Love Instructed: What Parents Don’t See… and What Adult Children Carry

Parental Alienation

Image: the energetic explosion that occurs at conception

Parental alienation does not require separation to exist.

It can and does live inside intact households, carried through unspoken tension, subtle preference, emotional alliances and the silent positioning of one parent against the other, shaping a child’s loyalty long before a word is ever spoken.

For this blog, however, I am speaking to how this dynamic often becomes amplified and more visible in the context of separation, where emotional fracture, fear, and unresolved hurt can more easily turn loyalty into leverage.

If you recognise this dynamic in your own history, this blog still speaks to you, particularly in helping you navigate it.

This subject carries personal weight, having experienced it within our own family for years, while also witnessing the same pattern repeat across hundreds of others in varying degrees. In the last few weeks, as more clients have spoken from the child’s side of this experience, it has become clear that this needs to be brought into the open,  for those who have suffered it and for those who, often unconsciously, have created it.

Behaviour fuelled by buried anger, fear and loss can become so normalised that the ripple effect disappears from view.

Yet, the impact on our children runs deep and long, shaping their inner world in ways few ever intend, with an energetic and spiritual disturbance that moves through everyone involved long after the storm is believed to have passed and the dust has settled.

When separation is navigated with emotional honesty and spiritual maturity, children do not falter; they adapt, learn and often grow with surprising stability. They remain anchored because the adults around them remain anchored. They are not pulled into sides, emotional management or covert loyalty tests, but allowed to witness two imperfect humans modelling responsibility and respect, which teaches them resilience rather than confusion. Love stays free, not instructed.

And yet, this is the very territory many avoid looking at. We tend to sidestep what unsettles us, choosing silence, distraction or justification instead, mistaking that for self-preservation. Free will allows that choice, of course.

Growth, however, always asks for something braver, the willingness to face what feels uncomfortable. I know avoidance may feel safer in the moment, but it does quietly ensure the same emotional patterns keep cycling.

I am not here to soften the truth or make it more comfortable; I am here to offer the possibility of change, and what you choose to do with that is entirely yours.

When Separation Turns Spiritual: What Parents Don’t See… and What Adult Children Carry

My clinic has always run the same way; I have themes. It will send me several people in a row with the same story, told in slightly different lives.

I have always felt it was Spirit's way of not letting me plateau… new learnings daily.

This time, it was adults, twenties,  thirties, forties, fifties,  who all grew up in the rubble of parental separation and only now, decades later, are beginning to understand what happened to them.

They walk in as competent adults with jobs, marriages, mortgages, and mostly a sense of humour about things… but the moment they speak about one parent being turned against the other, their voice changes. You can see it in their energy field, a contraction as if they are shielding themselves from some assault.

And it became clear, again, how deeply not the separation but the parental alienation that was attached to it shapes a child, even when the adults involved insist they were “just protecting them.”

Parental Alienation begins in the small emotional negotiations that a child doesn’t have the language to describe. The tension in the car, that sigh when a name is mentioned, the tight smile when the weekend is over, if there was a weekend allowed. The words “you’ll understand one day.” That warning tone disguised as concern. The face when a desire to see the other parent is shown.

Over time, those subtleties become the emotional climate in which the child grows up. And long before they learn to multiply or tie shoelaces, they learn how to manage the feelings of the alienating parent. They pick up very quickly which truths are allowed and which carry the consequences.

And they learn which parent they are supposed to love.

And later, maybe thirty years later, they sit in front of me and quietly ask the same question:

“Why did they do that to us?”

The emotional tone behind the question differs: anger, a sense of betrayal, resentment, hurt…

And the answer, after watching this pattern for years, is both simple and uncomfortable:

They didn’t alienate you because they wanted to hurt the other parent.

They did it because they were terrified you might one day love that parent more.

Alienation is built on fear, and the greater the fear, the greater the effort behind it.

Fear of being replaced. Fear of losing control. Fear that the child will discover a truth that contradicts the version they’ve been fed. Fear that affection might drift in the “wrong” direction.

And when you take the psychology away, when you step back from the drama, the lawyers' letters, court orders, the narratives, and the self-justification… you see the same pattern across every case:

Alienation isn’t about keeping the child safe.It’s about keeping the child loyal.

Let’s break down the layers as I discussed in my post yesterday, because this is where healing begins:

Layer 1: “I’m protecting them." This sounds noble, but it’s rarely true.

Layer 2: “I don’t want them around that person." Still not the truth…. just the boundary version of fear.

Layer 3: “What if they prefer them?"Now we’re nearing the emotional bones of it all.

