Family Disappeared

What's My Part In The Family Disease of Parental Alienation Part 2 - Episode 68

• Lawrence Joss

Share episode

In this episode of the Family Disappeared podcast, Lawrence Joss delves into the complexities of alienation and estrangement within family dynamics. The conversation explores how communication styles, conflict avoidance, and personal reflections on parenting contribute to these issues. Guests share their experiences and insights, emphasizing the importance of understanding and adapting communication to foster healthier relationships. The discussion highlights the challenges of navigating emotions, the impact of family origins on behavior, and the potential for growth and healing through self-awareness and accountability. 

In this conversation, participants explore the complexities of parental alienation, the futility of seeking validation from professionals, and the transformative power of recovery. They share personal experiences of navigating the legal and mental health systems, the challenges of communication, and the journey toward self-acceptance and healing. The discussion emphasizes the importance of personal growth, compassion, and finding balance in life amidst struggles.

Key Takeaways

  • We contribute to alienation unknowingly.
  • Conflict avoidance can perpetuate dysfunction.
  • Meeting children where they are is crucial.
  • Disagreements can strengthen relationships.
  • Communication styles are learned behaviors.
  • No communication can be a damaging form of communication.
  • Defensive responses hinder connection.
  • Reflecting on past mistakes is essential for growth.
  • Understanding family dynamics is key to healing.
  • Taking ownership of our actions fosters accountability. Nobody wins in alienation; it's a losing game for all.
  • The desire to win can lead to destructive behaviors.
  • Seeking validation from professionals can drain energy.
  • Personal growth often requires letting go of the need to be right.
  • Recovery involves shifting focus from past trauma to present healing.
  • Finding balance is crucial for emotional well-being.
  • Self-care practices can significantly improve mental health.
  • Embracing change can lead to new opportunities for happiness.
  • Compassion for oneself is essential for healing.
  • Sharing experiences in the community fosters understanding and growth.


Don't forget to Subscribe to our YouTube Channel:
https://www.youtube.com/@parentalalienationadvocates

If you wish to connect with Lawrence Joss or any of the PA-A community members who have appeared as guests on the podcast:

Email-      familydisappeared@gmail.com

Linktree: https://linktr.ee/lawrencejoss
(All links mentioned in the podcast are available in Linktree)

Please donate to support PAA programs:
https://www.paypal.com/donate?hosted_button_id=SDLTX8TBSZNXS

This podcast is made possible by the Family Disappeared Team:
Anna Johnson- Editor/Contributor/Activist/Co-host
Glaze Gonzales- Podcast Manager

Connect with Lawrence Joss:
Website: https://parentalalienationanonymous.com/
Email- familydisappeared@gmail.com

Speaker 1:

we start to lose even more control in trying to tell everyone else's story and I know so many of us just want to tell it and we identify with it and we become it and it's super destructive.

Speaker 2:

And I would say just one that's the thing that I've learned through the 12-step program is that, as I've been in the program longer and longer, that narrative that I came in with we call it the narrative where I have to really tell all the gory, nasty details of how I was done wrong and what was me and it was, you know, it was horrible and gosh, I got traumatized and all that stuff. All that stuff may be true, but as I move further into recovery and healing, I don't feel the need to share that anymore. What I can share now is where I am now, how I'm moving forward, how I'm showing up today, which is a different, whole different story there was a time in my life when I was overwhelmed and underwater.

Speaker 1:

Those days are the inspiration for this podcast. This is by far the ultimate healing journey for all of us. Healing ourselves emotionally, spiritually and physically is paramount to this journey. From this, this place of grounding, we can all go out into the world and change all our interactions and relationships. We can engage people from an integrated and resourced place. This is a journey of coming home to ourselves. In today's episode we'll start to explore some of these issues. Let's begin the healing journey today. Welcome to the Family Disappeared Podcast. Hi, my name is Lawrence Jossoss and welcome to the family disappeared podcast.

Speaker 1:

Today we have part two of the alienator in me and, yes, provocative, if you're just hearing that for the first time, but we're really uncovering how we um contribute unwittingly, unknowingly, to alienation, estrangement, erasure, and sometimes it's just by doing the right thing and overdoing the right thing and not talking about conflict that's going on. We'll write conflict avoidant. Sometimes it's by people pleasing like. All these different things help perpetuate the system in a really negative way at times and we're doing the best we can. So if any of these things resonate with you and you're doing these things, the show's phenomenal. If you didn't listen to the first part, I highly encourage you to listen to the first part first. And it's rich and there's love and compassion and great stories and also acknowledgement that we're doing the best that we can and, as I uncover some of these behaviors in myself, like I can give myself grace and I can adjust course and I can start to work on different tools and skills and resources and build some different resilience. So a magnificent, magnificent show. If you're new to the community, welcome.

Speaker 1:

Our show notes have a bunch of great stuff. We have a free 12-step program. Parental Alienation. Anonymous. My email's always in the show notes FamilyDisappeared at gmailcom. Reach out to us Please, please, comment, share what you think about us. Youtube's a great place to do that. Engage, engage, engage. Let us know other provocative conversations. We you want us to have other experts or the panels you're interested in hearing about. You know, participate right, just like life. Participate like energy in equals energy out and uh, today's show is fantastic. Thanks for coming out to play and just pitching that. We are a 501c3 non-profit. Donate monthly, yearly, a little bit, a lot of it. You know whatever works for you. Share with other people. Please share, like, share like and if you have any um charities or matching at your work or anything like that that can help the community, let us know and we'll get you whatever information you need to help share that stuff. And with that let's jump into the show.

