Collateral Damage with Estrangement and No Contact

Collateral damage is that term defines the damage that can over spill from a bad relationship that effects family members and mutual friends causing them to sever relationship with you or you with them.  When people go through a divorce and lose their in-laws in the process, collateral damage has occurred. 

 

Similarly, collateral damage can happen when an abusive parent is finally confronted, when boundaries are enforced, when no contact periods are taken, or when an estrangement occurs. When some people are faced with a family member or friend who is going through an estrangement or no contact situation, it just seems easier not to have to take sides. For others, the relationship is severed because it was never really all that important. Also, if you are dealing with a BPD who enlists allies against you (her target of rage),  letting those people go is prudent for peace of mind and your health. 

The estrangements with my mother and Dad were due to their behaviors over extended periods of time (my entire life). With my mother, she shut me out due to her perceptions of my unplanned wedding. With my Dad, he tried to control my husband and me and became upset when he couldn’t. Ultimately with both estrangements, collateral damage happened. I lost touch with the people surrounding each of them.

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What kind of collateral damage have you experienced with your estrangement or time of no-contact? Do you think the collateral damage is because you are just letting it be, the relationship was never that strong to begin with, the one with whom you’re estranged turns people against you, or some other reason? Please post your comments below.

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Letting Go

First of all, I am not the type to put someone in an awkward position. So, if you are close to my mother or Dad (for example, their spouse), I am not going to over-step the boundaries and expect them to chose me or even speak with me. I am not going to have someone ‘chose sides’ nor feel uncomfortable because they were put in an awkward position regarding loyalty. My mother and Dad have always been ones that placed a high value on loyalty, so with their narcissistic personalities, having their respective spouse not exhibit loyalty would be a huge violation.  

Weak Relationships

I must add also that if the relationship with the surrounding people wasn’t strong to begin with, why would any loyalty shift from aligning themselves or sticking by their spouse? Same goes for other people surrounding my mom or Dad. If I wasn’t close to them in the first place, why would an estrangement cause them to reach out to me MORE?  For example, with my Dad, I was never close to his wife or her daughter. So with the end of communication with my Dad, I didn’t attempt to contact either one of them, nor have they tried to contact me. And even further out in the lineage, my step-sister’s husband and his mother / father have not been in contact either. We never kept up with each other before, so why now? We occasionally visited during family get-togethers but that’s it. 

Campaigns of Denigration and Allies Against Target of Rage

With my mother, the situation is a bit more complicated because she enlists people in her target of rage (me being the target this time) and a campaign of denigration begins. With my mother, when she flew off the handle about her perceived view of my unplanned wedding, she spent her time and energy soliciting people to ‘her side’ rather than spending her time and energy trying to talk to my then fiancé and me. She also has had a history from my birth of controlling the people in my life—basically meddling in my familial relationships since birth. She ousted my birth father out when I was months old. She made it nearly impossible for my brother and me to have a relationship with my paternal grandparents. She wrote off my maternal grandfather shortly after my maternal grandmother died and wouldn’t even allow me to write him letters. She divorced and villianized my adopted father (whom I call Dad) when I was around 11 years old. When it fit into her plan of villianizing my adoptive father, she introduced my birth father back into my life around 12 years old. So, she controlled and molded my family relationships even up to our last estrangement. 

When she didn’t like what she was hearing about my wedding (that I didn’t feel comfortable having all three of my fathers together at the wedding), she said that she was ‘out’ of the wedding (which she was never ‘in’ because there was no wedding planned yet) and that she was going to call my birth father and his family to tell them they aren’t invited either. When she announced this, I became angry- angry because for my entire life, she manipulated who I could talk to. And now, I was taking a stand and speaking about what I felt comfortable with, which didn’t fit her wishes, and she exclaimed that she was ‘out’. Anyway, from that point forward, she made it her mission to  denigrate me to my birth father’s family and to turn them against me. 

I never had a solid or strong relationship with my birth father or his family, although my contact and experiences with them far exceeded my mother’s. So when she came forward to them when she was upset about wedding, I decided not to get into a ‘he said / she said’ with them. They never contacted me, however, so my side of the story was never communicated to them. I wasn’t about to call them in order to defend myself. I didn’t do anything ‘wrong’ so I didn’t feel the need to put myself on the stand to be cross-examined. 