Layer 4: “What if they find out I wasn’t the victim?” This is the layer that disturbs people the most, because it reveals intent.

Layer 5,  the real root: “If they love them… does that mean they won’t need me?”

That is the part no parent will ever say out loud. But it’s the part every alienated child feels in their body, even decades later.

And for the parents currently going through separation, please note:

Your child’s soul chose both parents. Not the best one, the easiest one, or the one who packs the better lunchboxes…  both. For their growth, learning, karmic design, and emotional blueprint.

When you interfere with that, you’re not just altering a relationship, you’re altering the core of who that child is allowed to become.

So how do parents sidestep the alienation trap — spiritually, emotionally, and practically?

Nobody expects or needs perfect behaviour; it’s an impossible ask.

And not by pretending the breakup didn’t hurt,… the body knows better.

Children grow strongest when they experience the full rhythm of life.  The impact, the wobble, and the slow, steady rise back to balance their parents' display.

Not with the “high road” speeches people like to post online or in courtrooms.

It starts with something far more honest:

1. Own your fear before it owns you

If you feel insecure, jealous, threatened, or replaced… simply admit it to yourself. Unseen emotions really do behave badly. But named emotions soften.

2. Let your child love freely

Love is not a competition. If you make it one, the child loses ..  not your ex.

3. Don’t hand your emotional wounds to your child

They’re not your backup therapist or your moral witness. And they’re not your ally in a war they didn’t declare or want any part of.

4. Understand that children read energy far more accurately than they read words

You don’t have to say anything cruel. Your body language already did.

5. Remember this spiritual truth: “My child’s bond with them has nothing to do with me.”

Let them have it. That bond belongs to them, not you.

6. Keep your story separate from their story

You were hurt. You were disappointed. You felt betrayed.

That is your story to heal…. not your child’s to carry.

7. Trust that character reveals itself without your commentary

Children grow up. They see, understand and form their own opinions that may very much differ from yours. But they are the only judge in their connection.

You don’t need to guide their perception. You just need to stay clean.

And for the adult children who lived through alienation:

No, you didn't imagine it, that confusion wasn't born in your immaturity, and your guilt wasn’t loyalty. You were pressured into choosing someone else’s fear over your own freedom.

It wasn’t your fault then, and it isn’t your fault now.

But now that you’re an adult, you get to reclaim the part of yourself that was never allowed to come into being: The part that trusts your own instincts, loves without permission, and chooses relationships based on truth rather than emotional politics.

A simple reflection exercise — the same one I used this week:

Take one memory from your childhood where the emotional rules felt confusing.

Ask yourself:

“What was I being asked to feel? “Whose fear was I carrying? “What did that confusion cost me?”

And the most powerful question of all:

“If I take their fear out of the equation… what do I feel?”

That is where your healing and your freedom start.

And it’s the place both parents and adult children eventually have to reach if they want to live outside the shadow of someone else’s insecurity.

For the parent who has been alienated:

There is a very particular grief that comes with being slowly or swiftly erased from your own child’s world while still very much alive. I know that it sits in all those ordinary moments, birthdays, missed weekends, school milestones heard about second-hand, the growing sense that you’re being rewritten in a story you no longer recognise.

And the instinct for most alienated parents is to fight harder, explain, explain, explain, prove more, defend the truth until you’re exhausted and raw, and still somehow end up as the villain in someone else’s story.

But

Alienation is designed to pull you into a state of reaction, desperation, and the need to explain yourself to someone who has already chosen not to hear you.

So the work for the alienated parent is different. It isn’t about winning but rather staying intact.

Here are a few of my thoughts and an exercise that tends to shift at least something.

1. Stop arguing with the story and start strengthening your own field

Acknowledge that you may never get to correct the narrative, let alone get the apology. And you may never get the moment where everyone finally sees what you see.

But you do get to choose who you become in the middle of it.

Every time you ground yourself rather than react, you send a quiet signal that eventually reaches the child... even if they don’t yet know how to hear it.

2. Understand that loyalty binds a child more than logic ever could

Your child may parrot words that hurt you,  distance themselves, or act like they’ve chosen a side.

This is not proof that you were unlovable. It is proof that they are trying to survive an emotional environment that feels unsafe to challenge.

One day, when the environment changes, their own perception will become much clearer.

So your job is not to convince but to remain recognisable.

3. You are not responsible for the version of you they were taught

Someone else’s fear handcrafted that identity. And no amount of defending yourself will undo what a child had to believe to stay emotionally safe at the time.

But you can still become the steady reference point they return to when the fog lifts.

A reflection exercise for the alienated parent

Choose one moment that still hurts. Not the biggest one. Start small…

Ask yourself:

What did I feel in that moment? And what did I lose?

