By the severe stage, the alienating parent no longer needs to be active. In terms of the motivation, the alienating parent holds no value at all for the other parent (whether motivated by fears, emptiness, helplessness) and the hatred and disdain are completely overt. The alienating parent will do anything to keep the children away from the target parent.

At this stage the child is so enmeshed with the alienating parent that he agrees totally that the target parent is a villain and the scum of the earth. The child takes on the alienating parent's desires, emotions and hatreds and verbalizes them to all as his own. The child too sees the history of the target parent and family as all negative and is able to neither remember nor express any positive feeling for the target parent.

These, and overt cases, are the ones that as an attorney invade your private life and lead to emotional over-involvement, although any high conflict alienation case beginning in the moderate category can do so.