2017 Bring It On!

It’s January 1, 2017 (observed)

One of my personal goals for 2017 is to rewire my perspective about my life.  Ok, you got me… this has been my personal goal every new year since I can remember, but I am getting closer.

I got thinking about my life in general.  I was impressed with how emotionally stable I was as I sifted through the chronology of tortures.  Then, all of the sudden, I clearly heard chanting; 

“IT REALLY SUCKED!   IT REALLY SUCKED!  

IT REALLY SUCKED!”

I am usually oblivious to these intrusive negative mood persuaders, but I was pretty sure that this was one of those thoughts that could implode into an emotional meltdown if I didn’t keep the thought from triggering my overly sensitive stress response system. 

I stopped right in the middle of my living room and demanded,

“Really? My life sucked? 

According to who?”

Now here’s the dilemma, I am the only one in the room.  I know very well that the taunting remarks were echoes of years of verbal abuse from my ex-husband, but why was I still doing his dirty work?  Why was I still marching down that same path to trigger my emotional pain?  

While having contact with my ex-husband directly or by what he was doing to the children, he controlled my emotions and self worth, he made me question my intellect, and cultivated my perceptions of the present and the future.  After cutting off contact with him,  I found myself living only in the past.  The past with him in it. The past with my children in it. The past that was 1/2 empty. 

 I have processed a lot of the trauma and the past is starting to become the past, which has no control over my present or future.   But the past will always control our present and future if we filter our perceptions of the world through glass that is ½ empty.

In her Ted Talk, Alison Ledgerwood discusses how we get stuck in the negatives with those pesky personal rejections (10 minutes).

After watching this Ted Talk, I began to challenge myself to see my world as it is.  This will take conscious, mindful work, but here is how I am going to start.

When I think about my years in hell and family court (which are one in the same),  I am amazed.  I did everything humanly possible to stop my ex-husband from abusing our children.  And, I did it to the best of my ability.

 I did it alone. 

I did it afraid.

I did it traumatized.

I did it depressed.

I did it exhausted.

I did it all AND

I stayed in the game.

As for 2017, Johnny Truant gives us this advice:

 “This is game time, champ.

You're in.

You're in, playing, right now,

and the clock is ticking.”

 

 

The Momentum Is Unstoppable

This has been an amazing week, despite my last blog.

And about that…

I am sorry if my last blog made you feel sad.  I was selfishly thinking only about me at the time.  I usually don’t complain.  I know that rumination only reinforces the triggers that cause me to relive the trauma.  But it is healthy to journal and I guess that I needed to vent. You know what it is like to try to tell someone about what the narcissistic/borderline has done to you.  There are no words that can adequate describe the emotions.   No matter how much our friends and family love us, they can’t relate.

For that reason, you are an incredible blessing to me.  You’ve felt the depth and breath of the worse days of my life.  You not only hear me---you know me.   Your understanding and your will to keep fighting is what keeps me going. Thank You.

OK, on to the Good News:

Holiday time or not, the work to save and protect our children and us continues, thank God.  The momentum has been swiftly and steadily rising over the last year.  Given the progress that I’ve seen this fall, 2017 will make history. 

Let me share a few very recent examples of how we are beginning to turn the corner on narcissistic/borderline family abuse.

1. Last Thursday, I went to a presentation by a very popular nutritionist (I still want to lose some weight).  Do you know what she talked about?  ACEs and trauma!  As I listened I thought, “This is not an accident.”  The presenter explained that chronic high levels of cortisol from traumatic stress (our ex-partners) breaks down muscle and turns it into fat.  So those of us who have CPTSI – Complex posttraumatic stress injuries are prone to weight gain even if we are eating healthy.  That explained why nutrisystems didn’t work for me! 

We all need to go on an elimination diet.  We need to eliminate the narcissistic/borderline from our lives and that includes our thoughts, feelings and reactions.  For many of you actively engaged in the battle, you need to see this person as he or she really is.  Mentally ill, void of empathy, and living in a delusion.   Narcissistic/borderlines are dead to this world but extremely toxic to everyone else.  They are like an android, programmed by their parents.  There is no upgrade.

2. Speaking of ACEs.  Everyday, more and more articles come across my desk like this one from the Chronicles for Social Change.

“The blockbuster Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) Study has become the fulcrum of a powerful and diverse consortium of interests bent on preventing and addressing childhood trauma.

Groups ranging from pediatricians and charitable foundations to politicians have increasingly asked how this growing body of research—which clearly shows how bad events experienced as a youngster can negatively affect adult health—can be applied to policy and practice.

While a politically viable and economically feasible strategy to lift up the lives of millions of children has been elusive, the interim step of using the study’s Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) questionnaire as a screening tool is gaining traction.”

This means that we are going to start to see routine screenings for ACEs at just about every point in which our children touch society.  Whenever and wherever our children are screened. it will set off alarms that our children have an ACE score of 7+.  The first question they will ask is, “What has this child been through to cause so much trauma?”   The second question that will be asked is, “How do we reduce this ACE score?”  There is only one way, and we know what it is.

3. I was surprised to read that Dr. Bernet of the Parental Alienation Study Group is familiar with how ACEs cause mental health problems.   He included a discussion about ACEs in an article he published with members of the DSM-V last summer.  While he got some of the information wrong in the article and is still on the fringes of the problem-- pushing the language “parental alienation,” it is obvious that ACEs are entering into every conversation about child abuse and neglect.

4. Also, in a recent blog, Dr. Craig Childress strongly asserts that mental health professionals must STOP using the words"parental alienation.”  He mentions that parents can still use this nondescript term, but I totally disagree. We all need to be on the same page.  We may be traumatized, but we are not stupid.  We have lived through triangulation, aligning a child in a cross-generational coalition and splitting so we can certainly attest to it by the scientific names. Personally, as the parent, I don’t want to look ignorant or throw any obstacles in the way of interventions.  The words “parental alienation” will always divert the attention from our families and ignite the age-old controversies.  Besides, one the strongest assets for the ACE framework is that it provides a common language and platform for all of us to use, and that framework will never include the words “parental alienation.”

5. The BBC aired an excellent investigation about “parental alienation” on one of their network channels.  Within the short documentary, they defined “parental alienation” as a set of strategies that one parent uses against the other…  This is exactly right.  You and I know that these strategies are rooted in the narcissistic/borderline’s decomposition into persecutory delusions because they are reenacting their own attachment trauma.  But, that’s not necessary to explain…yet.

6. From the family court arena, a member of the Alliance and a candidate for both her family law and social worker degrees, recently published an article in Family Court Review titled: High Conflict Divorce: A Case of Child Neglect.  In her well-documented article, Alexa Joyce proposes that high conflict divorces are cases of child (emotional) neglect and should involve child protective services. I talked with Alexa about how well her article has been received by the extremely conservative but powerful Association of Family and Conciliation Courts.  Alexa told me that her arguments (which stem from the ACE study) are strongly supported. 

7. Finally, an investigative reporter has taken on the daunting task of exposing how Family Court Judges are placing children with the abusive parent.  I don’t want to let this cat out of the bag just yet, but she has already published in ACEs Too High.  I'm following up.

