How does growing up in a dysfunctional family affect us as adults? For adult children of addicts, the behaviors and beliefs that enabled us to survive as children can cause us a myriad of problems in adulthood. These patterns are so ingrained and automatic that we do them without even realizing it, and changing any of them can provoke anxiety and fear. They seem like a lifeline, but in adulthood, they become an albatross around our necks.

The degree to which we are affected depends on the level of dysfunction in the addicted parent and the other parent’s ability or inability to protect us. Some people who are addicted to substances are better parents than others. Some addicts may be able to function as a parent some of the time, and even when drinking may try to show an interest in their children. Others may be gone most of the time and be mean or even violent when they are home. A minority of non-addicted parents may seek help and be honest with us about what is happening in our home. They may be mature enough to put their own feelings aside to do what is best for us. Other parents may deny what is happening and try to put us in an adult role, which adds to our harm.

Consequences as Adults
The majority of adults from dysfunctional families find it difficult or impossible to trust people, especially in close relationships. Since they were often emotionally abandoned by one or both parents, they are terrified of being abandoned as adults. Loving someone makes them feel vulnerable, which is very frightening. To avoid this fear and anxiety, they often keep their feelings inside and don’t share who they really are with their partner.

If there is a problem or conflict they don’t talk about it—why would they? They have never seen two mature adults fight fair, so they don’t believe that it is possible. If they make it to therapy, it’s usually because they’re dragged in by their partner. Due to their fear of abandonment, they question their partner constantly about fidelity, even when they have no reason to. This often drives the partner away.

Most adult children of addicts have very lopsided relationships. People with codependency feel responsible for everyone who needs help and tend to attract friends and lovers who under-function. They are totally focused on everyone’s needs but their own, which keeps them from knowing themselves and what they need and want. Self-care is a foreign language. They work very hard and then feel hurt, resentful, and used.

People with codependency constantly question their own judgment. Some may check frequently with others. In therapy, they tend to ask me often if certain behaviors are normal. This lack of confidence in their judgment comes from the hideous scenes that happened in their family: where a parent was drunk, had a manic episode, or some similar incident, and the next day the family behaved as though it never happened.

People with codependency can struggle with self-esteem and feel chronically inadequate. They set impossible goals for themselves and then refuse help, which they see as weak or shameful. They often feel overwhelmed but keep it a secret so that nobody knows they’re suffering until they burst at the seams. Often, this is the crisis that first gets them to a therapist. They may be trying to juggle a ridiculously impossible schedule: they may work full time, go to school full time, have several children, and a dysfunctional partner to take care of. Often, they don’t realize how hectic their own life is, because they never think about it. They are too preoccupied with other people’s lives.

One of the most arduous decisions you may ever have to make is whether to stay married to someone who has cheated on you. For many people, the decision to not stay in the marriage is pretty straightforward, most often due to moralistic views about infidelity and the covenant of marriage. More often than not it’s complicated, and deciding whether to divorce or salvage a marriage can be heartbreaking and confusing. Marriage is a huge investment for many people, and as with anything in life, the greater the investment, the greater the loss. Marriage is tied up with many dreams, expectations, and fantasies, so divorce is a hugely difficult decision that should be taken very seriously.

Here are some issues that can get in the way of making a sound decision about whether to divorce:

Fear
Fear is at the core of most bad decisions. When we make choices in life based on fear, we are using the most primitive part of the human brain, a part designed to help us respond to dangerous situations for survival purposes. Human beings are the only species with a more evolved part of the brain that allows us to assess, reflect, and consider a situation before acting on it. This is the part of the brain we want to be using when making decisions about whether to divorce. Slowing things down, not acting hastily, and talking with a professional will help you achieve this goal.

Having Children
Many divorcing couples base their decision to stay in a marriage on their children. While it is extremely important to consider the impact of divorce on your children, it is helpful to not make them the determining factor. Children can easily be used as scapegoats to help parents avoid looking at all the options, even if those choices do not offer the most ideal consequences. There are many divorced households in which the children actually do better, so staying together for the children is not always the only and best solution. Meeting with a child therapist and reading up on the impact of divorce on children will help you make an educated decision.

Low Self-Esteem
Staying in a marriage because you are afraid there is nothing better out there is an issue of low self-esteem. Not feeling worthy of something better leads people to stay in bad marriages at the expense of their own happiness. Working on building your self-esteem and being clear about your value will help you make a proper decision about staying or leaving. Feeling empowered and complete with yourself is a valuable goal regardless of where you are in life, so use this opportunity for personal growth.

Black-and-White Thinking
Thinking in terms of right and wrong is the most obvious form of black-and-white thinking. It is easy to slip into a moralistic or righteous place after an infidelity, but it’s just a way of coping with the painful truth. Black-and-white thinking is very limiting and can lead to making a decision that is not founded on the whole truth. It is important to approach the decision to divorce with flexibility and openness to all options. Staying in the gray, as opposed to rigidly clinging to the black or white, allows for a more efficient and genuine decision.

Anger
Anger, not unlike fear, is not the best state of mind to be in when making a decision about your marital situation. Anger is a defense mechanism we use to gain control in a powerless situation, and it can cause us to make rash decisions that are not based on fact. If you respond to the circumstances of your marital conflict with anger as opposed to a calmness and clarity, you become blind to the possibility of potential solutions or answers. While the anger you feel may be justified and expected, it does not serve you in dealing with this important decision.

