright idea to engage in psychopathic cruelty & violence, live an exceedingly unpleasant, uncomfortable life fighting all the time and then go and blow yourself up just for fun. And it works !
The thing I was hoping for Relate to be able to do is to get your kids in there - I think they need counselling to get their thoughts and feelings into the open (not necessarily to you). Any counselling might work, but Relate would be a joint effort, so your kids might be more inclined to go along.
This woman and her centre seem to be very well respected. Read her blog and you will see she really knows her subject
I spoke with Karen back in 2012 & 2013, regarding Parental Alienation and found her very helpful in explaining things, I spoke about possibility of getting her to help in my case to prevent what has now happened from happening....however the costs were just spiralling out of control and I simply couldn't afford at the time to pay out for her expertise....I wish o could have cos it may have helped...then again if i'd have had a barrister or proper legal advice at the time may be that would have too.
either way i'm now stuck fighting against the courts and CAFCASS to find a way to re-establish contact with my child who's has been brainwashed by the mother for over 18mths since I last took her to court to get the enforcement orders penalties acted on.
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