Parental alienation and the pain of custody battles in the the family courts

‘I struggle with the suggestion that parental alienation is not “real”. The label may be problematic, but parents can manipulate and coach children against another parent.’ Photograph: William Barton/AlamyView image in fullscreen‘I struggle with the suggestion that parental alienation is not “real”. The label may be problematic, but parents can manipulate and coach children against another parent.’ Photograph: William Barton/AlamyLettersParental alienation and the pain of custody battles in the the family courtsReaders respond to an article about a mother who feels let down by the family courts

Hannah Summers’ article raises disturbing concerns about the misuse of parental alienation allegations in family courts (‘Just like that, I lost my girls’: the mother who feels betrayed by the family courts, 29 September). However, I believe that it would benefit from a clearer distinction between the discredited theory of “parental alienation syndrome” (PAS) and genuine, demonstrable alienating behaviour.

PAS proposed that a child’s unjustified rejection of a parent could be identified as a distinct syndrome. It is no longer an accepted clinical diagnosis, since a child’s rejection of a parent cannot itself establish manipulation, therefore treating it as diagnostic risks overlooking abuse or other legitimate reasons for the child’s feelings.

However, rejecting PAS as a clinical diagnosis should not obscure the reality that one parent can manipulate a child into rejecting the other. Persistent denigration, emotional pressure and demands for loyalty can leave a child feeling that loving one parent means betraying the other. No child should have to carry that burden.

The Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass) deliberately uses the term “alienating behaviours”, recognising that these can damage children’s identity, self-worth and wider family relationships, and that manipulation or coercion may amount to emotional abuse. The Family Justice Council similarly distinguishes the unsupported syndrome from behaviour whose existence and consequences courts must determine as matters of fact.

For a child, being made to feel that loving one parent betrays the other is an intolerable burden. For the rejected parent, losing a relationship with a living child can bring devastating grief. These experiences deserve recognition alongside the suffering caused to both the child and rejected parent.

Children must be heard, domestic abuse taken seriously and allegations carefully examined. Rejecting an unsupported diagnosis should strengthen that scrutiny, without obscuring the reality of harmful parental manipulation.

Balanced reporting should acknowledge both the danger of unfounded allegations and the anguish caused by proven manipulation. These are not competing concerns. Both demand our attention if children and families are to be protected.Name and address supplied

Reading this article was painfully familiar. I lost custody of my daughters in 2013 after initially applying for shared, 50/50 care.

My experience was complicated by the fact that my barrister argued that it was my ex-husband who was alienating the children from me. My daughters, now adults, have since told me that their father and his family coached them on how to answer Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass) questions and encouraged them to believe that I was mentally ill and did not want to care for them.

At the time, Fathers4Justice and fathers’ rights were receiving considerable media attention. The judge in my case was approaching retirement, and my barrister told me she believed his decision to award my ex-husband full custody was intended to make a wider statement. I cannot know whether she was right.

Central to the judgment was the claim that I was mentally unstable. After my ex-husband abruptly removed the children from school and obtained an ex parte order preventing me from seeing them, I was distraught and called the Samaritans. My ex subsequently obtained my phone records and used that call as evidence. The judge treated calling the Samaritans as evidence that I might be suicidal and therefore unsafe to care for my children.

At my barrister’s suggestion, I obtained an independent psychiatric/psychological assessment. It found no reason why I could not care for my daughters. As I remember it, that report was simply ignored.

So I struggle with the suggestion that parental alienation is not “real”. The label may be problematic, but parents can manipulate and coach children against another parent. My daughters have since confirmed to me that this happened to them.Name and address supplied

Your report on Sarah’s case raises concerns about reliance on flawed psychological assessment. My experience in Zurich highlights the consequences of failing to obtain any such assessment.

I am a father living in England, whose son lives with his mother in Switzerland. Despite joint legal custody, court orders providing for contact and repeated enforcement proceedings, I have not seen him since July 2023.

Zurich court decisions recognised his mother’s interference with contact. Two sets of social workers, involved at different times, recommended psychological assessments of the parents to assess parenting capacity. Yet the authorities never acted on those recommendations. Without those assessments, my son has remained with the parent whose behaviour I regard as emotionally manipulative, while his relationship with me has been allowed to disappear.

Reliable psychological assessment can help authorities understand family relationships; its absence can leave damaging behaviour unexamined. The answer to poor expert evidence should be rigorous assessment where warranted, alongside careful examination of the facts.

A child’s expressed wishes matter, but so does understanding how they developed. Refusal of contact may reflect harmful experiences, pressure, divided loyalties or several factors together.

We should therefore resist drawing general conclusions from individual cases. Misusing allegations of alienation to dismiss genuine abuse is an injustice. Ignoring deliberate obstruction and denigration can also deprive a child of a loving parent. Rejecting a disputed diagnostic label does not establish that the underlying behaviours never occur.

Neither mothers nor fathers have a monopoly on suffering or causing harm. My case cannot establish what happened in Sarah’s family, any more than hers settles mine. Both call for competent investigation, timely intervention and scrutiny of outcomes. Years lost to a parent and child cannot be restored by a later acknowledgment that the system failed them.Name and address supplied