Uncertainty
Uncertainty breeds the tendency to cling to what we know. When it comes to the unpredictable future that is inherent in divorce, the first instinct is to hold on to the past because it’s familiar. The decision to stay or leave a marriage can be clouded by the unpredictable nature of your future without your partner, but the truth is that your future is unpredictable whether you are married or not. However, it is important to remember that the best predictor of the future is the past, so use your past experiences, successes, and failures to provide you with an accurate assessment of what you are capable of doing going forward. This will help you make a choice that is founded on the realities of who you are.

Deciding to stay in or leave a marriage can be torturous. Often, the heart and mind are conflicting when it comes to marriage and divorce, so it is normal to feel confused and uncertain about what to do. It can also be confounding to make a decision about something that doesn’t appear to have any positive consequences. Consulting a professional, becoming aware of your thinking and feelings, and taking the proper amount of time and space is integral to making the best possible decision for your future.

What do you do when you feel bad? You may clean your house, take a walk, or binge on sweet or salty foods depending on who you are and what habits you’ve developed. Does whatever you do make those bad feelings go away? If so, for how long?

Your feelings – good, bad, or ugly – represent your reactions to experiences. When you disown feelings, you disown yourself. This hurts your self-esteem. Let’s take a closer look at why.

By definition, you can not esteem someone who you are unfamiliar with. Self-esteem requires some knowledge of who you are and what you’re about. In other words, to have healthy self-esteem, you need a measure of self-knowledge. The more aspects of yourself you are aware of, the better you know yourself.

When we try to avoid to feeling the way we actually do,we are performing a kind of psychological gymnastics. We are maneuvering around inside ourselves in an attempt to distance ourselves from the pain. Cutting ourselves off from the pain rejects the part of us that is feeling pain. It’s a sacrifice similar to cutting off a leg caught in a trap in order to save the rest of our body.

Nobody wants to feel badly, which is why we try so hard to feel happy most of the time. When we can’t avoid feeling unhappy, we often try to contain any damage by “getting over it” quickly, or trying to talk ourselves out of an underlying feeling of loss. Some common examples are:

• “He was no good for me anyway.”
• “I should be glad I still have my health.”
• “She’s in a better place now.”

This is adaptive behavior that attempts to minimize emotional pain. Unfortunately, such attempts sometimes succeed too well in the long term. We isolate our hurt selves. We become fragmented in the process and keep ourselves from the healing we need.

At a deep level, we are aware of this banishment of our hurting selves. We know that we’re keeping something from ourselves. This knowledge itself must be hidden. Losing connection with the pain worsens as we lose trust in ourselves. There are too many secrets. We might even have lost self-respect because of what we dimly perceive as a lack of courage. We are afraid to repair the rift and invite all those suppressed feelings back into our awareness.

Feeling separated from ourselves erodes self-esteem, just as a collection of “No Trespassing” and “Keep Out” signs might erode the goodwill of one’s neighbors. Self-esteem requires that we embrace every aspect of ourselves. We need self-awareness and self-acceptance to feel whole. What many call “wallowing” is an opportunity for both awareness and acceptance of ourselves. Constructive wallowing is not for the weak or the idle. It takes courage and fortitude.

True wallowing is not like sinking into a warm bath; it’s more like getting a bikini wax. If you want the smooth results, you’ve got to endure the uncomfortable process. Just as it’s said that there’s a price for beauty, there is also a price for self-esteem. If it were easy to come by, more of us would have it. The price of self-esteem is full awareness and a willing embrace of our emotional pain.

Only by fully experiencing our pain can we reunite with the cut-off parts of ourselves that carry our deepest hurts. Through allowing ourselves to have our true feelings without self-criticism, we can know our whole selves and experience the courage of our intent to be who we are. This is the essence of self-esteem.

“It feels heavy right here,” Rebecca* said, crying and touching her chest, “like a huge rock is sitting on me. It’s like that old cartoon, where a boulder would fall off a cliff and pin the roadrunner to the ground—it feels like I can’t move.”  Rebecca, a 32 year-old successful marketing professional whose older sister had recently been diagnosed with a psychotic condition, had come to see me last year. She seemed lost in grief. Fluctuating bewilderment, sadness, fear, anger, tenderness, and love were tying knots in every part of her.

I thought that untying some of the knots in her body, with the help of mindfulness practices, might help her begin to lift the boulder.

Growing up, Rebecca’s sister had provided unconditional loving support which protected Rebecca from demanding, neglectful, and painfully critical parents. She had always relied on her sister to guide and comfort her; they had always been best friends. She said that now it felt like she was standing at the edge of the ocean, watching her sister sit on a raft drifting out to sea. She had been crying uncontrollably off and on for days. What made things even harder was that her sister sometimes acted like her old self, then became delusional again. Rebecca’s emotions were rising and crashing along with her sister’s state of mind.

Mindfulness of the Body: Body Scanning and Stretching

The first foundation of mindfulness is mindfulness of the body. It is cultivated with body scanning and movement practices, like yoga and walking meditation, anchored in feeling the sensations of breathing. A body scan involves directing one’s attention to different areas, one at a time, and focusing on the sensations in each place. A scan can begin with feeling the moisture on one’s skin, sensations of warmth or coolness, pressure or tingling. Then we scan the interior of the body, noting muscle tightness or ease near the surface and going deeper, where emotions express themselves as inner physical sensations.

