"Assembly Required"

~my two most dreaded words~ EXCEPT when it comes to repairing adult children.

In the past 5 months, I’ve ordered 165 items from Amazon. My humongous spending spree with this company started early this year on January 6th, when my home burned down. This life-altering event was followed by months of residing in hotel rooms.

I’ve been rebuilding from scratch~ from Ground Zero if you will. That old saying, “you don’t know what ya have until you’ve lost it,” definitely applies here. My world finally feels stable and nourishing, as my new house has steadily morphed into a “Home,” thanks to some furniture and decorative accents. Life is feeling good again (thank you, God).

Throughout this arduous process of regrouping and having to assemble way too many new Amazon items to the point of sheer exhaustion, it’s occurred to me that we never seem to attribute the principle of ‘assembly required’ to our offspring. I can’t for the life of me figure out why we fail to be aware that child-rearing, the most important job there is, requires careful, methodical assembling of varied and intricate parts.

I’ve been saying for decades now, when the Mother Ship is sound, her passengers can reach their destination intact. Yet how many do we personally know, who’ve raised teens or young adults who seem terribly unhappy? How many of these kids continuously struggle with active addictions to drugs or other substances, and engage year after year in self-destructive behaviors?

I’ve had to bite the bullet and assemble a lotta items I’ve purchased these past months~ and out of sheer survival, have forced myself to pre-assess prior to ordering, will I love this item enough to expend the energy and time it’ll take for me to put it together?? How many do this I wonder, before deciding to conceive a baby? Is it more often the case that a spontaneous, passionate, inebriated encounter produces an infant~ and what happens from there?

I’m delighted if a new item simply unfolds, like the desk I recently bought for my office from Wayfair. If it’s cheap, easy to construct and looks great driving by at 20 mph, it’s good enough for Me! Compromises must be made during challenging times~ but do we have this luxury with our offspring?

Painstakingly assembling these new items and cursing up a storm half-way thru my labors, has brought to mind the question of just how much diligence and conscious effort goes into building sturdy, empowered, resourceful children who’ll grow up with a healthy sense of self-worth and confidence? And what does it really take to instill these vital characteristics in a child~ I mean, where in the world do we even start?!

Many clients over these past years, have told me what “good people” their parents were. Both my parents were good people~ but did this automatically make them good parents? Deficits in my own childhood from early on, were substantial. By the grace of God, I figured out how to raise myself and it seems I’ve mostly done a decent job of it. Perhaps my early imposed autonomy gave me a secret advantage over folks who were exposed to too much parental influence. Bottom line, I feel lucky to have turned out okay.

My healing practice over the past few decades has attracted clients who for the most part, were raised by “good people,” but they’ve borne serious core damage, which has left them habitually self-critical and hard on themselves. This type of self-destructive behavior inevitably keeps depression and anxiety alive in the body on a cellular level~ even if one lapses into it “only occasionally.”

Nobody who was properly and well-loved as a child grows up with self-esteem issues and routinely notes what’s missing in themselves, rather than celebrating aspects of the Self that are worthy of love, respect and admiration, beyond a shadow of a doubt. You can take this to the bank.

Perhaps some responsible exploration into the etiology of a child’s or young adult’s emotional and/or psychological difficulties merit examining. After all, none of us popped out of our mother’s womb with “issues.”

When a child observes his parents discord~even if he only picks up on the tension between his mom and dad, it instills fear in him. Children cannot grow up in a virtual war zone, and turn out okay. The most sensitive/sentient child will be prone to acting-out the tensions and adversarial energies he senses between his mom and dad~ even if they never yell or scream at each other.

This kid knows full well, something’s very wrong between his parents, yet they and his other family members act as though “nothing’s wrong.” It’s business as usual as far as they’re concerned. This child starts feeling troubled that his inner experiences don’t match the picture that’s being painted by others, or what he’s being told. Can we guess what this does to his perceptions of marriage? And how might he learn to perceive himself?

An unhappy, dissatisfied couple presents crucial challenges to any child living under the same roof. Adults tend to believe “children are resilient,” and while a kid will figure out how to survive his perpetually uneasy home atmosphere and try to make the best of it, he experiences his parents’ hot or cold war daily, which undermines his sense of safety and well-being. He cannot feel happy nor content in this household, no matter how many material gifts are bestowed upon him, in the name of “Love.”

Too many parents think, “if I enroll my kid in enough extra-curricular activities, he’ll turn out fine!” But in truth, all that kid really needs, is closeness, comforting, hugs, holding and kisses from a joyful, not-too-busy mom or dad who is willing to just hang out and stream a movie while snuggling with their son or daughter on the sofa, sharing a big bowl of popcorn.

