From The Parents Whom You Have Rejected
Well, another festive season has arrived, another family occasion at which you are not present. This time it is different. We are not setting a place for you at our tables in the hope that by some miracle you might reverse your rejection of us and of your extended families. This time you are not ‘absent friends’.
This does not mean we, whom you have rejected, are not thinking of you when our families and we get together. It means that we are not taking responsibility for your absence. You see, the thing about love is that those who love each other are the ones who show up.
We and your extended families are not sad, we are not angry; we are not hurt that you are not amongst us. We are celebrating that those of us who love each other in our families are here affirming our loving relationship with each other. We are being the very best we can be for ourselves and for each other, in the face of your silent and persistent rejection.
The question for you is how can you be the best you can be when it is okay to dispose of a parent who loves you and treat them as an object of fear and loathing? We, together with the other members of your families eschew such a violation of values. It is not okay to respond to people who love you with horror, derision and fear when there are no grounds for doing so.
We are not writing this festive season message to you to dissuade you from the hostile rejection and false beliefs that you learnt as children, which you have then chosen to perpetuate as adults. Instead, we stand before you as living refutations of what you believe about us and indeed of yourself. We are here to confront and remind you of your adult responsibility and choice in what you are unquestioningly perpetuating in your lives, and perhaps in others. So consider how will this influence your relationship with your children, with your partner? How will your children treat you when they grow up?
This is what it means to be your loving parents, to be the examples of not only who you can be but who you inalienably are, were it not for your denial of the part of you that is us. We are unrelenting and implacable in our love for you as our children. We are here before you to evoke and activate that same part in you in the full discharge of our loving duty as parents to you. We will continue to be fulfilled, loving, authentic people regardless of your rejection-but you will not because you have denied that part of you who loves yourself and others.
We are not here to save you from anything or anyone, or even to save you from yourselves. We are here to be your mirrors, mirrors not just of whom you have rejected but mirrors of the part of you whom you have denied. Yes, we are the mirrors of your denied souls, your shadows whose whispers will remind you of the higher, authentic selves that lie within you. We will always be there, part of you, to show you the way back to us and therefore to yourselves. You just have to look.
You are adults now. It is your choice, your responsibility how to exercise your freedom and your agency. This is our festive season message to you. Go with love.
Similar Posts:
- Oh No! The Non-Festive Season: A Protest By Targeted-Alienated Parents
- The ‘Irritant Factor’ Approach: Using Seasons Greetings to Undermine the Delusional Relationship between Alienated Children and their Alienating Parent.
- Happy ‘Alienated Fathers Day’
- Parental Alienation in the Australian Media!
- What Happens When Men become Alienated from their Children?
Thank you Stan + hoping your Christmas is filled with all the love and affection we all once knew + cherished + may l thank you for being one of the very few people in Australia that have bothered to have studied and grasped a full understanding of Parental Alienation + in turn given many of us long over due releif +support. Cheers Bernie.God bless you + your work.
Maybe this might work for those alienated parents who have extended family, but for those who don’t ……. well we are just one or maybe two family members (e.g. mother & uncle) who are alienated and I don’t really matter that much anymore as my alienated daughter’s life is wonderful as she has latched on to wealthy successful people who have believed her lies. She has no reason to reconsider anything. As for her future life; I’m sure if she has children she won’t experience alienation; she’ll make sure she doesn’t.
Very sad comment. Maybe our alienated children believe we do not matter so much in their lives. However the reality is that deep inside every alienated child who has rejected a parent is a deep emotional hole that can only be filled by that parent. It is an emotional landmine just waiting to go off. There are no guarantees about this but the research shows that alienated children are more predisposed to adverse outcomes in their lives than those who are not. Our mission as the parents whom they have rejected is to never let them feel comfortable or vindicated in their rejection. This is a tough call, if we can’t parent directly and we can parent for accountability.