Building brief body scans into a sustained stretch can begin to soften tight muscles—created from strong emotions—and release the mind from thinking for a while.

Prior to entering therapy, Rebecca had taken an 8-week course in Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) from me. MBSR is based on the work of Jon Kabat-Zinn at the University of Massachusetts, and is taught in hundreds of hospitals, corporations, and schools in the US and around the world. Rebecca had done many body scans as part of the course. She knew how to locate and identify the physical sensations accompanying her emotional states. The following intervention was natural to offer, and easy to do with her.

Untying Knots in the Body

As Rebecca continued to cry, we talked about the benefits of recognizing and allowing her grief. But after 20 minutes of repeated bouts of intense sobbing, she asked me to help her stop. I asked if she would like me to guide her through some breathing and mindful stretching; she immediately said yes. We did a four- or five-minute sequence of stretches, while she remained seated on the couch. I guided her to stretch gently, to her limit, with each pose, holding it for 20+ seconds, and remembering to breathe. While holding each stretch, she scanned, place by place throughout her entire body, for unnecessary tension—inviting it to soften (without insisting) wherever she found it.

“Psychotherapeutic approaches that utilize mindfulness offer well-developed non-verbal exercises that enable the individual to dip into direct sensation beneath the veil of words that may often conceal the mind’s pain. This sensory immersion enables the individual to disengage from those bottom-up enslavements at the root of suffering….” (Siegel, 2007)

“Our poses can strongly influence our emotional states. For instance, because of the expansive inhalation and opening of the chest, backbending, traditionally a stimulating practice, can elevate a low mood. Exhale-intensive poses such as forward bends tend to calm an agitated mind. In any balance practice, both inhale-oriented and exhale-oriented postures are executed in order to create equilibrium in the body and breath and to gain emotional
harmony.” (Gerstein)

Untying Knots in the Mind and Heart

This practice creates a state of non-thinking in the midst of strong feelings. Non-thinking helps release habitual, reactive thought patterns as attention is redirected to the body—what is called the neutral ground of attention. If, in the heat of raw emotion, we give free rein to thinking or emotions, our familiar and deeply grooved cascades of mental and emotional activity take their usual course, often intensifying the emotions, or cordoning them off from awareness. Instead, if we direct ourselves to notice “what am I feeling in my big toe right now?” the cascade slows, or even stops, for a while. Awareness remains intact, and new, more balanced, and less distorted thoughts have a chance to arise.

When she sat up again after her last slow, deep forward bend, Rebecca’s face had softened, her breathing was quiet, and she said “it’s gone, the heaviness is gone.” She said she felt sad, but less afraid and overwhelmed. She began to speak with compassion for herself and her sister, while remaining more relaxed for the duration of the session.

Before ending, we rehearsed the practice again: she brought the feelings back into her awareness on purpose, then, increasingly independently, guided herself through stopping, breathing consciously, body scanning, and stretching/releasing tension.

Rehearsal increased the chances that she would remember to use breathing and stretching in the days ahead. Later, she reported with some relief that she had remembered and been able to stop and practice, and that it had helped sometimes. Directing focus away from thinking, and into the body, gave her a sense of independence in calming herself, and also helped her to use her considerable intelligence to understand her sister’s situation, and to face the frightening challenge of becoming independent of her sister for the first time in her life.

Practices like these are not intended to offer an easy fix for difficult emotions or life experiences. Mindfulness, at its core, involves observing things as they are and not fighting them. One formula used is Pain x Resistance = Suffering (PxR=S). Paradoxically, allowing ourselves to be with our pain, sadness, fear, or anger, frees us to go beyond them for a while. And, according to Daniel Siegel, when practiced enough, “… an intentionally and repeatedly created state can become an effortless trait of our being.”

Is prior training required for this intervention to be effective?

A person must be open to locating and feeling different body sensations. Not having this training is a limiting factor. In my experience, however, the breathing, stretching and scanning practice can lead to a similar shift in people who are receptive, regardless of having prior training in mindfulness.

*Names and identifying information have been changed for privacy

Resources:
Center for Mindfulness—Stress Reduction Program
Jon Kabat-Zinn’s Guided Mindfulness Meditations site

http://drdansiegel.com/

References:

1. Gerstein, Nancy. (n.d.). How Yoga Affects Emotions. OmPlace.com. Retrieved from http://www.omplace.com/articles/Yoga_Emotion.html
2. Siegel, Daniel J., M.D. (2007). Reflections on the Mindful Brain. New York: W. W. Norton & Company
3. Siegel, Daniel J., MD. (2010). The Mindful Therapist: A Clinician’s Guide to Mindsight and Neural Integration. New York: W. W. Norton & Company

Cutting is the physical expression of hidden mental pain. Children may begin cutting or engaging in other forms of self-harm when their mental pain reaches a level that they can no longer deal with. While some children may find positive ways of coping with such pain, others seek negative coping methods including self-harm or drug use. Mental pain can be the result of built-up stress, past traumatic events, hurt feelings, rejection by peers, abandonment by significant others, or other life stressors.

Is My Child Just Trying to Get Attention?