Speaker 1:

I can't remember really if I've shared the story before and I might have, but it feels really important to share it as we're talking about the alienated me and where, sometimes unwittingly, I have perpetuated the disconnection and the lack of access to my kids and sometimes it's been by trying to explain stuff to them or teach stuff to them. And I'm really thinking with my middle daughter. You know she reached out about a year, year and a half ago and we texted a little bit. And you know I really practice strong communication and sometimes it's useful and, as I talk about in the episode, sometimes it can actually be weaponized, where I over communicate strongly and I'm really advocating for myself and it feels really important to ask for what I want. But I really think I missed an opportunity to meet my daughter where she was and to walk really, really, really slowly and I'll text in our conversations and I wanted more and I think I actually um created harm, you know and if you have access to your kids, meet them where they are, take what's offered, work on yourself, you know, come to some, you know, parental alienation, anonymous meetings, find different support therapists, whatever it is man, but I would say, um, I'd like to meet my daughters where they are and not try to make them meet me where I am.

Speaker 1:

I'd like to give that time to evolve and to build trust and consistency and continuity. And, yeah, that makes me sad that I might have created some harm, and even more than that, and even with all the work that I'm doing, that I make mistakes too. So if you're making mistakes, welcome to the community. If you're not making mistakes, start making mistakes. That's how we learn. And with that let's jump into the second part of the show. Steven, same question for you family of origin, strategy, coping mechanisms that you brought into your, to your, your next family life, your next family journey.

Speaker 2:

Uh, I think there's two big ones, uh, that come from my family of origin that contributed to, uh, some of the challenges with alienation. One was in my family. I was the I don't know they call it the Enneagram nine, but the sensing feeling kid who kind of took the temperature of the room and the sole goal of that individual personality which I have is that I just want peace and calm. So when you combine that with the second thing, which is a strong dose of family defensiveness and conflict avoidance, it's a prescription for a disaster. And I guess it was a question like how does that show up in the alienation scenario?

Speaker 1:

And picking a partner and raising your family together before you separate it and in the alienation scenario. And picking a partner and raising your family together before you separated and in the continuing relationships. Any one of those?

Speaker 2:

I think that my desire to have peace at all costs cost me a lot. I think there should I've said this again. I'm remarried now and I've been married for five years and I've had this discussion with my current spouse that we talk sometimes about. You know, our old relationships and and and going back, I said multiple times I think we should have had more knockdown, drag out fights those first couple of years because everything got pushed under the carpet, right and so. So that wasn't great for the relationship.

Speaker 2:

But then I realized that some of that also happened with my kids' relationships, right, that we didn't learn even when my kids were young we didn't learn well, or I didn't teach them well that we could have a conversation and they could have a completely different opinion than me, and we could end the conversation and we have a different opinion and that's okay and we move on and we love each other. And that was not part of my growing up. It was there was a winner and a loser, end of story. There was a winner and a loser in every situation. So, and then the other thing was, you know, the conflict avoidant. You know when those tough discussions come up, whether it be in a marriage, or sometimes even with the kids, being able to hang in there and not shy away from the conflict, you know, or the disagreement, and that was just how I was brought up.

Speaker 2:

Disagreement was bad, it was evil, it was scary, and so as an adult, for the early part of my adulthood I would avoid that, and that's just how I realized that you know a lot of the, as they say, the marrow of relationships is in the disagreements, is in the working things out, is in the connection over difficult situations. It's not when things are going smoothly. Sometimes I think we grow more when we get into those times of sort of the marrow of relationships, which is disagreements, conflict, working things out together as a team. And so I didn't learn that super well growing up and I've had to learn that as an adult. Of course the 12-step program is helping to teach me part of that.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for that and I appreciate you bringing up this idea of conflict avoidance, which is the main piece that I'm going to pick up, even though you spoke about a bunch of different stuff. But sweeping stuff under the rug, not talking about what's really happening, pretending that everything's okay and no one really gets to have a discussion, and then we're role modeling this for our kids, that this is how they go out in the world and exist, and then we have divisive divorces and we see these kids in really crappy situations and we wonder, hey, why can't they communicate through this again? No one's bad or wrong and if you've experienced this in your life, this isn't about judgment. This is about change and creativity and possibility for healing. And what I'm hearing you say, steven, is that's how you're raised, that's how you started to raise your kids, and now you can reflect back and see oh, oh and start to change and readapt. And now, with readapting, life starts to change and you are able to have those conversations in your new relationships or your existing relationships going forward correct?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it's the ability to be able to have that in my life now, man, it's just such a blessing to be able to have a discussion, to have a disagreement, sometimes a really strong disagreement and to be able to come back together and actually feel closer after the disagreement than you did before, which I would. If you told me that, as a you know, zero to 35 year old or 40 year old, I would have said that's completely impossible. There's no way to come out of a really strong argument and actually feel better about things at the end. I just I wouldn't have believed it, but I know it now to be true and had I have done. I had a situation where my daughter just to share the situation that again one of those things I would have done differently when she was 14, we went on a walk.

Speaker 2:

I remember it was Christmas of her 14th year, we had been separated for almost a year and we went on a walk and it was the first time she wanted to open up about how she felt about the divorce and I listened to her and my first response was well, you know, there's another side to the story and if I could take that back, if I could take that back?

