 Richard WarshakBestselling author of "Divorce Poison"Dr. Richard A. Warshak is a clinical, consulting, and research psychologist in private practice in Dallas, Texas with more than a quarter century of experience. He earned his B.S. from Cornell University and his Ph.D. from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center. He is a Clinical Full Professor of Psychology at the Southwestern Medical Center, and is past president of the Dallas Society for Psychoanalytic Psychology. Dr. Warshak serves on the Editorial Board of three professional journals and is an Editorial Reviewer for three other professional journals.In 1977 Dr. Warshak began a career-long project of examining prevailing and proposed child custody assumptions, presumptions, and practices in the light of logic and scientific data. His research on divorce and stepfamilies, conducted as director of the Texas Custody Research Project and Co-Principal Investigator of the National Institute of Mental Health Stepfamily Project, are cited often in the social science literature and in courtrooms and legislatures throughout the world. At a time when few fathers were awarded child custody, his landmark studies comparing mother-custody and father-custody homes established him as the leading expert on father-custody.
"If you are recently separated and struggling with a vindictive ex,
please do not assume things will blow over or die down. People whose
personalities allow them to justify bad-mouthing, bashing or even
brainwashing often become consumed by revenge and cannot let it go even when it
is detrimental to the child. Read Dr. Warshak's book and take action
appropriately. "
Dr. Warshak consulted at the White House on custody reform and, in addition to his professional publications, he wrote The Custody Revolution (1992, Simon & Schuster) for the general public. This book offers practical advice to parents and professionals dealing with custody decisions and recommended fundamental reforms in custody practices that have since been widely adopted and are now considered mainstream.
Tania
Houston, Texas. Following his work on father custody, Dr. Warshak tackled the issues of joint custody and the primary parent presumption. In the late 1990s he read what he thought was a misrepresentation of divorce research that had been submitted to the California Supreme Court as an amicus brief on the impact of relocation. In response he wrote an article offering a more balanced view of the subject and the prestigious Family Law Quarterly published it. Three years later the California Supreme Court again took on a relocation case and Dr. Warshak authored an amicus brief for this case that was endorsed by leading divorce experts throughout the country. The Warshak brief has been credited with influencing the Court's 6-1 decision. When prevailing practices restricted young children's overnight contacts to one home, Dr. Warshak wrote Blanket Restrictions which exposed the lack of scientific foundation for the common practice. That article is frequently cited in the professional literature and has helped reform parenting plans for young children. Dr. Warshak is generally considered one of the world's leading authorities on pathological alienation in children. His book, Divorce Poison: Protecting the Parent-Child Bond From a Vindictive Ex, is the best-selling book on the topic and is considered a classic resource for parents in conflict and the professionals who help them.. "If you are in a situation where your ex is poisoning your children and
corrupting their hearts, I highly suggest you read this book. The
damage done is not limited to your relationship with them. Because of the
nature of the abuse, children carry these scars and distortions into
their adult life. This poison will most likely compromise their ability to
engage in healthy relationships for the rest of their lives, if the
damage is not controlled or reversed. "
Dr. Warshak's project of shining the light of social science on custody assumptions has covered father-custody, joint custody, relocation, overnights, the primary parent presumption, children's role in custody disputes, and alienation. Currently he is extending his project to critically examine the "Approximation Rule," a presumption recently proposed by the prestigious American Law Institute to govern custody disputes.
MG, North Carolina
Dr. Warshak is working on another book to complete his trilogy of books for divorced parents and he is also co-authoring a book on collaborative divorce. What has Dr. Warshak most excited among his current professional activities is developing interventions to help prevent and rapidly reverse severe alienation in children and teenagers, and training therapists to conduct these interventions. Dr. Warshak maintains an office practice evaluating and treating children, adults, and families, and he consults with attorneys, mental health professionals, and parents in the U.S. and abroad on matters relating to child custody, childhood trauma, and personal injury, and he serves as an expert witness in selected cases. In addition to his custody work, Dr. Warshak developed the Warshak Parent Questionnaire (now in its second edition; formerly the Inventory for Child and Adolescent Assessment), used by mental health professionals throughout the United States, Canada, and Australia to understand better the psychological problems of the children they treat. It has become a valuable addition to social studies, custody evaluations, sex abuse evaluations, and consultations, and is used by attorneys and mediators to help understand children who are the subjects of litigation. Dr. Warshak believes in bringing psychological knowledge to the general public and is a regular guest on the television program, Fox4 Good Day Dallas, where he discusses a wide range of topics in psychology. Also, he has appeared on NBC Today, NBC Weekend Today, CBS Early Show, CourtTV, CNN, the ABC Home Show, and National Public Radio and his work has been covered in Time, Parade, Psychology Today, Parents, The London Sunday Telegraph, The Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, USA Today, Chicago Tribune, Boston Herald, Boston Sunday Globe, Dallas Morning News, Redbook, Men's Health, Parenting, and Working Mother. About Divorce PoisonIn his new book Dr. Warshak helps parents shield children from the crossfire of divorce and separation.Your ex-spouse is bad-mouthing you to your children, perhaps even trying to turn them against you. If you handle the situation ineffectively, you could lose your children's respect, their affections--even, in extreme cases, lose contact with them. The conventional advice is to do nothing for fear that any response could result in greater injury to the children. But with twenty-five years of helping families, Dr. Richard Warshak is convinced that a passive approach just leaves parents feeling helpless. And the damage to children is considerable, particularly when warring parents enlist children as allies in the battle. The problems range from tainted parent-child relationships, in which children are disrespectful or reluctant to show their affection, to a disturbance in which children virtually disown one of their parents and all the relatives on that side of the family. DIVORCE POISON offers specific advice to protect children from the results of their parents' animosity. In it, you will learn how to:
Dr. Warshak reveals the typical behaviors of alienated children, how and why parents manipulate their children, seven rules for responding effectively to bad-mouthing without succumbing to the impulse to retaliate in kind, and how the controversial diagnosis parental alienation syndrome is used in court to take children away from parents or to regain contact with alienated children. This groundbreaking work gives parents powerful strategies to preserve and rebuild loving relationships with their children--and provides legal and mental health professionals who work with families in which there have been accusations of alienation, whether true or false, practical advice to help their clients and safeguard the welfare of children. Whether they are perpetrators of divorce poison, victims of it, or both, parents who heed Dr. Warshak's advice will enable their children to maintain love and respect for two parents who no longer love, and may not respect, each other. |
