Family Disappeared

100th Episode: Healing from Parental Alienation | Survey Findings, Generational Trauma & Self-Work Part 1

• Lawrence Joss

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In this 100th episode of the Family Disappeared podcast, Lawrence Joss reflects on the journey of creating a supportive community for those affected by parental alienation. He shares insights from a recent survey, highlighting the generational impact of estrangement and the importance of community support in healing. The episode emphasizes the struggles of grief, loss, and anxiety while celebrating the transformations experienced by listeners and participants in the community. Joss encourages connection and self-care, reminding everyone that they are not alone in their experiences.

Key Takeaways

  • You're not alone in your grief.
  • Community-based activities have been transformational.
  • One third could track generational alienation.
  • Two thirds are in the court system.
  • Two thirds said their relationships improved.
  • Grief, loss, and anxiety are top struggles.
  • Community is what saves my life every day.
  • Transformation means I can breathe and engage in life.
  • Self-care is essential for relationships with children.
  • I love you, and that's transformational.

Chapters

00:00 - Introduction and Personal Reflections on Grief
02:55 - Celebrating 100 Episodes and Community Engagement
05:40 - The Birth of Parental Alienation Advocates
08:55 - Understanding Generational Impact of Alienation
11:44 - Survey Insights: The Community's Struggles
15:02 - Mental Health and Community Support
17:51 - Transformation Through Connection and Healing
20:38 - Closing Thoughts and Affirmations

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:

But I just want to tell you that you're not alone If you're grieving and you're crying all the time and you don't know what to do and your life feels like it's falling apart. Yeah, me too, I've been there. I felt that Some days, you know, it's really deep and hard and, as I said, I'm taping on Father's Day and, yeah, it's a hard day. There was a time in my life when I was overwhelmed and underwater. 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 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.

Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Family Disappeared podcast. Hi, my name is Lawrence Joss and welcome to the Family Disappeared podcast. Today is actually a really, really, really special day. It's our 100th episode and I will be doing a series of podcasts. The first podcast will include the survey that we did. We do a survey every two years of the whole community and there's some phenomenal information on there that I will share during the podcast and share how it relates to parental alienation, estrangement or racial anything else that you're going through. It's really some phenomenal information and it's community-based, it's not just one person's experience. So this is a huge population of people and everyone's contributing what they're going through and it's really important for us to see the intersectionality of all our different lives. You know, sometimes we feel all alone, but the survey gives us some really poignant moments to say oh yeah, I'm going through that too. Oh yeah. So anyway, if you're new to the podcast, welcome.

Speaker 1:

And this is a little bit different segment because it's our 100th episode, but we have 99 other episodes available to you. There's specific episodes on attorneys, therapists, there's panels of parents talking about different stuff. There's all kinds of playlists on YouTube, a bunch of stuff. So please check that out, and this is gonna be a wonderful episode too, I hope. 100 episodes is a lot and we wanna hear from you, the audience, the community, like is there anything else you want us to talk about? Is there anything you want more of? You can always get hold of me and the team at familydisappeared at gmailcom. We'd love to hear from you.

Speaker 1:

We also have a free 12-step support program, parental Alienation Anonymous, which is just phenomenal. You know it's transformed my life. You know 12-step has been a big part of my life and me getting through parental alienation because I couldn't do it alone. So our community is super sweet and loving and caring and it's life. Sometimes it's challenging too Like it has all those components as well. So we'd love to see you at a meeting. There's a bunch of other great resources in the show notes. There will also be a copy of the survey, which is super interesting to read through and please share. Share with friends, family and therapists, lawyers, judges. You know we mail out to all these folks to try and educate them and advocate for change and also advocate for community support and more on peer to peer stuff, instead of these people out there charging exorbitant fees to fix this or change that or do this. We've really felt that community based activities have been transformational for so much of that. And that's a lot out of me and with that let's jump into the show and see what happens.