They were under the spell of my manipulative and dysfunctional mother, and she tangled them into her web. I suppose if I had a solid and strong relationship with them that her power wouldn’t have affected them? I don’t know. They are very impressionable, small town folk that are very smitten with the wealthy and city life that my mother and her third husband live. So perhaps they would have fallen into the ‘poor pitiful woman whose daughter ripped her heart out’ trap by a very clever 

con-artist BPD.  

"The borderline enlists others as allies against the person who is the target of her rage. She may seek out friends, family members (including siblings and children), and co-workers of her victim in whom to confide fabricated stories designed to discredit her enemy. She intentionally leaves out discussion of her own behavior, presenting the other person's behavior as entirely unjustified." Lawson (p, 141).

But the bottom line is that I didn’t have a solid or strong relationship and the loss of them as collateral damage was not significant although I am disappointed that they think so poorly of me. I am still amazed, however, that they took the garbage that my mother spewed out of her mouth as gospel and turned to support her (even though they were victims of her toxicity several times in the past). 

"Others may believe the BPD's allegations of mistreatment because of the intensity of emotion. Misinformation is calculated and constructed in order to destroy the victim's reputation. Those who do not know the true situation may not notice inconsistencies in the BPD's story. It is difficult to verify the truth because the intensity of the emotion dissuades others from asking details" Lawson (p, 141).

Minimizing Collateral Damage

Collateral damage is a distressing effect of relationships gone awry. If both parties are supportive and understanding about the people surrounding them, relationships can continue. If both parties vow not to involve others in their own personal disagreement, argument, or split, collateral damage is minimized as well. Saying negative things and slinging insults is not the way to minimize damage. Agree not to bash each other and agree not to talk about the situation to others. These steps are seemingly simple, but to a BPD or NPD who wants to control, manipulate, or prove who is loyal to them, the task not not possible. Ultimately, due to my mother’s campaigns of denigration about me, I was not able to try to maintain a relationship and continue the link with grace with my birth father and his family. And the relationships surrounding my Dad were never that important to begin with.

What is Childhood Trauma?

I have always viewed my childhood as 'traumatic' ... not just as a memory but even when the situations where actually happening to me as a young child. I always knew that what was happening wasn't normal, that I was in survival mode, and that I would have some issues to deal with when all the dust settled. I distinctively remember at 12 years old upon the moment of calling the police on my parents for a 'domestic disturbance' (they were physically fighting each other at the front door) that I was thinking, "Deep-six-ing everything in order to get past the moment will result in something coming out later." I could feel in the pit of my stomach, in the depth of my being, that I was getting eaten up by the stress, the drama, and the trauma. I knew that brushing it all aside and moving forward without truly addressing what happened would later haunt my brother and me.

So, for years, I went about life during my parents' long, drawn-out, and viscous divorce which encompassed custody battles, possession wars, and using us kids as pawns (Parental Alienation Syndrome). My parents remarried very shortly (within a year) after the divorce to 'ready made' families, so my brother and I were thrust into these 'ready made' families without having comprehended or adjusted to my parents actually being separated and divorced. The 'ready made' families immediately had riffs, battles, and conflicts, making life even more strained and stressed.

Although my mother will deny that our up-bringing has any effect on our adult life (read Blaming Parents for Our Past), nearly every researcher agrees that early childhood traumas lie at the root of most long-term depression & anxiety, and many emotional and psychological illnesses. Severe traumas can even alter the very chemistry and physiology of the brain itself. I have continually stated that I feel as if my brother's life as a dysfunctional adult is part-and-parcel of his upbringing. My mother and Dad both think that he is solely responsible for his mental state, lack of ability to manage his life, and his depression, lack of motivation, & more.

I wasn't left unscarred from my childhood either. I have battled insomnia during peak times of childhood trauma. I have battled anxiety through out my life, waiting for the next bomb to explode in my family. I have sought acceptance and attention from my parents that I will never achieve in receiving. I have searched, researched, dug, and sought understanding of my past, with which my parents have never assisted (my mother is irrational when speaking of the past, and my Dad 'doesn't remember' because he 'doesn't want to', which neither helps when trying to gain peace with the past).