On a personal note, I was honored to receive a full scholarship to attend Rick Hansen’s Foundations of Well Being Program.  It starts in January and I am sure I will learn ways to improve my life by using my brain, by one of the best teachers.  I look forward to sharing. .

Kay

The Ghosts of Christmas Pasts

Even though I grew up in poverty with my severely handicapped mother and an alcoholic father who was rarely home, I loved everything about Christmas. 

I knew that Christmas was about Jesus bringing light and love to a weary world and sharing what you could with others. These were things I could have.  Besides, my Aunt Dot would always give me $10.00, which seemed like a fortune. 

The day after Thanksgiving, we would go up into the attic and bring down the advent wreath, some garland and my mom’s Christmas tapes. My mom would listen to her favorite Christmas music over and over all the way through Christmas Day. We kept trying to give her new ones, but Christmas wasn’t Christmas if she didn't hear her favorite songs.

She delighted in everything that my sister and I did to decorate the old dilapidated house.  We draped the living room with treasures that we found in huge bins at St. Vincent DePaul and lit up every corner with brightly colored lights. Even the ratty, pink, lace wreath had a special place over the fireplace.

Every Christmas was magical, UNTIL I got married.  Little by little my narcissistic husband choked the joyful spirit out of the season.  His birthday was on December 23rd, and he constantly reminded everyone that he had always been “ripped off” because of Christmas.  He would make up stories about how sad his birthdays were when he was growing up to get sympathy and to keep the focus on him.

Of course, I didn’t know that the stories were not true. So every year, I was determined to make his birthday so special that he would forget all the bad ones before.  Of course, that never worked.  No matter how elaborate the plans or how much everyone focused on him for the day, his birthday was never anything but a “rip off” And he never missed the opportunity to tell us so. He carried this chip on his shoulder from Thanksgiving through December 26th.  Now, I have only a handful of memories of past Christmases that don’t bring tears to my eyes.

Our daughter, Alexis was always wide-eyed and quiet.  She was confused about how everyone was happy about the holidays except her dad.  He was a stay at home and she had bonded closely to him.  Whatever her dad felt, she felt. Christmas was confusing for her.  By 4 or 5, she had figured out that her father would snap at her for just about anything during the Holiday Season, so it was best to stay out of the way.

Our younger son, Scotty was more wild-eyed than wide eyed.  I guess he inherited my genes of a love for Christmas.  Up until he was 6, Scotty loved Christmas too.  His eyes sparkled brighter than the lights on the tree.  He had no sense of time and everyday he would ask if it was Christmas yet. He was a list maker like me, and would write down every toy he saw on T.V. during December.  But, the most fun we had on those early family Christmases was when Scotty and I would mix oatmeal and brightly colored glittered together for Santa’s reindeer.  Scotty was worried that Santa wouldn’t find our house because we lived so far out in the country. We needed something to make our house visible to the reindeer from the sky.  On those cold, crisp, early Christmas Eves, Scotty and I sprinkled our special reindeer food all over the driveway before we hurried off to bed.

As Christmas morning rolled around, the kids would be jittery and giggly. They bounced on the bed, announcing that Santa had come and begged to dive under the Christmas tree.  I smiled and waited. Sometimes their dad would play with them for a little while and I would think for a moment that maybe this year would be different.  But narcissists can only tolerate seeing that others are happy for a short time; even when the “others” are their children.  It never took too long before he would get angry at them and demand military obedience.

First, the kids had to settle down and eat breakfast. Then, when much of the wind was taken out of their sails, we walked into the living room for the presents.  Opening Christmas presents was regimented and required the “proper” emotional control.

I did love to watch my children open the presents I had bought and wrapped with all my love. I also liked helping them pick out or make gifts for their dad.  After the presents were opened and everyone was busy playing, no one would notice me leave the room with nothing.  My husband never even looked up or thanked me for all the extra time I had put into decorating, cooking, baking, buying and wrapping presents, etc.  I always did these things alone.

As I cleaned up the paper, scissors and tape that I had left out from my late night wrappings, I cried softly, happy that there were at least a few hours of quiet and concentrated play.  I consoled myself by trying to focus on Jesus and thanking God that the holiday torment was over for another year. I didn’t need any presents, I was more concerned that my children had learned that Christmas was all about their dad. 

The longer I was married, the more my feelings of Christmas joy and wonder turned to work, disappointment and fear. Then came the year that we divorced and it got a lot worse.

It was 2009. My ex-husband had the kids on Christmas Eve and I was to have them Christmas Day.  About 10 am, my ex-husband galloped into my house with Alexis on his back.  He smiled at me.

I looked behind the both of them. Where’s Scotty? I questioned. “He didn’t want to come,” my ex said, as if it were no big deal.   I barely heard my ex-husband babbling explanations and telling me what I should and should not do. I grabbed my coat and headed out the back door.

“There is no way, I’m going to be without my son on Christmas!” My mind raced as fast as my car. “No way, he or they are going to start this; my son, my day, my Christmas.  Scotty, what are you doing? What are you thinking? You have no reason, no reason at all not to want to be with me on Christmas.” Who gave him a choice and why?  He is only 13!  He is my son too!”

I pulled into the driveway.  The house had absolutely no decorations, not even a Christmas tree.  It looked as bare and empty as my ex-husband's heart.  I rushed out of the car and I was through the door starring at my son before I knew it. “What?” Scotty asked. I paused. “Get your coat, it is Christmas and it is my time with you.” I said calmly but sternly. “I’ve let you stay with your dad a few extra days here and there, but I will not spend Christmas without you.”  Scotty didn’t move or didn’t argue. “This is not a choice young man, it is not your decision, it is not your father’s decision.  If your dad wants to change placement he has to go through the court, until then we follow the placement orders.”   Scotty and I locked eyes.  “No, I am not going with you to your house.”

I reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone. My ex-husband jogged into the room behind me and I heard him say, “You’re not going to call the police.”  Wow, was that a question or a command?  “I will if you don’t tell Scotty to get his coat and get in the car, now.” I said, never changing the tone of my voice or taking my eyes off of my son.  I dialed the number.

Officer Henzel arrived in minutes and assessed the situation.  He went into the living room and sat down next to Scotty.  My ex-husband and I backed into the kitchen ignoring each other. Scotty came out of the living room, got his coat and headed out the door in stony silence. When we got back to my house, he promptly locked himself in his room.

Christmas didn’t exist in 2010.  I didn’t put up a tree, declined invitations and tried to pretend that it was just another day.  Scotty now hated and rejected me and Alexis had learned that Christmas was about her dad and had become passively aggressive.

I would be alone and that was all I wanted. I knew I wouldn’t be able to hold back the grief, loneliness and loss. Crying was the only way I knew to release the years of hurt and disappointment that had turned Christmas from a time of joy to the most dreaded time of the year.  I hated the entrepreneurs who would shove the illusions of happy families, decked halls, and shared laughter under your nose.  It only served to pry the gap between my dreams and reality farther and farther apart.

