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Question about PAS

Crazystep30's picture

If you have one parent who is Actively trying to turn the child against the other parent does it Usually work? Does it back fire when kid is older and they see what a Piece of crap the parent is for trying to split them from their other parent? 

What are some classic “Signs” a child will do/say if they are being Manipulated by one parent against the other?

 

Lndsy747's picture

I think there are a lot of factors that play into it so it's hard to say (how bad BM is, the kids personality, support from extended family, who had custody) but from reading other people's stories in here it usually works at least temporarily (2-3 years) usually in their teens.

We were banking on the kid growing up and seeing her mom for who she is. It backfired on us and instead she's just like her mom. She's only 16 so maybe she'll grow out of it still (doubt it).

 I don't think BM really trashed us but SD is aware of her mom disliking us so she must have said something at some point. She was more about manipulation . .   Making SD feel guilty about having fun with us, telling her she was missing out, letting her know that she didn't have to follow our rules. I would say there weren't many signs but what stands out was her changing her mind about what she enjoyed doing with us and wanting to go home or not come over again over small things like getting in trouble for not listening.

 

2Tired4Drama's picture

I was a child of PAS.  Looong before we knew such a thing even existed.  My mother made it her mission in life to do everything she could to bad-mouth my father and destroy his relationship with us kids.  It didn't work.  Part of the reason is because of who we are as individuals.  Even as a kid, I was insightful enough to know deep down that my father was not a horrible monster, but that my mother was incredibly hurt and damaged.   Knowing this didn't change my love for either of them.

But that's me.  In my SO's case, the kids were alienated in subtle but persistent ways, kind of like what Lndsy has seen.  It's still alienation and IMO, the subtle stuff can be much worse.  While my mother may have screamed, "Your dad is an a-hole!" it wasn't subliminal like the twisted and insidious messages that BMs can constantly drip, drip, drip into a kid's psyche.  Like laying guilt trips on them or letting them know that anything (positive) to do with father is an act of treason.

In my SO's case, the alienation took deep root and will never go away.  SD28 has nothing to do with her father nor his entire family - including her grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins her age, etc.  These are all good, decent people who have never done anything to deserve this treatment.  But SD has made it clear they are all of no consequence to her and makes no effort to have a relationship with them - including her own father.  

I recently spoke with one of her cousins (same age) and he told me he had reached out and wished her happy birthday.  She ignored him.  

This has happened because BM taught SD that her father and his side of the family are of no worth.  Since BM's family has money, the skids learned that was where their family focus needed to be.   This to me is the greatest tragedy - BM's efforts severed an entire branch of the family tree.  Even my mother, as bad as she could be about my father, was still civil enough to keep us kids in contact with our aunts, uncles, cousins, etc. on his side.  

However, now that SD is well into adulthood, I blame her.  She knows better and can do better.  But she CHOOSES not to.  F'her. 

 

justmakingthebest's picture

So far for SS14, yes it has worked. It is horrible and miserable and the most disgusting thing that could be done.

We are headed back to court again and this time the GAL recommends a custody flip due to BM's behavior. We shall see.... It was a long road to prove everything she has done. DH hasn't spoken to his son since Oct 31, 2018. He has been blocked from all communication.

tog redux's picture

PAS is not just about the parent's behavior, it's about the child's psychological ability to withstand and understand. My SS did not/does not have the psychological strength to avoid being alienated.

beebeel's picture

My mom badmouthed our dad long before their divorce. The woman never had a nice thing to say about him and she was constantly talking crap about him with the other men-haters in her life as though her three children couldn't hear every word. I'm the only one who still calls her, and I make a point of keeping that to a quarterly basis.

My mom failed in her campaign because she made our educations a priority. Once we had enough critical thinking skills to understand adult concepts, her smear job no longer worked. 

My skids' educations have been willfully neglected. They have not been taught critical thinking or the value of education. As result, they believe all of the stupid and false nonsense their mother spews.

stepper47's picture

With SD almost 16.  From my point of view (and everyone has a point of view, even BMs, as much as I am feeling deep anger right now) it has been going on for a few years at least, but it is just now slapping DH in the face.  I can't say how it ends up because I am also wondering and following your thread.

