How to combat parental alienation after divorce

[Family Court Strategies: When Your Partner Has BPD OR NPD Traits.]

I am seriously considering separation from my BPDw.

One of the things that frightens me the most in doing this is, to what extend she would be willing and capable of damaging my relationship with our children.

She has made threats a few times. Once she even made a chilling and a little over-the-top dramatic declaration: "I will make our child the instrument of my vengeance." Also, she has accused me of trying to damage her relationship with the children - something I'd never do, but I fear this accusation is an indication where her heads at and what she's prone to do.

I've seen that she can reliably act in the best interest of the children... As long as she doesn't feel she's been wronged in some way, then she can lose the ability to see that going after a grudge is not in the best interests of the children.

All in all, I think that this is a serious concern. I've read some really sad stories about parents succesfully turning the children against a parent, and also about cases where that doesn't happen but the children suffer for the attempt.

My question is this. How much can I do to prevent this? Preferably I'd like to convince (or force) my wife not to even try, but at the very least I'd like to minimize the harm she can cause.

Any good advice, any good materials to go look at?

[Versant]

I am seriously considering separation from my BPDw.

One of the things that frightens me the most in doing this is, to what extend she would be willing and capable of damaging my relationship with our children.

She has made threats a few times. Once she even made a chilling and a little over-the-top dramatic declaration: "I will make our child the instrument of my vengeance." Also, she has accused me of trying to damage her relationship with the children - something I'd never do, but I fear this accusation is an indication where her heads at and what she's prone to do.

I've seen that she can reliably act in the best interest of the children... As long as she doesn't feel she's been wronged in some way, then she can lose the ability to see that going after a grudge is not in the best interests of the children.

All in all, I think that this is a serious concern. I've read some really sad stories about parents succesfully turning the children against a parent, and also about cases where that doesn't happen but the children suffer for the attempt.

My question is this. How much can I do to prevent this? Preferably I'd like to convince (or force) my wife not to even try, but at the very least I'd like to minimize the harm she can cause.

Any good advice, any good materials to go look at?

[EyesUp]

Hello Versant,

You're wise to study and consider your options in advance of taking action.

There are a few dimensions you'll want to try to map out on this chaotic chessboard. There are no foolproof processes or practices.

The basics are:
- be the best parent you can be at all times
- demonstrate to your kids that you are safe, reasonable, and you love them
- minimize behaviors that can be weaponized, e.g., take care not to become emotional with your kids or be overly critical. you need to be a paragon of patience and demonstrate good parenting by showing lots of interest, lots of listening, and lots of care

In practical terms, keep a journal of everything you do with the kids - document everything. This will come in handy when you need to prove to yourself - or anyone else - that you have been a part of your kids' lives - and a positive part, at that. It may also help you to identify things you want to do differently. 

Consider how to have occasional 1:1 time with your kids, and make the most of it.

Some things to read:

Parenting jiu-jitsu - Craig Childress (though Childress and his work have become controversial, this is a short read and provides good food for thought)
Divorce Poison - Richard Warshak (he advises "take action" - repeatedly - though he's often light on what action to take);  you may not be in divorce process today, however many people who have gone through PA feel that the process starts while still married - so while reading this may be difficult or feel not applicable, it may still help to recognize the dynamics that need to be countered

In terms of convincing your wife of anything - you know her best. If she's already disparaging you to your kids, family, friends, or in your community, your best option may be to quietly yet confidently expose her in a way that makes her think twice about further disparagement.

The suggestion to take some counter action may be controversial here - it's risky to try to manipulate a manipulator. Conventional wisdom is to starve a fire - don't get sucked into the conflict. It's good advice. The key is to figure out how to throw a blanket on the fire rather than passively avoiding/ignoring it, while it rages on...

[PeteWitsend]

...

My question is this. How much can I do to prevent this? Preferably I'd like to convince (or force) my wife not to even try, but at the very least I'd like to minimize the harm she can cause.

Any good advice, any good materials to go look at?

Don't let her threats dictate your course of action.  Don't avoid separation (if that's what you want) out of fear of what she may do. 

Do plan for it though. 