Speaker 2:

I would, because that she, she was crying, she had those tears, those big crocodile tears If you've any of you had daughters when they're 12, 13, 14, those big, sweet, you know, crocodile tears, not the tears of like I'm upset or I'm mad, but like this is my heart and and I shut that down with my comment, and if I could take that one back, I would Can't. I hope to be able to discuss it at some point because I would do it much differently now. But that was me not wanting to sit in with the conflict and it was my way of trying to, of that defensiveness, of trying to preempt a conflict that was coming right and that shut it down. And we have not had. That conversation still needs to happen, and that was 12 years ago.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for that. That's very beautiful to be able to identify it and share it with the community so other parents potentially can identify that in the moment when it's happening. And I would like to say to the community out there that as we practice working on ourselves on an interpersonal level whether it's through a 12-step program or whether it's through a different program or through whatever other support, it starts to build up resilience and resourcing so we don't cut off or split off. You hear about the kids splitting off all the time, but it happens to us too. We can't navigate an emotional situation because we're never toward hell, so we split off and then we push the conversation down, we move on to something else and we miss some really wonderful opportunities. And in those opportunities we actually contribute and help perpetuate alienation or dysfunction or whatever word you want to use.

Speaker 1:

I think that was really powerful and for me and my family system when I was in vitro, my mom was really anxious. She was an only child. My dad was high maintenance and instead of the energy coming from my mother to me which it does in a healthy attachment style the energy was actually getting taken from me to my mother. So when I popped out into the world. I identified really well with people's nervous systems that were dysregulated and I was really good at helping people's nervous systems calm down and that gave me meaning right. So I had that in my family of origin. I started to pick partners like that. I picked a. My ex-wife was like that and I was really good with working with a nervous system like that and in doing that, I'm showing my kids how to take care of people, how to make sure that other people's nervous system is okay, so they can be okay. And it's an incredibly dysfunctional strategy and it's not useful and I've created a lot of harm in my family system by doing that. And again I want to say this that's the best that I could do in the moment. I'm not bad, I'm not defective, I'm just another human being and identifying that is the healing, is the opportunity for change.

Speaker 1:

And if you're a parent and some of this stuff feels really triggering and you're like I'm doing that or I did that, great Welcome, welcome to humanity. And what a great thing if we get to unpack that and prepare ourselves to be the best possible parent, aunt, uncle, friend, employer, employee, librarian, whatever it is Like. This is rich stuff and hard to digest. And with that we're just going to take a cumulative breath here as a community and just acknowledge this is wonderful, rich, meaningful conversation. And you know it's a, it takes a toll emotionally on us. So I think we're all, uh, I think we're all feeling that a little bit, and I wouldn't be anywhere else If I was going to be in a different conversation. I'd say no, I want to be here because it's important to have.

Speaker 1:

And with that we're going to move on to the next question and this is kind of like a theme and and something that's connecting a lot of these different things we're having. And it's about communication, right, like how has communication had a negative role within the context of alienation or estrangement, or just the family dynamics? Like how has it contributed? And I use this terminology like alienation, in my opinion, has an inertia, and when we're dysfunctional, we don't have different skills, or maybe we're dysregulated and we enter a conversation that way, sometimes unknowingly or unwillingly, we propel the inertia of alienation forward. And I want to talk specifically about communication. Do you feel like that's true for you? And if it is true for you, can you give us one example where you maybe propel the situation just by communication, and yeah, and let's see how that evolves. So let's go with you first, julie.

Speaker 3:

That's a tough one. Do you want to define communication?

Speaker 1:

Communication is just like language, like if you're going to say, hey, lawrence, you're not being nice and I'm like you're not being nice, or no one in the world is nice, or you did that to me first, I mean like that communication where you're not really listening to the other person, I would say, and you're just being more reactive, or something like. To that degree, does that make more sense?

Speaker 3:

yeah, I think that I mean I, I know I'm very defensive. I can't handle criticism in any way, shape or form. Form, I cannot handle it. And the minute I think you're saying something critical, I'm going to clap back and it's probably going to be to point out how you're worse than I am. And I hate to tell you that I've probably done that to my own child and again, I think it comes from a family system of my mother not being able to take criticism and I learned but it was a source of strength Like if you take criticism, you are weak. So, in order to show your strength, you cannot allow anyone to criticize you and now that I'm saying that out loud, you definitely can't allow your child to be critical of you, because we are supposed to be, you know the authority and you have to respect us and you are definitely not going to criticize me and there's no question.

Speaker 2:

As I say that out loud, that's.

Speaker 3:

That's gotta be awful as a kid, and you should have room to voice your own needs to your parent, and your parent may take that as criticism. You know, mom, I think your macaroni sucks. I think your macaroni sucks, you know, like you make dinner, then he's allowed to say I don't care for your macaroni, so can we not have that? Can we have something else? But I did not grow up where any form of negative feedback was allowed, and so I don't take negative feedback from anybody else either. And that's got to be really tough.

