‘Whichever parent I am with wants me to be loyal…I can only prove my loyalty by saying I don’t want to be with the other parent’

Background: Charlotte Hardwick’s Dear Judge (Kid’s Letters to the Judge) is a fascinating collection of letters which children caught in divorces have written to family law judges. In the tragic letter below, two parents are at war and are demanding that their children be loyal to them and only to them–a common element of Parental Alienation.
Dear Judge, I thought the worst moment of my life was when my mom told me she and dad were getting a divorce. I was wrong. This is the worst. Whichever parent I am with wants me to be loyal. I can only prove my loyalty by saying I don’t want to be with the other parent. The other parent is worried that I will stop loving that parent because of something the parent I am with said. Then I get dropped off or picked up and it starts all over again. It’s like sixth grade when two of my girlfriends made me crazy trying to force me to pick one of them to be my best friend. I remember when I was sad sometimes. Now I have trouble remembering when I wasn’t sad. Yours truly, Bailey A.