They All Blew It Now What?

What is the name of your state? California
I'm an adult who was a PAS child so I know to a degree what my son's going through and how he feels or at least I did until he went Severe. And I mean Journal of Psychology Severe. Just to give you a feel for how vicious my ex-wife could be, she left me while I was out of state pulling the plug on my dying father. I found this out immediately after the funeral, when I attempted to get gas using my credit card it was denied and I was told to call the card company and when I did they informed me that she had closed all my cards. Needless to say she didn’t send flowers. The alienation began upon my return; she refused visits with my son until she heard what the courts had to say. So one day I get a pass at his school and brought some burger king, anyway when I walk in the classroom he turned white and began yelling "call my mom, call my mom, he's gonna kidnap me! He finally settled down and we had lunch and he had me throw out his packed lunch so that they wouldn’t know. In my response to the divorce I very clearly warn the court that she was going to attempt to split Andrew and I and of course in no way did they acknowledge this concern. However they spare no expense in having me jump through hoops to prove I wasn’t a drug, addict/alcoholic.
Instead the family courts mediator note a disturbing connection between my wife and my sons thoughts and feeling. So because they didn’t believe the results proving my innocence, they order a custody evaluation/ It was to take three months to complete but takes a year the whole time having twelve hours a week visitation and the relationship drifting away. Finally after nearly a year and a half from the start of the divorce the custody evaluation was complete, but not until the last minute my attorney did get a copy until a couple days before the hearing. It was twenty-eight pages of psychoanalysis for the three of us, and four pages summarizing observations and then final recommendations. My attorney told me it was favorable finding the abuse allegations were unfounded and recommend normalized visitation, so I felt vindicated not to mention happy after eighteen months that the battle was finally over. So I settle up with my attorney and begin what I thought was to be happier, less stressful chapter in my life. But sure enough that dream was not to be, a few weeks later I traveled back to Ohio to be best man at my brothers wedding. Once again I return to California to be greeted with my exwifes refusal to allow visitation. Only telling me that Andrew didn't want to see me, shortly there after I get a copy of a letter addressed to the judge on the case, expressing the terror my son was experiencing during his visits with me. She admits to not having reviewed the evaluation nor ever meeting me, however being my son's advocate requesting visitation be suspended immediately and the already scheduled father son therapy begin. And it did, my ex-wife would accompany my son in the waiting room prior to our sessions, I would try to kiss my son and talk to him and he would stiffen up and get very uncomfortable. I would ask her if they needed anything and what not and she would refuse to acknowledge me. After a couple weeks of this it became so bad for Andrew that the therapist asked me to come ten minutes late and enter by way of the back door so not to come in contact with my son's mother. Week after week the sessions became increasingly nonproductive, with Andrew ignoring me and not participating. So about our sixth session I came in late as usual and the therapist immediately states that she and Andrew had been talking and he had something he wanted to tell me. So I sit down across from him and he tells me that he's tired of nobody listening to him and that he was tired of going to therapy and evaluations, just the whole thing. Then what he said to me must have been one of the hardest things he'll ever do, and the most painful thing I’ve ever heard. He looks me in the eyes and says that maybe in two or three years he might feel different. But that he didn’t want to see me anymore. I knew right then he had enough and I agreed to his request, I told him that I would be there for him if ever he needed me, then to avoid breaking down in front of him I quickly left the session. That was in October of 1998, then December 3rd of that same year I received a call from my son's therapist Judith Linzer, Ph.D. She opens with telling me that she had made a terrible mistake, and that I was right in saying that my ex-wife and her parents had been brainwashing my son. And then explained to me that she too was alienated from Andrew and that she was concerned for him being that he was cut off from everyone and his needed therapy. She advised me that she believed him to be a Parental Alienation case and offered to sell me a copy of an article that explained the seriousness of his condition and asked me what I wanted her to do. I said I didn’t know I just didn’t want him to end up in a clock tower on a college campus with a riffle yelling I thought you loved me! She said what do you mean? He's already that sick, he's one sick puppy! I then told her to immediately contact the court and inform them of his situation, then she had the nerve to tell me that she would have to charge me $500 dollars for writing a letter to the judge. I told her we would discuss that later, and she wrote the letter. In it contained shocking and disturbing descriptions of both my son and his mother’s behavior. She makes the diagnosis of PAS and gives a very non-committal opinion of what the best plan of action would be. She recommends a second evaluation was in order, so the judge met with my ex-wife and I and said he was requesting another evaluation. One thing I want to point out is that his doctor was cut off from my son in October and didn’t decide to contact me until December. Thus as she states in her letter that because she hadn’t seen Andrew in two months and was unaware of his condition she thought the evaluation to be a good idea. It took me a while to put that together.
Once again due to the evaluators inflexible schedule he wasn’t able to start for nearly a month, and my exwifes attorney is quick to file a three month continuance and making the statement that we would then address Dr. Linzer's so called Parental Alienation. Well that was January 1999 and sure enough the evaluator once again felt no urgency in completing this his second evaluation, in fact it took him ten months to complete approximately 22 billed hours of evaluating. So finally in October of 1999 a hearing was scheduled to review the findings of the second and I've always believed unneeded evaluation. However one week before we were to appear the evaluator phones me informing me that he had just tallied up his hours and that his fees exceeded the initial retainer by twelve hundred dollars, and that my half was six hundred dollars. I told him that was fine and I could pay him $100 dollars a month until paid, he rejected this idea informing me that if he wasn’t paid in full prior to the hearing scheduled the following week then he in turn would be unable to release the findings of his report. I told him there was no way I could come up with that kind of money in less that a week, he said he was sorry but he would have to contact the court about enforcing payment. And that’s exactly what he does I have a copy of his letter sent to the judge telling him that I refused to pay him anymore than what had been paid to cover the retainer, in fact went as far as to tell the judge that I told him that I owed money to the father son therapist previously used and that she wasn’t getting paid nor would he.
That was October 12th. 1999 the case was closed, my wife disconnected the phone and refused to answer the door, when this happened I went to evaluator pleading for him to assist me and he asked me if I knew that my son's mother was pretty ill, I told him I didn’t know and he then told me that she had been locked up in a mental ward three times over the course of a year. I went to family court service telling them that my son’s mother has been unable to care for my son numerous times. She told me that they were done with the case. And that if I want their assistance I would have to take it back to court.
And here we are, and that's the short version!
.
Any suggestions as to our civil rights or reunification?