So what exactly constitutes childhood trauma? Did I actually experience childhood trauma? A seminal 1992 American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) report defines childhood abuse as "a repeated pattern of damaging interactions between parent(s) [or, presumably, other significant adults] and child that becomes typical of the relationship." In addition to physical, sexual and verbal abuse, this can include anything that causes the child to feel worthless, unlovable, insecure, and even endangered, or as if his only value lies in meeting someone else's needs.

Examples cited in the report include:

• "belittling, degrading or ridiculing a child; making him or her feel unsafe [including threat of abandonment]; failing to express affection, caring and love; neglecting mental health, medical or educational needs."
• The AAP also includes parental divorce in the list of potentially harmful events which can traumatize a child.
• Moving home frequently is traumatic for a child (it has been linked to suicide in older children)
• Disruptive home life, including having to adapt to a parent's remarriage and being part of a new blended family (perhaps several in the course of childhood).

Reference: What is Childhood Trauma?

Given the information above, my brother and I indeed experienced childhood trauma, namely (1) the repeated pattern of damaging interactions with my parents, (2) parental divorce, and (3) 'disruptive home life' with having to adapt to a parent's remarriage and being part of a new blended family (two in the course of our childhoods). The results are also blatantly clear with my brother who is very depressed and suffers anxiety with panic attacks.

Not only can these childhood traumas cause depression, anxiety, PTSD, ADD/ADHD, but researchers at the CDC have also found that a traumatic childhood can take 20-years off of one's life. The study, which appeared in the November 2009 issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, is the latest in the ongoing 14-year-old Adverse Childhood Experiences Study. The study involved 17,337 adults who became members of Kaiser Permanente, a health care maintenance organization in San Diego, between 1995 and 1997. After visiting a primary care facility at the HMO, they voluntarily filled out a standard medical questionnaire that included questions about their childhood. The questionnaire asked them about 10 types of child trauma:

• Three types of abuse (sexual, physical and emotional).
• Two types of neglect (physical and emotional).
• Five types of family dysfunction (having a mother who was treated violently, a household member who’s an alcoholic or drug user, who’s been imprisoned, or diagnosed with mental illness, or parents who are separated or divorced).

The researchers found that people with six or more of these types of trauma died nearly 20 years earlier on average than those without — 60.6 years versus 79.1 years. In this particular research, neglect was not included. So, a person who has been emotionally abused, physically neglected and grew up with an alcoholic father who beat up his wife would have an ACE score of 4. The significance of the study is that it supports the previous research — that child trauma is an important public health issue, stated David Brown of the CDC.

Research also shows that if a person has one risk factor, he or she usually has another. So, the researchers asked: if risk factors for disease, disability and early mortality aren’t randomly distributed, what influences their adoption or development? In parallel research, the neuroscience community has found that that trauma alters the function and development of children’s brains and nervous systems. Epigeneticists, who study how a person’s experiences turn their genes off and on, have found that trauma can turn on genes that manufacture the chemical stressors that affect the brain.

Traumatized children become hyper-vigilant, edgy, and impulsive with hot tempers. They are unable to focus on their schoolwork, unable to sit still, and regard social interactions as threats. These behaviors can get them in trouble or suspended, and that can lead to engaging in risky behaviors, such as smoking, drinking too much alcohol, workaholism, eating too much, etc., which can affect their health. Each of those descriptors fits what happened to my brother: hyper-vigilant, edgy, impulsive, hot tempered, unable to focus on schoolwork, couldn't sit still, and engaged in risky behavior (smoking, drinking).

Reference: Traumatic Childhood Takes 20 Years Off Life Expectancy

I still believe that one's personality and genetic make-up have a huge effect on who you develop into as a person. Your perspective in life which leads to how you handle your surroundings, thus your stress levels, greatly impacts your health. I recent dove into that topic of Nature vs Nurture And considering that my brother and I both came from the same parents, with the same childhood trauma, and over the same duration, but we both turned out drastically different gives an indication of personality's effect. Regardless of how we turned out as adults and regardless of my mother's and Dad's perceptions of my brother / my childhoods, we did indeed experience childhood trauma: my brother from 7 years old and onward, and for me from 9 years old and onward.

