High Conflict Divorce/Parental Alienation in the News in Detroit

[ForeverDad]

Notice how the courts typically dance around the "Personality Disorder" labels.  Not even mentioned in this case.  That is why (1) we often don't get a diagnosis despite the clear patterns of behavior and (2) courts so often limit themselves to dealing with the behaviors and behavior patterns.  It's easy for us to feel it's not optimal, we wish if we have a diagnosis then we could "call it like it is" and move on to therapeutic solutions.  But courts only try to deal with people as they are.  Accepting that, we do well to work with courts and their processes.

[sanemom]

I have been watching this case, and I am glad that Warshak is involved.  I agree with Childress--it IS a child protection issue.  You can't have a syndrome when it requires two people to have it--that is one of the reasons PAS didn't make the DSM 5.  Likewise, there is no "child physical abuse syndrome" even though children who are physically abused exhibit certain behaviors.

I have a friend who is a counselor who actually had a CPS referral due to parental alienation.  It seems that the parent called in a coached report to CPS to villify one parent; once CPS realized it was a coached report and saw the alienation, now the reporting parent had CPS requiring counseling for that parent and the child who was being alienated.

My friend says this is the first time that she had ever seen that happen... .at least some are aware.