I was also concerned with this, and although I think I weathered the "storm" of the first few years post divorce & things seemed to have calmed down, my daughter still tells me (it's now been 7 years since we separated) that BPDxw and her BF bad mouth me all the time.  Whatever.  She seems to see through this and while she told me she doesn't like it, we sometimes joke about it.  Like she told me I make the best burgers she's ever had.  I said "don't tell your mom that" and she laughed and said she was going to now, just to see what crazy thing her mom would say in response. 

Anyways... here is my advice:

1) get your child(ren) a therapist & have this written out as part of the divorce settlement.  Specify the therapist.  Don't allow your ex to jump from therapist to therapist in order to sabotage the process. 
1a) changing therapists requires joint consent.
1b) if the therapist retires or otherwise can't see your kid(s) anymore, they should designate a competent successor.

2) don't "fight fire with fire."  Kids don't like to hear their parents bad mouthed, even if they know that parent is wrong or has issues.  If you hear or they tell you your ex is saying things, be very judicious in what you respond to.  If there's an obvious falsehood, feel free to refute it, but also ask your kids why they think that, or what they think, or if they agree.  Give them space to think and don't argue with them.  I'll share some examples:
- BPDxw HATED, and I mean HATED my mom.  After we got divorced, my daughter asked me if her grandma "is a witch."  This made me angry b/c I knew where it was coming from, but I simply asked my daughter why she was asking the question, and asked her what she thought.  She said she didn't think her grandma was a witch, but her mom kept saying that.  I just told her that her mom didn't get along with grandma, but her grandma loved her (my daughter) very much, and she could disagree with her mom's opinions.  She nodded and never asked me about it again.

- BPDxw kept telling my daughter that I left because "I didn't want to be a father anymore or her dad."  This was one I took issue with... I told her in no uncertain terms was that not true, and I only left because of her mom, and if I didn't want to be her dad anymore, I wouldn't have stayed close by and saw her every week.  She looked worried and said "I don't know who to believe now."  I said she didn't need to believe  anyone, she should form her own opinions. 

3) Be yourself.  Don't worry so much about all this; make sure to have fun and enjoy your time with your kids, and don't pressure them for information about your ex, or get into deeper discussions about this, unless they're asking questions that you feel you need to answer. 

Remember, you're building trust with them over time, and this will go a long way to defeating any attempts by your ex to upend things.

4) This is probably an issue for another thread, but if you do separate, consider what rights you're willing to give up, and what you should push for.  If you're wife is going to "weaponize" the kids against you, it's harder to do if you're the primary parent, or if you have joint decision making over schools or residence or things like that.  The more rights the BPD-parent has, the more "levers" they have to pull to cause problems. 

[Pook075]

One more tidbit to consider.

When I separated from my BPD ex-wife, I did a lot of things wrong.  But one thing I stood firm on what that we had to put our kids first in all situations and I could care less if we were divorcing; we were always mom and dad.

My ex left me for another man, and bad-mouthed me to anyone who would listen, and turned my kids against me for a period of time.  I have every reason to hate her, to return her venom with venom, but that's not the route I chose.  I was patient, kind, and continued to insist that we had to have a good relationship because the kids would always come first.

So my ex-wife and I are on very good terms today, I can talk to her about anything.  Truthfully, I don't like her as a person anymore and I'd rather not talk to her at all...but I don't have that choice because I'm a dad and she's a mom.  The kids should always come first and I always kept that in perspective.

Regardless of how you proceed, I beg you to keep that in mind.  Things will probably get ugly at times and they'll be unfair.  But remember who you are and who you want to be in the future.  Don't take the "scorched earth" route unless there's no other option.

We divorced without attorneys in a "no fault" proceeding.  I could have gone the adultery route and sought damages, etc...but why?  Was the goal to get a little more stuff, or to do what's best for the kids?  It's the one thing I did absolutely right through all of this, i made peace with my ex and treated her like a person.

[ForeverDad]

To add to prior replies...

PeteWitsend 2) ... Remember that you don't handle a child's question or distress once and then forget it.  Follow up periodically and as needed.  Your ex is repeatedly pounding negatives into the children's heads, you need more than one response to ensure you too are reinforcing things, just with positives.

Pook075 ... My final couple years together, the separation, the two year divorce, the post marriage years, they were all heightened conflict.  Over time I realized that having a child was a huge trigger for her, in her perceptions I had morphed from a husband into a father and that resurrected the traumas her stepfather had caused throughout her childhood.  There was no option but to divorce.  Now our son is grown.  He still lives with me so she visits him and largely ignores the past conflicts.  (And I don't discuss it either or she gets triggered all over again.  After all, even though never diagnosed, she is still easily triggered by almost anything in her life.)