It’s now 2016. My children are 20 and 22.  I have not had a Christmas or a Thanksgiving with my children since 2009.  Some years have been easier than others, but there is no denying that every Christmas I am visited by the Ghosts of Christmas Pasts.  

America In Distress

I was told that somewhere down that great, great, great…grandmother line, I am related to Betsy Ross.  So be assured that I would never do anything to our flag that was disrespectful or anti-patriotic.  Today, I am flying my flag with the union side down because under

THE UNITED STATES FLAG CODE, Title 4, Chapter 1§ 8(a)
 

The flag should never be displayed with the union down,

except as a signal of dire (serious or urgent) distress.

Distress is defined as: 1. great pain, anxiety, or sorrow; acute physical or mental suffering; affliction; trouble.  2. the state of a ship or airplane requiring immediate assistance. 3. that which causes pain, suffering, trouble, danger, etc. 5. liability or exposure to pain, suffering, trouble, etc.; danger.   America is in distress as the war against health and happiness escalates behind closed doors

We all need to fly our flags upside down. 

America is in dire distress from Adverse Childhood Experiences that cause negative physical and mental health outcomes for more that 60% of our population.

For generations, Americans didn’t have to care about what was happening next door.  Words like domestic violence and child abuse slipped in one ear and out the other.   Americans relied on severely under-reported, meaningless government statistics, to lull us into complacency while the epidemic of violence within our families grew. 

The dire distress cannot be contained behind the government statistics anymore.  In 1998,  a study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Kaiser Permanente clearly documented the factors that determine negative physical and mental health outcomes for an individual from infancy to adulthood (2014, American Academy of Pediatrics). 

The CDC/Kaiser Study discovered specific Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) that are extremely common and can cause profound immediate and long-term psychological distress and functional impairment to affected children (2012, American Journal of Orthopsychiatry).  These ACEs include all chronic abuse, and/or neglect, living with a mentally ill parent, witnessing domestic violence, divorce, substance abuse and criminal activity.

The most severe ACEs, are perpetuated by a parent or primary caregiver and without regard for a child’s vulnerable developmental periods.   Any child who is exposed to ACEs in the absence of other adults to help them cope, will experience neuro-chemical, anatomical, and physiological harm from toxic stress.  If the literature differentiates abuse and violence by the presence of physical harm, then there is no abuse, it is all child violence because toxic stress changes a child’s brain and disrupts normal development.

Within the last 10 years, psychological maltreatment or emotional abuse and neglect were shown to be the most prevalent and destructive ACE as it stands alone, however when it is combined with other ACEs, this type of violence strongly exacerbates the negative outcomes.

America has one of the worst records for child abuse compared to other industrial countries.  The U.S. loses an average of 5 children each day because of child abuse.  It is surprising that it isn't higher because a child is abused or neglected every 47 seconds and Infants and toddlers are most likely to be the victims.

In 2014, Americans reported 3.6 million cases of child abuse and neglect, involving 6.6 million children.  However, these numbers are grossly underreported.  For example, child psychological abuse and neglect is known to be vastly more prevalent than physical or sexual abuse but the government statistics place it at the least likely type of abuse to occur.  It is the least likely type of abuse to be investigated or interrupted, but it is far more common than most people think.

 In America, teachers can’t teach and children can’t learn because the children have toxic levels of stress hormones in their systems from being abused and neglected at home.  Many children are being misdiagnosed and prescribed psychotropic medications.  While, older children may be turning to substance abuse to relieve the psychological pain.

Psychological (emotional abuse and neglect) has turned out to be the sleeping dragon, and we are woefully underprepared to do battle.   Psychological maltreatment (emotional abuse and neglect) is as damaging if not more so than physical or sexual “abuse.”

Child abuse and neglect cost the U.S. $80.3 billion each year in direct costs and lost productivity and we are watching it grow.   Our children are our country and the American flag represents their lives and our future.   Things are not all right for American children.

Can you respect and honor a country that does not address the violence against their children or do you think it is time to send out the signal that….

America is in Distress?

back2skol

This video is about back2skol

Dream Until Your Dreams Come True

 I’ve always had vivid, colorful dreams and nightmares.  My absolute favorite dream was when I was on the bridge of the Star Ship Enterprise.  I was on the REAL Enterprise, with the real Captain-- James T. Kirk.   Who else can say they’ve ever been there?  And what did my space adventure dream mean? 

Don't know, don't care; it was just a blast.

An article in Scientific America, The Science Behind Dreaming, Sander van der Linden describes research that found that vivid, bizarre and emotionally intense dreams (the dreams that people usually remember) are linked to parts of the amygdala and hippocampus.  Hmmm, trauma is linked to the amygdala and hippocampus.  We know that the amygdala plays a primary role in the processing and memory of emotional reactions, and the hippocampus has something to do with moving information from short-term to long-term memory.   In other words, dreams seem to help us process emotions by encoding and constructing memories of them.

When I was young, I a lot of dreams when I was flying.   That was so cool.  I would guess that flying has something to do with feeling free and unencumbered.  I was sad to hear that neither my son, nor my daughter had ever dreampt that they could fly.  But here are some dreams that we all probably share.

Common dream symbols for the targeted parent.

#1.  Being chased means you're feeling threatened, (duh).  The trick is suppose to be to figure out why you feel threatened and by who but that's not very tricky for us.

After I had been in therapy for about 4 months, my nightmares can back with a vengeance.  Every night I’d be terrified, running around a bunch of parked cars.  Of course I couldn’t find mine, but that happens all of the time.   Anyway,  I thought that the increased nightmares meant that I was regressing;  but, my therapist was delighted.!  She said to me, “You're thawing Kay!”  She went on to explain that I had been paralyzed in the freeze fear response ever since I had started therapy.   Now that I had processed some of the traumatic experiences, I had escaped and was running away.  I thought that was some pretty concrete evidence of brain rewiring. 

#2.  They say falling relates to our anxieties about letting go, losing control, or somehow failing after a success.  And you don’t die if you hit the bottom.  On a related note:, when my daughter was young, she dreampt that her teeth were falling out.  We later found out that it was from anxiety.  It makes sense because it was a very stressful time for her.

#3 Being trapped (physically) reflects our real life inability to escape or fix our crisis.

#4 Demons.  I didn’t like the description I read about this, so I made up my own.  I think that demons represent the evil in my world, (instead of significantly repressed emotions).   One reason is because I handle all my demons the same way.  I scare them off by singing old church hymns and telling them that I know Jesus personally.

#5 Not so long ago, my life was all just trying to get to point A on the right day and time.  If I got to the right place at the right time, it was a miracle.   They say that dreaming that you miss a flight or something like that means that you're frustrated over missing important opportunities in life.  This is probably pretty true. 

# 6 & # 7 Nudity and exams always went together in my dreams.  And actually the combination makes sense.  Nudity represents feeling vulnerable and exposed to others and exams reveal uncertainty under conditions where we are being evaluated or judged.  It didn't help that I always came into the exam room late, so everyone would see that I was naked.