Speaker 1:

So I'm sure I've told the story before in one of the podcasts, but like, how did we get here as a community? How did the podcast start? How did the organization start? And the organization is Parental Alienation Advocates and under this umbrella of Parental Alienation Advocates, we have Parental Alienation Anonymous, which is a free 12-step program. We have a podcast Family Disappeared. We have a bunch of trainings we're trying to get off the ground, which we'll talk about a little bit later on Nonviolent communications, somatic tracking, family systems and so many other things that are super exciting, and we have an advocacy pillar, which we'll talk about a little bit too. So how do we get started?

Speaker 1:

So I started the meetings because I was suffering. I didn't do it to help anyone, I did it because I didn't want to die, because the pain was just so intense, and I had this framework for 12-step meetings on my desk for years and I think a lot of people will resonate with this. I was struggling. I didn't know what to do. I was reaching out to experts, I was reaching out to different folks and I happened to reach out to a particular therapist therapist and expert in the field Lynn Steinberg. I gave her a call and we both landed up, being from South Africa originally, and we had this wonderful conversation and it kind of switched from a therapist-client conversation to a peer conversation to two people that were talking about what they were doing to help support people in their communities and around the world.

Speaker 1:

And at that time, covid had just started and Lynn previously had a group on Meetup for in-person meetings. And I was compiling my stuff and she's like hey, why don't you take over my meetup group and you can use these people as contacts, you can use your contacts? And I'm like, okay, so it's really interesting because that was the impetus, like everything came together at one time in that moment and I had enough energy to go forward and I think you'll relate to this too, like some days I don't have energy to do anything, I'm just tired, I'm just trying to get through the day. I just want my life to be back to normal. I want my kids back in my life, I just want to be a dad, I want someone to tell me that they love me and say hey, dad, you know, and that wasn't the case.

Speaker 1:

So this conversation with Lynn happened and we launched the website, we launched Parental Alienation, anonymous, the 12-step program, and and at that time the podcast was already developed. The ideas were already there, but it seemed like a lot of work. Like how do you do a podcast Like? What does that mean? How do you get guests? How much does it cost? All these different things that I had no idea because this isn't part of my lived experience until it has been the last hundred episodes. The podcast started about two years later. We're coming up on our five-year anniversary next March and it has been a wonderful experience talking to people all over the world and having these wonderful conversations. And the community is incredible and we've had so many panels of wonderful parents that their lives have been transformed.

Speaker 1:

And transformation doesn't mean I got my kids back. Transformation doesn't mean that my life is perfect. Transformation means that I can breathe, I can get through the day, I have a full and robust life, I engage in activities, I love people. I miss my kids still, but I love me and I love people too. And I'm in a Zendo and a Zendo is kind of like a meditation room, comes out of the Zen tradition, and I'm in Hawaii, on the big island, and I'm off grid homesteading.

Speaker 1:

This is my second trip here. I've recorded some episodes, maybe 20 episodes ago out here, and, yeah, how'd I get to be homesteading, who knows, but I am and it's been a wonderful adventure. It's wonderful getting back to the land. It's been so incredibly healing. I feel I'm healing, I feel my kids are healing, just by connecting to the land. But anyway, I'm in Mazendo. In that direction is a little door to a little small bedroom, don't have electricity and I don't have running water here yet. So my neighbors next door in that direction are super sweet and that's how I landed up on this property, by going to some retreats, self-help retreats, just to kind of find myself. And I met a wonderful community and they told me about this property. And here I am recording the 100th episode from the big island in Hawaii and saying aloha to you all. Thanks for coming out on the journey today.

Speaker 1:

And let's jump into the survey. Let's see what it has to say. I forget to mention something super important it's Father's Day and I'm taping the 100th episode and I'm in Hawaii and I intentionally came to Hawaii on the 11th of June and you know, if you're in the United States, father's Day is the 15th of June. I'm not sure what it would be in other countries or if it's celebrated that way. I'm not really sure.

Speaker 1:

But I intentionally came here because I wanted to really care for myself. I wanted to be in a loving environment. I wanted to be in nature. I thought it'd be a really wonderful gift for myself and also wanted to have a little bit more space for my daughters, because it's super, super painful, because you don't get any kind of connection. So this is what I've chosen to do and I've been going through this for that.