And above all else-WE MATTER TO US
Very important approach “never let them feel comfortable or vindicated in their rejection” and to do this from a place of integrity as a parent
So… How do you do this?
Thank you Stan for your incredibly important work, I wish you and your loved ones a very Merry Christmas….
It is a real tragedy that we have allowed bloated Government organizations to interfere in the relationships between innocent Children and their parents.
At Christmas time the sadness for Children and the Alienated parents of what these organizations have created is on display for all. Why people would believe that a Government Organization would know better than their the child’s own parents is beyond me. The nuclear family is under attack and the Organizations that are supposed to working in the “Children’s best Interest” are just tools for political ideologies.
It is my opinion the harm done to so many innocent children is an unforgivable crime, I wish you much success Stan in your work to uncover the truth about Parental Alienation.
Hello I just found this site. This the first Christmas without my son. Long story short his wife has accomplished her goal..she took him from our family plus my grandson. I feel so alone even though I have my husband, my daughter and her girls. My daughter just got through having a Christmas day with my son and family. I know this is wrong to feel this way, but I feel like I have been stabbed in the back.
I have a hard time convincing myself I was not a bad parent. I did not do anything to cause the situation. Any one in my family will tell you that I did nothing.
The wife is a character. She told me to never contact her or her family even again and never send anything to my grandson.
Sorry to write a book. Thanks for your time..
Hi Rit
Sorry for your loss. This is my 2nd Christmas without my son in my life. He met and married someone that conditioned him to believe that our family is not good enough. My son doesn’t communicate with any of his family any longer.
The message above is the best I’ve ever read. We are not to blame. My son and i were very close and nothing was done to cause the split on this side. Therefore I believe he has to return one day to make his life whole again.
God Bless You! You are not alone!
Sorry.. It should read … Hi RITA
I have the exact parallel experience so painful no one who hasn’t experienced it could know.
I feel for you
Merry Christmas to you Stan and all parents feeling the pain at this time of year. I am somewhat more fortunate. I have done my best to move on and forgive my ex. I have practiced largely, but not completely, an approach of positivism. I have endeavoured to learn from what Christianity and psychology has to offer about alienation and true forgiveness. And it has borne fruit. 2 of my teenage children now live with me full-time and one part-time, from mid 2016? I encourage all my children to spend time with their mother, as I need a break! I feel empathy for their mother. I have also remarried and our blended family is a real, happy(ish) family. I have long along tried not to compare myself to others and to not feel sorry for myself. It seems to work. All, the best to those early in what can be a long journey
My youngest son and his wife have alienated themselves from us a little over a year ago.They have also ensured that our only granddaughter has not seen us since she was 14 months old. They moved away without warning to another state supposedly for work. I found out that they came back for the holidays and that they stayed her father who lives in the next suburb. One of the largest light displays in our city is nearby. My daughter-in-law posted pictures on Instagram tonight of the 3 of them at the display. My granddaughter was within walking distance of my house and I couldn’t see her. I’m heartbroken all over again.
Have you written any articles relating to spouses who aleniate their husbands/wives from their families?
Thank you for your enquiry-a very interesting question.
Amongst my many plans is to write articles about how alienation is not limited to parents and children but how it extends into alienation from extended family, alienation of partners from relationships outside the partnership relationship (e.g., marriage, de-facto) and how networks of step families can alienate children from each other’s family groups.
I am contacted regularly by parents who believe that their adult children have been alienated from them by their children’s partners. I also work with parents in stepfamilies where the stepparent or biological parent in one stepfamily alienates the children from the biological parent in the other stepfamily. And of course, there is alienation within so-called intact families that intersects and overlaps with the known family systems presentation of coalitions and triangulated relationships.
What we know is that parental alienation is but one form of alienation that may be manifested in social and relational contexts, not limited the parents and children.
I suggest that the manner in which alienation is disseminated throughout relationships and social contexts is not fully understood and this is one of the reasons why I am undertaking sociological research into this phenomenon.