I can tell you right now that you are WAY more likely to get replies if you trim that down some. Make it MUCH smaller.

[stealth2]

Uuuuh, yeah - you need a LAWYER. And you need to pay the lawyer AND the evaluator. Neither of whom are required to provide a payment plan.

OK How about this why dont you do what the Judge and the therapist didnt do! Read the Evaluation! The First One! Which by the way I paid $3,500 for and since it took a year over $5,000 in attorney fees. Getg the whole picture before playing judge!

The custody evaluation which was to take approximately three months to complete, However it takes nearly eight months to complete, this due to the vacation schedule of the court recommended custody evaluator, Milton Schaefer Ph.D. The following observations and recommendations are taken from that twenty-eight-page report.

Observations
Since their separation in December 1996 ANDREW has lived with his mother at his grandparents home and has had limited contact with his father, consisting of three hours on Wednesdays and three Sundays a month. Both parents acknowledge that these contacts have been difficult for Andrew with him having great anxiety and his maintaining a distant and aloof relationship from his father

Jim states that this is new behavior on his son's part and that he has become a fearful and anxious youngster since the separation. He believes that this is the result of his mother and grandparent’s influence. There is ample evidence that in many ways the Qs never fully pulled together as an autonomous family unit.

Lori shows significant difficulties in establishing her own sense of independence and autonomy from her parents Lori's difficulties with separation also extend to her son and she has a difficult time differentiating her own fears and worries from those of Andrew. She is hyper vigilant and often projects out her own worries and anger in a somewhat paranoid fashion.

