Reunification Therapy With Your Alienated Child

Wednesday, May 16th, 2018
names have been omitted in this post
this post contains language
this post is longer than most
​has been edited for space
***************************


We all took our places at the large conference table that was surrounded with glass windows and a glass door. Getting settled in our seats the reunification therapist began with addressing my son, "I'm sure there are things for you to get off your chest... I think that's important. And we also talked about how I'd like you to share some positive things about you and your mom... but you said you couldn't think of anything." She told my son who was seated at the head of the conference table to my left. Across from me she sat, petite and blonde, with a legal pad and pen for note taking. In the far corner of the room beside my son sat my ex husband in silence. My ex was merely there to keep our son from attacking me if he became enraged during the session.

My son nodded and affirmed that he didn't recall any positive memories with me. I wasn't surprised, as his dad had a done a stellar job at brainwashing him. Anyone familiar with children and psychology knew that that reaction wasn't normal and had been the result of parental alienation. It was good seeing him again... after so much time... he was taller, older and in various moments I caught glimpses of me and his dad in him... it was good and yet weird at the same time to see him. I wanted to hug him yet couldn’t. It was a deep feeling of sorrow and loss within me... so many years lost and for no good or valid reason. I’d been made the bad guy; every story has to have a scapegoat.

"There's been so much pain..." She lamented and I took note of her catering to him; she seemed to be treating him with kid gloves... I was certain she didn't want him going off on her. Then she added "But in speaking with your mom she was able to recall some positive things with you." She told him with a smile "Does that surprise you?" She added, asking him. I cringed at her latter question. What exactly was the purpose of her asking that question? It was so personal; like she was trying to be as cruel as possible toward me. It was bewildering and bizarre.

He nodded that yes, it surprised him and replied "Yeah."

"Mom," She said, "Did you have some positive things you'd like to share?" She asked me.

I nodded and turned to my son "Well, when you were a lot younger we liked to bake together. You always liked vanilla cupcakes and cookies and so we'd make those and I'd make chocolate with your sister." I reminded him.

"So do you remember baking when you were younger?" She asked him with a smile and added, “What were some of your favorite things to bake?" She asked.

"Chocolate chip cookies." He replied and glared at me. I took note of the silent message. He had hated chocolate when he was younger. He'd always been adamant he wouldn't eat chocolate. He'd only wanted vanilla. He was lying. Or he was referring to now present day; to his current preference... not back when he was younger, a toddler or in grade school. It was his way of denying and dismissing our shared moments and the truth.

"So what other things do you remember?" She asked me.

"He was a great helper, that's one of his positive traits... around the house, we would bake together, cook together and at Thanksgiving he would help me make the dressing." I told her. I had photos from previous family Thanksgivings years ago that showed us making the cornbread dressing.

"You're such a volunteer... helping others... does that surprise you to hear your mom say that?" She asked him.

"I thought you would have figured that out a long time ago since we already talked about it." He retorted to her.

I sat back aghast at his attitude and how he was responding to her. This was not the boy I had raised. When I had been in the picture when he was younger he'd had beautiful manners. His father had done a lovely job since then, I noted. I wanted to reprimand my son and tell him he needed to speak nicer but didn't... I didn’t feel like I could after no contact for several years.

"And a helping spirit is a proud thing to have." She nodded.

"An act of service is a good positive trait to have." I affirmed.

"So you can go for broke and share what you're mad about regarding mom, from what I gather there is a laundry list of things." She added and I cringed once again at how she seemed to be egging him on. This "therapy" was a joke. He begins speaking but she cuts him off and says "Look at me or your mom but not at your dad... he's an ant on the wall during this." She informed him.

{discussion ensues regarding his childhood items and baby stuff
I have been storing for him and that he wants it immediately}

"I have some things that I found," I told the therapist "I already took a bunch of his stuff to him a few years ago to his dad's and left it outside the garage like his dad asked in bags." I pointed out.

"What additional things have you found?" She asked me.

"I found his moo cow that mooed, blankets, quilts his great grandmother's made, the white turtleneck from when he was three or four with the trains on it... his hat from Old Navy that he wore to the zoo during the summers... his Bear In The Big Blue House fork, it was his favorite when he little." I shared, listing several of the top items that came to mind.