You might say: I lost time, closeness, trust. I lost my place.

Then go one layer deeper:

What did I start believing about myself because of that loss?

This is where the real wound sits.

You might find that I am forgettable, I am easily replaced, I don’t matter as much as I thought, come to mind.

And now the most important question:

Is that belief true… or is it the scar left by someone else's fear?

Sit with that with a knowing….

Because alienation doesn’t just take a child away, it tries to dismantle the parent, too.

And the most powerful act you can make in this space is not rage, revenge,  or heroic endurance, but something much more defiant:

To stay emotionally upright, energetically clean, and relationally available, even when it isn’t returned.

That is what counts.

And in time, more often than people realise, it becomes the safest shoreline a child eventually swims back to.

And perhaps the most important thing to remember:

You are not here to undo the lie, but to outgrow it.

And that, in my experience, is a far more powerful way to live… because when you refuse to let alienation define your worth, you stop trying to reclaim your place through fear and start inhabiting it through truth.

The “well-adjusted child” illusion

There is another pattern that keeps surfacing in these sessions, that deserves a clear name.

Alienated children are very often showcased to the world as evidence of successful parenting. They are described as calm, mature, emotionally balanced, resilient, independent, and insightful for their age.On the surface, everything appears to have worked.

And sometimes, the child even appears to agree.

.

But what is rarely understood is that many of these children have simply learned the consequences of not presenting that way. They have absorbed, often unconsciously, the emotional rulebook of their environment.

They have learned which version of themselves is rewarded and which version summons withdrawal, tension or disappointment. So they adapt, edit and self-monitor.

.

By the time they reach adulthood, this adaptation has usually been confused with health.

The alienating parent, still interpreting the world through their own emotional lens, sees the child’s compliance as proof of stability. The child appears aligned because alignment has been carefully conditioned. They sound reasonable because reasonableness has kept the peace. They look balanced because imbalance has never been safe to express.

So of course, the child appears well-adjusted. They are behaving exactly as they were trained to.

But emotional compliance is not well-being, and as we know as parents, silence doesn't always mean peace; in fact, most of the time, it means trouble is brewing.

Many of the adults who now sit across from me describe an underlying exhaustion, a sense of living in permanent self-surveillance, and a fog around their true feelings that they struggle to name. They were praised for being “strong” and “ sensible,” yet no one ever asked what parts of themselves had been quietly swallowed to achieve that reputation.

What looked like maturity was often emotional containment and composure, a survival strategy.

And the alienating parent, still convinced of their own narrative, continues to view this adaptation as evidence of having raised a healthy child, never quite noticing that the child has never been free to show anything else.

The deeper truth for both parent and child

A child who has been alienated rarely feels safe enough to be fully themselves. They learn how to perform psychological safety instead.

And when those children grow up, the work becomes undoing the choreography. Usually not to retaliate, but in saying that, some clients have shown an intense but well hidden anger. They want to discover what lies beneath the trained response, finally.

Real well being is about permission.

Permission to feel, to wobble, to disagree, to love without calculating the emotional weather first.

And for the alienated parent witnessing this from the outside, the confusion can be agonising: seeing your child appear “fine” in a world that feels emotionally misaligned. But as we know, appearance has never been a reliable measure of truth.

A final reflection

When a child has been shaped by alienation, the question is no longer “Are they doing well?” but rather “Who were they allowed to become?”

And when that question is asked with honesty, compassion and patience, something begins to return that has been held back for far too long.

Real healing can begin when the patterns are finally seen.

 Common Outcomes for Children Who’ve Been Alienated

Here are the patterns repeatedly seen in adult children who grew up where alienation occurred:

• Persistent anxiety and depression in adulthood. PMC+1

• Struggles with trust and intimacy in relationships (because early relational templates were skewed). psychologytoday.com

• A tendency to either over-function (very “responsible” children) or under-function (self-identity confusion).

• Ongoing guilt or loyalty conflict — feeling they “should” hate or love a parent, and constant emotional surveillance of themselves.

• Low self-esteem, feelings of unworthiness, or a sense of being easily replaceable.

• Identity issues: not knowing their story, or being unsure of which parent’s version of “truth” they belong to.

• Difficulty establishing personal boundaries: having grown up in a dynamic where someone else’s fear determined their allegiance.

• Potential for repeating the pattern with their own children or relationships because the underlying emotional engine was never addressed.

Common Outcomes for Parents Who’ve Been Alienated

For the parent on the receiving end of alienation, the consequences tend to look like this:

• Chronic grief and ambiguous loss: alive but feeling absent from the child’s world.