She is now closing ranks with her family and to do that Jim must be cast out as an active and valued participant in her son's life.

A major question in this evaluation is the extent to which Jim presents a danger to his son that Andrew is in any physical danger when he is with his father. It is true that Jim has a history of alcohol abuse but I see little to no indication that he is drinking at all further, there is no history of Jim abusing Andrew or placing him at substantial risk. It is also the case that Andrew's behavior is quite provocative Based on all the above, I would not expect Andrew to be in any physical danger.

Andrew is a very anxious youngster caught in the conflict between his parents Andrew has adapted the hyper vigilant stance of his mother and is thus tense and waiting for his father to explode in some way. For Andrew, time at his father's is grim and joyless with little sense that he can have a good time. I think he has little interest in having an improved relationship with his father oven though I also believe that the relationship was better before the final separation

As a matter of psychological survival he has also closed ranks with his mother and grandparents and has adopted the same distrustful and is suspicious attitudes.

I also believe that it is important that he be able to regain a relationship with his father to assist in distancing from the enmeshed and one sided, position he has taken. In effect he has decided that his mother and grandparents are good and his father is bad I believe that this type of splitting will inevitably lead to his also having a negative and distorted view of himself.

Recommendations
Jim and Lori Q should share joint legal custody of Andrew. I have seen nothing to suggest that Jim should not play a part in decision-making in Andrew's life. Andrew should reside primarily with his mother. It is to her and his grandparents that he looks to for support and as primary attachment figures. It is important for him to know that this relationship will not be threatened by contact with his father. It is important that the relationship between Andrew and his father be strengthened I believe this will take a combination of counseling and increased time.

I also believe that if one waited until Andrew or Lori felt ready then it would not occur because of Lori and her parent's opposition and Andrew's need to not oppose their desires. Thus I recommend that Andrew and his father start seeing someone in parent-child counseling on a once weekly basis. The focus of this therapy should be the relationship between father and son rather than individual work for Andrew.

Goals would include improved communication, Andrew feeling more relaxed and less fearful, and Jim being more able to show his feelings to Andrew and reassure him that he has his son's best interests in mind. It would also be important for this therapist to meet from time to time with Lori or Andrew and Lori as she sees fit.

I also believe it would be helpful if this therapist were a woman to help prevent tendency in Andrew to see a male therapist as his father's ally. There will be a tremendous resistance in this family system to increasing contact with concomitant pressure on the therapists involved. I would thus recommend that four months after starting therapy the contact be increased in principal.

Andrew should be able to spend an extended time over the summer with his father. Lori specifically asked that she be able to know about Jim's medication and that she be able to assess his condition before Andrew goes with his father. This is intrusive, heightens and lends credence to Andrew's hyper vigilance and should not be permitted.

It is essential that Andrew remain in his therapy to help him in what will no doubt be a difficult transition Andrew appears to have made a very good connection to Dr. Linzer and to have been helped by her. It would also be very helpful to both Jim and to Andrew's therapist if she would meet with Jim on a regular, though not necessarily frequent basis to give and get feedback, about Andrew and how his visits with his father are progressing.

Milton P, Schaefer, Ph.D. Nex
[URL=http://groups.msn.com/VictimsofParentalAlienationSyndrome/yourwebpage.msnw]http://groups.msn.com/VictimsofParentalAlienationSyndrome/yourwebpage.msnw[/URL]

Let's try this a little more slowly:

You

Will

Get

More

Replies

If

You

Trim

Your

Post

Down

[stealth2]

ditto REParker & craftymom. Noone has the time to read a book.

Also, I do not think that on the internet, forums, etc., that anybody should be including the Real names of any counselor, psychiatrist, or even friends or enemies for that matter because it really serves no purpose and think that they would not appreciate that their name is listed on the internet regardless of what the reason is, unless they have okayed it.