As far as what we have experienced, it started with BM over-catering to SD and over-stepping DH.   She comes to the "rescue" if SD is unhappy about something here (literally picks her up), she undermines DH by still giving permission for things or making plans with SD on his time, and saying things in front of SD about how *BM* would not expect things like SD letting us know before she drops in when she is with her mom. That I think was the big starting catalyst for our trouble.  There was a point in time that SD was coming in at random times every day, sometimes more than once.  It bothered me deeply, and at first I did want her to check to make sure it was an ok time, but I eventually just said she needed to give us a heads up.  That turned into a huge battle, her saying she did not feel welcome and me getting increasingly resentful because my request was being ignored. Meanwhile, BM was in her ear telling her that she is ALWAYS welcome at her house and continuing to drive her over with no warning. They could not see it wasn't about being welcome, it was about consideration.  So that started the seed of we were awful...add into that BM disagreeing with our expectations of picking up after yourself, and that she jumps in to do anything for SD right away if DH doesnt hop to it.  A few weeks ago, SD instructed DH on the definition of coparenting (it was inaccurate), and it was obvious where it came from.  The stage was set for her to lose respect for us, because BM encouraged it.

In the last couple weeks, SD went around DH to get permission from BM to go somewhere she wasn't allowed when she was on her dad's time.  BM then undermined DH after he put a stop to it, and came and got SD, and now SD says she is not living here anymore.  BM gave SD the master bedroom this weekend, which to me, doing that at this moment rewarding her for making the choice to leave here. 

DH and I were talking last night, one of the biggest problems in his marriage to BM was that she had a need to control everything, and always kept score.  It seems like those behaviors are showing up in this situation - I don't know that BM is intentionally setting out to alienate SD from DH.  I don't know if that would make it better or worse if she doesn't mean to. I don't know what your situation is, but if you are asking this question in know it must not be easy Sad

dysfunctionally_blended's picture

In our case HCBM began a crusade through gifts. She rewarded the skids for carrying out her agenda, such as lying and stealing. 

But their PAS is off and on with my SO. Some days they will act like he doesn't exist and others they want to be his bestie.

What she has managed to do is PAS skids against me. Of course much easier than against a bio parent. But I am the evil SM.

However, that seems to be backfiring now as she didn't realize that I would just simply step away. Sorry not a SM. The slack that I used to pick up, I don't do it. Nope, busy, guess you need to figure it out.

And I bathe in the reward as she scurries around trying to have my SO force me to participate! Never gonna happen. 

shamds's picture

pas will work because even when the truth is right in front that say bio mum lied, they still think she’s mother theresa, they justify her wrong actions and even worse still attack dad with all the crap bio mum spewed even when logic proves she is full of crap... 

my skids lack critical thinking skills, everyone in family tiptoed around them and they haven’t dealt with the harsh reality of things...

Thumper's picture

Kids who are victims of attachment based parental alienation don't flip a switch at 15, 18, 21, 30, 35 years old.  They also dont flip a switch at ncp's house and figure it out UNTIL they are completely away from alienator AND all of alienators minions. Aunts, Uncles, 1/2 siblings, Grandparents, church friends etc.  This also includes every form of contact. Letter writing, telephone calls, cards...texts. TOTALLY must be zero influence from minions and Alienator.

Sounds strange doesn't it?

You may want to check out youtube videos by Dr. Craig Childress. Watch every single one of them...starting with number 1.

You can check out his professional website too. Just google his name.

A change of custody does nothing without closely guarded treatment specifically  for kid AND alienator.  A great therapist should be able to fix this in a reasonably short amount of time IF alienator is also in opposing therapy, IN concert with Childs therapist.

"PAS" is a nightmare.

Other situations that may look like PAS until the kid turns 18 or emancipated were just a money grub by custodial who figure out the system by making sure kid didn't have many over nights with NCP. Court know this and they suggest it with eow schedule. 

With kids like this,,,all of a sudden at 18, like a switch, the kid shows UP at NCP and wants a relationship with ncp.  Which means cp is done with them for the most part because no $$$ is rolling in.  Adult kid may want to move in, or asks for $$$ or both,  since cp never saved 1cent for them.

Very sad.

I really REALLY wish courts would remove physical exchanges of money from ncp TO cp. I believe a shift would occur from bm's having majority of custody to dads.  IF ncp doesn't want visitation between 50 to 100 bucks would be standard, not to exceed, child support.

Watch dr childress youtube...

Sorry about this possibility of "PAS". Some situations never get better, they get worse. I can attest to that. We lived in fear inside our own home.

 

Thisisnotus's picture

I am a BM and a Step Mom. YES it works. My Ex Husband has turned every person we have ever met against me...he's a charmer, a sweet talker a huge A-hole disguised by a can do know wrong, good guy sort of thing. If he was so good why he did he work SO HARD to get all of our former friends to choose sides.....my EX tried so hard to turn my 3 children against and he succeeded with my oldest (now 16). She told me one year ago she doesn't want to live with me (that was 2 years post divorce) and her dad's is more fun. She became mean and nasty to me and I had no choice but to let her go. I rarely see her and she feels about me like her father does....like I don't exist and am the worst person on earth. My other children, now 14 and 11 almost turned against but did not.

