I am doing what I can to bring the tragic nightmare of “parental alienation” to an end. The battle to reclaim professional mental health as your ally has been engaged. We are demanding professional competence in the mental health assessment, diagnosis, and treatment of the pathogenic parenting referred to as “parental alienation” in the common-culture. It’s time now to also start turning our attention to the failures of the legal system as well.
Pathogenic parenting that is creating significant developmental pathology in the child (diagnostic indicator 1), personality disorder pathology in the child (diagnostic indicator 2), and delusional-psychiatric pathology in the child (diagnostic indicator 3) in order to meet the emotional and psychological needs of the parent represents a DSM-5 diagnosis of V995.51 Child Psychological Abuse, Confirmed.
Pathogenic parenting is not a child custody issue, it is a child protection issue.
It is a child protection issue.
It is the professional responsibility of ALL mental health professionals to appropriately assess and to accurately diagnose the pathology. This is an expectation of professional competence consistent with Standards 9.01a and 2.01a of the ethics code of the American Psychological Association.
Yet even as the battle to reclaim professional mental health as your ally is underway, it is time to also turn our attention to solving the current failures of the legal system to appropriately respond to the pathology of “parental alienation.” One of the greatest challenges faced by targeted parents is explaining the pathology to legal professionals, such as minor’s counsel and guardians ad litem, as well as to family law judges.
In an effort to address this issue I have written a 40-page booklet for legal professionals describing the pathology of the narcissistic parent using standard and established psychological principles and constructs. This booklet relies on descriptions of the narcissistic pathology drawn directly from the established literature of professional psychology to both describe the pathology of the narcissistic parent and to highlight its characteristic features. This booklet is now available on Amazon.com:
My goal is to provide targeted parents with a resource that they can provide to legal professionals involved with their families, such as minor’s counsel and guardians ad litem, which will explain the pathology of the narcissistic parent in high-conflict divorce. I wanted to make this resource brief enough to be easily accessible yet also substantial enough to be authoritative and accepted. To accomplish this I relied on quotes drawn directly from the professional literature woven amidst my narrative framework.
I do not use the term “parental alienation” at any point in the booklet. The description of the pathology relies entirely on standard and established psychological principles and constructs grounded in the professional literature.
The brief 2-4 page Chapters of The Narcissistic Parent are:
- Introduction
- The Narcissistic Parent
- A Hidden Pathology
- Blame and Projection
- Triangulation of the Child
- Disregard for Truth and Authority
- Trauma Reenactment Narrative
- Processing Sadness and Grief
- The Co-Narcissistic Child
- The Attachment System
- Child Testimony
- Epilogue: The Dark Triad
- References
This booklet:
is now available through Amazon.com.
The School
I’m aware that many targeted parents have asked that I produce a similar resource that they can provide to school personnel. I’m still working on conceptualizing what school personnel would need to know about families and children in high-conflict divorce. It hasn’t yet framed itself into my mind. But in the meantime, this booklet, The Narcissistic Parent, may also be useful to educate school personnel regarding the pathology until I can develop a booklet which is more directly focused on issues relevant for school personnel.
I’m doing what I can as quickly as I can because I understand that each day that passes without a solution to the pathology of “parental alienation” is one day too long.
Craig Childress, Psy.D.
Clinical Psychologist, PSY 18857
Dr. Craig Childress: Attachment Based "Parental Alienation" (AB-PA) 
Thank you, as always.
This article was published yesterday http://www.familylawweek.co.uk/site.aspx?i=ed161124 entitled ‘ Serious Parental Alienation – The Approach of the Courts and Practitioners in 2016′.
Francesca Wiley QC of 1 Garden Court Family Law Chambers considers how the landscape is changing in the courts’ and practitioners’ attitudes to intractable contact cases.’
The tide in the UK is turning thank God. Maybe slowly, but turning.
oh, and purchased – thanks
Thank you!!!!!!
Bless you dearest Doc. I am ordering 10 of these books this weekend. One will go to the judge, another will go to the lawyer, one will be sent to Prof. Nic Bala in Ontario, Dr. Kathleen Reay, one will be sent to the College of Psychologists of BC, one will be sent to the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of BC and two will be sent to Madam Justice Beverley McClachlin of the Supreme Court of Canada. I will be entering this book, along with your other books, as exhibits in my Affidavit. I shall keep you apprised of our progress. I thank you from my soul on behalf of my daughter, Sofia, my mother Colleen and all targeted parents. You are the Angel we have prayed for. Always, Lisa Langton, Parents for Children, Canada.
Hi Lisa!
Question: Which ‘books’ are you entering, along with other books, as exhibits in your affidavit? I really want to know 🙂 Please email me if you would… I am 12 days away from a hearing and open to interesting methods of awareness and education of pathogenic parenting. Thanks, God bless you, and I hear you!
jaimesuz2@gmail.com
Love,
Suz
Suz, I will email you with more detail tomorrow. I will be entering Foundations and Dr. Childress’s latest book which is a resource for lawyers and judges. When you attach these to your Affidavit, the court has to acknowledge them. I have been in and out of the Supreme Court in British Columbia since 2001, trying to prevent my daughter from a pathogenic parent who was diagnosed as having Anti-social personality disorder and histrionic PD, but the so -called expert witness, a corrupt psychologist, advised the judge to give him custody, even though she disclosed being sexually abused and came home from an access visit in 2000 with a vaginal laceration. There is a trend in Family Court all over the world now: when a protective parent or targeted parent reports their child or children’s disclosures, custody is given to the abusive parent and the protective parent is labeled as having a mental illness. This is an ancient battle we are fighting. Dr. Childress is a brave, enlightened professional who steps up to the plate while others are in this arena for the money.