Questions and Doubts Surrounding Parental Alienation Syndrome

Having come from a situation where BOTH of my parents used my brother and me as pawns in the divorce and pitted us against each other trying to turn us again the other parent, I deeply understand each element contained in Garder's and Baker's research and conclusions regarding PAS. I lived it. I experienced it. I had to overcome its devastating and damaging effects. To read that the scientific and legal legitimacy is questioned disturbs me.

First of all, regardless what LABEL is slapped on what happened to my brother and me in regard to brainwashing and manipulations by our parent to alienate the other, we underwent tremendous emotional abuse that was far stretching into four decades of our life. No matter what LABEL is attached to what happened, our parents blatantly tried to use my brother and me to hurt the other parent, and in the process, tried to turn us against the parent by telling us lies, embellishments, and scare tactics. TO THIS DAY:

• I don't know if my mother broke all the windows in the house as my Dad lead us to believe-- or did my Dad actually do it and pin it on my mother to scare us kids?
  
• I don't know if my now step-father (at the time he was just my mother's boyfriend / Dad's ex-friend) actually pulled a gun on my Dad or did my Dad make this up to scare us kids?
  
• If my mother was actually violent as my Dad portrayed with testimonial tapes made by friends, private detective followings, and medical records.
  

So, if the scientific legitimacy is questioned, therefore the courts don't accept PAS as actual abuse to the child, then how else is the child protected and removed from the abuse? I understand that for the courts to recognize PAS as 'scientific':

1. PAS must be based on methodology that can be or has been tested-- the courts have determined that PAS does not meet the threshold requirement to qualify as scientific. I take issue with the court's determination-- not merely on their 4 part 'test' but also for the sake of the children who are caught up in the court system's legal jargon and loop-holes. From the research I have performed, in the last 20 years the methodology of testing has been thorough and with depth & breadth.
   
2. PAS must have been the subject of peer review and publication-- PAS has been the subject of peer review and publication-- simply look at Amy J. L. Baker's body of work. She is the author or co-author of 3 books and over 45 peer reviewed articles.
   
3. The known or potential rate of error (reliability and validity) of PAS-- the reliability and validity of PAS is evidenced in the reality of its victims & their stories which fit perfectly into the constructs of PAS. Some of the court's comments about PAS's reliability and validity stem from the emergence of PAS into general public. The court is discrediting the findings saying that PAS is in its initial stage of discovery and, therefore, can't be determined reliable and valid. At this point, after 20 + years of more evidence, cases, and studies, PAS is as recognized as BPD (which was labeled around the same time).
   
4. Does PAS enjoy general acceptance within the scientific community-- since PAS is not a 'mental disorder' and doesn't meet the criteria for a 'mental illness', the psychiatric community has shunned PAS. I don't think PAS is mental disorder or illness. I believe it's a SYMPTOM of an overlying disease, such as BPD, NPD, alcoholism, or drug addiction. In and of itself, I don't think that PAS is a stand-alone disease. I think that during times of duress, PAS manifests itself. In other words, my Dad wouldn't have a reason to turn my brother and me against my mother during happy times of their marriage. Not until my mother cheated on my Dad with his friend and he shuddered at the thought of her also getting us kids did he decide to turn us against her. Reciprocally, when my mother lost custody of us kids to my Dad, but then got us back, she waged an all out war against him to this day with a tool kit of alienating arsenal. In other words, if my parents didn't have the mental and personality disorders, they may have had a copesectic divorce. But due to the disorders, the divorce dragged on, and each parent went into a pseudo-psychotic state-- not taking any consideration of how their behavior ultimately effected the kids as they lived in a world of revenge and vengence. My mother to this day can't talk about my Dad without copping a nutty-- and my Dad continues to say that if my mother died tomorrow that he wouldn't shed a tear. So does acceptance in the scientific community REALLY matter when a child is being abused? Does this really matter when a parent is being alienated from his / her beloved children? I understand this is a prong of the court's test as evidence of legitimacy, but if the prevalence of this type of abuse is so profound as it has been discovered, don't the children need protection? So rather than ditching PAS for whatever reason, shouldn't the abuse be recognized and handled regardless?
   

