Too many beautiful, loving folks believe they and the narcissist are soul mates or twin flames. They believe the narcissist is simply fulfilling the “runner” dynamic and will ‘come to their senses’ and return to the relationship sooner or later. And they will wait YEARS for this to happen, enduring untold, horrific abuse. Please understand that a soul mate will not betray you, stab you in the back, tell you pathological lies, or make it their duty to cause you to feel unworthy of their love. Only sadistic manipulators do that. Many writers and content creators are romanticizing emotional abuse and calling it ‘spiritual lessons’ and ‘evolution’. This is one of the worst forms of gaslighting. The truth is, staying in a relationship with an individual who emotionally abuses you and repeatedly breaks their promises can cause crippling levels of chronic depression due to repeated emotional traumas, the nature of which is made worse by the limiting beliefs we form in response to the narcissist’s degrading verbal assaults. Even more alarming, repeated emotional injuries shrink the brain’s hippocampus, which is responsible for memory and learning, while enlarging the amygdala, which houses primitive emotions such as fear, grief, guilt, envy, and shame.
In short, you habitually become hijacked by your freeze response, unable to form rational thoughts or reactions. Over time, this becomes your baseline state of being. It’s a cycle of emotional destruction of the most grievous kind. I cannot recommend enough to stop romanticizing abuse and stop self-abandoning.
The Modules of THRIVE are dedicated to helping you evolve into a healed version of yourself so you can say “NO” to continued abuse.
And you will be restored in more incredible ways than you ever believed possible.
“Sometimes the pain of being rejected by our own adult children and being rendered completely invisible to our grandchildren cuts so deep that we loose sight of the fact that what our estranged/alienated adult children are truly rejecting is parts of themselves and their own children. That’s the part of all this emotional cut-off / no-contact madness that is the most tragic. We’ve got a whole lot of adult sized humans running around pretending as if their own parents don’t exist, and, a whole many more adult humans trudging through life as if they have been buried alive. Then as a result we’ve got all these young humans being raised by parents who have come to believe the illusion that if they just emotionally cut-off and ignore the existence of their children’s grandparents they will somehow succeed in “parenting” the grandparents out of those children.” ~Anue Nue “if you show someone the sun in your bones and they reject you you must remember. they hurt themselves this very same way. – unable” ― Nayyirah Waheed, Salt
A proper risk assessment for possible child abuse looks at both sides.
When a child is rejecting a parent, the first rule-out is that this parent is abusively maltreating the child resulting in the child’s rejection of the parent.
The first focus for the assessment is on the parenting practices of the targeted-rejected parent. Are they abusive-range parenting or is this a normal-range parent?
That is the first question to answer – definitively. If the answer returned is that the targeted-rejected parent is abusively maltreating the child, then that becomes the focus of the treatment. Nothing else moves forward until child abuse is resolved.
This is a key and first assessment in any risk assessment for possible Child Psychological Abuse (DSM-5 V995.51). Is the targeted-rejected parent abusively maltreating the child?
I recommend that the assessing mental health professional use the Parenting Practices Rating Scale to document their professional judgment based on their assessment of the parenting practices of the targeted-rejected parent.
Level 1 Abusive-Range Parenting and Level 2 Severely Problematic Parenting by the targeted-rejected parent would represent abusive-range parenting that should become the focus of treatment.
Level 3 Normal-Range Problematic and Level 4 Normal-Range Healthy would both be normal-range parenting and would not be considered abusive maltreatment of the child.
If the parenting practices of the targeted-rejected parent have been determined to be normal-range by the assessment, then the diagnostic question surrounding the child’s attachment pathology shifts to the other parent, the allied parent.
At this point the risk assessment is for a possible shared persecutory delusion (ICD-10 F24), a thought disorder with the allied parent from unresolved trauma that distorts their thinking and perception regarding current situations, and that they are then imposing this false and distorted belief system onto the child. i.e., a shared persecutory delusion.
The American Psychiatric Association provides a definition of a persecutory delusion:
From the APA: “Persecutory Type: delusions that the person (or someone to whom the person is close) is being malevolently treated in some way.” (American Psychiatric Association, 2000).
Google malevolent: having or showing a wish to do evil to others.
Does the child (and allied parent) have a fixed and false belief that the targeted parent has a “wish to do evil” to the child?