The National Alliance for Targeted Parents is currently working with 3 school systems. We have partnered with the Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE’s) and Trauma Informed Movement for building trauma sensitive schools. The first ACE recognized in the famous Kaiser study, was that children living with a parent who has an untreated mental illness predicts a broad range of internalizing and externalizing mental health problems. However our children also experience other adverse situations as a fall out from the narcissistic/borderline parent; emotional abuse, divorce, witnessing domestic violence, and substance abuse to name a few, resulting in an ace score that puts our children at high risk. School systems are a key resource for targeted parents because teachers usually notice the abrupt change when a child aligns with the abuser and shuts down their attachment system. If schools aren’t informed they can be manipulated by the abuser (like everyone else) and contribute to the cut off of the targeted parent. Schools also are available and responsive to parents and are mandatory reporters. The Alliance is looking for a few parents and/or advocates who would like to be part of a team to design and develop materials and a presentation that targeted parent can take to their schools. If you are interested, please let us know by using the contact tab on the website (www.targetedparent.com) or email us at info@targetedparent .com. Our target date for posting these resources on the website is August 1.
Thank You! Kay
The National Alliance of Targeted Parents has my full support in their efforts to protect children and bring an end to the pathology of “parental alienation.”
Craig Childress, Psy.D.
Clinical Psychologist, PSY 18857
Thank you so much Dr. Childress for the incredible and invaluable service you are doing by providing information on this delicate matter. I am currently in a custody trial initiated by the narcissistic father of my son who is now 15 and who will have to give his testimony next Thursday before the judge. I see him completely manipulated by the father and don’t really know how to make him see that. I see contempt and defensiveness in him whenever we approach the subject, as well as in my daughter who just turned 18 and is thus now an adult. I end up preferring to avoid the subject altogether. It feels like a constant tension, which drains me.
Kind and grateful regards,
Paola Bustamante >
Paola, Please see Linda Gottlieb’s website, End Parental Alienation. She has made a number of amicus briefs available for us to use in the courts. They are all stellar, but the one you need is on why children should not be allowed to testify in court. She has worked with over 5000 kids, and she makes numerous scientific points related to the child’s underdeveloped capacity to make critical decisions based on the neurosciences of childhood development and the child’s “diminished capacity” to testify.
Thank you, Dr. Childress.
I have been working “with” and to inform the Orange County School Board here in Orange County, Florida about parental alienation and am getting closer to the heart of how the pathogen infects through the schools; how can it not? Three of us parents went before the School Board on April 26th and made an impact, although the board members continue to stonewall. On the other hand, it’s all about relationships, isn’t it? The individual I spoke to the very first time in December of 2012 (lead counsel for the schools) is the same person who’s daughter was my daughter’s orchestra student in middle school this past semester. They had their Spring Concert night before last and I enjoyed talking to him about his daughter and her accomplishments. My daughter will be teaching orchestra next year in the same middle school that became me and my other daughter’s demise. It all comes around! I am from Colorado and have seen what they are doing in the schools there, going from zero tolerance to restorative justice and ‘circles’, and this is something that I see being infused with the child psychological abuse laws to report– all mental health people in the schools will be forced to know what to do. The board member and I (oh, by the way, his wife is one of the four family court judges here in this county — she was at the concert too) have been talking about having a consortium and It will one day finally happen BASED ON FOUNDATIONS. The time hasn’t been right. It has been painful in the waiting. But the time is now to overturn the school’s lackadaisical attitude about horrible abuse going on in the schools, in the form of crime and cutting, and everything in between, under the guise of pathogenic parenting. There are two more meetings left this year and I may get up and in my 5 minutes make mention.
I am also working on a really cool PowerPoint presentation I will eventually be able to use (with authority) after getting my psych degree and gaining ground with the child psychological abuse reform legislation. Thanks! Suz
Thank you, Dr. Childress. Your work has helped me so much, personally, to understand what is happening with my child. It has given me a direction from which to operate. I go to mediation Monday, and I will be bringing your work with me. Thank you for the dedication that you have put forth, to give some clarity to an otherwise maddeningly confusing phenomenon.
With much gratitude,
EK
Hi, You are a blessing! ! ! I am just saddened that we experienced this without YOUR support earlier. So painful to watch my children and be powerless and unable to have authentic relationship with them, who now are 20,18 two young woman and 15 y/o male. If there is anything I can do to help I will be glad to. Rick Elmer targeted parent. Rickyelmer@gmail.com
I wonder how a parent who’s lost custody and hasn’t seen their kids in over two years can still work to save a child who is 15, self harming and missing school and deal with the child’s therapist who ignored thev parents right to information.
I’m not even sure the therapist knows the cold had started hitting herself again.