With that being said, I spent my 3 children's lives from birth until the divorce (they were 9,11,14) being a doting SAHM mom. The helper in classrooms, tag along on field trips, sports mom, you name it. And the divorce hit and my DH turned from a genuinely nice, kind and caring man into this horrible awful person. He told the girls any and everything he could think of to make me look bad. He then married my friend who is so insecure and jealous of my existence so then he started acting like I do not exisit and told my girls that I should die. People, this is a man who, for a living, is an elementary school prinipal that EVERYONE loves.

On to my current DH, his Ex wife has successful alienated him from his 11 year old for over a year now using guilt. She is now working on the 16 year old....and in the last couple months is succeeding.

Between my DH and I ....we have 2 bitter ex spouses hell bent on making our lives hell at the expense of our children.

Rags's picture

It depends on how involved the targeted parent remains.  The more involved and the more the targeted parent is doggedly active in protecting their kids ... and most importantly the more the targeted parent keeps the manipulated kids tuned with the facts of the PASing POS parents crap....  and the more dedicated the target parent is to destroyin the PASing POS parent the better it is for the kids.

They need the facts in order to learn how to pretect themselves from the toxic parent as they progress through childhood and in order to be able to protect themselves from the POS parent as adults.

Facts, facts, facts and destructuion of the toxic parent.  Those are the goals to success when confronting the PASing parent and protecting the kids.

IMHO of course.

Maxwell09's picture

Parental Alienation is not just a BM convincing their child to hate their other parent. There are a bunch of other subtle ways to alienate. Look up videos on Youtube, there's a guy on there that explains his own experience. If you have a child going through this there is a video called "Come back Pluto" that also touches on it. BM would alienate DH in passive ways by convincing him that DH doesn't truly care about him "Oh your DH left you with Max instead of spending time with you? Wow, that's sucks. I know how much you would have loved to spend time with him even if he's too busy for you" (DH would be at work, night shift) Also saying things like "I am so sad when you aren't with me" or "I am so lonely when you aren't here, I just sit here and wait for you to come back" pressuring the child to think he is responsible for BM's happiness and he is letting her down/hurting her by not being with her. One of the ones that annoy me the most are her little comments to pit her against DH like asking SS who is the funniest parent (she is a weekend mom so obviously DH wouldn't be his first choice) She also likes to reinvent some of the situations we've had in front of SS to make herself look like a victim and that SS needs to protect her.  

Pass is so much more than convincing the kid that Dad is shit. 

Rags's picture

And this is why the PASing POS blended family opposition parent must be destroyed.  Facts, facts, facts, facts, facts.

The kids need the facts in order to recognize the PASing POS parent's bullshit and to prepare them to protect themselves from the PASing POS parent for the rest of the PASing POS's hopefully short life.

Crazystep30's picture

BM is like what a few Mentioned above. She will “reward” SS for being Defiant with us. Either by Sympathy telling SS she is SO SORRY how mean we are to him which causes him to lie and make up shit that did not happpen to get more positive attention from BM.BM will Purposely let SS do things he’s not allowed to do at our house example stay alone late at night or walk to the store alone. Then tell him we don’t “trust SS”. BM also babies SS to death and let’s him run wild. No bedtime at BMs, does not brush his teeth, let’s him play Video games all day. BM does this as she wants to be the favorite parent.  Disciplining comes down to DH so he’s always the bad one. 

marblefawn's picture

My SD is 30-something. I don't think you can ever totally shake the effect of PAS. And I think it's sometimes transferred to the new spouse.

The first time I laid eyes on his ex, she was screaming at me in the middle of a movie theater parking lot: "You're not going to take him away from his daughter!!!!!" It was so freaky -- the woman was totally unhinged! So I KNOW alienation was in full force even though we'd just started dating.

That, paired with SD hearing my voice on her dad's answering machine, made his dating life real to SD. She stopped speaking to him for two years after that. Slowly, they got the relationship back on track, but by then, we were dating pretty seriously and I only met SD once or twice -- I guess my husband knew his kid would be awful to deal with. That combination of factors made me the perfect target for SD's anger.

I'm now married 10-plus years and SD is fine with her father, fine with her mother, but I'm somehow the bad guy. It's almost as if SD couldn't risk holding anything against her father, so she just holds the fact that he remarried against me.

I disengaged out of self preservation. How can I possibly shoulder all that girl's anger that she should be putting on her parents for wrecking her happy first family?

PAS is tough and at least in our situation, it has been painful for all of us. It lives with us every day in this marriage.