In the flagship journal of the AFCC, Family Court Review, Walters and Friedlander noted the association of attachment pathology in court-involved family conflict and the potential delusional beliefs of one parent toward the other:
From Walters & Friedlander: “In some RRD [resist-refuse dynamics] families, a parent’s underlying encapsulated delusion about the other parent is at the root of the intractability (cf. Johnston & Campbell, 1988, p. 53ff; Childress , 2013). An encapsulated delusion is a fixed, circumscribed belief that persists over time and is not altered by evidence of the inaccuracy of the belief.”
Walters and Friedlander cite a 2013 essay-article from me posted to my website:
Childress, C. A. (2013). Reconceptualizing parental alienation: Parental personality disorder and the trans-generational transmission of attachment trauma.
A delusion is a a fixed and false belief that is maintained despite contrary evidence. A persecutory delusion is a fixed and false belief in supposed “victimization.”
The assessment for delusional thought disorder pathology is a Mental Status Exam of thought and perception.
From NCBI: “The inability to process information correctly is part of the definition of psychotic thinking. How the patient perceives and responds to stimuli is therefore a critical psychiatric assessment. Does the patient harbor realistic concerns, or are these concerns elevated to the level of irrational fear? Is the patient responding in exaggerated fashion to actual events, or is there no discernible basis in reality for the patient’s beliefs or behavior?”
From NCBI: “Of all portions of the mental status examination, the evaluation of a potential thought disorder is one of the most difficult and requires considerable experience. The primary-care physician will frequently desire formal psychiatric consultation in patients exhibiting such disorders.”
I have that “considerable experience” from 12 years of annual training in the assessment of delusional thought disorder pathology while I was with a major NIMH research study on schizophrenia.
9/85 – 9/98 Research Associate UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute Principle Investigator: Keith Nuechterlein, Ph.D. Area: Longitudinal study of initial-onset schizophrenia. Received annual training to research and clinical reliability in the rating of psychotic symptoms using the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale (BPRS). Managed all aspects of data collection and data processing.
Most (all) mental health professionals working with court involved family conflict lack the “considerable experience” needed for a Mental Status Exam of thought and perception (i.e., practice beyond the boundaries of their competence – Standard 2.01).
In an effort to be helpful from my background and experience, I have provided a three item checklist that can reliably identify the family pathology created by a shared persecutory delusion, along with 12 Associated Clinical Signs that are often co-occurring with this delusional thought-disorder pathology.
I have also provided an Outcome Measure, the Parent-Child Relationship Rating Scale, in which daily ratings made by the targeted parent are sent to the treating family therapist along three scales, 1) Affection (attachment), 2) Cooperation (emotional regulation), and 3) Social Involvement (mood & arousal).
I’m not going to fight about it. In the court system surrounding child custody litigation, everyone fights about everything. I’m not participating. I’m treatment not custody, I’m a clinical psychologist not a “forensic” psychologist.
I would never be a “forensic” psychologist. The standards of practice in “forensic” psychology are substantially beneath those in clinical psychology.
The Parenting Practices Rating Scale, the Diagnostic Checklist for Pathogenic Parenting, and the Parent-Child Relationship Rating Scale are for your benefit, not mine. I’m just trying to be helpful.
I know what I’m doing already. I can conduct an MSE of thought and perception and rate the delusional belief on the 7-point scale of the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale (BPRS), the “oldest, most widely used scales to measure psychotic symptoms.”
I have described the pathology in detail in my book, Foundations.
I’ve done my part. It’s not my job to educate other psychologists, it’s their job to already know.
2.01 Boundaries of Competence (a) Psychologists provide services, teach, and conduct research with populations and in areas only within the boundaries of their competence, based on their education, training, supervised experience, consultation, study, or professional experience.
2.03 Maintaining Competence Psychologists undertake ongoing efforts to develop and maintain their competence.
2.04 Bases for Scientific and Professional Judgments Psychologists’ work is based upon established scientific and professional knowledge of the discipline.
The established scientific and professional knowledge of the professional psychology is:
Attachment – Bowlby and others Family systems therapy – Minuchin and others Personality disorders – Beck and others Complex trauma – van der Kolk and others Child development – Tronick and others Self psychology – Kohut and others ICD-10 & DSM-5 diagnostic systems
In 2017 I presented directly to the national convention of the AFCC informing them regarding the nature of the pathology and their ethical obligations.