#8 House.  My mom lived in the same house for 35 years, and that was home.   Anytime I was in my house in my dreams, I was comfortable and safe.   But if that's too boring of a description,  try this interpretation.  A House represents your mind. The floors in the house represent different levels of thinking. The mind is made up of three major parts: the conscious mind, the subconscious mind and the super-conscious mind. Within these three parts are seven levels of consciousness. The house is where you stay/live – your belief system.

On that note: hooray for our brains, AGAIN.  They are working on processing our trauma day and night.  Aneffective therapy for many traumatized people works on the same principles and dreaming.  It is called EMDR or Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing.  I'll post more on my experiences with EMDR later.

And the word on the street is

Neurofeedback rewires your brain like Buddha on steroids.

. 

The Stalking Never Stops

This video is about My Movie

To those who got this list before it was suppose to be posted.....I'm so embarrassed!  If we get a grant writer, we could afford to pay the rest of us.  But for now, this is the

Volunteer Job Board

1. Leadership and Technical Administration-

1.1 Planning and Development Team

1.2 Technical administration with squarespace & mailchimp

            1.21. Keep website working, clean, and up-to date

            1.22 Advance mail campaigns, surveys and new pages, RSS

            1.23. Security
 

2. Marketing and Promotion

2.1. Encourage new subscribers with short videos, animation, memes, OVOs     

     2.2. Press Release (Bob and Mark have contact lists)

2.3 Work with facebook leaders to encourage subscription

2.4 Promote strategic plan and campaigns

2.5 Design Brochure for NATP

2.6 Brainstorm Contact Campaign for Clergy (?) and other Mandatory Reporters

2.7. Facebook and Linked in Administration

3. Research/Writing-

3.1 Articles:  EX) Why psychologically abused children should NOT testify in court.

     3.2. Toolkit: How to file in child abuse reports.

4. Design-

4.1 Assessment/Screening Instruments for child psychological abuse

      4.11. Signs and Symptoms of the child

      4.12. Patterns of behavior for narcissistic/borderline

             4.13. Trauma and the Targeted Parent

4.2 Evaluation instruments and protocol for collecting information about the quality and effectiveness of services provided by law enforcement, CPS workers, Family Court lawyers, GALs, Judges and Psychological Evaluators and disseminating the results

5. Environmental Scanning

            5.1 Mental Health

5.11 Assemble introductory package for mental health and include progress and product evaluation instrument (3.2)

5.12 Follow, report and recommend action: ACEs and Trauma Informed Movement

5.13 Follow, report, and recommend best practices for trauma (C-PTSD) recovery therapy, self -help guides, videos etc.

5.14 Review and recommend cost effective recovery plan after separation.

            5.2 Family Court

5.21 Assemble introductory package for family law providers; include progress and product evaluation instrument. 

5.21 Follow, report and recommend action based on the National Council Juvenile and Family Court Judges (Trauma Consultation)

                 5.22 High Conflict Institute

                 5.23 AALS

                 5.24 AFCC

Riding the Wave of ACEs

This video is about the new strategic direction.

Coming Soon!  A Special Report From The

National Alliance For Targeted Parents

Please read the Introduction tell me if you are intrigued.

America is in serious distress.  Child psychological maltreatment (emotional abuse and neglect) is the most prevalent and damaging type of child abuse, yet it is the least likely to be reported, investigated, or stopped (Spinazzolla, 2014), by family law or Child Protective Services. The evidence of this crisis is seen not only in the abundant scientific literature, but also in the explosion of resources to help the growing number of adult children of narcissistic (NPD) and/or borderline (BPD) parents process the trauma of child psychological maltreatment.

Psychological maltreatment constitutes a disruption in the parent-child attachment relationship.  A narcissistic (borderline) parent lacks emotional nurturing, attunement, and responsiveness to their children and also verbally and emotionally abuse them. This abuse derails the child’s psychological safety and interferes with the development of critical attributes for a healthy life such as emotion regulation, self-acceptance and -esteem, autonomy, and self-sufficiency.  

Science, health, and child protection professionals have known for decades that parents with narcissistic and/or borderline personality disorders severely maltreat their children, but they appear baffled about how to recognize these parents and what to do about child psychological maltreatment.  “Child abuse and neglect have been understood for decades as major etiological sources of aberrant behavior.  It is perplexing that these well-described phenomena are buried in the in the back of DSM- IV and DSM-5” (Kaplan, S., 2014).  

One problem is that a NPD and BPD parent is almost indistinguishable from the other healthy parent in public.  NPD and/or BPD parents have been able to thrive in plain sight of authorities and laypeople because they can mimic socially and emotionally appropriate responses and the wounds they inflict are not visible.

For over 30 years, the healthy (ex) partners of narcissistic (borderline) parents have been fighting to rescue their children from the psychologically abusive parent despite being “targeted” by the abuser to be erased from the family. In addition, “targeted” parents have been re-victimized by the staggering lack of support from law enforcement, mental health, child protective services, and family court. Targeted parents suffer pure trauma from years of savage abuse by their ex-partners and the legal system. These loving parents usually lose their children to the abuser, along with their economic stability, their integrity, and their mental and physical health (Harman, J., Biringen, Z., chapter 7).

This special report from the National Alliance for Targeted Parents describes an efficient and effective intervention program for severe child psychological maltreatment by narcissistic (borderline) parents in what has become a large, dangerous, but accessible and stoppable population of child abusers in America.  An evidence-based, cost effective protocol for child rescue and recovery from severe child psychological maltreatment has been accessible for years and needs to be implemented NOW.  

Paying For Services By the Hour

When we go to a doctor he or she assesses our condition.   If and only if the doctor gathers enough evidence to substantiate a diagnosis will one be made.   Doctors tell us what they think the problem is and why.   They also consider the best route of treatment to eliminate the problem.   We pay for the examination, diagnosis and treatment plan.   I think that is fair, we are paying for the service.   The majority of doctors will tell us to come back if the problem is not gone in 10-14 days and it is amazing the number of doctors who will follow up to check on our progress.   This is because medical doctors are committed to helping us reach the goal of getting better.  They make careful, thoughtful decisions and stand accountable for their judgments and actions.   I call these health providers "professionals". 

Unfortunately, there are other vocations that also call themselves professionals but do not make the mark, in my opinion.    Based on the collective experience of targeted parents; lawyers, judges, therapists and social workers treat us  the opposite way that we expect to be treated by "professionals".  

Targeted parents regularly seek lawyers and mental health providers to help us resolve the greatest tragedy of our lives and the lives of our children.   However, practitioners in both of these domains seem to have a lot of baggage in the way of being a true professional.  Unlike professionals who provide a helping service, legal and mental health providers do not practice in such a way that they appear interested in the quality of the services they provide or whether or not they resolve our problem.  

When working with either of these groups, targeted parents report that they don't appear to know what they are doing.    This would account for their unusual payment structure.  Rather than rely on their knowledge and skills to provide a valuable service for which we gladly pay,  they require us to pay them for their presence.  That is to say, lawyers and therapists are paid on an hourly rate regardless of what they do or don't do, independent of whether they help us or hurt us.  What seems to be missing in both situations is that people in these domains don't understand the problem or know what to do about it.    And most targeted parents don't ask.   

