Fortunately, most cases of parental alienation are not so severe that the damage cannot be unwound through skilled, timely therapeutic intervention.
However, in special cases – in which alienators are particularly relentless or egregious, or where the child is uniquely susceptible to the brainwashing – more formally structured assistance may be needed.
Dr. Richard Warshak developed a program called Family Bridges, which is available in Canada and throughout the United States, to help such families repair the damage done by PA and reconstruct their relationships. This private workshop involves multiple sessions over four consecutive days, designed to teach children how to have more balanced, objective views of their parents and also to develop skills to resist brainwashing and outside pressure.
The goal is to empower children to form their own opinions independently. Parents, meanwhile, get practical tools they can use to diffuse conflicts and manage relationships.
Not all families qualify for this intervention program. If the child’s history with the rejected parent is rocky — the child doesn’t want to live with or communicate with the rejected parent because of abuse, neglect or disparagement, for instance — that family cannot participate.
The sessions strive to help children think critically, extract themselves from the middle of conflicts and stop them from unfairly rejecting parents. They also teach children and parents how to set and enforce limits and to prevent interactions that are psychologically damaging.
Some Science Validates That Even Severe Alienation Can Be Reversed
One research analysis found that the Family Bridges workshop has a 95% of success rate, when measured in terms of whether children regained positive attitudes about rejected parents. The results seem to stick. Follow-up surveys found that 82% of these mended relationships remained positive long after the sessions concluded.
Another peer reviewed study with a smaller sample of children (23 total) found that, by the workshop’s conclusion, 22 out of 23 of the children regained positive feelings for the targeted parent, and 18 out of these 22 children retained positive feelings over the long-term.
For skillful, experienced assistance handling your Parental Alienation case, call the Williams Law Group, LLC immediately at (908) 810-1083.