If your child cuts in places that you can see and does not try to hide their wounds, then it is likely that, consciously or subconsciously, they are trying to let you know they are in pain. If they cut, or threaten to cut, in front of you, then they are likely crying for help. If your child has been hiding their cuts for a long period of time and has not told anyone about it, then they are likely trying to deal with their pain privately and are not seeking attention.

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Why Do Children Cut?

This behavior, while it may appear to have no benefit, may actually provide several means to cope. I know what you are thinking: cutting hurts, right? Not for the cutter; for them, it actually releases pain. It allows the person who cuts to express how they are feeling on the inside by letting it outside. The chemical reactions that go on when people cut themselves make the behavior addictive. Once the person who cuts is used to dealing with pain in this way, it is hard for them to choose alternative coping methods. When a child who cuts becomes upset, they may go to the behavior as automatically as a person with alcoholism would turn to drinking to deal with a stressful day.

What Not to Do

It is important not to label self-harming behavior as “bad” or tell your child that they are doing something “wrong.” This kind of reaction will only make the child feel ashamed and desire to cut more to get rid of those negative feelings. Telling your child, “Just stop it,” is just as ineffective. Tell your child that you understand they are going through some difficult things, and that you want to find a way to help them.

Getting Help

Often when we ask teens, “What’s wrong?” they will invariably respond, “Nothing.” Many teens have a hard time opening up, especially to their parents. This is partially because it’s just not “cool,” or because they have a hard time bringing up certain topics our of fear that they will be misunderstood or get in trouble. It is important that they have someone who they are comfortable talking to, whether it is a family member, a friend, or a therapist. When looking for a therapist, it is important to find one whom your child will feel comfortable with so that your child can learn to release their pain in a healthy way.

Resources for Parents and Children

1. GoodTherapy.org’s What To Do If You Are In Crisis
2. Hollander, Micheal. (2008). Helping teens who cut: Understanding and ending self-injury. New York, NY: The Guilford Press.
3. S.A.F.E. Alternatives/Self-Abuse Finally Ends (www.selfinjury.com or 1-800-DONT-CUT)

Communication and trust are key ingredients in any relationship, yet are often negatively impacted by the effects of a traumatic experience.

Trust
The very nature of trauma can shatter an individual’s trust in the world and fellow human beings. A survivor’s reduced level of trust can also make communicating difficult and even damage the foundational fabric of a relationship. Many a survivor believes, “I once trusted and I got hurt, therefore I will protect myself by never trusting again.” After trauma, the world and people in general can seem to be completely unpredictable. Danger seems to be everywhere and so a survivor of trauma may feel that they can never put their guard down in order to relax, feel safe, or trust.

These false beliefs about the world—that no one, including oneself, is worthy of trust and that one can never be safe—can be clung to and reinforce each other. Unfortunately, these beliefs are often expressed via impulsive, mean, or aggressive behaviors towards the people closest to the survivor. While the individual may often feel self-hatred or shame for acting in harsh and distrusting manners, to discuss the reality of these behaviors and the impulsiveness and fear behind them would require open communication that may be difficult or impossible at the time.

Listening and Communication
Survivors of traumatic events often struggle with both expressing themselves and listening actively. Active listening requires a certain amount of concentration and can be made more difficult by the presence of  hypervigilance. After experiencing trauma, most people’s concentration levels are lower and their levels of hypervigilance higher than their pre-trauma baseline. It can be difficult, if not impossible, for survivors of trauma to process significant chunks of information, making complex or lengthy conversations a significant challenge.

In addition to a potential decline in listening abilities, people who have experienced a traumatic event often shy away from openly communicating. Open and forthcoming communication may be avoided for two types of reasons:

• The individual may want to avoid certain internal experiences. It is common for an individual to not want to experience the emotions, thoughts, or memories that go along with talking about the trauma or to share their internal distress with others because of shame about this this distress.

• The individual may want to avoid certain reactions from their listener. The survivor may choose not to share the horror of the traumatic event out of fear that the listener will become traumatized or not believe them. This fear of being toxic often silences a survivor. A survivor may worry about burdening loved ones with information about the trauma or how the survivor has been impacted. Many individuals also do not communicate about the traumatic life event for fear of judgment and rejection: the worry that by sharing information others will think that the survivor is “going crazy,” overreacting, weak, or should be “over it by now.”

Emotional Bonding
These deficits in trust also negatively impact the opportunities for appropriate emotional and physical closeness, which, like open communication, are an imperative component of any relationship. A survivor of trauma often feels emotionally dead inside. This internal deadness can prevent the individual from experiencing emotions for friends and loved ones and can make it incredibly difficult to receive care, support, and nurturing from these loved ones. Feeling and being emotionally bonded or close is not really feasible.

The absence of a strong emotional bond and the survivor’s heightened state of physiological alertness can negatively impact the physical closeness in a relationship. In a state of hypervigilance and presumption of danger, being touched can set off the person’s safety—fight, flight, or freeze—reactions. The friend or lover who inadvertently triggers the safety response by physically touching the survivor quickly learns to avoid physical contact at all cost. Unfortunately, loved ones often stop trying to connect with the traumatized individual, emotionally or physically, since it can feel like the survivor is actively rejecting the loved one.