[Pook075]

Pook075 ... My final couple years together, the separation, the two year divorce, the post marriage years, they were all heightened conflict.  Over time I realized that having a child was a huge trigger for her, in her perceptions I had morphed from a husband into a father and that resurrected the traumas her stepfather had caused throughout her childhood.  There was no option but to divorce.  Now our son is grown.  He still lives with me so she visits him and largely ignores the past conflicts.  (And I don't discuss it either or she gets triggered all over again.  After all, even though never diagnosed, she is still easily triggered by almost anything in her life.)

My experiences are similar.  Every now and then, my ex wife will bring up the past and I can tell it's because something in the moment hurts her.  She's not coming from it the way she did pre-divorce though, it's like she's experiencing it and looking for my agreement that it was a tough time in our life.  For example, we recently talked about an ugly argument she had with my mom shortly after being married...it led to our first separation (for about 2 weeks).

Although BPDs don't show it, I believe they visit the past often trying to reconcile what the heck happened, who did what, etc.

I realize now that my ex was never my enemy, even when she was destroying our lives.  She was sick and making selfish decisions to run from her internal pain.  I don't agree with it but I can understand it anyway.  And I'm very happy we're able to be mom and dad today, even though we've both moved on.

[PeteWitsend]

My experiences are similar.  Every now and then, my ex wife will bring up the past and I can tell it's because something in the moment hurts her.  She's not coming from it the way she did pre-divorce though, it's like she's experiencing it and looking for my agreement that it was a tough time in our life.  For example, we recently talked about an ugly argument she had with my mom shortly after being married...it led to our first separation (for about 2 weeks).

...

I've found the only reason conflict b/t my ex and I has decreased over time is that she now has so much conflict with others in her life that she doesn't have time to fight with me.  Or I guess to look at it another way - given that she seemed happier when we were fighting and in a state of heightened emotions - she's getting "her fix" from these other people and doesn't need to fight with me. 

For the first couple years post divorce, the story was almost the same: baseless allegations (sent via email) that I was "behaving aggressively" toward her, or engaging in "parental alienation" (which of course she was telling me at the same time she was telling our daughter I made her bad food, never loved her, never wanted to be her dad, was going to leave her and never see her again, etc.), and just general insults and difficult behavior whenever I needed to switch days, or she wanted extra time with our daughter.  I rarely engaged because I really did not like her, resented her deeply for what she put me through, and did not want to see her or even think about her if possible.  And as my D's therapist quipped "I see a lot of exes repeat the same patterns once divorced that they had when they were married.  I tell them they didn't get their money's worth in the divorce!"  I wanted to get my money's worth.   

Now, BPDxw has two more kids with her longtime BF.  They've both gone through lots of money problems and bouts of unemployment.  she brought her parents and some of her extended family over to live here (mom and dad and cousin and his wife), and one-by-one gotten in fights and thrown them all out...who knows where they live now.  And my daughter tells me that  BPDxw and her BF still fight "constantly"... throwing things, screaming, etc.  Her own mom called CPS on her BF, and he called CPS on her mom.  Nothing ever happened, but you can see the patterns continue even without me there.  Glad to be out of it, and hope over time my daughter decides to spend less time there for her own sanity. 

[Pook075]

I've found the only reason conflict b/t my ex and I has decreased over time is that she now has so much conflict with others in her life that she doesn't have time to fight with me. 

Sure, because BPDs have emotionally charged lives due to mental illness.  You were never the actual problem- she just fought with you because she was struggling.  Now she's away from you but has the exact same problems...because the problem is mental illness and handling everyday life.

My daughter is also BPD and I can't tell you how often everything is going well, then suddenly there's a crisis of global proportions in her life.  But when she tells me about it, the story is something like, "One friend got mad at another friend, and now they're both mad at me because they're putting me in the middle of it.  I'd be better off dead than dealing with this stuff...."

Yet my kid can't see that she gets sucked right in and tries to play both sides with both friends.  When that backfires, and it always backfires, the situation turns on her as the bad guy.  My BPD ex-wife had/has the same challenges.  She sees it as "stuff always happens to her" instead of realizing that "she causes stuff that hurts herself and others".