Some advocates are marking April 25 as Parental Alienation Awareness Day in Canada and the United States, and are hoping to raise awareness of the issue so parents experiencing alienation are better able to identify it.
The term parental alienation refers to the process through which a child rejects a relationship with one parent as the result of the psychological manipulation of another parent. It commonly happens during a divorce, separation, and custody disagreements, when one parent engages in behaviours intended to destroy the relationship between a child and the other parent.
There is debate in the psychological community around the theory, however, and parental alienation is not accepted as a mental health disorder by psychiatry’s diagnostic bodies. The American Psychiatric Association has repeatedly declined to include parental alienation in its diagnostic manual. Manipulating a child to hate a parent is recognized by the court system, however, provided there’s robust evidence.
Some scholars argue parental alienation is a growing field of study and can also become a form of psychological child abuse. Studies estimate 10 million parents in North America are experiencing what they perceive to be severe alienation from their children. One study in the journal Children and Youth Services Review estimated over 22 million adults are the targets of parental alienation in the United States alone.
Calgary mom Chantel Kovacevic said she has experienced parental alienation on both sides—both as a child and a parent—and has taken to sharing her story through podcasts and blogs in hopes of helping others.
It wasn’t until she lost regular contact with her own children that she realized she had experienced something very similar as a child.
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Kovacevic said she and her twin sister were alienated from their father by their mother from the age of 3.
“I was quite young, like very young when it happened,“ she said. ”I didn’t even have memories of a biological father.”
She said both she and her sister were told negative things about their dad.
“I just knew there was a hole in my heart … a piece of me always missing, and I really noticed it around holiday times, or my birthday, or Christmas, and I could never put my finger on it or why I felt this emptiness,” she said.
She said she started to understand more about the dysfunction when her marriage broke down and she lost contact with her daughters, who had moved to Winnipeg.
“I just saw my dad in my mind, like just his face popped up in my mind, and I said, ‘This is what happened in my childhood, and it’s happening again,’” she added. “It took me really to experience going through it with my own children, to really see that this was even a thing.”
Chantel Kovacevic has since reunited with the father she lost as a child. Photo by Sherri Kovacevic
Kovacevic’s experience is “a pretty common pattern, sadly,” Mount Royal University lecturer, author, and researcher Christine Giancarlo told The Epoch Times in an interview.
Those who are exposed to the dysfunction as a child are likely to grow up to repeat the pattern with their own families, Giancarlo said.
“If you have been alienated, then it tends to do one of two things in the next generation: either you, who were formerly alienated, also become alienated from your kids, or you are attracted to somebody who will become a targeted parent, so you would be an alienator.”
Parental alienation can happen even to mothers and fathers who once had a good relationship to the child now rejecting them, Giancarlo said.
“These are parents who are capable and loving and productive parents, but they’ve been removed through no fault of their own,” she said.
One way to recognize parental alienation, she said, is the child’s animosity toward a parent. If a parent is abusive, children will internalize it, saying it must be something they did to cause the parent’s behaviour. In alienation cases, children instead will often say they hate the other parent or wish they would die, Giancarlo said.
“They are absolutely 100 percent against that parent,” she said.
Reconciliation
Kovacevic said understanding parental alienation has helped her heal. Part of that has been finding a belief in God and coming to understand forgiveness through reading the Bible.
Once she came to understand what parental alienation is and gained insight into her experience as a child, Kovacevic reconnected with her father, who she said has been her “rock” as she goes through it with her daughters.
“I’ve learned a lot. It’s changed me as a person. It’s made me more aware. It’s made me heal. It’s made me forgive and have acceptance,” she said.
Kovacevic has since remarried and has four step-children and a 2-year-old son who has not met his sisters.
Her mother remains a part of her life and now that she and her family are moving back to Winnipeg from Calgary, she is hoping to heal that connection.
Kovacevic said she also has hope she will reconnect with her daughters, and advises other parents going through parental alienation not to give up.
“Don’t give up on your children. Be patient,” she said. “Do as much healing as possible … so you’re ready with open arms for your child. Just don’t give up.”