According to the courts, alternative factors to PAS for an expert to consider are (and some of these cracked me up because they are part & parcel of PAS... they are symptoms of PAS):

1. developmentally normal separation problems
2. deficits in the non-custodial parent’s skills (part of PAS: most alienating parents meet the diagnostic criteria for a personality disorder, a pervasive and distorted relational style, including narcissism and borderline personality. A related finding is that many of the alienating parents appeared to have features of narcissistic and/or have a borderline personality disorders, alcoholism, drug addiction. These parents usually have deficits in parenting skills due to how the disorder is manifested)
   
3. oppositional behavior (part of PAS: children become the prize to be won or lost in what often becomes an escalating conflict, being used as pawns & turned against a parent in the process.)
   
4. high-conflict divorce proceedings (part of PAS: during heated child custody situation, the prevalence of PAS is heightened)
   
5. other serious emotional or medical problems of one family member (part of PAS: already mentioned above, parents with personality disorders, alcoholism, and drug addition are more likely to try to alienate the child from the other parent)
   
6. child abuse (part of PAS: well, actually PAS is EMOTIONAL ABUSE. Period. So, looking to see if the situation is 'child abuse' rather than 'PAS' is simply splitting hairs.)
   
7. inappropriate, unpredictable, or violent behavior by one parent (part of PAS: the brainwashing, manipulations, and scare tactics are just that-- inappropriate and unpredictable)
   
8. incidental causes, such as the child’s dislike of a parent’s new roommate or lover
9. alienation by third parties
10. the child’s unassisted manipulation of one or both parents
    
11. fears for the absent parent’s welfare

"The value of an expert’s contribution to the courts’ deliberations regarding children’s welfare should be based on clinically sound reasoning formulated from empirically derived data that will serve the best interest of the child and not on unsubstantiated hyperbole"-- Parental Alienation Syndrome: Frye v Gardner. Hyperbole?? Finding all of the information and research about PAS was a HUGE revelation for me. PAS explained for what I have been searching for decade. PAS is EXACTLY what happened to me. Short term losses included a normal childhood, healthy relationships with parents, shattered attachment with parents, and more. Long term effects included but not limited to anxiety, feelings of intense guilt, fear, and confusion. For the court to take what could be so VALIDATING, so HEALING, so much of a REVELATION for a child that is in the midst of the damaging of effects of PAS is a complete shame. Where the emotional abuse could be stopped in its tracks, the court would rather not hear about PAS.

I know that I have made this all too simplistic than reality; however, that is just the point. Simply put, the abuse can be more readily identified through the tool of PAS, and therefore, simply STOPPED. By the court allowing what they think is not 'scientific', they could allow as a 'tool' to enable children to see beyond the dysfunction and toxicity of the world they're enveloped. I know that when I was going through PAS at the hands of my parents, I didn't see the full picture of what was going on. I didn't have an enlightened witness to help me to see what my parents were doing. When a child is caught up in the crazy turmoil of not only their parents' divorce but also the emotional abuse of PAS, the child most likely is unable to see the clear picture and, therefore, not able to steer clear from brainwashing. I would have been eternally grateful if the courts defined PAS for me and put a stop to the crazy circus that my parents created.

As strong willed and level headed as I was, I still had a very difficult time deciphering what was going on with my parents-- who was telling the truth, if I should be weary of one parent or the other, the realization that one of my parents was not being honest but which one was telling the truth, that no matter what I was going to upset a parent so I was always walking on eggshells, wanting to please my parents so much and having to play sick games, knowing that I can't have a relationship with both parents at the same time (it's one or the other), being legitimately SCARED of my parent, and that my parents wielded guilt as a very effective weapon (definitely a huge tool with alienation).