Authors Herbert & Wetmore phrase it well when they state that, “It is usually not the case that trauma survivors cease to love the people who were close to them before the trauma, but rather that, for the present, they can’t respond to those people normally, because they have lost access to their capacity to love.” Yet an important distinction to make is that even though a survivor may not be able to feel love, they can still act in a loving manner.

The good news is that these difficulties do not need to be permanent. It is possible, through the slow work of healing,  for the survivor to relearn how to trust and feel safe, and for these disturbances or difficulties in emotional and physical closeness to recede. This slow but entirely do-able process is best engaged in with a trained professional. May those of you who are the friends and family of a trauma survivor find an extra ounce of patience and fortitude, and may those of you who are healing from a traumatic life event find validation and the courage to keep growing.

In my practice, people trace depression back to trauma most of the time. Emotional trauma is an overwhelming shock to a person’s equilibrium. Trauma might be linked to an emotional, physical, or sexual attack or witnessing such an attack. War, rape, murder, accidents, and even well-intentioned medical procedures might all lead to trauma. So can single or repeated incidents of shaming and other emotional and verbal attacks. Trauma can also happen when heartbreaking losses of any kind occur.

When people are traumatized, it often shapes their beliefs about themselves or life. These trauma-induced beliefs—such as “I’m never safe,” “I’m unlovable,” “I’m a monster,” “love is dangerous,” “I’m a failure,” “I’m helpless”—affect how people feel and often contribute to depression. Sometimes an individual’s belief is based on something that was true at the moment of the trauma: “I’m helpless” is true when a person is in surgery under anesthesia (where unconsciously-remembered thoughts can still affect us).

But beliefs that formed during a traumatic event are stored without information about what that means over time. So “I’m helpless at this moment” can become “I’m always helpless.” This underlying belief may contribute to depression and helpless behavior indefinitely. If this person doesn’t get a chance to talk about their helpless feelings and express their emotions, they could carry that belief into the rest of their life. It is trauma that turns time-limited events into a part of people’s belief system and identity. It makes sense that people would be depressed when they believe they have no personal power to create the life they want.

“I’m a Coward”

Trauma-related beliefs can be a formative part of a person’s personality, particularly if trauma occurs in childhood. The trauma-related beliefs can be so painful that the traumatized person has to develop ways to coping with the belief—and then the methods for coping become a new part of who the person is.

For example, say a child watches his mother get mugged and freezes in fear until it’s over. Perhaps in his child mind, he concludes, “I’m a coward.” Living with the belief that he is a coward is so painful that he deals with it by trying to prove he’s brave: picking fights and engaging in high-risk behavior. These behaviors give him a euphoric feeling of self-confidence and he gets some relief from the pain of the “I’m a coward” belief. The combination of euphoria and the desire to avoid the shame of believing he’s a coward keeps him trying risky things.

He is new to taking risks, so he and others begin to think of him with a new identity. Risky behaviors get him in trouble in school, which means other kids in trouble gravitate toward him while cautious kids avoid him. This makes it hard for him to do well in school and he develops an identity as a tough street kid with crime rather than college in his future. This trauma-belief comes to shape every decision he makes and pretty much everything about him: who he dates, what he does for money, where he lives, who his friends are.

In situations where he might feel vulnerable or scared, he doesn’t dare show it for fear of revealing himself as a “coward.” So when he experiences other trauma, he can’t express his vulnerable feelings, which keeps him from processing the trauma, causing each new trauma to incapacitate him further. When he does start to feel vulnerable, afraid, or sad, he uses drugs or alcohol to suppress the feelings and give him the high of confidence again.

At some point, this man may realize he is depressed, perhaps when a friend dies of an overdose, a woman he loves leaves him, or he ends up in jail or a hospital. At this point, unraveling his story to find what is causing the depression will be complicated. The depression he feels is caused by this most recent loss, but it’s also caused by drugs and alcohol, living a life that keeps him from reaching his potential, and the self-hate that has developed over the years through taking risks despite serious consequences. But ultimately, the depression began when he watched his mother get mugged. When that is resolved, and he realizes he never was a coward, that freezing was normal and even wise at that moment, he will feel much better. He will probably begin to feel free to redefine himself and make different choices for his life. But because his whole life has been based on the way he reacted to trauma and the way he continued to react to his reaction, he will also have to unravel and replace all the aspects of his life and self-image that were created by that initial belief and shame that he was a coward.

“I’m Worthless”

Another example: imagine a child who is sexually assaulted by an adult. That child may respond to the trauma by believing “I’m only worth something if I’m being used for someone’s sexual satisfaction.” It’s not hard to imagine that this child might become an adult who deals with this belief by being sexually available to many people, who she may not even find attractive, as a way of getting some temporary relief from feeling worthless.

Being sexual with many people becomes part of her personality and identity, both of which would have been very different if she hadn’t been assaulted as a child. When this method of coping with trauma stops working—maybe because she can’t find lovers anymore, or she gets caught compulsively having sex outside her marriage and loses her husband—she may become depressed. She will be depressed about the recent changes in her life, but again, ultimately, the depression comes from the original trauma, and from the problems caused by trying to cope with the original trauma.

As complicated as these scenarios may seem, the origins of a given person’s depression can be even more complicated. Sometimes trauma isn’t involved in the origins of depression, but most of the time, with enough exploration, I find the roots of depression in trauma.

Slow down and listen.

