Navigating the Heartache and Triumph of Parenting from Afar Part 1- Episode 40

Imagine the piercing silence of a father's heart as he misses his daughter's wedding, or the hidden tears when a grandchild's first cry echoes, and he's not there to share the joy. Lawrence Joss, in a stirring narrative, unveils the emotional landscape of parenting in absentia—sharing not just the pain but the triumph in creating bonds that transcend physical barriers. With Anna, a kindred spirit who once graced the guest seat and now joins as co-host, they weave a tapestry of hope and connection for those navigating the complexities of alienation. This episode serves as a homage to the enduring spirit of family, honoring resilience and the pursuit of unity despite life's trials.

Lawrence gives voice to the silent struggles and victories that mark the journey of a parent sidelined by circumstance, yet undeterred in love. We uncover the transformational power of community through the option of involvement with Parental Alienation Advocates, illustrating that support can fuel growth and foster a renewed sense of identity. This is an episode filled with heartfelt revelations and strategies, an offering of solace and solidarity to those who walk this challenging path. Listen as we celebrate the warrior spirit in every parent who faces the world with strength and courage, and who reclaims their voice in the stillness of separation.

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This podcast is made possible by the Family Disappeared Team:
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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

This is important work, like this kind of parenting Like I challenge anyone in the world to parent the way we are parenting, Like we are like ninja black belt, crazy cool parents, because we have to parent in a way that no one's ever role modeled for us before, like this is a path that I literally, for myself, is emerging.

Speaker 2: 0:23

There was a time in my life when I was overwhelmed and underwater. Those days are the inspiration for this podcast. This is by far the ultimate healing journey for all of us. Healing ourselves emotionally, spiritually and physically is paramount to this journey. From this place of grounding we can all go out into the world and change all our interactions and relationships. We can engage people from an integrated and resourced place. This is a journey of coming home to ourselves. In today's episode we'll start to explore some of these issues. Let's begin the healing journey today. Welcome to the Family Disappeared podcast.

Speaker 1: 0:57

Hi, my name is Lawrence Joss and welcome to the Family Disappeared podcast. Today we're going to have a really exciting show for you. We're going to be talking about weddings, deaths, births, graduations, like all the different seminal events that, if you're an alienated parent, grandparent or family member that you don't necessarily get to participate in, and how do you get to have a voice, how do you get to participate in a different kind of way? That's really what we're going to be talking about. I'm going to dig into it and you might agree or disagree, but it's going to be really cool.

Speaker 1: 1:25

And part of that conversation is really going to also be talking about parenting without access. Like, how do I parent at a wedding, at any of these different places, when I don't have any access? How do I still have a voice? Where can I still have a voice? And it's an interesting conversation and, uh, I have no idea where it's going to go, but I'm really excited to have an Anna on board as a co-host today. We're going to chat and dig in and see what happens. So, anna, please go ahead and introduce yourself.

Speaker 3: 1:48

Thank you, Lawrence. Hi everyone, I'm Anna. I'm grateful to say that I've been a guest on the podcast before, and today I get the opportunity to sit in the co-host's chair and see what that feels like. I'm also very grateful to be able to give back to the community and to stretch my recovery muscles and use my voice, which has been an important part of my recovery. Thank you, Lawrence.

Speaker 1: 2:13

Yeah, we're so excited to have you here and in the next couple of weeks Anna's going to be hosting a show. She's going to step into the host scene and dive in and it's really a magical part of recovery how we get to be on a podcast together like we would never have met each other. So it's a it's very cool, I'm very excited and let's let's jump right on in. So if you're new to the show, welcome. And if you don't know, necessarily some of my history, I'm an alienated father and I have three daughters, you know, and my um, my middle daughter, got married about three or four years ago and, uh, I didn't know what date, the wedding was, where it was, how it was, you know, and she, she ended up having a couple of kids and I haven't met my grandkids and stuff like that, and it's all been incredibly trying and there's been all these different layers of stuff and three or four years ago I didn't get to have a voice.