People who hide the fact that they don't know what they are doing are not professionals.  Not that all professionals know everything, quite the contrary, but true professionals will tell us the limits of their competence and offer to learn, collaborate with others, listen to what we say and take official documents seriously.  True professionals will tell us if they disagree with us and recuse themselves it they think that they can not be of service.   True professionals invest in a positive outcome and feel some responsibility to actually help us once they enter into a contract for service.  On the other hand, lawyers and mental health providers don't contract for service, after all, they don't know what to do or how long it will take them or what the outcome will be.  There isn't any way that they want to be beheld accountable for anything.    So what are we paying for? 

Well let's look at what we get for our out of pocket expenses.   We get misdiagnosed, misunderstood and minimized .    We get delays, discrimination and distress.  We get blamed, bullied and bankruptcy. 

We really need to have higher expectations

of those who we hire to help us save our children. 

We must have professionals who are trauma informed.  

Question to lawyer or mental health provider: Are you trauma informed?

Answer. I don't think I understand what you mean.

Response.  Wow, you would if you were worth the powder to blow you up (my mother's saying).  Isn't your profession part of the solution to the single greatest public health threat in this country?   My child has an ACE score of 6-8+.   The other mental ill parent is controlling the family, psychologically abusing us,  emotionally neglecting us, he or she is responsible for my child's loss of a parent (ME) and I am the only resiliency factor he or she has.  The mentally ill parent is lawless and teaching the same to my child by not following court orders, lying to authorities, etc.

How is it possible for you to help my family if you can't recognize complex interpersonal trauma from a narcissistic/borderline partner?  

If I hire you and you don't have and knowledge or experience with ACEs and you're not trauma informed, you will hurt us even worse!  In fact, you will become part of the problem that perpetuates the most severe and damaging type of abuse - psychological abuse!

Ok,  you get the point.  Regardless of their credentials, every mental health provider MUST assess, diagnose and design and plan for appropriate treatment to resolve the diagnosed problem.   A treatment plan MUST assess the impact of trauma and where it is coming from or the problem will never be solved.  

Demand that your therapist and your court is trauma informed!

I Should Have My Head Examined

Part 2 of 3: Targeted Trauma

Mental health is the only branch of medicine that treats severe and life threatening internal injuries and diseases without ever looking at the affected part of the body.  Instead, the American Psychiatric Association continues to condone the practice of guessing at what the psychiatric problem is and then medicating the symptoms.  

Brain scans are indispensable in assessing, diagnosing and treating most mental illness.  In fact, the National Institute For Mental Health (NIMH), who funds most of the research for mental health in America, dismissed the DSM-V because it ignored the objective, clinical measures that brain scans provide to accurately diagnose and treat problems of the mind and the brain. For targeted parents, brain scans validate the interpersonal traumatic injuries that our children and we experience at the hands of our narcissistic/borderline ex-partners/parents and can alert the world to the severity of our plight. My experience is a case in point.

2009 was the year in which my closely attached son started to suppress his attachment to me. This was the most traumatic of all times.  Of course, I began to search wildly for why I felt so terrified, confused, spacey, depressive and anxious.  While researching my symptoms online,  I took a survey that said that I was a good candidate for a brain scan (understatement).   I wasn’t sure if I could just go buy one or if I could even afford one, but I knew that I had to find out what was wrong with me.  If I could "see" what was broken, I thought I could figure out how to fix it.   I compared the $ 2K price tag of a SPECT (single photon emission computed tomography) scan to the benefits of a concrete, accurate diagnosis and decided that it would be money well spent.

My first appointment was a bit weird.  I met with Dr. Best for a brief conversation.  After I answered a few of his questions he cocked his head to the side and asked me, “What are you doing here?  You seem so…well look at you!  You’re bright, articulate, you don’t look like you have a problem.”  Then, one of his staff opened the door and dragged in my health history.  The neuroscientist started thumbing through the documents and then quickly stood up and said, “OK, lets get you set up for a brain scan.”

Two weeks later I was back and met LuAnn, the lab tech.  LuAnn took me back into a small room.  I was followed by Dr. Best’s two German Shorthaired dogs, who didn’t think that I had a problem either.   LuAnn administered a radioactive isotope and then we talked nonchalantly to pass the time as we waited for the isotope to get to my brain (or whatever). 

I told her how long I had been struggling with depression and anxiety.  I also told her that I “hadn’t felt like myself in such a long time that I thought that I’d forgotten who I really was.”  LuAnn’s response was, “And this is the first time that you’re having a brain scan?”  I retorted, “First!  Am I going to have to have more than one? That’s not in the budget.”  Still, I just had to know if I was as crazy as my ex-husband had always told me. I had to know why I couldn’t make decisions and why I was so emotional and foggy.  I had to get my world turned right side up again by getting to the source of my muddled, insecure self.

As I let my mind wonder for a few minutes, I suddenly felt that familiar hyper-vigilance and fear spreading through my body.  I heard LuAnn ask me if I was all right.  The source of my fear became obvious and I looked back at LuAnn and asked, 

“What if my brain scan shows that there isn't

anything wrong? 

Will that prove that I really am crazy?” 

Two weeks later I returned and met with Dr. Best for my results.  He was slow in getting to the point, but then he crossed his legs, leaned towards me and asked, “What the hell happened to your brain?”  I was so relieved.  Finally, I had proof that the problem was in my brain, not in my mind.  Now this was something I could understand.

The conclusions based on these scans made sense to me even if I didn't know exactly what areas they were describing.  I have paraphrased the results below.

1. Extreme or marked increase(in activity) in areas of the brain that are compatible with anxiety.  Remember, I'm laying in a bed somewhere trying not to think of much, but areas of my brain are still registering as being hyperactive.  The hyperactivecolors register dark red to black. The under-active parts are green and yellow.

2.  The hyperactive thalamus (black spot in the middle) plus the under-active left orbital-frontal area (big green spot) is compatible with depression.

3.  The blah blah blah right apico-mesial temporal blah blah blah extension to the pole blah blah blah indicates possible post traumatic etiology. 

4. The marked localized areas blah blah occipital and frontal lobes blah blah blah may indicate origins of episodic events.

 

Lead, Follow or Get Out of the Way

I'm sorry this isn't a video blog, but my house is getting new windows and it's 90 degrees ( feels like 120 with the humidity) and I'm self conscious enough,  thank you. 

But there are many experts that we need to be listening to and one of them is Nadine Burke.  In this widely popular TED talk, Dr. Burke a pediatrician and public health expert,  describes the staggering "big picture" of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs).   She represents just one of the professional domains who are quickly coming on board with the trauma-informed movement. 

ACEs and the Trauma informed movement is not a fad.  It is a paradigm shift in the way we address the toxic environments our children are being raised in.  This is a national scientific, child centered paradigm shift, not something we need the from the American Psychological Association (who didn't discuss our petition at their board meeting).  This movement dwarfs our petition and the APA.

Targeted parents are the perfect ambassadors to carry this movement into every community in America.  We are trauma survivors(or recovering)  and soon to be trauma informed.   As a brief and powerful introduction to the mission that awaits us, please watch "How Adverse Childhood Experiences Affect Children Over Their Lifespan".   And as you do, keep in mind that our children have ACE scores of 7-8+: highlighting for everyone to see, that our children are at the GREATEST RISK for mental health and physical problems. 