When we communicate, sometimes we ignore what our partner is saying. Instead of focusing on our partner, our thoughts are consumed with what we plan to say next. If you pay attention to your partner’s words, and then you reflect back what you hear them say or feel, then they will feel heard. As a result, you will be on the road to a resolution of the issue. Does someone in your life, maybe yourself, constantly repeat a message over and over? It is probably because said person does not feel heard.

Try reflective listening and see if you can stop that person from repeating. “Reflective listening” means you state back the jest of what you heard or the emotion associated with the communicator’s message. Keep it short. If that is not what the speaker meant for you to hear, then the speaker will say, “No that is not what I wanted you to hear.” The speaker then repeats the statement, trying to change it in a way that the meaning can be more clearly understood. We talk and listen through our life filters. What one person says and intends to be heard may be totally different than what the receiver hears. Reflective listening is an advantageous tool because it confirms if the message was heard in the speaker’s intended manner. (more…)

Parents often ask me to describe what options they have for their post-divorce living arrangements. In addition to the many ways it is possible for children go back and forth between two residences, there is also the possibility of having children stay in the home they are currently living in while the parents move in and out. This is sometimes described as “the children get the house,” “bird nesting,” or just “nesting.”

The Advantages

• Said to be child-centric: it focuses on the needs of the children.
• Children are able to continue to live in their home for a greater sense of stability.
•  Minimizes the difficulty for children of living in two places, like forgetting homework, toys, clothing, or other belongings at the other parent’s home.
• Parents might be better able to handle the experience of moving back and forth between their residences than the children might be.

How It Works
The parents move in and out of the home according to the parenting plan they have established. This might include a situation where one parent spends the night with the children. The other parent comes to the house when the first parent goes to work and is at the home until the working parent comes home, often after dinner. The daytime parent then goes to their “other” residence. This arrangement could change depending on which parent is spending the night with the children.

Alternately, one parent can live in the home with the children for one week, then the other lives with them the following week. This is what as known as a week on/week off arrangement.

In a 2003 case in Ontario, Canada (Greenough v Greenough), the judge court-ordered parents to implement a bird nesting arrangement—which they had not requested—until the hearings on the case could continue.

In the case record, Justice Quinn wrote:

“The court made a bird’s nest custody arrangement in which the children (aged 3 and 5 years) remained in the home, with the mother staying in the home during the week and the father on the weekend. I think that the benefits of a bird’s nest order are best achieved where the children are able to stay in the matrimonial home, particularly if it has been the only residence that they have known…

“Time and time again I have seen cases (and this is one) where the children are being treated as Frisbees. In general, parents do not seem to appreciate the gross disruption to which children are subjected where one of the parents has frequent access. In this regard, I do not believe there must be evidence that the children are suffering before the court is free to act. To me, it is a matter of common sense. At the risk of falling prey to simplistic generalities, I am of the view that, given a choice, I do not see why anyone would select a living arrangement which involved so much movement from house to house.”

Justice Quinn clearly saw the advantages to the children of living in the home they were most familiar with and of having little change in their day-to-day lives, and saw the role of the court as instrumental in advancing this option on behalf of the children.

The Disadvantages

• It is expensive. Unless the parents are able to share the residence in which the children do not live, they are looking at having three residences, one for the children and one for each parent when they are not living with the children.
• It requires a large degree of civility between the parents and the ability to get along and make decisions together. In general, the absence of conflict is the best indicator of resiliency for children, both in a marriage and post-divorce. A bird nesting situation, especially, cannot work if there is conflict. Co-parents who choose this model might consider working with a mediator or other professional who can assist in discussing the fine-tuning necessary to make the arrangement workable.
• It does not take into consideration what would happen when one or both parents enter a new relationship. Even before this aspect of “moving on” occurs post-divorce, both parents often need to individuate from each other and establish separate lives in order to disentangle from the marriage relationship they had with each other. Bird nesting does not adequately foster this aspect of divorcing.
• House rules: in order for parents’ movements to occur in a non-disruptive manner, both parents would need to have similar rules and house cleaning sensibilities. “House rules” need to be established to avoid creating a situation where children need to remember which rules are in place on which days, or at which times, depending on which parent is “on.”

These lists are not exhaustive. Clearly, bird nesting is not for everyone. The question remains whether it is for even doable for a small percentage of divorcing families. We do know that when parents live in close proximity to each other, when the children have easy access between homes, and are not subject to ongoing conflict, children of divorced families are quite resilient and do as well as children from families where there is no divorce. This might be a solution that is just shy of bird nesting: good neighbors.

When we relate to others, there are three modes we can utilize. However, most of us probably predominantly behave and communicate in one of these modes.

Submissive mode is a way of communicating that demonstrates lack of respect for one’s own needs and rights. Most submissive people do not express needs, or do so in such an apologetic and diffident manner that they are often ignored and not taken seriously. Sometimes a submissive person will think that they have communicated clearly when in reality their message was so vague and unclear that it was not understood at all.

Aggressive mode is an expression of feelings, needs, and ideas in a way that goes against the other person. It is a “move against” or “move with the intent to hurt.”

Assertive mode is a method of communication which enables a person to maintain self-respect, clearly communicate and pursue their needs, and defend their rights and personal space without abusing or dominating others. It confirms one’s right to be in the world and put forward needs, desires, ideas, and feelings.