Speaker 1: 2:58

I didn't know what a voice meant and a week ago, at the end of March, my oldest daughter got married and I didn't know what day she was getting married. I found out a couple of days before she was getting married and it ended up being, I think, she got married the day before my birthday, which is a whole different, interesting, and as I'm reflecting on my oldest daughter getting married, I'm realizing that I didn't feel like I had any kind of voice when my first daughter got married. But with my second daughter getting married, I did. Something really cool is I recorded a speech of what I would have said at the wedding. You know what I mean, and I get to share this with people in my community, and three years ago I didn't have the recovery to get there. So we're really going to be talking about the stuff today, about how we can change our relationship to these seminal events and how we can actually be part of them and also have some tribal history of what it looks like for us to participate in those events and hopefully, one day our kids or our grandkids get to see that. And for any kids out there that are disconnected from their parents or grandparents, that are alienated kids. There's really cool ways for you to document your life too, and this is really going to be from the parents and the grandparents' perspective today. But there's definitely a different perspective that we might not be capturing. I just want to acknowledge that and we welcome anyone to let us know different topics that they would like us to discuss from different viewpoints.

Speaker 1: 4:21

Please like, subscribe, follow us. We're a 501c3 non-profit. We need your support to keep doing what we're doing. We love what we're doing. We're bringing some really great content and great guests to the, to the forefront, and some really needed conversations. So please participate and, uh, let's see, let's see what happens next. So, anna, you just listened to my introduction and I haven't shared this with you personally that my. Actually, I did share with you that my, my daughter, was getting married and I think I told you I didn't know what date it was, but I just found out a couple of days ago that you got married on my birthday weekend.

Speaker 1: 4:53

And I had this epiphany that I get to have a voice too and I get to record how I'm feeling, what I'd like to say as a father. You know, maybe I don't get to have that first dance, Maybe I don't get to say that in front of everyone, but I'm making a choice for myself not to be erased and I'm making a choice for myself to parent, and as a parent I want to have a voice at the celebration. So it's kind of like a really interesting concept and idea and I'm curious how does that land with you hearing that? What are your thoughts, feelings, ideas around that?

Speaker 3: 5:21

It sounds really healing. Lawrence, I've thought about doing something similar, but when I get to that point, I I still I've got a lot of grief that I'm still processing and it feels so emotional I might I lose my voice at that point. So I'm curious when you spoke in the introduction, you were talking about how you're at a place in your recovery now where you feel like you can express that yourself that way, but you weren't able to do that before. Can you identify what that shift has been for you?

Speaker 1: 5:50

It's interesting the way that you asked that question. You said I wasn't able to do it before, and I don't think that's necessarily true for me. I didn't know it was an option, right. So, like for me, like when I'm stuck in parental alienation, it's this tiny little black hole and I'm in these ruminating thoughts and I just get stuck in this pattern and I lack creativity because all I'm doing is trying to survive and not die. There's different solutions on how to show up in the world versus just what we've seen on TV growing up and what our families of origin have told us. So I really think it's about recovery and creativity that I can say hey, I'm going to participate in this wedding, I don't care if I wasn't invited. Well, that's not true. I care, I'm heartbroken that I wasn't invited and you're not going to erase me, you don't get to tell me that I can't have a voice, you know. So I don't know. Did that answer your question?

Speaker 3: 6:46

I think it did. It's brought on another question, which is you've recorded the piece. Have you gone as far as sharing it with any members of your family, or is that the next step? How are you feeling about all of that?

Speaker 1: 7:03

So this is a really exciting part that we haven't launched as PAA, as our actually organization, where we're going to be doing a piece together on living and dying and we're going to be able to have a place to save all these different messages and have like a platform so our kids can find these messages and find out what we're doing and how we expressed ourselves and how we expressed ourselves and and maybe not, and maybe it's for our grandkids and maybe it's that me having an idea to share with you, that you share with someone else, that someone else shares with someone else and it has an impact on someone else's child, the grandchild down the line. So I have not shared it with anyone. It's a, it's a brand new thought and literally my birthday was march 31st and we're recording this this on April 2nd. You'll all see it. It's probably two or three weeks after we recorded this, but literally it's like a two-day-old thing. So I haven't really fully processed it or had it seep yet, but I think it's really important that we continue to parent.