Speaker 3:

And I think you know, as a parent, you have to learn how to. It's not just about taking the criticism. It's about teaching your child how to be able to express his or her needs and giving them the space to do that. And if they say it in a critical way, say that actually kind of hurt my feelings when you said it that way. What if you tried saying it this other way instead of I know my reaction just shut him down, and that's not helpful. Him down, and that's not helpful. And I think the other thing that I know from my communication style in general is that and you've probably noticed I feel that I have to educate you in every moment, and I don't think my son always appreciates that. I don't think he wants to be educated in every moment, but I feel like I have to say something really wise and important, and I'm sure that that too has been hard. Sometimes he just wants to joke around with me and not get my dissertation on the history of whatever it is he's brought to my attention.

Speaker 1:

I love that. I love that the educating part. I love the part where, like, yeah, like we're brought up, where, yeah, you, there's no space for feedback. You know what I mean. But again, I'm being able to identify that and especially for folks out there like huh, like what's a different way to enter this? Is there space to hold, that being whatever it is for the child as well, and is the transformation and holding in a different way? So I think both of those examples were wonderful examples and I love the example of teaching, because I find myself doing that too, like I got a lot of information and this is really really useful, and I find that sometimes, in trying to be useful, we disconnect from each other.

Speaker 3:

Absolutely.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, that's a rich one. I love that. That's a great, great example.

Speaker 2:

And, stephen, same question for you, my example, would be very similar along the same lines to what Julie was saying. You know, as she was speaking, I flipped through my phone and I kept some memories from some of the things back in those times that poignantly hit me, and this one was something my son said. This was back in 2014. So technically, I've only been alienated from him officially for three years, but this was back about less than a year after we officially separated. And this is what he said. I remember. I typed it in my phone and I have it as a note. These are the hardest decisions, whether to stay with you or go home. You don't know. You don't have to make these decisions. This is ruining my life and you don't understand how it is. And I remember, and I can remember. I remember back to that statement.

Speaker 2:

And had I to do that over? I don't exactly remember what my response was, but I can, knowing myself at that time. I think my response would have been something like you know well, it's not just here that it's hard, or you know who knows why. I really can't remember exactly what I said, but had I to do it over again, I am pretty sure my response to that would have been somewhat defensive, that what he was saying was like, basically, like I would have interpreted that he's saying I'm putting him in this situation, which, in reality, the alienation had already started there.

Speaker 2:

Right, you can hear that in that, in the tone of that, that he is being pulled in a in a certain direction, and I was not doing that pulling at that time, and you know, if I had the chance to do it over again, the response to that would have been wow, that sounds really difficult. Could you, could you explain a little bit more about how you're feeling? Or, um, would you like to share more of your feelings on that? I'd really, I'd really like to hear what you're, what you're saying. And, uh, that was not the response at the time and uh, it would certainly be different now thank you for that, steven.

Speaker 1:

and yeah, the things that our kids say to us that are so incredibly, um, revealing that we tend to minimize at times or skip over because we're not necessarily fully emotionally in our bodies and available because we're under so much stress, which is real, like this is a crappy situation and just getting through this on a daily basis some days is impossible, and just to look back at that and be able to reflect on that again, I think is so rich and opens up a conversation later on with you and your son and just is so incredibly helpful to the community. So thank you for sharing that, stephen, because so many people are experiencing that today and this is a takeaway you can take today and actually go out into your life and use. And Anna, what about for you? Where has communication had an impact in your relationship with your kids? And maybe in a negative way or in some way that's propelled alienation forward just because of the situation, or passing over something, or being reactive, something to that degree.

Speaker 4:

I think what's been coming up for me thinking about the question, but listening to other people's answers too is that I'm only just learning how to communicate effectively myself. And so and that's in the last five, 10 years maybe, when I was more involved in my kids' lives and more actively playing the role of a mum because of the people-pleasing tendencies that I talked about earlier I can see now that I was modeling to them to not have a voice because I never, ever, really voiced my opinion. I picked the person in the room that I most wanted to please and we would go with whatever they wanted typically, and I never, never, had a voice really. And I mean that started for me really early on as a child. I learned I decided that I was going to switch my voice off because it didn't feel like what I had to say was acceptable, and so I switched it off and I've only really, in recovery, started to turn it back on again. So, and I can see with my two sons how that's played out for them in their own character development and the way they've dealt with what's gone on in the family.

Speaker 4:

Again, I didn't know how to do any differently, but it's interesting how no communication is. It's a form of communication as well, right, so I'm not happy that I passed that on to my children. I wasn't even aware that I was doing it, and it just for me. It points to how complicated this situation is. It was when I was living through it and it just for me. It points to how complicated this situation is. It was when I was living through it. It is now that I'm unpacking it. It is for my kids, as they're trying to figure out where their voice is and how they communicate, and it just reminds me how challenging it all is. Yeah, wow.

Speaker 1:

I think that's actually a really profound statement. Anna is really realizing that no communication is a form of communication and it's a bypass. And again, it's a way that we help propel some of these behaviors forward by our lack of even having words. You know what I mean. And again, no judgment just like oh yeah, this is in a lot of family systems and in a lot of relationships and the people pleasing weaves into that so seamlessly. And can we look at that? Can we start to change? Then do our kids have an opportunity to start to change? And that's, I think, that wonderful, wonderful, complex part of the equation that you're introducing. So thank you for that. And I'll say for me and I'm going to share this story like I'm an awesome communicator, you know. I mean I'm like really practice it a lot and I really listen to the nuances of what people are saying and stuff, and I can weaponize having a skill set.

