Two weeks ago was my friend's youngest daughters Confirmation. I'm not sure what that is, but apparently it's an important event in a child's life of a certain faith. It was an important event in the life of this young girl. My friend found out about it last week, a week after it happened,.. by accident. This is a classic example of alienation still happening even though my friend has a good relationship with his daughter and see's her often. Parental Alienation is not about parents not seeing their children, it's about a form of emotional and mental abuse of that child, even if you are seeing them. I hope this example makes it clear.
Now, I would suggest you confront the other parent and their family, in a very polite manner, every time something like this happens, because if you just say nothing, you have given them permission to do it again.
I'm sure any kind of confrontation would be met with 'X did not want you there, or she felt uncomfortable with you there so I did what was best for the child, or if she wanted you there, she would have told you about it'. A remark like this can be answered with something like.. "As a parent, you should have communicated the event to me yourself, not put the child in the middle. Also as a parent, you should have insisted on both sides of the family being there, we need to teach our children respect of family. I suggest you take some parenting classes in order to be more aware of what children need, may I suggest XYZ class on X night, and I'm happy to do them with you as well!" Note none of it is said in anger. It's a fact, if you can't control your children or you can't understand that you need to communicate with the other parent, then parenting classes may be of great benefit.
The point is not to get angry or point fingers, the point is to speak up in a polite, non-anger fueled manner, suggest a solution, and even though it will most likely be ignored, you have said something, done your part, and not ignored it. Alienators thrive on people saying nothing. Someone once said all that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do nothing. So say something.. I stress again.. politely and as nicely as possible.. but still say something. Do not just ignore it, it will get worst, not better.