Speaker 1: 7:58

No one can take that away from us and I use this term often parenting without access, like I'm a great parent and I don't have access to my kids. I can express myself at a wedding not at a wedding about a wedding, about a graduation, about a birth, about whatever and I can document my feelings and where I am. No one can take that away from me. You know, and I think there's such an empowering point to that and I'm curious, this parenting without access what does that look like for you? Since you got into PAA Parental Alienation Anonymous Did you feel you had any power to parent without access? Now do you feel like you're parenting without access to some degree?

Speaker 3: 8:37

I think that statement is very true for me. I've been in program for two and a half years now. When I first came in, I don't even know if I felt like a parent. I didn't At that point. I hadn't seen my kids for years. It was really.

Speaker 3: 8:51

The damage to our relationship was irrevocable. At that point I didn't have any aspirations of getting my children back. I really wanted to survive. I felt like I was dying emotionally and I needed a community. I need people that understood what was going on for me. So, being an active parent, having any kind of parental role, I mean I knew I was a parent. I certainly didn't feel like one and I didn't feel like I had a voice. I felt I'd lost my sense of agency. And now it's interesting, I do feel like I have a voice and I really get to express that when I'm part of the PA community, when I'm part of podcasts, when I write for the social media.

Speaker 3: 9:32

But I've had another shift again recently, when my kids are 21 and 19 and one is studying overseas and the other one, I think, is studying here. I really have no information about what's going on for them and it's leading. It's an interesting process. I'm starting to really grieve the lack of relationship with my kids which I think I've been pushing down for many, many years. I know I have been and so that the grief is coming out.

Speaker 3: 9:57

But I'm also having moments lately where I don't feel like I'm a parent at all, which is it's a strange space to occupy. I know that I am and it was different when my kids were still in school somehow, even though I didn't have contact with them. Now that they're young adults and I really have no idea where, I sort of have an idea of where they are, but I don't know if I mean they could be married, they could be parents themselves, I have no clue. And they could be married, they could be parents themselves. I have no clue. And it's really a challenging space to occupy and dealing with the grief at the same time is really interesting. So the parenting without access I can feel that intellectually, but emotionally it's feeling a little bit wobbly right now.

Speaker 1: 10:39

You said something really powerful. You said when you got into the program, you didn't feel like a parent at all.

Speaker 1: 10:46

And I think so many of us don't feel like a parent or don't feel like a grandparent, or don't feel like another family member, because we're just so traumatized and in a trauma response and being reactive and trying just to survive and fight for our kids and fight for our families and all that stuff.

Speaker 1: 10:58

So, yes, I relate to what you're saying about not feeling like a parent. When you first got here and, yeah, I totally felt disempowered and then, through recovery, I feel more empowered in my life and have more agency. But it's taken a long time to feel into this idea of parenting without access and I've been going through this for god I can't remember how long now 16 years, 17 years, 18 years, something like, yeah, 18 years, 18 years and I'm just starting to feel like this idea of parenting without access feels like such an empowered part of our community where we can really galvanize together, we can parent and we can show up, even if it's not in an optimal way, but still in a really useful way. And you said you didn't feel like you were a parent and then you did feel like you were a parent and now you're starting to feel that you're not a parent again, even though you're in recovery and doing all your work.

Speaker 3: 11:49

So that sounds a little scary when you say that it certainly didn't feel like an effective parent. I was beating myself up. In fact I thought like I was a very useless parent. But I also programs. Maybe six months into program I started to realize that I didn't know who I was. Leave alone, I am a mother, I'm a sister, I'm an aunt, I'm a granddaughter, I'm all those things, but I didn't know who Anna was.

Speaker 3: 12:30

So a big part of recovery and I think that's taken me two and a half years is to figure out who I am. And aside from being all of those different, they're roles that I've played. But who am I and what do I want? And recovery, I mean I never imagined that that's what I would be doing in the parental alienation support group. I had no clue, and so it's been a discovery process of sort of unpacking all of that and figuring that out and then looking at the piece around being a parent and what that feels like and opening up a whole like.

Speaker 3: 12:55

My recovery journey hasn't been just about alienation. It's about recovering myself and finding out where I am in terms of intergenerational trauma and dysfunction in family lines. So it's saying that I'm only. I still consider myself a newcomer and I feel like a newcomer sitting alongside you, because I don't. It gives me hope to hear what you're saying about the access feeling like a parent with access. I still do feel it.

