High Conflict Families: Healing the Hostility, Revenge, Manipulation and Parental Alienation

• Assess for Parental Alienation Behaviors and Hostile Aggressive Parenting
• Confront manipulation and stay out of the “co-parenting quicksand”
• Ethical obligations and violations
• Steps to resolve entrenched parental conflict
• Develop non-hostile communication, conflict resolution and relationship-building skills
• Teach self-care, resilience and coping strategies

High-conflict co-parents destroy their children. Torn between both parents and being forced to lie—or take sides—these children become depressed, anxious, stressed and get in trouble. They suffer from grief, fear of abandonment, anger, resentment and are afraid to love one parent while with the other parent. As clinicians, we are seeing more and more of these cases.

Join high-conflict family expert Monica Johns, LPC, NCC, and learn how to firmly, yet positively, push co-parents out of their enmeshed, negative relationship and move into a new, healthier type of structure. You will leave the day with specific tools to guide co-parents past their hostility, anger, revenge, manipulation, resentment, guilt, and grief, which will have a direct, positive and immediate impact on the children.

Attend with an open mind and a willingness to challenge old techniques in working with high-conflict families. Leave with a deeper insight into the psychology of high-conflict families and how they attempt to manipulate you and other professionals. Your new knowledge will open doors for your clients as well as new doors for other professionals seeking your expertise.

Walk away with explicit strategies and tools to:

• Detect Parental Alienation Behaviors and Hostile Aggressive Parenting
• Assess the high-conflict family and conduct a thorough home visit
• Teach non-hostile communication, conflict resolution and relationship-building skills
• Confront hostility, anger, revenge, manipulation, resentment, guilt and grief
• Stay out of the “co-parenting quicksand”
• Teach self-care, resilience and coping strategies
• Proactively work with attorneys, Guardian Ad Litems and Social Services
• Illustrate the ethical pros and cons of parental behaviors relating to emotional abuse and neglect

OUTLINE

Illustration of a High Conflict Family (HCF)

• What does a HCF look like?
• Hostile Aggressive Parenting
• Parental Alienation Behaviors
• Alienation vs. estrangement vs. justified resistance

Assessment Tools to Measure:

• Strength of the perceived alliance between parents
• Parents’ ability to cooperate and negotiate with each other
• Willingness vs. ability
• Parental personality disorders

INTERVENTIONS FOR WORKING WITH HIGH CONFLICT FAMILIES:

Family System Approach: A Step by Step Process

• Conduct a home visit
• Clean up the boundaries
• Establish the rules
• Create safe place
• Manage family meetings
• Access needed support systems
• Eye opening family strategies

Sessions with Child/Children

• The child’s voice
• Confront grief, anger, fears and embarrassment
• Address child manipulation
• Conquer resistance to parental contact
• Relationship-building skills
• Self-care and resiliency strategies
• Coping strategies
• Overcome strong alliance and internalized false beliefs

Sessions with Co-Parents

• Steps to resolve entrenched parental conflict
• Confront family grief, anger, revenge, conflict addiction
• Address parental manipulation
• Overcome strong alliance and internalized false beliefs
• Navigate co-parent agendas
• Manage parental personality disorders
• Self-care and resilience strategies
• Non-hostile communication skills
• Conflict resolution skills
• Healthy co-parenting skills

Alternative Dispute Resolution Options

• Parent Coordinator
• Parenting plans
• Collaborate with outside systems, such as attorneys, schools, Social Services, Guardian Ad Litems

Ethical Obligations

• Confidentiality
• Emotional abuse and neglect
• Reporting/involving Child Protective Services (CPS)
• Ethical violations
• Dual relationships and impartiality

OBJECTIVES

• Illustrate the psychology of a high-conflict family and how they attempt to manipulate others.
• Identify Hostile Aggressive Parenting and Parental Alienation Behaviors.
• Demonstrate techniques to motivate and challenge co-parents in making child-focused decisions.
• Construct a safe environment giving children permission to love both parents.
• Employ effective strategies to navigate and defuse family grief, anger, revenge and conflict addiction.
• State the ethical necessity to reduce high conflict for the emotional and mental health of the children.
• Design and inspire a supportive, family friendly team of professionals.

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