• Emotional trauma: often resembling PTSD from living in waiting, hoping, feeling rejected without clarity.

• Identity erosion: questions like “Who am I if I’m not the parent they know me as?”

• Guilt, shame, and often self-blame: “Was I not enough? Did I fail?”

• Relationship issues: They may struggle with new relationships or parenting because they feel wounded and uncertain.

• Financial or legal costs: long separations, disputes over contact, and ongoing stress in the system.

• Trouble moving on: because every child’s milestone they miss becomes a reminder of what’s been lost — even when the separation is long past.

  
  

Common outcomes for the alienating parent

Alienation is often driven by fear, insecurity and the need to maintain emotional dominance. It may look like control, protection, righteousness or “doing what’s best for the child,” but over time, the internal cost becomes visible.

1. Emotional isolation

The alienator may succeed in shaping the child’s loyalty in the short term, yet over time, their world narrows. Relationships often become strained, superficial or dependent because the dynamic is built on fear rather than genuine safety. Other adults drift away, and the family system becomes tense and brittle.

2. Increasing insecurity rather than relief

Alienation rarely delivers the peace the parent imagined. Instead of calm, it deepens anxiety. The fear of losing control remains active, so vigilance becomes constant. Every independent thought from the child can feel like a threat.

3. Erosion of authentic connection

As the child matures, cracks in relationships appear. A child raised through emotional manipulation often begins to sense the distortion, even if they cannot name it. The relationship may persist, but it loses sincerity as the deeper bond weakens.

4. Identity entanglement with the child

The alienator often becomes psychologically fused with the child’s emotional state, expecting alignment, loyalty and ongoing validation. As the child grows, this creates conflict and resentment on both sides.

5. Difficulty adjusting when the child individuates

All children eventually seek autonomy, and when this happens, the alienating parent often struggles profoundly. The grief that emerges can resemble abandonment, even though the dynamic created it.

6. Loss of credibility when truth surfaces

As children age and gain perspective, they begin to notice inconsistencies. This can lead to confrontation, distance or complete relational breakdown. Many alienators face a painful reckoning when the story collapses.

7. Chronic victim identity

Instead of healing, some fall deeper into their own narrative of being wronged, misunderstood or mistreated, reinforcing the patterns that began the cycle in the first place.

8. Emotional stagnation

Growth slows where control dominates. Without addressing the root fear, the parent remains psychologically stuck at the age at which the wound formed.

9. Grief they never expected

Even when “successful” in alienation, many experience a hollow grief. The child who complied eventually pulls away, or the closeness begins to feel artificial

10. Repetition across generations

As we know, unexamined behaviour echoes forward. Children shaped by alienation may unconsciously replicate similar patterns in romantic or parental relationships unless awareness intervenes.

The deeper truth

Alienation might give rise to the appearance of power, where in reality, it produces emotional debt.

The behaviour protects the ego in the moment, yet quietly corrodes the relationships it claims to defend.

The irony:

A parent who alienates a child to avoid abandonment often creates the very distance they feared.

When separation is navigated with emotional honesty and spiritual maturity, children do not fracture; they adapt and often grow with remarkable stability. They remain anchored because the adults around them remain anchored. They are not asked to choose sides, manage parental emotion, or interpret tension disguised as love. Instead, they are allowed to witness two imperfect humans modelling responsibility, self-reflection and respect, which teaches them something far more valuable than an illusion of unity ever could. In these environments, love is not weaponised, loyalty is not extracted, and affection is not conditional. The energy field stays clean, emotional lines stay clear, and the child continues to feel safe to love freely, without instruction or fear of consequences.

I believe resilience is born in truth, not in the theatre of keeping a family intact at any cost. I meet many parents who feel trapped inside deeply unhappy partnerships, paralysed by the guilt of ‘breaking up the family’, yet children read the emotional temperature far more accurately than adults like to admit.

They live what you live. They feel the tension, the silence, the subtle erosion of joy, the undercurrent of anxiety, doubt, emotional distance and unspoken grief, and they absorb those states as their normal. Staying together out of guilt or inherited programming does not protect a child; it teaches them to normalise emotional compromise.

A healthy separation, chosen with intention and maturity rather than impulsivity, can be far more healthy than years spent inside quiet misery. When you are grounded, regulated and emotionally honest, they feel safe.

When you are scattered, they feel that too. Separated or not, unspoken energy moves through a household like weather through open windows. And often, in these situations, the real work is not about blame or sides at all — no alienation required.

Thank you for reading this far. It's been a long one, but to create a far better world for our kids, it has to start with our own actions.

Penny x