We are working hard on developing the very best presentation for targeted parents to take into their children's school system.  Partnering with educators is the fastest way to move this battleship.  While the APA is "discussing" what to do, we will be doing it. 

They can lead, follow or get out of our way.

(did I say that out loud?)

Courts That Care?

As we begin to talk about trauma, I thought it would be good to re-post this blog from last February.  The newest addition in the library section of this website now contains the protocol manual being used for family courts to become trauma informed.   Every targeted parent in family court must be aware of the official, professional movement to make family courts trauma informed and use their personal cases as avenues to protect their children while pushing the movement forward.    We are traumatized and our children are traumatized.  We need courts that are trauma informed! 

According to the protocol manual for developing trauma informed courts, "Juvenile and family judges and courts are in a unique position to promote healing and prevent future trauma.  In 2013, the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges (NCJFCJ) undertook development of a court trauma consultation protocol in response to an increase in requests for assistance from courts seeking to become trauma-informed. the NCJFCJ and organizations such as the National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN) have an extensive history of providing training and technical assistance to courts on traumatic stress."

Published February 10, 2016

Recently, The Honorable Marshall Murray, a respected and experienced Circuit Court Judge in Milwaukee County, co-authored a blog with the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges (NCJFCJ) in which he sounded more like a caring parent than a Judge.  It was the first time I heard a Judge express sadness at seeing so many abused children in his court.  It was also the first time I had heard anyone defend judges for being concerned that courts make the right decisions in cases involving abuse.

“One of the most important duties for any court system

is to ensure that youth in the community

are protected.” 

                                         -Judge Marshall Murray (2016)

One point that Judge Murray discusses is that in order for judges to make the right decisions when ruling on cases involving children and youth, they must be able to recognize how trauma affects behavior. He specifically mentioned trauma from emotional and verbal abuse, recognizing that psychological maltreatment (emotional abuse and neglect) is the most prevalent and damaging type of child abuse, causing a lifetime of problems for these victims.  The blog that Judge Murray wrote focuses on teen dating violence, but I found that his sentiments reflected a fundamental problem for Judges presiding over high conflict custody cases in family courts.

For decades, Family Court Judges have misinterpreted the expression of trauma in most of the high conflict custody cases.  This misinterpretation continues to lead Family Court Judges to make inaccurate assumptions about the parents and children.  Their mistaken assumptions are the basis for placing children with the abusive parent.  Thus, Family Courts directly contribute to severe adverse childhood experiences and the escalation of intimate partner violence.  The travesty of Family Courts abandoning children to their abusive parent is so common that it appears as if the Judges are intentionally colluding with the abusers.  As it stands today, a Family Court Judge could throw a dart at both parents in high conflict custody disputes, and at least then, they would make the right decision at least 50% of the time.   

It is hard to imagine that Family Court Judges care about families, abuse or even the job they do because I see no indication that family courts are trying to improve their longstanding abysmal record of making family situations worse for the “high conflict” families they serve.  As a self-regulating profession, this lack of care, due process or competence is inexcusable and begs external oversight if not remedied.

While the majority of families can manage custody issues without assertive court intervention, a significant and growing population of parents cannot.  These “high conflict” custody cases take up a disproportional amount of family court dockets because one parent has a personality disorder in which he or she is manipulating the court and escalating conflict.  All the while, he or she continues to psychologically abuse the family causing extreme ongoing chaos and stress.  In the pure sense, these cases aren’t “custody” cases; they are cases of child abuse and domestic violence and need immediate court ordered protection.

High conflict custody cases have been particularly troublesome for family court because the origin and nature of the problem lies in the abusive relational pathology of a narcissistic and /or borderline personality disordered parent who is a master at manipulation and exploitation.   By the time the family gets to court, the abuser has seriously wounded the children and the non-abusive parent and they present with extreme and misleading symptoms of trauma.  Comparatively, the abuser appears calm and confident as if he or she were innocent.

To add more confusion to the decision, narcissistic and/or borderline personality disordered parents have a well-developed social persona where they can mirror appropriate responses appearing sincere, charming and caring.  The abusive parent stays hidden behind this persona while covertly escalating conflict, exploiting the expressed trauma of the non-abusive parent and the children, making false allegations of abuse or fitness, manipulating the Judiciary, sabotaging treatment plans and lying through their teeth.  

Narcissistic and/or borderline parents will not admit that they have a personality disorder, even if they have been diagnosed, however once Family Court Judges are cued into looking for a handful of specific personality disorder traits, they will see that narcissistic/borderline abusers present as predictable as a March snowstorm in Wisconsin, and are just as easy to spot. 

Family court judges are not psychologist, nor should they be.  However, the fact remains that family courts have become the roosting site for narcissistic and/or borderline personality disordered parents and they are manipulating the court into making decisions that are extremely harmful to children and the non-abusive parent.  Assertive court intervention is necessary because these abusers cannot and will not change or follow any orders by the court unless the court will enforce sanctions for violations.   

The good news is that under a caring family court judge, trained to recognize the psychological manipulation of a narcissistic/borderline abuser and to spot trauma, family courts can stop being part of the problem of child abuse and domestic violence and become a big part of THE solution.  If these high conflict abuse cases can be stopped when they get to family court, the children and parents can recover and learn how to protect themselves from being psychologically abused so that the children can still have a relationship with both parents.  Just as important, Family Courts can lead the way in breaking the cycle of narcissistic/borderline abuse by preventing it from being expressed in the next generation of families who are lucky enough to have found their way into a court that is concerned about making the right decisions.

Targeted Trauma video 1 of 3

Remember to comment at the bottom!

What is trauma?

We usually think of combat veterans or people who have survived natural disasters, as victims of trauma but trauma can be caused to anyone who experiences something that is profoundly “life-threatening.”   Trauma is an extreme reaction an unnatural, terrifying event.   A victim of trauma tries to encode the cognitive AND the emotional memories but the experience is so horrific that it overwhelms our capacity to cope and cannot be processed or resolved.  It is a type of experience that is impossible to understand because it conflicts with the current perception of reality.   It rocks our world and then stays the victim’s head and is re-experienced every time it is triggered.

A trigger is an unconscious perception of something that has a connection to the trauma and thrusts the victim into the cascade of memories and feelings that were experienced when he or she was first traumatized.  Triggers conjure up the stored feelings of pending doom, helplessness, terror, confusion and other types of intolerable emotional pain that are unprocessed and continue to live within the victim.

It is easier to understand trauma in the context of combat or severe storms because these experiences have a recognized beginning and end and occur as a result of natural or man-made disasters.   But the numbers of individuals that experience trauma like this is relative small, compared to number of people who experience interpersonal trauma or abuse in our close relationships, which are even more traumatic.  Interpersonal trauma is more complex because the victim is exposed to multiple traumatizing experiences over a prolonged period of time and occurs in the victim’s everyday life.  These experiences are not “events” that can be compartmentalized in time or space.  The memories blur together into one hot mess that changes a person forever.  