Speaker 1:

So my oldest daughter, before she stopped talking to me, was graduating from college and our relationship was super challenging. You know she was alienated from 12 to 13 years old and then we had communication again until she was like 19 or 20 and um, so she's like nearly she had to be like 22 and she's getting ready to graduate and there's all this animosity and stuff and she's not saying she doesn't want me at the graduation. But she's not saying she, she wants me. So I'm having a really explicit conversation and I'm in the conversation I'm digging deep enough where I hey, like you have volition here and you have agency if you don't want me to be at your graduation, just saying it. So I created an environment for her to say something out loud that she didn't want to. Like I basically communicated it out of her. So I just want to say, with a person like I have a strong skillset which can be weaponized too. So I don't care if you're a lawyer or a psychiatrist, park place to park bench, whatever socioeconomic class you come from, like we can weaponize some of the stuff. We have street smarts, how we communicate, how we show up our body language.

Speaker 1:

Like I weaponized my kid into a certain behavior and then I want to yell parental alienation, that was mine, that was my bad, I take ownership of that. That was something that I really, really regret and uh, and one day maybe we'll get to make amends in person for it. But I just want to say that again, because we're all bumping up against these conversations around graduations, around weddings, around all these different places and we want it to look a certain way. And if it doesn't look that way, then we want to make it wrong with the other person wrong. And for me, like I, perpetuated parental alienation. I was parental alienation in that moment, but the person that was getting alienated by me was my daughter. So it's really powerful and important to talk about that. I'll just take a little breath here, rub my chest a little bit, maybe pat it a little bit and just yeah, I feel a little bit of emotion in my eyes. That was a. That was a good one.

Speaker 3:

If I can tag onto that, lawrence, I mean, I think in Al-Anon in Al-Anon we'd call that martyrdom. You know that you want to throw yourself under the bus and then be like the bus ran me over. Yeah, you did that, but I think we're all guilty of that.

Speaker 1:

A hundred percent, and I and I like the theatrics Julie, the hand on the head, the leading the head back, like it's all happening to me now and everyone's laughing and smiling. So this is the best part so far. Like this is reality, like this is serious and it's funny in a weird sort of way. I want to continue this conversation, but I want to open up the lens a little bit. We're talking about our kids, we're talking about our partners, but all of us have a bunch of other stakeholders we're dealing with. We have the therapists, we have the psychiatrists, we have the attorneys and we have the judges.

Speaker 1:

So I'm really curious, like where has our behavior contributed again to propelling some of these ideas or behaviors, or alienation, or estrangement forward, or estrangement forward? When have we been in court or when have we been talking to another professional where our behavior has actually done the opposite of what we were trying to do? And I think we're on to? I see Julie's shaking her head and she's last this time. Stephen, you're up first. I'm excited to hear what you have to say, though, julie.

Speaker 2:

I could pull my answer for all of those things. I'm not dealing with the legal system anymore, but I was for many years. But I do deal with counselors and I do deal with my kids and occasionally I deal with my ex and I deal with my wife's ex and her his wife, Good God. But I guess what I would boil it down to is there was a view on my part that there has to be a winner and there's a loser, and I'm not going to be the loser.

Speaker 2:

So I'm going to win in this situation, whatever I determine that to be, I'm going to win. And the reality is, in alienation, nobody wins. Nobody wins in alienation. And so this idea I had that I could win the alienation game. If I just convinced my kids to see things, see the full picture, they would get it. Or if I could just make the judge see it, or get my attorney to really understand what was going on here, that that would somehow change behaviors, or force my kids to force my ex to follow a decree that was in place, or you know, whatever the things are, there's so many I can't even I won't even go into them all.

Speaker 2:

But there was this, there was this deep desire in me to win. And what I mean by win is that somebody would hear my story, that they would hear my pain, that they would hear my suffering, and that that that that would change things. And uh, it was a fool's a fool's game, and there is no winning in alienation unless the alienation stops. And I guess I would say that I would have gone into it with, with the idea that the winning is how do we get the kids to win, and I thought I was doing that, but in hindsight there were many actions that weren't weren't lining up with getting. How do we get the kids to win? So that that would probably be the thing for me.

Speaker 1:

I would say thank you for that and I just want to pick up on one point you made, because I hear it all the time and I've experienced it too this idea, if we tell enough people our stories, like we're going to get enough people on our side, there's going to be like an army of zombies behind us and we're going to change something, we're going to affect something and by trying to get all these people on our sides, we're actually creating energy and inertia for this conversation to continue in a negative way and then people gossiping and all this other stuff happening and trickling down to our kids at some times or our spouses and creating a negative effect.

Speaker 1:

So that's what I picked up from your stuff is trying to get these teams on board. Then it extrapolates out and then it starts pushing that same ball up the same hill at a faster speed. Like we start to lose even more control in trying to tell everyone else story and I know so many of us just want to tell it and we identify with it and we become it and it's super destructive.

Speaker 2:

And I would say just one that's the thing that I've learned through the 12 step program is that, as I've been in the program longer and longer, that that narrative that I came in with we with the content narrative, where I have to really tell all the gory, nasty details of how I was done wrong and what was me and it was, you know, it's horrible, and gosh, I got traumatized, and all that stuff All that stuff may be true, but as I move further into recovery and healing, I don't feel the need to share that anymore. What I can share now is where I am now, how I'm moving forward, how I'm showing up today, which is a whole different story.

Speaker 1:

That's beautiful. That's beautiful. Thank you and Anna, same question for you Can you think of a situation or story where you're dealing with a therapist, an attorney, any other stakeholder, where your behavior has actually propelled stuff in the opposite direction of what you're trying to do?

