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You feel like you're losing your kids to your abuser and you don't understand why they are behaving and responding to you in ways that don't reflect the relationship that you've always had with them. What now? If you're still in the throes of coparenting with your abuser, you need to be aware of CAMS and understand the basics of how to counter it in ways that have you showing up in your power and not getting sucked back into the vortex of narcissistic projection and gaslighting via your kids.
If you're just hearing about CAMS, pause for a moment and go do a quick Google search for "Dr. Emma Katz, CAMS". Now that you've had your "OMG that's it!" moment, let's jump right into what you need to know in order to move forward in the healthiest way possible for you and child(ren). It's not so much specific actions to take, but more some truths about the situation that you have to understand the dynamics of in order to recognize and respond appropriately to your children--while you're both living in your trauma responses
It has taken sixteen years for me to understand the nuances of what I experienced. Learning about and being certified to help other mothers navigate CAMS has been a very triggering education. It gave me the lens to not only understand how I failed to show up for my kids, but the clarity to identify so many specific examples. I can still see their blank faces looking back at me while I’m in tears, begging them to tell me why they seem so mad at me or why they seem to hate me so much. Everything I did was wrong. I was living in my own trauma response, incapable of recognizing theirs, and giving them the emotional support they needed to process their own experiences. They saw a mom standing in front of them, emotional and weak, needing them to be the ones to respond in the middle of their freeze responses. I showed up unregulated and I triggered their shame. I made them feel responsible for the things I was feeling and ways I was being triggered, even though I knew where the behaviors or attitudes were coming from.
And so without further ado, I present to you the fundamentals of what you must understand in order to effectively counter the CAMS you are experiencing (in no particular order).
One, you must recognize that your kids are also victims of abuse. In fact, they have lived their entire lives in a dysfunctional and abusive environment--and you were part of that equation--it is literally all they know. If you're lucky, this was your first encounter with an abusive person and while you've been able to divorce him, and you know what you experienced was abusive or unhealthy, your children literally have no other reference for "normal" or healthy/unhealthy.
In fact, you leaving has left them alone with the person you divorced because of abusive behaviors. Those abusive behaviors don't magically disappear when you leave, and the kids will develop coping mechanisms for survival. They're going to be at the receiving end of the yelling, the lectures, and the manipulation and torment of you as a sport. In fact, as they get older, one of the ways they'll cope is to develop some of those same behaviors towards you. <insert the triggers that you need to be prepared to respond appropriately to>.
The most common responses that children will develop are freeze and faun. You can't fight or run away from an enraged man who is three times your size and it will serve them well while they are in those situations with him again and again through their childhood. But they'll also do those things with you and if you don't understand the physiology behind it and how they literally can't respond to you as you stand there begging them to just tell you what it is so that you can fix it.
Two, you need to consistently show up in your power, strong and authentically you. You may not even know who that is right now, but the most important thing to start doing right now is to start figuring it out--and until you do, you fake it. Find a good trauma-informed therapist, and start doing things to unpack all of the complex PTSD you're lugging around. Find one for your kids as well--shop around if you have to--and make it a priority in your lives. Something you all do because it is healthy to have someone to talk to and help you deal with hard things, not because any of you are broken.
Three, and probably the most important thing to consider and remember anytime you're dealing with your kids and feeling triggered or frustrated yourself: Do not trigger their shame. When they come back to your home dysregulated, angry, or acting out, Do not trigger their shame.
This doesn't mean you tolerate disrespectful behaviors. It means that you address the behavior as unacceptable and if necessary, remove yourself from the situation to create space for you regulate before you reconnect with your child.
This is the second most important piece after not triggering their shame: You create moments of connection. And you do NOT revisit the previous encounter. When they've acted out or said something hurtful and you've had to hold a boundary or separate yourself from them to collect yourself, make that first encounter a positive, connective experience.
It will look different in every circumstance and with every child, but let's take a very simplified scenario and break it down: Your teen comes back from extended time with their father acting very angry towards you, stomping around the house and being louder than usual. You ask them what's wrong and they launch into a verbal attack about how you don't use the child support money that their dad pays you the way you should.
The mistake would be attempting to have a conversation with the child about why that's not true. You can explain how the court determines child support, how it helps you pay for the home they live in, the food they eat, clothes, etc. DON'T DO THIS!!! You're feeding the confusion for your kids. You're giving credence to the idea that there is one parent lying and one parent being truthful and presenting your side, expecting the child to figure it out.
The more appropriate way to respond would be to say something along the lines of "Child support is something that the court has determined and is not a topic that children should be brought into or have to think about. I'm sorry that you are being told that, but it's not true and we're not going to talk about it any further in our home." Then be done with the conversation. Go find something to do--even if it's go to the bathroom. Give yourself space to let your words and your truth be absorbed. Perhaps you walk back into the space where the child is several minutes later and say "Hey, you want to go get a blizzard?". And go get a blizzard, or go take the dogs to the park, or go do something and don't talk about what happened prior. You don't trigger their shame.
It's obviously a little harder if the behaviors are aggressive or more directly attacking of your character, but the concept is the same, regardless of the situation. You respond from a healthy place where you recognize you are being triggered, you recognize that your kids are very much operating in their own trauma responses and being triangulated and manipulated to question everything they know about you and their connection to you.
You address the behavior that is inappropriate or unacceptable, from a place of authenticity, you remove yourself from the interaction to eliminate the possibility of escalation or getting you sucked back into the victim/defensive position. And you intentionally reach out to create moments of connectivity, where you do not give any additional energy to prior events. You do not trigger their shame.
Whew. That's it. That's the basics: CAMS Management 101. In order: Understand and heal your own trauma, recognize the trauma your kids are experiencing and how it will manifest in their behaviors, show up in your power when those circumstances present themselves, remove yourself from the engagement, reconnect with the child, and don't trigger their shame.
I hope this has been a helpful start to understanding how to counter the effects of CAMS. It's definitely not the end of the conversation. If this is you, I hope that you'll join me over on Patreon, where I'm consolidating my coaching content specific to CAMS in one place, and where I hope to build a support community for the moms experiencing this nightmare.
You're not alone.
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