How is trauma related to the targeted parent?

Most trauma begins at home; in our case trauma is home.  Our families are both the source of our agony and the ones who we need help from to resolve our emotional crisis.   Given the shear numbers and the particularly savage interpersonal experience that targeted parents experience, we are one of the most traumatized populations on earth.   While, billions of dollars and nationwide campaigns are in full swing to provide help to every other traumatized population, no one knows that we exist. 

First we married a narcissistic/borderline person who undoubtedly started psychologically abusing at his or her first chance and hasn’t stopped since.  We finally mustered our way out of the relationship to find out that our ex-partner can’t co-parent.  Soon after, our children start acting out in hate and rejection against us and everyone blames us.  Then, we must stand witness to the destructive abuse of our children from the other parent’s psychological manipulation and control.  All along the way we are blamed and our pain minimized or dismissed.  We lose our rights our integrity, our jobs, our homes, our children, our voice and finally ourselves.

The result is that we are condemned to cruel and inhumane psychological torture for years on end. 

Our brains were built to survive and protect our children. Our fear arousal system (fight/flight) takes over because we feel that our children’s lives are threatened.  But for all the fighting we do, nothing is resolved.  We also can’t run away because our ex-partners have our children hostage.

Our amygdala or alarm system is stuck on code red and keeps signaling for the release of the stress hormone, cortisol.

Our circumstances are so traumatic that it causes neurochemical, anatomical & physiological changes in us, real changes.   The ongoing toxic stress compromises our ability to make decisions, to plan and to communicate what is going on.  It hijacks our perceptions, reactions and our basic sense of who we are.   It doesn’t matter how long we’ve struggled, our fear arousal system (fight/flight/freeze) floods our bodies and drowns out almost everything else except for the commands to run, fight and save our children! 

We feel like we are losing our minds and in a very real sense we are as our brain continues to take non-essential functions off line.  We experience a fundamental shift in our brain’s neurochemical and physiological functions as the left, logical hemisphere shuts down and the right, emotional side amps up.  These changes reorganize the way we think, the things we think about and even limits our capacity to think at all.

We are chronically out of sync with others.  We have nightmares at night and the constant intrusion of horrible memories during the day.  We’ve been so abused that we become hypervigilant and desperate.   When we talk to anyone who will listen, our voice becomes tense as we “fire hose” them with anything and everything that we feel is relevant.  Unfortunately,  trauma impacts our ability to filter relevant information from irrelevant and there are no words to describe the hell we are in.

We want advice but often don’t take it and we don’t learn from our experiences.  We grab a hold ofanything that we think might help somebody“get it”  even when we know that what we are doing basically never works for anybody.   There are only so many times that we can say, “Don’t use the words parental alienation,” or “Stop listening to your ex,” or “Stay out of family court.”

As, targeted parents, we all have complex posttraumatic stress disorder, which is a very serious brain injury.  Brain scans of combat veterans look identical to what brains scans of you or I.   It is the outcome of prolonged exposure to the front lines of war.

 

 

Welcome to Our Video Blog

Welcome to the National Alliance For Targeted Parents-Video Blog

Part 2 Symptoms or Diagnoses?

 May 12th, 2016, part 2. 

What my husband told me as I lay on the couch, reeling from the excessive medications and being shut off from the world was, “I like it when you are down, then I have all the control.”  I knew then that I needed a miracle.  

And I got three!

My disability had a fully favorable award, but that certainly was not a miracle.  I was enrolled in Medicare, which compared to the benefits I was getting at work, was absolutely not a miracle.  My supposed intelligent, heavily published, psychiatrist didn’t take Medicare so I had to find a new psychiatrist. This was the first miracle!  Interestingly, this doctor eventually had to have a liver transplant.  Apparently, he was taking as many of the medications as he prescribed for his patients. 

Only one psychiatrist in all of Green Bay would see Medicare patients.  It was minor miracle that I got into see anyone at all.  His name was Dr. Ashraf Ahmed and he was my second miracle.   This brilliant doctor immediately knew that I wasn’t bipolar and gradually took me off of all of the weird medications.  Once he got me back to my “better” self, Dr. Ahmed kindly he told me that I would never recover fully if I didn’t leave my husband.  He and I kept track of my mental health status and the quality of the relationship between my husband and me.  There was a direct correlation.  The more abusive my husband was with me, the more depressed and anxious I became.

Dr. Ahmed knew that my depression and anxiety wasn’t caused primarily because

it ran in my family;  he and I both knew that my depression and anxiety was caused

primarily because my husband wanted to run my family.

For the next couple of years I went to a Divorcecare program and tried to leave my husband, but even with Dr. Ahmed’s continual coaching and compassion, I didn’t have the courage.  Then, the third miracle came.   It was the holiday season, my absolutely favorite time of year, until I got married.  Eventually I learned to hate Christmas as much as my husband.  It was the day after Christmas in 2006 and my husband was in a particularly foul holiday mood.  He started punching in a wall swearing about me.  Then he got the kids out of bed and had them help him.  Both were young, but had taken Karate lessons and my husband encouraged them to hit and kick the wall while he instructed them.  “This is what you do when you marry the wrong woman!” he told them. I called the police. 

I didn’t know that they would handcuff him and take him to jail and  I also didn’t know that they would restrain him from having any contact with the kids and me.  This reprieve was the third miracle.  It gave me the chance that I needed to file for divorce.  During this short time I was walking on air.  I never realized that I had been living under his constant oppressive manipulation and control until he was gone.  When he left our home my depression and anxiety went with him.

We Need To Get To The CAUSE!

Yes, depression and anxiety run in my family and these were written down as my primary diagnoses.   But, Dr. Ahmed knew that these were just symptoms of a deeper, darker cause; psychological abuse.  We experience the same traumatic abuse that our children do; psychological abuse.  Your mental health care provider needs to recognize the causes, not the symptoms. 

Engaging in therapy with our children to eliminate our ex-partner’s abuse is really illogical.  We are NOT responsible for any part of our children’s rejection and neither are they. 

Yes, we are an emotional mess, and 

Yes, we are angry, confused and desperate, and

Yes, we might lash out in moments of intolerable pain, and 

YES we are traumatized by psychological abuse by our narcissistic/borderline ex-partner! 

*     *     *     *     *     *     *    *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *

Yes, our children have suppressed their attachment to us, and

Yes, our children behave with those horrible narcissistic/borderline traits, and

Yes, our children bought into our ex-partners’ delusion that we are awful parents, and

YES, they are being traumatized by child psychological abuse by the other parent!

What to Do?

The next time you are in therapy with(or without) your child(ren), make sure you know the diagnosis and why it was made.  In our cases, depression, anxiety, ADHD and PTSD are all symptoms of a traumatizing home life.  A traumatizing home life that you and your children are constantly being exposed to.  The Diagnosis is psychological abuse (both child and ex-partner). You need protective separation to resolve all of the symptoms.  Let your therapist or psychologist know the diagnosis.  Give them this article.  Have them contact us (info@targetedparent.com).  They are probably members of the APA.

Depression and Anxiety: Symptoms or Diagnoses?