Speaker 4:

I think my answer is kind of similar to Stephen's. I spent a lot of energy and a lot of time hoping that someone within the legal system or the mental health professionals would really see what was going on and would be able to do something to actively help and stop what was going on. And I can see now. I lost a lot of energy doing that and actually, as I was listening to Stephen talking to you, I was remembering that there and this is going off on a side tangent, I think but there were people within the mental health community that could actually see what was going on and couldn't necessarily do anything about it if the kids weren't saying that there were any issues, which was what happened in my particular circumstances. So that made me even more frustrated At certain points. It made me feel just as dumbfounded. So it caused me to feel stagnated and powerless and I sat in that place for quite some time, not knowing what to do with it and, turning that into, I'm being abandoned by the system. This is unjust and there was nowhere for that to go and it didn't help anybody. It certainly didn't help me and I was stuck in that mindset for quite a while. And then it gets taken recovery for me to be able to then have conversations about that and realize that it's part of a much bigger picture.

Speaker 4:

But it was a leak of energy that I couldn't afford in the first place because I was already so worn down with everything that was going on. I want to say it was a waste of time. I mean it was part of the process. I think I had to go through it in order to understand how futile it was. But I remember at the time thinking it added to the sense of craziness that I had about the whole situation anyway and the insanity and when I kept sitting in it that that wasn't helping me at all to move forward, to detach, to do any of those things. So it was uh, it certainly wasn't. It wasn't helpful, that's for sure, thank you.

Speaker 1:

And when I hear you talking about the professionals and wanting someone to take your side or identify it or just, you know, throw a book at your ex or whatever it was, it's like you actually giving away your agency and your real ability to advocate for yourself and abdicating your advocation to these professionals that you're spending 50 minutes with, and in that way, you are actually abandoning yourself. And abandoning yourself is another way of helping the inertia and propelling alienation through, in a completely different way, but just as powerful as anything we've discussed. Does that resonate my reflection?

Speaker 4:

Yeah, it does. I couldn't see it when I was in it, but I can certainly see that now. Yeah, it's very interesting. I had no clarity of thought going through all of this. That was which is which is. I'm grateful to say that I have. I have now, and yeah, more compassion, more clarity, more understanding of the bigger picture thank you.

Speaker 1:

And again I'm just going to say, like with the, with the parental alienation anonymous, the 12-step program, we start to get to look at a lot of the stuff in our behavior zone. We work with a sponsor who's kind of like a guide, or we work in a sponsorship pod and we start to look at this. And we also looking at this in community and hearing people's stories and experiences and just from this conversation I know I've had 50 aha moments. I'm like, oh yeah, me too. And then I remember this or I remember that, and if you're listening to this podcast and you have some little bells going off or some whatever deep breaths or whatever, that's what recovery looks like is we learn from each other and then we practice and we uncover, discover and discard stuff that's unuseful in our own lives. So you're actually working the 12 steps Congratulations. Anyway, julie, same question for you. I'm curious you seem really excited about this question Like, can you give us a situation where you might have not helped the cause?

Speaker 3:

Lord knows I did not help my cause. I mean, I got thrown into a pit of lawyers and multiple therapists and a psychiatrist and in the beginning I naively thought that when they heard my story they would give me my son back. You know, when they heard that these were false allegations, that my son actually never told a living human that I abused him, he typed it online to strangers in these chat rooms. But whenever a human adult asked him if they were true, he said no. I thought all I need to do is convey my story and then I'll get my son back. And no matter how many times I told my story, I got farther from my son and that made me angry. So the angrier I got, I got even farther away from my son, me angry. So the angrier I got, I got even farther away from my son and and it was turned against me as like well, he says you're angry and you look awfully angry, you'd be angry too. And I mean I really felt like I was living in the twilight zone. I was living in the upside down, like if I moved my right hand, everybody else moved their left hand, and what was happening and this image I couldn't get out of my head was of a, of a finger trap. And you know, the more you struggle, the more stuck you get. And the only way out of a finger trap is to stop.

Speaker 3:

And it took a year of me fighting and resisting and struggling and Thinking that I could educate the therapists and the lawyers and they would see how I was in the right. Well, they didn't, and it really wasn't, until I just shut up and just stopped fighting, which went against every fiber of my being. I'm a fighter, you are. You are not going to do me wrong and I'm just going to stand by and let you do it. But I had to. I. I just stopped communicating with the therapists and stop letting them provoke me. I mean, I feel like I almost felt like they were trying to provoke me just so they could point their finger at me and be like, see, there it is, that's the reason you don't have your kid.

Speaker 3:

So they would say things and I would just take deep breaths. I would channel Lawrence and say, well, that's interesting, I haven't looked at it from that perspective and, lo and behold, I started to get my son back. Oh, okay, it's been one of the most challenging things I've ever had to go through that. I literally had to do the opposite of what I thought I needed to do, but the answer was not to scream and yell and fight back. That wasn't getting me where I needed to go.