Understanding Submissiveness
The payoff for submissive communication is that the person gets to avoid conflict. Submission is a way of avoiding, delaying, or at least hiding the kind of conflict that is very scary to some people. Most people have been trained for submission by parents, older siblings, teachers, and others. Submissive people are often praised for being submissive: they are called “nice”, unselfish, good sports. It is important to note that submissive people often “win” and control others through their seeming niceness and weakness. They get to have what they want by having the least amount of responsibility and avoiding conflict at the same time.

There is also a price for “nice.” Submissive people go along with everyone’s wishes and needs and do not call their own play. Their relationships tend to not be as intimate and satisfying as those of others: a relationship requires two people and the submissive person is almost not there. People may like and praise the submissive person who voices no complaints for a while, but eventually the other person may start to feel guilt about being selfish or taking advantage of the submissive person.This feeling can then turn into pity, irritation, and eventually anger. Submissive people themselves eventually lose affection for others because they feel a lack of fulfillment.

The thing to remember is that every submission is a repression of anger, which eventually seeps into the affection individuals may feel. Sadly, submissive people act this way in order to be loved—but that very way of being eventually creates conflict and estrangement.

Understanding Aggressiveness
The aggressive person tries to get their needs met, even at the expense of another. Aggressive communication and behavior pay off in three major ways: the aggressive people tend to get their material needs met, are able to protect their space, and seem to have control over their lives and the lives of others.

There are also several downsides to aggression. Aggressive people are very fearful: people are aggressive not because they feel strong, but because they feel weak. They tend to make enemies, and their aggression ultimately makes them even more vulnerable and fearful. Aggressive people tend to alienate people and are usually not liked or loved. This alienation is a very powerful reason to deal with this issue. Too much aggression can also have serious consequences on one’s health and creates an unsafe world for all to live in. There are many aggressive people in our society.

Understanding Assertiveness
Assertiveness has a number of benefits. Assertive people usually like themselves more than the other two types: there is a connection between the ability to assert yourself and improved self-esteem. Assertiveness usually fosters better relationships by making a person more comfortable with themselves and therefore more comfortable to be around. Assertiveness greatly reduces fear and anxiety and enables people to release positive energy towards each other. Healthy and mutual satisfaction of needs in any relationship can only occur between assertive people. The biggest benefit of assertiveness is the feeling of living one’s own life. Your chances of getting what you want out of life greatly improve if you can let others know what you want and need, as well as how you feel.

I think that a person is most likely to get what they want from life and from others by being assertive. Of  course, assertiveness doesn’t always guarantee that you get what you want and need, but under most circumstances it is still most appropriate and preferable.

Is there a price for assertiveness? Yes, there always is. Learning assertiveness takes effort and can be a struggle. It is not easy to change a habitual way of communication. It can also be very painful to communicate vulnerably and honestly what you need, want, or feel and have that lead to conflict or rejection. In order to be assertive, you must be willing to risk enduring a conflict in order to hopefully forge a more authentic, intimate, and satisfying connection.

There are times and situations when submissiveness and aggression are appropriate. The problem is when those kinds of behavior are compulsive.

A choice to work on becoming more assertive is not an easy one. But it is the only possible way to take charge of one’s life and break out of a rut of compulsive behaviors learned in dysfunctional relationships. Assertion helps people to develop the power of having and making a choice, as well as learning to respect that choice in others.  In the end, assertiveness is better most of the time.

Self-esteem is a relational term. It describes a relationship between you and yourself. Having a solid sense of esteem for yourself puts you squarely in a partnership that is nurturing and accepting, as well as motivating and energizing.

Where does this relationship with you come from? How is it determined?
The answer for most of us is that our earliest relationships in life set the tone for our inner dialogue. This is good news, because it means that we can explore the origins of low self-esteem and intentionally create new relationships that fuel a more positive view of ourselves. Our childhood does not have to be our destiny.

Let’s explore how early relationships might affect self-esteem by looking at three different ways parents discipline their children: authoritarian, permissive, and authoritative. Of course, parenting consists of more than just discipline, but the methods parents use to teach children right from wrong can have effects that last well into adulthood.

Let’s look at these three typical styles of discipline, and see how they’re likely to affect self-esteem.

1. Authoritarian: In this style, parents are the ultimate and only authority. They rule with an iron hand, and they are obeyed out of fear. Children who disobey the rules – which might be arbitrary or systematic, fair or unreasonable, known ahead of time or stepped on by accident – are punished. The form of punishment can vary, but punishment is the expected outcome of rule-breaking.

This style of discipline can be likened to a military dictatorship. No one gets to vote, and the law is handed down from above. Punishment is swift and merciless.

Children raised with authoritarian parents learn to obey rules, but they do not learn to listen to their intuition or pay attention their own feelings. Their thoughts, values, and opinions are treated as irrelevant by important others. So they learn to treat themselves this way over time.

As adults, children raised in authoritarian homes are likely to have a great deal of self-discipline, but little self-knowledge and generally poor self-esteem. Since their inner workings were apparently irrelevant to their caregivers, they minimize their inner lives and maximize “shoulds” in their self-talk. Such people are intimately familiar with “shoulds.”

2. Permissive: A permissive family is sort of like a country without leadership: it’s a free-for-all, and anarchy reigns. This is terrifying for children, no matter how much kids seem to want their own way. In order to feel secure, children need to know that someone bigger, stronger, and hopefully smarter than them is in charge.