In 2018 I hand-delivered a Petition to the APA signed by over 20,000 parents notifying the APA of the ethical violations surrounding forensic psychology.
If you’re a psychologist working with court-involved child custody conflict, it’s not my job to educate you – it’s your job to already know.
I have mandatory professional obligations – required not optional.
1.04 Informal Resolution of Ethical Violations When psychologists believe that there may have been an ethical violation by another psychologist, they attempt to resolve the issue by bringing it to the attention of that individual, if an informal resolution appears appropriate and the intervention does not violate any confidentiality rights that may be involved.
1.05 Reporting Ethical Violations If an apparent ethical violation has substantially harmed or is likely to substantially harm a person or organization and is not appropriate for informal resolution under Standard 1.04, Informal Resolution of Ethical Violations , or is not resolved properly in that fashion, psychologists take further action appropriate to the situation. Such action might include referral to state or national committees on professional ethics, to state licensing boards, or to the appropriate institutional authorities.
There are apparent ethical violations by other psychologists that are not properly resolved by informal resolution, and these ethical violations by forensic psychologists have substantially harmed and are likely to substantially harm many people, including the children they work with.
I have notified the AFCC directly. I have notified the APA directly. What “further action appropriate to the situation” is required?
I have educated the parent-consumers on both the pathology and their rights guaranteed to them by the mandatory ethics code of the American Psychological Association.
Come 2022, I will be actively helping parents and their attorneys proceed with malpractice litigation against the involved “forensic” psychologists. Malpractice lawsuits require an attorney, and are expensive for that reason, and may not be practical for many.
Consumer complaints to their state licensing boards is an appropriate response for violations to ethical Standards of practice. Complaints made to licensing board are free to the consumer. There is a reason for ethical standards of practice, there is a reason they are mandatory, not optional. There is a reason psychologists must become licensed – so that they are under the jurisdiction of a formal licensing board for potential ethical violations and malpractice.
Board complaints should not be filed frivolously and without cause. They are not meant to harass, the board provides oversight regarding legitimate grievances and concerns.
In many-many cases in the family courts, there are legitimate grievances and concerns as I describe in the Petition to the APA signed by 20,000 parents. There has been no response from the APA. They don’t care about you and your children. The APA is in active cover-up for the unethical practices in forensic psychology.
I have notified the AFCC regarding the issues. I have notified the APA regarding the issues.
Beginning in 2022, I will be encouraging parents to file licensing board complaints when these complaints are justified by the psychologists’ violations to Standard 2.04 Bases for Scientific and Professional Judgments and Standard 9.01 Bases for Assessment, and for multiple failures in their duty to protect.
9.01 Bases for Assessments (a) Psychologists base the opinions contained in their recommendations, reports, and diagnostic or evaluative statements, including forensic testimony, on information and techniques sufficient to substantiate their findings. (See also Standard 2.04, Bases for Scientific and Professional Judgments .)
If the forensic psychologist has not relied on the established scientific and professional knowledge of the discipline as the bases for their professional judgements, then the opinions contained in their recommendations, reports, and evaluative statements are NOT based on information sufficient to substantiate their findings.
Note the specific citation reference in Standard 9.01 Bases for Assessment to Standard 2.04 Bases for Scientific and Professional Judgments.
State licensing boards are controlled by the forensic psychologists. They exempt themselves from all ethical standards of practice… because they can.
Parents will want to make their state licensing boards cover-up for the forensic psychologists over-and-over again – for exactly the same violations – Standard 2.04 – Standard 9.01 – Standard 2.01 (vitae) – and failure in their duty to protect on two separate grounds, 1) failure to protect the child from psychological abuse by the pathological parent, and 2) failure to protect the targeted parent from Intimate Partner Violence (IPV), i.e., from spousal emotional and psychological abuse by the other parent using the child as the weapon.
If an apparent ethical violation has substantially harmed or is likely to substantially harm a person or organization and is not appropriate for informal resolution under Standard 1.04, Informal Resolution of Ethical Violations, or is not resolved properly in that fashion, psychologists take further action appropriate to the situation. Mandatory, not optional.
You are more powerful than you know. Do the right thing. Live to who you are, live to your standards. Let the world take care of the world… you do the right thing.
Knowledge gives you power. Knowledge belongs to everyone. Use knowledge to solve pathology.
Ignorance solves nothing.