Speaker 1:

I've known about, you know, 19 years and existing in the family was probably from the time my first daughter was in. You know my ex-wife's belly in vitro. So it's been a long trip and it's taken me a long time to be able to really care for myself and really prioritize my life and building community. And I will show up for my kids if they want me to. But I got to show up for myself first, because if I don't show up for me, there's no relationship with the kids. It just doesn't work. If I'm not working on myself, even if I have contact, I'm going to blow this stuff up, or they're going to blow something up and I'm going to react and then it's all just going to crumple. I don't know if I'm being a little bit bumpy today and moving in different places, and if I am, eh, and if I'm not, eh.

Speaker 1:

Anyway, let's see what the survey has to say. So just to clarify who is in the survey? So it's pretty broad. We're not just saying people that resonate with the term parental alienation. We're saying people that resonate with the term parental alienation, people that identify as estranged, people that identify as erased, like we really want this to be a big tent, like it doesn't need to be under one title. So many of us are struggling with these kind of relationships and we have different perceptions and ideas of what that means to us. So it's super important to include as many people as possible and not to exclude people in our own community.

Speaker 1:

You know, I see at times that people are struggling Am I estranged? Am I alienated? Do I belong? Yeah, you belong. You belong right here in the community if that feels good to you. If it doesn't feel good to you, find a place that feels good Like community is the thing that saves my life every day. And that doesn't mean that it's only parental alienation communities. It means that it's through my spiritual practices, through my meditation practices, through my yoga, it's through the community next door that I really enjoy hanging out with and you know we get to cook together every night. We check in with everyone every morning, kind of like a little meeting. No one? No, I can't say that Some people are estranged and have different things going on in their families. They don't necessarily identify in a kind of way that I identify, but it's wonderful and it's not a parental alienation based check and it's just people living together, coming together, struggling with different things in their lives and building lovely, beautiful new lives.

Speaker 1:

So the first thing on the survey that I want to talk about is generational impact and you're like generational impact I know some of you can completely understand that, but for folks that might be struggling with the terminology that I'm using. So generational impact is if my father was maybe estranged or alienated from his parents or his siblings or someone in his family, or maybe even from me, and then you go down the generational line, you go down the maternal line, you go down the paternal line and you can start to track where you see flavors of this happening in your family and even places that you never really realized, like my grandmother was one of nine or ten kids and she spoke to one sibling and I'm not really sure what happened in her family because she passed before. I came to understand a lot of this stuff. But that's something for me to be curious about the person that I chose to marry and have my kids with. She was alienated from her father for 13 or 14 years, right? So on the paternal line you can see she was alienated from her father. But then you also look at the maternal line, right? So she was alienated from her father and now she's part of the system and the person that I qualify for that I don't know if I want to call her an alienator.

Speaker 1:

Some people might do that. She's a person that's had a lot of trauma in her life and is creating some discourse in my family system is creating a lot of harm, from my perspective, for the children. You know, and yeah, whatever terminology you want to use, but just getting back to the maternal line, so you got her and then you got her mother in the maternal line that did the same thing with her, and then how far back does that go in the maternal line? So you can see it can be in both different directions, it can come in all different things. And to be curious about these things, like where are they coming from? Where's the trauma coming from? Like this just doesn't materialize one day. And this is what the family system is. This is actually brewing and coming down and getting handed down in DNA or technology or whatever it is from my perspective, and sometimes it's just trauma and sometimes it's just life. But the way that I can track it in my family system it goes back in a lot of different directions.

Speaker 1:

And the really interesting thing about the survey is one third one third of the people that responded could track generational alienation, estrangement, erasure, trauma whatever word they want to use in their family system. That's a significant number and if we dug deeper with those other people, would that number go up? I think so. But it's something to think about, it's something to look at and it's part of my healing is understanding the family system the maternal, the paternal family system and also myself and how I'm wired and what attracts me to that kind of behavior. You know what I mean Like what was it in my ex-wife that's kind of being programmed into me, that codependency, that enmeshment, that closed family system that helped brew alienation to this degree? And it was trauma that's coming down the maternal line. But I was still part of that system and why was I so?