Speaker 3:

At first it felt like a betrayal of myself and when I would tell people that this was my strategy, they would argue with me that that was the wrong strategy. But I could see that I was making progress and I let go of trying to convince everybody that this was the right path and I just walked my path. And you know, maybe other people have experienced. People who don't know 12-step have very interesting reactions to 12-step and I get a lot of negative feedback about the fact that I participate in 12-step or the fact that I tell people that I participate in 12-step, because they're like oh, that's very taboo, you should not say that out loud. But I, you know I would tell people that no, I'm working in a 12-step and this is helping me. I'm working in a 12-step and this is helping me. But I no longer had to convince them it was the right path, because they would give me all kinds of feedback of.

Speaker 3:

I was in a cult or whatever whatever ideas people have about this program. But I saw that I was making progress, and the progress started with just. I can wake up every day and get out of bed, and that's good progress. I'll take it, and I slowly learned to just let the therapist say what they had to say. I don't have to agree with them. I just have to demonstrate that I am open to listening, and the fact that I stopped fighting was demonstration enough that I was willing to change. I no longer had to prove that I was right, because the fact that I have time with my son now means I did it. I don't have to prove it. I have time with him now and that's all I was ever fighting for.

Speaker 1:

I think that's a beautiful, poignant interest in this idea how counterintuitive battling these dynamics and these systems. Because really we're battling a system and the psychologist, the therapist, the attorney, judge are all part of a system and they're investing 50 minutes in the system with us and then they're bouncing out of the system and jumping into something else. So they're not really part of the system, they're just putting some pressure on the system at different points and then they leave. And this idea that you introduced about just stop fighting I would offer a reframe because for me this sounds like the real work and fighting such an interesting and divisive word. But this sounds like you were actually showing up for yourself in the most profound way by being able to have some introspection and reflection and see, okay, maybe something else is true and if it's not kind of like what you're saying with your mother, it's not mine and I'm okay that you say that and I don't need to disprove it, prove it, do anything. I think that's recovery is like I don't need to change what you're saying and I can say it in a useful way and then you got got your kid. Jesus, I want to cuss a little bit, but I'm not going to.

Speaker 1:

And I'm going to move here into our final question, just so you all know, because this is this is running a little bit longer than I thought, but just ridiculous good stuff going on. So the final question is kind of like the frosting right, like the cake's always good, but the more frosting the better, at least from my perspective. And like what does the frosting look like in your life Now? You're working a 12-step program, you have some resources, you have some community, you have some resiliency. Like what does that frosting look like in your life today and how has it manifested in your relationship with your kids, with your work, with your partner, with whatever you want to use as an example? Can you give us one example so people can really see, um and track the change from this conversation on some of the stuff we regret and some of the stuff we've learned from? But what are we cultivating today? What are we um harvesting from the garden today? So an, we are going to start with you on this one.

Speaker 4:

You know I think I started sharing this at the beginning of the conversation. I can't remember if you're recording or not, but working on these questions over the last week or so and thinking about things it's all of it is reminding me of how much more balance I have in my life now. I mean, I wasn't a good communicator. Before I started doing recovery work, I had a very narrow black and white perception of what had gone on in my life and what had happened to me. And then fast forward three years and 12 step work later and service work later and sponsor work later. It feels really I don't know if refreshing is the right word, but to be able to look at these questions and answer them and have all different feelings coming up and then listening to what everyone else is sharing and to be able to pull pieces out of that.

Speaker 4:

I feel like I'm living in a 3D world as opposed to a 1D world and I didn't have any of that sense of balance when I started and I still really miss my kids. But it's doing these podcasts and sharing this stuff. It makes it feel like I'm putting the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle together and so I help to heal myself. I love having these conversations and I hope that it stimulates some healing and some feeling in other people and I and I share this a lot. But I feel like it helps to heal my kids as well and gives people a way, gives them a way forward, and I feel so much lighter now. At the beginning I was feeling a little bit anxious and then partway through I thought I'm just going to go and have a little nap, like I wonder if they'll notice if I just go in, because I'm just my energy was tanking and I was starting to dissociate.

Speaker 4:

But now I can feel and this is what recovery feel like. Doing the questions is what happens when I do the step work, with my sponsor too. It puts the pieces together, and when I compare it to how lost and how little voice I felt I had and how much pain I was in when I started doing this work, it feels like night and day now. And it doesn't mean that I don't have moments that are painful and have times where I really miss my kids or I really want to beat myself up about decisions I've made. But the balance there's a lot more balance there and I have better connections with people, better communication, and I can go through my days and feel all the feels instead of just feeling like I'm just going to be perpetually stuck in fear and in pain.

Speaker 1:

Thank you and I love the word balance and I also like your description of the 1D world to the 3D world and I have a similar experience Like when I got here. I could only just see so much. I had a really limited view and because of the pain and the struggles and working on myself, my view has extrapolated out in so many different directions and the world in general is so much richer and I miss my kids. But the dimensions and what I can see puts me in the situation to be a completely different human being and a parent. So I love the 1D to the 3D world. I think that's a wonderful way to describe that and thank you for that. Anna. And frosting, julie. What kind of frosting do you have in your life?

Speaker 3:

Well, you know, I've battled depression for, I would say, my entire adult life and yet, despite the fact that I'm still in the middle of this situation, I think I have less depression than I've ever had, and I think it gave me an opportunity to take a step back and it gave me permission to focus on myself, because my kid wasn't here for me to focus on.

Speaker 3:

So I put myself in front and I moved out of a house that I'd been living in for 20 years, and part of the reason I stayed in that house was that it was the house I had with my ex-husband and I wanted my son to have this continuous environment and since he wasn't living with me, I felt like I think I can move now.