Craig Childress, Psy.D. Clinical Psychologist, CA PSY 18857
To the chosen parents, the parents who are chosen by the child to lead your families into solutions, your child and family need a written treatment plan based on an accurate diagnosis. Diagnosis guides treatment. Always. The concern is for possible child abuse (and possible IPV spousal abuse using the child as the weapon – that’s what this is all about, spousal emotional abuse of you, you know that, the ones who don’t see that this is all about spousal abuse are just stupid, i.e., ignorant + lazy). The pathological parent will seek to drive this into the court system because they want to put you on trial for being a bad parent (spouse) who doesn’t deserve to have a child, and that you should have your child taken away from you. You then have to defend yourself. You have to prove to the judge a negative, that you’re not “abusive” and that you “deserve” to have a child – at tremendous financial expense dragging out over years of litigation proving to a judge that you are not “abusive” and that you “deserve” to be a mom or a dad to your child. You can’t let your ex- do that. You cannot let them drive this into the court system, when they try, you must bump it back out to healthcare to first get an accurate diagnosis and treatment plan from healthcare on the nature of the problem in the family and its solution. Once you have an accurate diagnosis and treatment plan from healthcare – mental health care – ICD-10 F24, a shared persecutory delusion is a psychiatric (MD) disorder – then take that diagnosis and treatment plan back to the court for the judge’s consideration as to the remedy needed for the child and family. Your ex- wants to drive this into the courts to put you on trial for being a bad parent/(spouse). You must drive this into healthcare first for an accurate diagnosis and treatment plan, and then take this back to the judge as evidence, and then the judge can decide about what to do based on all the evidence presented for the Court’s consideration. Diagnosis guides treatment – always. The treatment for cancer is different than the treatment for diabetes. The concern is for a possible shared persecutory delusion – distorted thinking and perceptions of situations that come from their unresolved childhood trauma – ICD-10 F24. That needs a proper assessment. If there is a shared persecutory delusion, then the DSM-5 diagnosis is V995.51 Child Psychological Abuse and V995.82 Spouse or Partner Abuse, Psychological. When possible child abuse is a considered diagnosis, our diagnosis must be accurate 100% of the time. The consequences for the child of misdiagnosing child abuse are too severe and devastating. We need a proper risk assessment for possible child abuse that leads to an accurate diagnosis that can guide the development of an effective treatment plan, your Honor, then we can make informed decisions about what the remedy should be to the pending litigation, once we have a clear indication from healthcare regarding the nature of the problem and its solution. When they drive this into the courts, bounce it back to healthcare for an accurate diagnosis and treatment plan, and this becomes the evidence that you take back to court for the judge’s consideration. We need a proper risk assessment for possible child abuse – both directions, you and your ex- – we need a proper risk assessment for possible IPV emotional and spousal abuse of one parent by the other using the child as the weapon, we need a proper assessment for possible delusional thought disorder pathology in the family. From the journal Family Court Review: From Walters & Friedlander: “In some RRD families, a parent’s underlying encapsulated delusion about the other parent is at the root of the intractability (cf. Johnston & Campbell, 1988, p. 53ff; Childress, 2013). An encapsulated delusion is a fixed, circumscribed belief that persists over time and is not altered by evidence of the inaccuracy of the belief.” References:Childress, C. A. (2013). Reconceptualizing parental alienation: Parental personality disorder and the trans-generational transmission of attachment trauma. https://drcachildress.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Reconceptualizing-Parental-Alienation-Parental-Persoonality-Disorder-an-the-Trans-generational-Transmission-of-Attachment-Trauma-Childress-2013.pdf Walters, M. G., & Friedlander, S. (2016). When a child rejects a parent: Working with the intractable resist/refuse dynamic. Family Court Review, 54(3), 424–445. https://doi.org/10.1111/fcre.12238 Interestingly, this is the article I submitted to the he American Journal of Family Therapy whose editors are the Gardnerian PAS advocates. They rejected the submission for publication because it didn’t pay proper homage to Gardner and PAS. In fact, I never mention Gardner or PAS a single time. There is no such thing as “parental alienation,” Gardner was simply unethical, ignorant, and a lazy diagnostician. He should never have proposed a “new pathology,” he had professional obligations to apply the “established scientific and professional knowledge of the discipline” as the bases for his professional judgments – first. In 2013 I submitted this article to the American Journal of Family Therapy. When they rejected it for