Speaker 3: 13:21

I'm at the stage in my recovery now. I'm relaxed enough to have my foot in different camps because I'm learning to live in the grey. I came in with very black and white thinking and very rigid and lots of fear, lots and lots of fear. So I have still elements of that, but it's balanced with hope, it's balanced with joy, and I have support of people around me that actually know what I'm talking about and even when I don't know what I'm talking about, they provide a listening ear right, and I didn't have that, and that helps me to rediscover what feeling like a parent is, even though it's far from what I ever imagined it would be. So it's a very interesting process.

Speaker 1: 14:06

Yeah, it is interesting and you touched on a really important point, so we're going to take this little segue to the side here. At meetings, when we introduce ourselves, we go hey, my name is Lawrence, I'm an alien-mated father. I have three daughters. I have a 29-year-old that I've had no contact with for eight years. I have a 26 year old that I have no contact, mostly for a bit over five years now, and I have a 23 year old that I have regular contact with. And I'm a grandfather and I have two grandkids and I haven't met.

Speaker 1: 14:32

And that's usually how we introduce ourselves and I just want to add something onto that that Anna said is we introduce ourselves that way to become familiar with the community. But I'm also a brother, I'm a son, I'm a friend, I'm a yogi, I'm a knucklehead. I'm so many different things and just to identify that I'm only a parent, I'm only this thing, I'm only that thing, is really limiting and it's how I got here. When I got here, I was just so hyper-focused on being a parent, as Anna was saying, I didn't see these multi-dimensions of who I am. And as I work on these dimensions, on myself, I find access to parent differently because I'm learning about myself and finding myself and that's what recovery is. It's really me coming home to myself. It doesn't really have anything to do with the kids. You know like I'm working on myself and I have kids. You know what I mean. Yeah, I think that's really important.

Speaker 1: 15:25

Me and Anna have had some conversations about parenting without access before and we've spoken about it more of an ethereal level. So this might sound a little bit quirky to some people, but in some different kind of like spiritual practices, like for me, through breath work, through meditation, mostly through breath work, meditation, some dancing, some places where I'm like really moving my body or moving energy or moving breath. I've had time where I've been able to sit with my kids more like an ethereal plane and really connect with them in a really deep way, and that's another way that I parent without access. I'm still sharing with them about my life, asking them questions about their life, and I know we've discussed this before and I think you also have this connection beyond the physical plane, because we have to be creative, right. So what's, what's, what does that look like for you in like your life and practice?

Speaker 3: 16:13

It's been a really interesting part of my journey and for me, spirituality is a big part of my recovery. But the connection with the kids is very powerful because the times when I really really miss them and I really want them to be in the same physical space as me, through meditation and other practices, I can feel like I'm spiritually connected with them and in contact with them. And I can also in meditation I can, with practice, I can bring myself into a space where I can remember what it felt like to be around their energy and then I can and it's not the same as having them around and I would love that and during the grief that I've been processing recently, I'm screaming at the world that I want to sit in the room with my kids. I don't want to just be sitting on my meditation pillow and thinking about them and sending them love spiritually. I want them in the room with me and that's new for me too. It feels like it's healing.

Speaker 3: 17:05

I have a right to feel that as a parent and I didn't give myself permission to do that before recovery because it was too bloody, painful, I couldn't touch on those areas and I don't sit in that space for too long, but it's very liberating to be able to express that and say that to people and have conversations in community where I really get to speak through my heart and my heart really misses my kids.

Speaker 3: 17:30

But the spirituality piece is strong for me and I feel like they're walking a recovery path with me. Even though we don't have physical connection, we don't text, we don't do phone calls or whatever, I do feel like they're part of me and they're they're benefiting from. I mean, my sense is that if I can pick up on them spiritually, they can do the same with me. So they're feeling a very different mum right now, a very different mum living differently in the world. I'm a lot calmer, I'm a lot gentler, I'm living in a lot less fear, and I would really wish that for them as well. So my hope is that there's an exchange that's both ways and that feels quite beautiful to me to think along those lines.