Speaker 1:

These are things to be curious on why it's so important when we're talking about generational trauma, and for you to be really, really curious about your own family system, and if that sounds like a great topic to talk about, let us know and we'll get some experts and some folks together and talk more about it and anything that I'm talking about. I need community to step up and say, hey, I want to talk about that, or I know a great expert, or these are some really interesting questions that I'd love to have answered and I'd love to answer any of your questions. So, familydisappeared at gmailcom, send me your questions. Let's have a couple shows of just questions on any topic that we've spoken about and possibly topics we haven't spoken about. But if we don't have lived experiences or experiences with interviewing other people, it might be difficult to answer some of the questions. So I just want to let you know that.

Speaker 1:

Another really startling fact, at least to me, is that two-thirds of the folks that responded to the survey are in the court system. That's a staggering amount of people and a staggering amount of pain, and they were finding a lot of support, whether it's through the podcast, whether it's through the 12-step meetings, whether it's through the other resources that we're offering, but two-thirds of people in court. You know what I mean. So if you're struggling and you're feeling all alone and separated, there's a lot of people going through that same thing and that's why coming to meetings or getting connected to the podcast in a deeper way gives you more community. That's going through the same stuff and you don't have to do it alone and I don't think we're necessarily going to tell you this is the professional to go talk to. But we have people that you can talk to. You can share their experience. They can share their experience with you. That's what a 12-step meeting is. It's about sharing our own direct experiences, so we don't have to do it alone and it's free. Just saying so. I love this step.

Speaker 1:

Over two-thirds of the respondees said their relationships with their loved ones have improved since listening to the podcast, since going to 12-step meetings a combination of both, maybe just one or the other, and that is substantial. And just to quantify this to and that is substantial and just to quantify this to say that their relationships have improved doesn't mean that their relationships are perfect and doesn't even necessarily mean that they got their kids back. But some people 100% have got the kids back, have saved their relationships, have changed the arc of parental alienation, estrangement, erasure, whatever you want to call it Like. There's so many tools that we're providing and so many other tools out there that you don't have to go through this long, long, long arc. But if you do want relief and change in the family system, you're going to have to do a bunch of work on yourself, which is the crappy part of that.

Speaker 1:

And in this two thirds, I know I've spoken to so many people and they're like oh my God, my relationships changed so much with my sibling, my relationship at work has shifted. I'm learning so much about myself, I'm able to connect with people in a completely different way. And as we change all these relationships in our lives, we give our relationships with our children the best opportunity to grow, flourish and change. If I'm not changing everything in my life, if I'm not entering relationship in a different kind of way, then how am I going to relate to my kids with all this craziness going on, with all this indoctrination they've been through? How am I going to relate to them if I'm not doing the work around all this stuff? It's just impossible. So super important thing and super wonderful thing Two thirds of people, their intimate relationships are changing.

Speaker 1:

Like, let's just take that, stick it in a fortune cookie and call it a day. Right, stick it in a fortune cookie and call it a day, that's a good one. Someone write that down. So we also gave folks a list on the survey to, you know, said like what were you struggling with the most when you came in here? And just think about that for a second. Like what are you struggling with the most now? What have you been struggling with the most now? And see if this relates to some of loss and anxiety. Top three pretty simple with everything that we're going through, it makes a lot of sense. But I just want to tell you that you're not alone If you're grieving and you're crying all the time and you don't know what to do and your life feels like it's falling apart.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, me too, I've been there. I felt that Some days. You know, it's really deep and hard and, as I said, I'm taping on Father's Day and yeah, it's a hard day, it's a rough day. How do I take care of myself? That grief is still there, but it's not debilitating. I can still go out and connect with community. I can still take care of myself, yeah, and if you're like anxious and going to work and doing mundane activities seem impossible, me too I couldn't work for like a year when this all started and I didn't understand anything and I had no support. But I did go to a support group and it saved my life and I didn't know the term parental alienation but I went and got help because I was dying. You know, parental alienation.