PAS has been cited as part of the child custody determination process in the United States. Based on the evaluation of PAS, courts in the US have awarded sole custody to some fathers. Of sixty-four precedent-bearing cases, only two decisions, both in New York State and both in criminal courts actually set precedents. Both held PAS inadmissible and one case found that PAS failed the Frye test as the appropriate professional community did not generally accept; this decision was upheld in an appellate court. One case stated that PAS passed the Frye test, but the appeal did not discuss the Frye test and actually "[threw] out the words "'parental alienation syndrome'" and focused on the "willingness and ability of each parent to facilitate and encourage a close and continuing relationship between the parents and the child." In the second case the appellate court did not discuss PAS; the third case specifically chose not to discuss the admissibility of PAS and the fourth made no decision on PAS-- Parental Alienation Syndrome Wikipedia

Funny how the PAS is PAS whether you call it PAS or write it out in its definition form. Sad that so much time, money, and headache has to be put in with these cases, taking them all the way to the appellate courts. How much precious time is lost with the child's childhood-- the time they should be laughing, carefree, loved, and feeling safe. So much time is spent on the legal gymnastics and parental battles that the true meaning behind all of parenting is lost-- to nuture and rear your child in a loving, safe, and supportive environment.

The Divorce Continues

I have to add a post in here about the duration and extent of my parents' divorce. Their divorce started in 1979 and didn't fully complete until the mid 1980's. "If the borderline narcissistic couple divorces, battles over custody issues can continue for years" p 189 Lawson. The divorce was NASTY. They took each other back to court time and time again for custody battles, obtaining something the other wouldn't give them, terms of the divorce, and so much more. The divorce included teams of attorneys, psychiatrists, private detectives, character witnesses, taped phone calls, photographs, expert witnesses, and more. Basically, their divorce was a circus that costs TENS of THOUSANDS of dollars EACH, and involved many, many people... including me having to testify against my mother. For more about this type of divorce, see Narcissistic Borderline Couples.

"The most common campaign of denigration is organized against ex-spouses and ex-partners of the borderline. Divorces, separations, and endings of relationships can trigger full-blown war; thus, custody battles may continue for years. The borderline is consumed with annihilatory rage and may seek financial, emotional, and physical revenge" p 142 Lawson.

In regard to having to testify against my mother in 1979, the event was VERY traumatic and stressful for me. I felt extremely pressured by my Dad to do this, and I felt as if I were to display my loyalty and respect for my Dad, I would have to follow through with his wishes. I was a wreck, being taken out of school (7th grade) and going to the courthouse. Seeing my mother there was AWFUL. She was visibly distraught seeing her daughter in court with the motive to testify against her. My brother had backed out at the last minute, but I felt this overwhelming need to please my Dad and intimidated to say 'no' to him. Of course, everything my Dad had to say about this occasion was that I was merely 'telling the facts' and not doing anything wrong.

Looking back at it now, I think it was completely wrong on ALL levels. See subsequent blog entry: Adult Children of Parental Alienation. My parents should have never put the kids in the middle of their divorce. My parents should have never made us chose between parents. My parents should not have projected their pain during the divorce onto the kids. "Both the borderline Queen and the narcissistic King perceive themselves as innocent victims. The true victims, of course, are their children" p 190 Lawson. TO THIS DAY, neither of my parents admits to what they did to my brother and me-- and what they put us through for decades.

I found this very revealing study relating to Borderline and Narcissistic parents going to court for divorce. "There seems to be emerging a new kind of couple with which, I believe, courts are becoming more and more familiar. Although to date there is no diagnostic category indicating a collective diagnosis of this particular couple indicating their behaviors, pathological interactions, characteristics, and idiosyncratic nature of relationship, they are becoming an increasing concern to court officials in the area of family law. Moreover, judges, lawyers, counselors and court personnel are becoming more .baffled about this type of dyadic unit. They see them regularly but don't recognize that beneath their apparent stubborn, childlike behaviors are some real fundamental conflictual issues" Narcissist Borderline Couples

You Dropped a Bomb on Me (1979)

"Children have faith in their parents and believe their greater wisdom.
No child wants to believe their parent is capable of brutality"
Christine Ann Lawson

So, that sunny day was darkened. In the instant when the words came out of my mother's mouth, my life and my brother's life were changed forever. The course of our lives was changed. Although the beginning of the dysfunction started with the deaths of my grandmother and grandfather (or even earlier with my mother's 1st divorce) but his event definitely defines the beginning of mental and emotional abuse, as well as YEARS of soul searching.