 Depression and anxiety run STRONG in my family.   Both of my parents self-medicated with alcohol and my brother was suicidal, beginning in his teens.  So no one questioned why I woke up one morning severely depressed; not even me.  But, it hit me like a bolt of lightening on a sunny day.  I was an accomplished college administrator bringing home some pretty hefty bacon.  I loved my job and was using my successes at work to write my dissertation.  Everyday I hurried home to my two young children who were happy and healthy.  I was always in awe when I turned down our 1000’ driveway and it opened up to a pristine piece of heaven complete with horses running across the fields.

Then, in an instant, everything changed.  It was a Friday morning.  I felt so horrible that I didn’t hear my husband calling Cheryl, my therapist.  I had been with Cheryl during the years I struggled with infertility.  She also counseled “us” when my husband’s parental rights were terminated from a daughter he and his girlfriend had had in high school.  I had been seeing Cheryl again fairly regularly because I thought I needed a tune up.  I certainly needed more than a tune-up that morning.  I had hit a pothole in the fast lane.

When I sat down in her office, I thought about how we had recently been trying to right my ship.  Something in my life had become unmanageable, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.  That morning, I felt so far off course that I couldn’t imagine what “normal” felt like.  I leaned on my knees while Cheryl directed all of her questions to my husband.  There was a short pause in the conversation and Cheryl darted out of the room, reappearing a few minutes later with the psychiatrist.

Dr. Warren simply said to me,  “Kay, you won’t be able to go back to work again.”  I didn’t react, but I thought,  “That is absurd.  This guy doesn’t even know me.”  At the same time panic was setting in.  What wasn’t absurd was that I had an incredible amount of responsibility and a never ending number of projects to do and I was in no shape to go to work.  It had taken every bit of fight and energy I had just to get to this office this morning.  I needed someone to help me.

I sat across from my husband, Cheryl and the psychiatrist who were standing and waiting for me to say something.  Then Cheryl sat down next to me and touched my arm.  “Kay,” she said gently but firmly, “You have severe depression, that’s obvious.  How long do you think it will take you to over come this?”   Honestly, I had no clue, so I thought about how long it takes the body to heal from any major problem.  Then I padded my answer with a couple of weeks so I wouldn’t sound as uncertain as I felt and responded, “I don’t know about 6-8 weeks?”   There was a long deafening silence.  Cheryl and the doctor exchanged serious looks before she dropped her head in her hands, and blurted out, “try 6 years.”  

You would think that if depression just happens to people because of a genetic link, that I would have succumb a lot earlier than 43.  But that wasn’t even the issue. At some point, soon after that Black Friday, my husband had had a private discussion with the psychiatrist and had made another appointment for me.  During that second appointment, the doctor diagnosed me with Bipolar Disorder.  I had never even heard of Bipolar at the time, but come to find out bipolar is the most genetically influenced mental illness.  However, unlike depression, bipolar had never turned up in my family’s history.   I insisted that he was wrong, but Dr. Warren told me that other people (meaning my husband) could see my moods and behaviors better than I could.   I really wasn’t buying it, but I was desperate for the depression to lift, so I got my marching orders and I started on a boatload of medications, hoping that soon I would feel a lot different.  And I did, I soon felt like a zombie.

I was scared as hell about the “side effects” I was having with these medications, but I was even more frightened about not getting better.  I faithfully took my toxic medications, attended individual and group therapy, underwent countless bouts of electroshock therapy and read, studied and prayed day and night.  When my mental health continued to deteriorate, my psychiatrist filed papers for disability.

In the meantime, I laid on the couch wondering if my husband was right and I really was crazy.  I didn’t know how people “go crazy” or “are crazy,” but I didn’t think that one day I’d be having children, riding horses, and feeling the normal pressure of a demanding profession and the next day, “boom” I couldn’t function enough to sign my name. 

Everyone was really worried about me, except my husband.  He didn’t even care for me during that time.   I agreed with him, as I always agreed with him, that “we” didn’t want the children to see me in such a fragile state; so I was closed off in a small room with a T. V.   I only now know what he was telling my children.  What he told me was, “I like it when you are down, then I have all the control.”  I knew then that I needed a miracle.

To Be Continued…

Mission Possible.

NATP Agent,

You are one of the founding members of the National Alliance For Targeted Parents.  That in itself, tells the great story of your heroic efforts to save your children despite the widespread lack of knowledge or support from the mental health profession.  You’ve done everything to prevent and stop the trauma from psychological abuse that has hurt your children and you.  Nothing worked because no one knew what you knew about how your (ex) partner was/is treating your family.  And when you did tell the authorities, they thought that you were the problem.  The social workers in Child Protective Service didn’t understand psychological abuse or the opportunity they had to break the cycle of abuse just by placing your children with you long enough for the two of you to heal from the toxic influence of the personality disordered parent.  Every school or private counselor misdiagnosed your children with depression, anxiety, ADHD and other things when there was no evidence.  Your ex-partner manipulated the mental health professionals because they couldn’t recognized the serious mental illness that drove him or her to destroy your relationship(s) with your children and cause prolonged interpersonal trauma.   

You went to family court because you were desperate to help your children and had no other place to go.  Family court put the nail in the coffin by misreading every sign of psychological family abuse.  They thought your trauma was instability and your children’s insecure bond with the abusive parent was healthy.  

America’s Mental Health System must stop this epidemic of inter-generationally transmitted abuse and trauma and we have their attention.  Now it’s time to bring our children home.  The APA has the power and resources to mobilize quickly and save our children.  But the APA Board of Directors will only take this action if they are convinced of the critical nature of our problem.  Then they can take swift and decisive action to save your children and mine.  You don’t have to teach them about the pathology.  They know the caustic influence of a narcissistic and/or borderline parent.  They know our children are being sacrificed and have been derailed developmentally.  They know how to heal our unseen wounds.  We just need to tell them that we need them, now.

You have one more duty to perform in this war against the family.  One more mission before the APA will take the lead.  You need to accept the assignment to write the APA a letter.  Your letter doesn’t have to be long and arduous.  You don’t have to go into a lot of detail.  But you are the expert in the trauma and the pain.  The APA needs to know that this is a crisis with unparalleled destructive force.  Your children were FORCED to choose between the parents they loved.  They were FORCED to cope by suppressing their attachment from you because they couldn’t choose.  It has arrested healthy development and caused you unbearable complex grief.  It is above all, this country’s greatest travesty of unnecessary cruel and inhumane torture.  Tell the APA to make this their number 1 priority!

Grandparents TOO!

What To Do

1.  Write your letter.  Plagiarize anything from this website, or just scribble HELP! on a piece of paper.  I’m going to include a couple of pictures of my children and me to make it more personal.  Give them your contact information and offer to provide any level of detail they might want.  Refer them to your Facebook if you have one, or other resources that you particularly like.

2. Contact Howie Dennison or Phil Taylor for names and addresses of individual APA members.   Print a copy for each APA member you are given. 

3. Put your letter in the mailbox before you go to bed tonight.  Then sleep well knowing that you have been a good and faithful parent and a hero to this country.