Speaker 3:

And not only was it a really positive move for me and an opportunity to let go of a lot of things you know things, physical things, but just a place that held bad memories and move into a new house and be excited about it, and my son's excited about the new house, and I've just embraced this new opportunity and I'm I'm not putting off things that I used to always put off, and the new house has a backyard pool and I like to do old lady water aerobics in my backyard pool and I can do it because nobody's watching me, so I don't care how silly I look and I've been enjoying it.

Speaker 3:

I get a kick out of it and it's good for me and I've just given myself space and permission to do things that are good and wholesome for me and it's it's helping beyond, just helping me build a better relationship with my son. I'm stepping out of decades of depression and I know that a huge piece of that is working this program and working with my sponsor and working with my sponsees and reading the literature and just expanding my whole vocabulary and mindset and routine has helped me build a new routine of what you get up in the morning and you read, your courage to change and all these little pieces are building a much better cupcake with frosting.

Speaker 1:

Thank you so much and I love the idea of routine. I love the idea that working with depression and removing your son to an appropriate position to decide to walk with you instead of you walking behind taking up all the space, and you actually coming home to yourself and finding yourself and finding your routine and finding your life, family system that's an inflection point in the family system that is sustainable and can create sustainable changes and that you're role modeling. That gives me so much hope for us, for our community and for other people. So wonderful, wonderful example. And, stephen, what frosting do you have for us?

Speaker 2:

Oh, the more frosting, the better.

Speaker 2:

As long as it's buttercream and not that confectioner sugar frosting Jeez, you know the thought that comes to mind. There's an old song and the line of the song goes I'm looking at the man in the mirror and I'm asking him to change his ways. And when I came into this program I was impatient with myself and others. I was judgmental of myself and others to a level that was not helpful and I made assumptions about motive at every turn. You know what's the motive of this, what's somebody's angle, what are they trying to do?

Speaker 2:

And the work I've done, you know, not just in the 12-step program but other work outside of the 12-step program, has changed those things to a lot of patience, a lot of compassion and a lot of trust.

Speaker 2:

That patience, compassion and trust started giving that gift to myself first.

Speaker 2:

Once I was able to give that gift to myself, I was truly able to give, to begin to give that to others, and life has become so, so much more rich and meaningful because of that and the gratefulness I have for this program I really I really can't put into words, but my hope is because you know, participating with this group and hearing and listening to everybody else's shares here.

Speaker 2:

Participating with this group and hearing and listening to everybody else's shares here. I just hope that you know one of the things it says in the I think it's in the closing of the meetings is it basically says to the newcomer there are those of us here who have had that same experience and I just hope that this podcast, or Lawrence, whatever the other podcasts are that have been done over time, that they will give hope to the person out there who still struggles, because I, we all, were struggling mightily at one time and we still do now, but but not to the level probably we did when we came and and I'm just uh, the gratefulness of, of not having that the struggle in that same way that I had 19, 18, 19 months ago, I can't put into words, so just super grateful.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for that. And again, I love that idea that you had to come home and find compassion and love and hope and and gratitude I love the word gratitude and you found all these words and you gave these to yourself so you were able to take them out into your relationships. And, again, a beautiful reflection of what recovery can do. And when we talk about recovery, we are talking about a 12-step program and a 12-step community, and we're talking about everything else that you're doing spiritually and you might find a different path. This is just happens to be one path that we're talking about. So all pals are welcome.

Speaker 1:

We're not telling you that there's one way. This is just about change and creativity and, you know, reconciliation and the reconciliation is actually with ourselves, in order to be able to reconciliate with other people, including our children and other family members. And with that, you three are rock stars. You've been beautiful and poignant and vulnerable, and what a cool conversation. So, thank you, have a beautiful day. You're more than welcome to just unmute for a second and say goodbye and then we will sign off.

Speaker 2:

Bye, guys thank you so much bye everybody thank you super wow, super wow.

Speaker 1:

These are the two first super wows that I think have been uttered on the show, but a phenomenal Stephen knocked it out of the park. Some really, really poignant stories and reflections. And Anna was phenomenal, as always, and I love some of the nuances she shared because her lens is a little bit different. Incredibly useful, because I relate to everything that she shared too. And Julie had just some wonderful stuff to share and also some different perspectives and you know, with a family of origin and and some of that like us versus them, and this is how it looks, and just these ideas that we take into court, into therapy, into conversations with our kids, and we create distance instead of connection and it's so important to own that. Like I create distance sometimes. I want connection. I create distance based on my behaviors and how I show up. So I feel empowered. I feel empowered the more that I see the mistakes that I make, the more that I hear other people share their experience, the better opportunity that I have.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for coming out to play. We appreciate you. If no one's told you yet today, we love you and yeah, yeah, it's strange to hear from a stranger, or maybe we're not strangers anymore, or maybe I know you and and it's beautiful. It's beautiful that we get to cumulatively walk and trudge this path together. So, thank you, have a beautiful day. Say hi to a puppy today. I think that's it. That's a call to action. Say hi to a puppy today. Thank you, take care, see you around the neighborhood. Thanks for taking the time to join me on this episode of Family Disappeared Podcast. Do you know someone who can benefit from what we're discussing on today's episode? If so, please share this podcast with them and anyone else in your community that might be interested in changing their lives. Together, we'll continue the exploring, growing and healing journey. I will see you on our next episode. Until then, happy days to all.