publication because it was insufficiently Gardnerian and PAS, I published it to my personal website and moved on. I’m not here to educate anyone about anything. I’m here to document their lack of motivation to find solutions and their collusion with the child and spousal abuse in the family courts. They should already know, Standards 2.01 Boundaries of Competence, 2.03 Maintaining Competence, 2.04 Bases for Scientific and Profession Judgments, 9.01 Bases for Assessment. They’re just lazy and unmotivated, they don’t care. Apparently in 2016, Walter’s and Friedlander came across my online published essay and referenced it for their article in the Family Law Review, the flagship journal of the AFCC. Too bad they couldn’t have referenced my article published in the American Journal of Family Therapy (it likely would have reached a much wider audience being published in a formal journal rather than online), but the Garnerian PAS experts didn’t think this article that was subsequently cited in the Family Court Review as an online essay, was of sufficient quality for publication in the American Journal of Family Therapy. This article of mine could have been published in 2013, eight years ago, and could have been professionally cited for the past eight years. Now, in 2021, it emerges into relevance. We lost eight years because of Bill Bernet and the Gardnerian PAS “experts.” Fact. The past eight years of no movement on child abuse and spousal abuse in the family courts is on their decision to “freeze out” Dr. Childress. The Garnerian PAS “experts” (Bernet, Baker, Woodall, all the rest) made a decision to entirely ignore the work of Dr. Childress so no one would learn about it and they could remain “experts” in a mythical pathology (because they are “experts” in no real thing, it’s too much work). Apparently someone learned about it anyway, Walter’s and Friendlander, who cited my online essay about the shared persecutory delusion in their article in the Family Court Review. That was in 2016. Five years later, have the forensic child custody evaluators started to routinely assess for a possible thought disorder in the family, a shared persecutory delusion (ICD-10 F24) and for possible Child Psychological Abuse? No. They don’t care about solving anything. They don’t care about what’s actually going on. No one wants to solve anything over here in the family courts, they just want to take your money. In 2017, I went directly to their national convention of the AFCC, directly to all the forensic psychologists, and brought Dorcy Pruter with me. We explained it all to them and its solution. Did anything change? No. The forensic psychologists don’t want a soulution, they just want to exploit you and your family conflict to take your money. The exploitation of you over here is phenomenal. I’ve only found one person here who knows what the pathology is an how to solve it. She’s a businesswoman and family coach,successful at both, and the best trauma recovery specialist I’ve ever worked with, I consider Ms. Pruter a professioal of equal standing, and most recently I had the pleasure of co-presenting with her to the American Psycholgoical Association data that proves – proves – the High Road workshop sucessfully recovers children from child psychological child abuse and complex trauma in a matter of days – days – the High Road ABA single-case clinical research data. Your ex- will seek to drive this into the courts to put you on trial for being a bad parent/(spouse) who deserves to have your child taken away. They will want a “custody evaluation” where the ignorant forensic psychologist will be the “judge” of whether you deserve to have a child – based on whatever arbitrary criteria they make up – at $20,000 to $40,000 for the forensic custody evaluation… that provides NO diagnosis. They don’t want to solve anything. They just want to take your money. Everyone does. Only one person solves it. Only one. Ms. Pruter at the Conscious Co-Parenting Institute. She has my full endorsement and support. It is wise to listen to wise counsel, Ms, Pruter offers wise counsel. You want a written treatment plan – start there, not with the assessment. If you focus on the assessment, then you’ll need to focus next on the diagnosis, and next on the treatment plan. Instead focus on the treatment plan – treatment requires a diagnosis, and a diagnosis requires an assessment. If you focus on obtaining a written treatment plan, then this will pull you through all three steps; assessment leads to diagnosis, and diagnosis guides treatment. Always. Craig Childress, Psy.DClinical Psychologist, CA PSY 18857
“Incredibly, Denmark has become only the 12th country in Europe to recognise sex without consent as rape, although momentum for change is building in other countries to amend their laws. Rape in Denmark is hugely under-reported and even when women do go to the police, the chances of prosecution or conviction are very slim. Every year, 11,400 women in Denmark are subjected to rape or attempted rape, according to the Danish Ministry of Justice. The University of Southern Denmark’s research estimates that this figure may have been as high as 24,000 in 2017. However, in 2019 just 1,017 rapes were reported to the police and only 79 resulted in convictions.
GreatCosmicMothersUnite 