"So these sound like your things?" She asked my son for confirmation

He nodded, "I want my stuff back. I don't want excuses, I want results." He retorted toward me.

​"I wanted you to know that she's making an effort." She affirmed to him giving me credit that I had been searching for his things and trying to smooth things over.

​I spoke, wanting to make a point "I should also point out that it's not uncommon for parents to hold onto their children's things until they are older."

​"It's not yours! So give it back!" My son snapped at me. I had never heard of a fifteen year old teen boy so adamantly wanting his baby and childhood things. It was odd to me. I had always thought most children didn't take a big interest in their baby things until after college graduation and maybe even later; after marrying and having children of their own. I was fine with him having the stuff; it was his after all... and yet in that I also believed it was really my ex who was behind all this... this wasn't about sentimentality... this was about control, punishment and him erasing what little I had left of my son's childhood other than a handful of photos and years ago fleeting memories.

​Through gritted teeth I spoke "I hear that. I hear that." I replied, holding back a litany of what I wanted to say.

​"Oh you're going to hear it!" He snapped at me nastily.

​"Okay, so you have two months to find the remaining things and then you'll get your things back." The therapist stated. Changing gears and the topic she then spoke again... "We talked how your mom abandoned you." She told my son. Oh this was going to be really something, I grimaced to myself. Buckle up.

​"I was wrote off." He nodded, "Mimi was waiting outside in her car and my shoes go flying past me into the yard." He told her, referring to his dad’s mother.

​"And what did you do?" She asked him.

​"I didn't know what to do." He shrugged, and gestured to his dad sitting in the corner "He was in China. I was kicked out of my own home and the police had been called on me three times before that." He added. I found it interesting how there was no taking personal responsibility by him. He'd had the police called on him three times because he'd attacked me three times previously before that final day he was under my roof. No one had been up in arms I had been hit, kicked, bitten and threatened to be peed on by him.... no one had been up in arms that I was covered in bruises up and down my legs trying to fend him off and wrestled with him for well over twenty minutes drenched in sweat and my heart pounding from exertion... no one had been up in arms that I'd been called every ugly word in the book by him. The court, the amicus, no one had been up in arms. Instead I was a horrible mother because I wasn't going to put up with myself or my home being annihilated by him. Instead of being seen as the abuser; he was now the victim... kind of like his father... the irony didn't escape me. I didn't know what the hell the issue with these fits had been... Asperger's or just psychopathy... I didn't give a shit honestly... I wasn't dealing with it if it was abusive no matter what you want to call it.

​"What were your feelings?" She asked him gently. I practically rolled my eyes. Oh, please.

​"Helpless. Didn't know what to do." He replied. I looked over at my ex who was covering his face and shaking his shoulders like he was silently sobbing. Oh, please. What an actor. Grandstanding.

​"Scared... and helpless." She nodded and affirmed then turned to me "Do you understand why?" She asked me.

​I sat there choosing my words very carefully "I understand him feeling overwhelmed." I replied cautiously.

​"You had no contact?" She asked him referring to he and I afterward that final day together.

​"I was fine with that." He nodded. Lies. He was lying. There had been contact. For months I'd tried to reach out. I called him the following Thursday or Friday and asked him if he wanted to come back to my home on the condition that he didn't hurt me again. I'd also called his cell phone and asked him many, many times to go get ice cream, grab dinner or go bowling, etc with me. But he'd always turn me down. Then he blocked me. I then began calling his dad's phone and asking to speak to him. Those conversations entailed me asking about school, his day, what he'd had for dinner, about his friends and hobbies and him just grunting and finally saying he had to go. I actually asked his dad to please get on the phone as well and make our son converse with me; encourage the relationship yet my ex refused and said "I'm not going to sit there with him! I'm not going to make him do that!" He had instead delighted in our relationship deteriorating after his alienation and now here we were many years later with a mess bigger than us.

​"What would have made that moment better?" She asked him, "Would you have wanted her to call you?"

​"I was happy when she didn't call. I don't want her on my mind." He replied, lying once again.

