About
The purpose of Parental Alienation Hurts (parentalalienationhurts.com) is to raise awareness and educate the general public and professionals about Parental Alienation, Parental Alienation Syndrome, and Related issues involving our children and families. Parental Alienation Hurts is organized under Write to Parent, Inc. whose purpose is to educate and encourage the public to respect and protect parental rights.
The response to my public stance has been staggering. Recently, I read a statistic that said more than 25 million children have been affected by Parental Alienation; yet, there are only a handful of us speaking out. Not many people can believe the amount of shame and guilt that keeps us silent. I am hoping that if I find the courage to speak out and to get involved, that many more children, teenagers, and young adults can find the support they need to vent their anger and to heal their emotional wounds.
The games some parents play on a child’s heart is emotionally crippling and I know this is true by experience. The only way for me to describe it is to say that we become pieces on a chessboard that a parent keeps moving as if we’re the pawns on the chessboard, but we never hear the words “checkmate” because we don’t even know we are part of this game and no one else speaks out about the truth of what’s going on. As a child, I was used as a weapon, to cast revenge upon my mother, a parent my father taught me was my enemy, my brother’s enemy and his enemy. I became one with his mind and his emotions until I finally thought what he thought, felt what he felt, and hated like he hated.
This is an ultimate betrayal to a child because we become warped in our mind, but we don’t know it as we know nothing else. What’s worse is that it carries into adulthood and lingers like a dark cloud. It crushes the internal spirit of trusting and innocent children and infuses them with hate and enraged anger toward the victim parent.
We don’t want this. We don’t want any of it. We never wanted it to be true. But, our survival depended on believing it. And it crushed our hearts and filled us with guilt.
It’s a punishment we don’t deserve, but we can’t escape. I was made to believe my father was the victim. He was the wounded one. It was all about him and I felt guilty for having any needs at all. I was conditioned to think of him as the hurt parent, one who would claim to committing suicide. If he did, I knew it would be my fault. And I believed the reason I had the responsibility was because my mother failed.
It is just not fair. No child should be put through this.
But, we don’t know any other way.
Eventually, I was thrown to the curb by my father when I was no longer needed or when I got too expensive to keep and yet, my brothers have never escaped. Now, I’m sure they believe the same things about me that we were taught about my mother. I have not seen my brothers since I ran away from home to create my own family, to escape the prison I was in, by marrying at a very young age — seventeen years ago. I miss my brothers and I pray every day that there is a way we can be reunited and for all of us to heal.
My case is considered “severe” and there were years of alienation before the split of my parents. Because of this, I can understand various situations through the child’s eyes ~ Because I walked in their shoes.
I hope to help create ways to pave the path for them to follow: safely, confidently, and wholly. I hope to help alienated parents understand the children they are separated from to help them understand what the children feel, but cannot say, or they, too, will be punished and rejected. I hope to help illuminate what has been kept hidden and silent, just as physical abuse was kept hidden and silent two decades ago until a few people had the courage to speak out, so that all the others could know, they are not alone.
There is hope. There is a true desire within these children to heal, to reconnect, but they are just so afraid we have a hard time believing it can really be possible. I want to help them know it IS possible. I hope I can help alienated parents be patient and to provide ways for the children to have the time and space and safety they need to be able to release all the pent up wounds they’ve suffered for so long.
I am ready and willing to help serve these children and to help heal the wounds
of Emotional Abuse caused by the tactics and behaviors of parental alienation.