Speaker 1: 18:11

Yeah, and you said something really powerful. You said I want to be in physical proximity with my kids. Like sitting on this meditation pillow is getting old and sometimes it just drives me crazy and I just want to be where my kids, where I can touch them, where I can hear them, where I have access to them all the time and I want to acknowledge so, yeah, yeah, I want to be in physical proximity with my kids too. I love them and I want to be there and I want to follow and I want to play with my grandkids and this is important work, like this kind of parenting. Like I challenge anyone in the world to parent the way we are parenting, like we are like ninja black belt, crazy cool parents, because we have to parent in a way that no one's ever role modeled for us before. Like this is a path that I literally, for myself, is emerging and started changing two days ago again with this idea.

Speaker 1: 19:05

So, like I just want to say, like any parent, grandparent out there, that is parenting without access and feeling all these emotions and stuff, you're a warrior. You know what I mean. Like you're a warrior, you know what I mean. Like you're a warrior, yeah, can you acknowledge that for yourself and fall into that love and love yourself in that space, and you're a warrior, anna. I'm a warrior. Our friends doing this are warriors, because there's no. Well, that's not true. There's definitely some situations that could be a lot worse for the kids, but this is one of the most incredible ways to parent and to show up.

Speaker 3: 19:37

One of the biggest lessons I've learned in recovery is learning how to respond rather than react. So I'm curious when you found out about your daughter's imminent wedding, how did you respond? How did you react? How did recovery take a place at the table when you were trying to navigate that?

Speaker 1: 19:58

Wow, what a great conversation, my God. We covered so many different topics on parenting without access, what it looks like, how the parts of the family are included and all the complexities that go along with it. This is a conversation that has a lot of legs and if you're a parent or grandparent out there and you're parenting without access again, you know, man, this is hard stuff, this is real life stuff, this is challenging stuff and my hat goes off to you and my heart breaks with you. And there's different ways to show up and recovery and we're discussing this. And there's different ways to show up in recovery and we're discussing this and I love the creativity that comes out of the pain and that might be kind of crappy, but it's really a wonderful reframe that we can take this pain, the struggle, the suffering, and they can be different ways to parent. We can't be stuck in this paradigm that we only have one way to parent, because parental alienation wants us stuck in that paradigm. It wants us in ruminating thoughts, it wants us in a small world, in a small room, in the back of our mind or the back of our house. It wants us isolated. It wants to kill us. It really does want to kill us. Yeah, and I've bought into that for a long time and I'm not going to do it anymore. I'm going to live my life. I'm going to continue to parent without access. I'm going to do it anymore. I'm going to live my life. I'm going to continue to parent without access. I'm going to celebrate seminal events with my kids and uh, yeah, this is important conversations. And if you have any questions, if you have any add-ons, if you have any other new nuances that we're not discussing, we would love to hear from you. Parental alienation anonymous at gmailcom. It's in the show notes too. Um, if you have any other ideas for episodes, any questions, guests you'd like, please participate.

Speaker 1: 21:36

And Parental Alienation Anonymous is our 12-step support group, which is just incredible. It's an incredible place to meet people, to find support, to work on yourself emotionally and spiritually, and a place where you don't have to explain anything. We've got a lot of cool things going on. All the stuff's in the show notes. The Family Hope Project is out of hand and really cool. We have the foundational trainings. We're getting ready to start up and, lastly, we need your support. We're a 501c3 nonprofit. Without your support, all we do is bring you the bare minimum of services, which is a 12-step program and the podcast. Hopefully we can afford to keep bringing you the podcast, but without your support, or maybe someone you know that has access to more resources that wants to help fund helping parents and grandparents and kids kind of deal with this traumatic stuff, you know. Let them know about us.

Speaker 1: 22:22

So thank you for listening. It was wonderful having you. In case no one's told you yet, today I love you. Yeah, I do. I really love what this community is doing. I don't know you, but I can still love you. I can still be open-hearted through this really challenging experience and, uh, that was really cool. When I first got here and people used to tell me that they love me, I used to think that they were insane and I'm like I ain't saying that. But today I love you.

Speaker 2: 22:50

Have a beautiful day and thanks for joining thanks for taking the time to join me on this episode of Family Disappeared Podcast. Do you know someone who can benefit from what we're discussing on today's episode? If so, please share this podcast with them and anyone else in your community that might be interested in changing their lives. Together we'll continue the exploring, growing and healing journey. I will see you on our next episode. Until then, happy days to all.