When there are no guidelines or boundaries set around children’s behavior, they come to believe that they do not matter enough for parents to care what they do. They wonder how much they are loved if no one seems to notice whether they’re home at 10 p.m.

It is as natural as clouds for children to conclude that they are unworthy when parented permissively. They may conclude that if they were smarter, prettier, nicer, better in some way then maybe the parent would care. Parental structure lends identity and purpose to a household.

Children of permissive parents often grow into adults who feel lonely, alienated, and unworthy. Their self-esteem is injured by a failure of visibility. They experienced themselves as basically invisible to important others at a time when they needed help to discover who they were, and that they mattered as people.

Permissive parents may sometimes decide to set rules, but children test the boundaries and they often do not stick. As with Authoritarian parenting, the rules are apt to change at the whim of the ruler. This conveys the message that the world is a confusing and untrustworthy place.

3. Authoritative: Authoritative parents have something in common with the rulers of a democratic country. They assume responsibility for leadership, but all citizens have a vote. Children of authoritative parents know where the boundaries are, and they are free to express displeasure with the rules, even if their wishes do not always carry the day.

Authoritative parents use reasonable, age-appropriate punishment that fits the “crime.” Children know ahead of time exactly what will happen if they break the rules, and why. There’s no wondering whether or how they’ll be punished on that particular occasion.

Unexpected punishments and resulting confusion can occur within the other two styles of discipline. Though the rules are consistent and dependable, they’re also flexible enough to accommodate unusual circumstances. For example, a child gets to stay up an hour past her usual bedtime to attend an event that has special importance to her.

Children of authoritative parents enjoy a sense of security about themselves and the world in general. They are more likely to be able to trust others, as well as themselves. They experience the world as a place that makes sense, and others as generally fair and reasonable. They make choices about their behavior, understanding consequences, and develop non-neurotic self-discipline.

It is easy to see why children of authoritative parents have a leg up on others in the self-esteem department. Their objections to the rules are acknowledged and considered. And their good deeds are rewarded as often as the no-no’s are punished.

In other words, children of authoritative parents feel seen and valued for who they are. They know that they matter to important others. Therefore, they matter to themselves. This is the foundation of self-esteem.

All these styles of discipline fall along a continuum. Most parents practice some blend of these, and it is also possible to have one parent with a discipline preference that does not match the other’s.The more often parents are able to discipline with an authoritative style, the more their children will develop good habits, a sense of security, and healthy self-esteem.

Social Networking is a great way to connect with so many individuals! It connects you with your family, friends from the past, current friends, and even allows you to make new friends. With so many benefits, are there any potential dangers with social networking? Well, not if you are someone who has strong boundaries, is careful in what you share with others, and gets your emotional needs met in a healthy way. However, if you are someone who has struggled with being inappropriate on the Internet or in relationships, has received false intimacy in unhealthy places, or taken advantage of relationships for your own benefit, then social networking will most likely present some challenges. If there is not a specific focus and set of boundaries on how these challenges and concerns can impact someone struggling with sexual addiction, it can open the door for a brand new set of issues.

So what are some of those challenges that someone struggling with sexual addiction will face in dealing with social networks?
• In the past, there were more limitations to what a sex addict struggled with on the Internet. They mainly had to deal with pornography and chat rooms. Yes, these were very addictive, harmful, and destructive, but with the development of social networking, there are many more opportunities for the sex addict to find a connection and to face temptation that is seen as more socially acceptable.
• Facebook, Myspace, and many other social networking sites can start out seemingly harmless, but when there is a neediness that arises for the sex addict, it opens the door to make familiar connections with those from their past.
• These connections are easier to hide because they don’t appear harmful but can lead a recovering sex addict down a very slippery slope because they will rationalize that it is not pornography or a chat room. But the more they connect, especially if they are having challenging times in their life emotionally, the easier it is to go back to old behaviors of hiding, deception, and getting their needs met inappropriately.

Does this mean that social networking is completely wrong for the sex addict? Not necessarily, but there needs to be some strong boundaries put in place.

Here are a few that have proven to be helpful:

• If the person struggling with sexual addiction and his or her spouse feels comfortable being part of some of the social networks, it would be strongly recommended that the person share all passwords with his or her spouse and accountability partner. This keeps things very open and transparent!
• Have regular check-in times with spouse and accountability partner to see if too much time is being spent on these sites and if the sex addict is getting any “hits” emotionally or physically from any relational connections.
• Make sure the sex addict is very open about all friend requests and does not allow any past relationship partners or “hook ups” to be part of his or her network.
• Be willing to shut down these sites through a filter or by blocking them before they can become an issue or if challenges arise from using them.

The strongest and safest course of action is to avoid these sites to keep any problems, temptations, or challenges off the table. Why open a door that can lead to more hurt and pain after all the sex addict and spouse have been through? If you do feel you can safely manage these sites, be careful to have very strong boundaries in place to keep you safe and for your spouse and family to feel safe as well. Social networks can be fun and a very positive connection for many individuals. Just like a lot of other things, when it is abused it can cause more emotional pain and betrayal for those close to the sex addict. For the person who has faced and is dealing with the area of sexual addiction, social networking brings another tempting avenue into play that, if not handled directly, can lead to a whole new set of issues and pain.