After a divorce, you may experience hostility from your ex. In some cases, your former spouse may try to use your children against you. They may try to alienate you from your children.
According to Healthline, the term parental alienation syndrome became known in 1985. While not an official syndrome, it does refer to the mental health effects that children may suffer from because of one parents' actions.
How do children react to parental alienation?
If you fear your ex wants to alienate you, there are warning signs to look out for. One of the first signs is that your children will criticize you unfairly. They may not have strong evidence or justifications for the criticism but will not recognize that fact. Parental alienation causes children to lack ambivalence. They will not feel guilty or unsure about their feelings.
You may notice that your children use adult language when describing situations that they should not know of. You can typically tell when children learn a story or hear tales from the other parent.
How does the other parent act during parental alienation?
Your ex may try to keep your children from seeing you. He or she may make plans to go on vacation to convince your children to ask for more time with the other parent. Generally, alienators do not fill you in on different details of your children's lives. If your children become ill or a parent-teacher meeting you did not hear about, your spouse may keep you out of the loop.
When it comes to parental alienation, you need to keep track of the warning signs so that you can show proof of alienation.