Speaker 1:

Anonymous is great. Al-anon is phenomenal. We're based off the Al-Anon program. They have parent-focused meetings. I highly suggest that. If you're looking for in-person meetings, coda has some really great stuff going on. There's some great groups out there, which is super great to look at yourself and work on yourself. And if you're really looking for a place where you can share the same language, parental Alienation Anonymous is that place. You don't have to explain anything, but some of these other communities offer some wonderful, wonderful healing tools as well. So I just want to articulate that. I don't know how often we articulate that, but there's a lot of wonderful organizations doing a lot of wonderful work.

Speaker 1:

Let's talk about depression. Yeah, that one stings. It's dark some days and I'll also say it gets super sunny too and it does take some time in this process, at moments where you are walking through dark stuff, and if you listen to some of the parent focus meetings and the panels and you hear all these parents that were struggling and in this place and just you know, struggling to breathe, and then you hear about the transformation. So, wherever you are, there is hope and this community might be the place for you and we'd love to have you as part of the community. We'd love to hear from you, I'd love to see you at a meeting or one of the other pillars, and maybe this isn't the community for you, maybe there's a different community for you.

Speaker 1:

But find folks for support. It's impossible to do this alone and it's impossible for me to do this just with my family. Like, my family, from my perspective, is cut off emotionally from the idea of my kids because it's just too painful and I can't necessarily go there for some great support. So if I don't have community, you know what I mean. I'm up a creek without a paddle. I'm up a creek without a paddle, I don't know how to swim and I don't know how to get out of the boat. It's problematic. So I'm just saying please be kind to yourself, find your community, be kind to yourself, find your community.

Speaker 1:

You know this is also cool and it's about mental health and physical health and just functioning in the world, and a majority of folks that have listened to multiple podcasts as one door of entry or have gone to relatively consistent meetings have experienced some dramatic shifts in their mental health, in their physical health and also their ability to function in the world. Right, I can feel okay mentally and I can feel OK physically at home, but when I go out and I interact, I see families that are happy together and I see all that stuff going out there. That sometimes is super triggering, especially in the beginning. Can I interact in the world? And we're showing through the survey, a majority of folks that are committing to do their own work are experiencing this difference and this change. Right, don't you want something different for yourself? And that it already exists and there's already people that are experiencing a really positive and measurable change in their life. Like that's a big deal. Like if I can measure change, if I can see change from last father's day to this Father's Day, that's measurable. I'm out in the world, I'm tracking myself Super, super cool. Okay, I'm going to go with a wow, a wow wow and a wow Good show, great content.

Speaker 1:

At least in my head it sounded really good and I'm hoping you really enjoyed the conversation. Familydisappearedatgmailcom, I want to hear from you. 501c3 nonprofit support us if you can. Rental Alienation Anonymous free 12-step meeting. Beautiful people, beautiful community. We hope to see you around and, if it's your first time on the show, thank you for coming out and playing with us today. I'd like to finish the show with this If anyone has not yet told you today that they love you, I love you, and that's one of the greatest gifts that I've gotten out of working on myself and being of service is that I get to say I love you and mean it.

Speaker 1:

People used to say that to me when I first got into 12-step program. It was so nice to hear that someone cared about me and that someone loved me and that I wasn't a crappy person, a crappy parent, a crappy human. So it's transformational. And as I practice saying that it's transformational Again, it's transformational Again, it's super difficult, like who goes and says, hey, I love you, and you're saying it to random people and sometimes it feels shallow and not real.

Speaker 1:

And in this moment, in this struggle, in this message in this community, in this thing that we're striving to, as we're paddling against the stream, to try to get somewhere, to try to create change, to try to save our lives. Yeah, I love you, I, you, I love you. I love you in this moment. Happy father's day to anyone out there celebrating father's day, happy parents day, happy any other day that you're having today, or maybe just happy, happy day, and with that, I love you. See you around the neighborhood and let me know what you think about the show. 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.