"You felt neglected, left out and left behind. Do you realize how he felt?" She asked me like a child who had to be reprimanded.

​He interjected and spoke "Think about your actions. Because you clearly didn't." He scolded me.

​"Can you accept that you reacted emotionally?" She asked me.

​Again I spoke choosing my words very carefully " I can say that emotions were high all around that day." I conceded, "It was a highly charged day all the way around."

​"Are there things you would have done differently?' She asked me.

​"Yes, I believe so..." I replied not stating what those things were. How far back did she want me to go? To the day I said "I do"?

​"What else could you have done?' The therapist queried me.

​"I could have called his grandmother Mimi to come to the house and merely sit with him and talk to him." I replied.

​"I would have left anyway." My son replied callously.

​"But then that would have been your choice, correct?" She pressed.

​"Yeah, I would have gladly left." He shot back. I was continually amazed and shocked at how nasty his tone was. His father had done a bang up job alright.

​"Did you feel you could leave?" She asked him.

​"Yeah." He nodded.

​"And yet you don't feel as though it would have helped if your mom had had Mimi come help with you?" She affirmed to him then turned to me "You had a desperation and you didn't know what to do."

​"I was at a loss." I affirmed.

​"Yet kids believe that their parents will know how to handle stuff." She pointed out.

​Yes, please share with us boys and girls once again how I've failed as a mother, I thought sarcastically to myself. I spoke "I've learned that parents don't always know how to handle things. We look up to our parents and then think they know everything but they don't." I told her.

​"So you weren't really trying to hurt him?" She asked me. Was she for real? I thought to myself. No one asked my ex any questions about why he was such a terrible parent... and that question would be a valid one based on the results.

​"It's not malicious. You just want the situation to calm, you don't know what to do. We don't get a manual." I replied to her. Note to self: When you have kids in your next lifetime and perhaps get beat up you need to have taken krav maga. Geez.

​"Did it feel as though your mom was purposefully trying to hurt you?" She asked him.

​He nodded "Yeah."

​"I remember telling him as I was trying to keep from getting beat up that 'you're not going to keep kicking, hitting and biting me... 'and.." I added "I probably said 'this shit is going to stop...'" I told her.

​"That's painful to admit, "She admitted "Parents don't like admitting they messed up." She laughed. Wow, I thought to myself. Just wow. They really broke the mold when they made this therapist... I had never experienced therapy like this. This was all ridiculous, "After he went to his dad's I texted and called him over several months."

​"I never received anything." He shook his head.

​"That's because you blocked me." I replied back, "There were attempts."

​"I cut that off!' He snapped.

​"You were in charge of that..." She quipped almost with a proud tone.

​"Yeah, I had the judge stop that." He nodded.

​"So your mom was trying to communicate with you." She pointed out.

​"I didn't care what she had to say. I'm done. I'm still done. I don't want to be here! I didn't get a choice!" He practically yelled.

​"That has to be hurtful." She affirmed to me then added, "But maybe that's him being hurtful on purpose." She ventured.

"Did you know anyone in school who had a mother who kicked them out of the house?" He asked.

​"We're both victims. We're both in the pit." I replied quietly, "I felt abused by my kid. I felt abused by my ex. His abuse was him being used by his father to abuse me." I explained.

​"NO!!!" My son yelled at me with a dark glare.

​"You've felt pushed away..." She affirmed looking at me, "Was there a benefit to yanking one of his parents out of his life?" She asked me.

​"I don't feel comfortable answering that question." I said quietly, eyeing my ex in the corner, trying to make a subtle point.

​"But you've felt pushed away." She stated.

​"Yes, I've felt pushed away." I said, "I'd also like to point out that I should have been able to contact my son and gotten something in return." I pointed out.

​"Why do you think I keep so busy all the time?!” He responded in ugliness, “It helps keep things off my mind like this crud!" He retorted angrily then he rose from his chair "I'm going to the restroom. I'll be back." He departs from the room and I glare openly at my ex sitting in the corner...

​"Wow, you've really worked him over, haven't you?!" I exclaimed to him.

​"Go fuck yourself!" He snapped back nastily.

**********************

www.gracepowerstrength.com
​