This day, when my mother pulled us into the kitchen, taking two young & innocent souls, one 12 and one 10 years of age, with big eyes of wonderment, she told us that my Dad and she are getting a divorce. Dad is moving out of the house. Boom. Like my Dad is dead. Boom. Like my whole world spinning out of control. Boom. Like having two of the most important people in my life die the previous two years, and now my Dad being ripped out of my life. I was breathless. I didn't know what to think.

Cookie Magazine this past month had a very compelling article, "Louder Than Bombs" and the words hit home. Here's a bit from the beginning, "They say that every generation is shaped by its war. The Greatest Generation (1901-1924) was forged by World War II; baby boomers (1946-1964) were defined by Vietnam and the sexual revolution. But our war was the ultimate war-at-home: divorce. Generation X, according to a 2004 study conducted by marketing-strategy and research firm Reach Advisors, "went through its all-important, formative years as one of the least parented, least nurtured in U.S. history." Half of all Gen X children's parents split; 40 percent were latchkey kids." My parents divorce hit right here, 1979.

We moved from the kitchen to the den, sitting on the couch, my mother assured us that Dad would still be our Dad, just that he wouldn't be living in the house with us. We questioned where he would be. We were told some place close. I couldn't think of Dad not being with us in the house. And as bizarre as other behaviors in my house had been in the past, we went to a movie that evening. As a family, we sat in that movie theater as if nothing has transpired. In a cloud of avoidance and thoughts of denial, we sat watching this movie, numbing our minds of what all had just transpired. Bizarre then, bizarre now. More bizarre stuff to follow.

The days after the announcement were like days before. Dad was still in the house. Things operated pretty much like they did before the bomb. Dad hunted for a new home, however, and eventually found one about a mile up the street. Now let the bizarre events begin:

Dad would come to the house to 'babysit' while my mother went out. While she was gone, my Dad would go through her things. He would find things like a book, "The Sensuous Woman" and tell us that our mother is slutty. He found an incense burner and told us our mother uses drugs, which truly freaked me out badly. He made us promise that we wouldn't tell our mother that he was looking through her things, and we didn't (see subsequent blog entry: Adult Children of Parental Alienation).

During this time, I noticed that our family friend (the one that was giving my mother Valium; the medical person) was coming to the house to visit my mother often. I also would see his car outside of the house in the morning. As a 12 year old I didn't put 2 and 2 together, and I innocently asked my Dad why this man's car is always at the house. Little did I know, I opened a box of worms-- nasty worms. Seems that my mother had been having an affair with my Dad's best friend.

Seems that my mother had been running around with this man for some time before announcing she wants a divorce. And when my Dad found out the truth, he was immensely hurt. I have never seen him in this condition before, and I have never seen him like this after. The knowledge of his wife cheating on him with his friend drove him nuts. Dad enlisted me to report when I saw the car out front. Now I felt like a rat-fink and didn't approve of reporting things about my mother secretly for whatever reason. Dad also got a private detective to take pictures of the man over at our house with my mother. Dad also took pictures on his own.

I remember many times, playing in the living room with my mother and her new boyfriend (our Dad's best friend) and flashes would go off in the window. My brother and I would be scared, because we could see a person in the bushes or in the front yard. Other times we would play in the living room and the police would show up at the front door. The police said that someone called because they could see violence / child abuse happening through the front windows. My mother told my brother and me that my Dad was the one calling the police, just to harass us and to put a damper on our fun.

I walked to school at the time, and many times my Dad would intercept me. He would be in tears, saying how much he missed my brother and me. This tore me UP so much. I couldn't stand to see my Dad so upset. Around this time, he gave me a key to his apartment. He told us that my brother and I could come over any time. When we visited him, he was clearly sad, beaten & battered emotionally. He also spoiled us, allowing us sweets which we weren't allowed typically, staying up late at night, and doing what we wanted. He always talked about us coming to live with him and accentuated all the bad things about my mother and what she did. My brother and I were completely torn. We didn't want to hurt our mother's feelings, nor did we want to hurt our Dad's feelings. No matter what our choice, we would hurt one of them however. And this has been our predicament our ENTIRE life from this point forward.