If you’ve had the painful misfortune to struggle with A Problem Child, this isn’t about casting blame on you or anyone else. Most of us are shooting in the dark when we conceive and give birth to a new life. Children learn best from example, and precious few of us had a truly stable, healthy enough template to draw from during our own childhood, to provide a solid sense of what works and what doesn’t, when it comes to childrearing!

Sadly enough, parenting patterns (for better or worse) are automatically repeated generation to generation, which makes inner pain in so many, a generational trauma issue. It’s much easier to ski down a mountain with pre-packed snow, than to forge our way thru fresh powder. We humans tend to gravitate to what feels familiar~ whether it serves us or not.

Overcorrecting with our children to avert the failings of our parents doesn’t work either. It typically spawns narcissism in offspring. We tend to give too much to our kids if we got too little nurturing during childhood, even to the point of neglecting our own feelings and needs. Thus, a child never builds any sense that his parent has vital needs too! A distinct lack of empathy is thus embedded, which spawns a “life’s just about me and My needs,” personality, in the ensuing generation. This brand of narcissism appears to be quite common among young ‘liberals.’

This behavior comes from thinking our way thru life as parents, as opposed to feeling and sensing our way along. It’s why psychotherapists kids are generally the most screwed up you’ll ever meet.

My dad used to talk about a neighborhood friend he had as a little boy. When my father spent time at this young friend’s home, he frequently observed playfulness, humor, affection and flirtation between that kid’s parents. My father’s sense of incredulity in relation to the love he saw between a mother and father was in sharp contrast to what he experienced daily, at home. My paternal grandfather was emotionally and physically abusive, and my grandmother was mentally unstable. No surprise, my dad grew up and married a woman (my mother) who some years later, was diagnosed with Schizophrenia.

With a sense of wonder, my father recalled his playmate excitedly exclaiming, “I can’t wait to grow up and get married!” The pleasurable dance this little boy typically witnessed his parents enjoying, set the stage for what he fantasized about getting to relish in his own marriage when he was grown. Imagine that!

The primary, and most vitally important relationship in a family unit is between a husband and wife. If these two people aren’t happy and content with each other, if their dynamic isn’t mutually loving and nourishing, their children suffer~ because for these kids, no foundational stability exists. The ground beneath ‘em is always shifting.

A lotta people stay together “for the kids sake.” While this is a lofty concept, it’s often the very worst thing you can do to a young soul. It teaches a child that no matter how painful or debilitating our human existence gets, it’s not okay to walk away from it. Yet, how much of society believes they’re doing “right” by their children by remaining in a loveless, passionless marriage? And is this really about the kids~ or does it just feel too frightening or inconvenient to sever a tie that for years, perpetuates feelings of discontent and dismay?

A lot of marriages CAN be saved with the right kind of help~ but most “psychotherapy” rarely even touches the core wounds that men and women carry into a coupling, to dismantle the childhood trauma they conveniently and readily wanna blame their spouse for unwittingly resuscitating. When we castigate our partner for unhealed inner pain that has nothing to do with them, it’s called, ‘transference.’

Marriage for these folks, is like walking on a minefield with active explosives buried slightly under the topsoil. Under these circumstances, our triggers (unhealed injuries from childhood) are smacking us in the face every day of our life!

My best advice to you, is to try and take an honest inventory of your Primary Relationship, and stop shoving the ‘little things’ under the rug. When ya do that long enough, you end up with a very lumpy carpet~ and what possible balance can be had in a relationship dynamic, while trying to navigate life on such uneven terrain?

In addition, think back to how you handled your child’s earliest life experiences and what their daily existence may have felt like to ‘em, when you were trying to build a career and a family at the same time. My experience is, the job that pays us the least is the one that always suffers.

Ask yourself if you’ve spent enough time and energy working on building and maintaining contentment, joy and solidarity in your marriage. Check inside yourself with how diligently you’ve ‘assembled’ your tender little new offspring. Might you have accomplished these tasks any better with a little guidance from someone who’s spent decades reconstructing souls who had a rough start, and who still blame themselves for what feels to them like “unresolvable” issues?

No child wants to have to fix their parental units! That’s a job for adults who are committed to constructing a life together that feels nourishing, rewarding and serene. Yet, our world is rife with pathologically codependent beings who grow up being compulsive caregiver, fixer, rescuer-types who make unsound relational choices with impaired partners~ because what in the world can ya do with someone who doesn’t need fixing, when your entire sense of worth since 3 years old, is dependent on it?

If you ever wanna peel back the layers of your codependent leanings and understand how these got implanted in you, ya might find my book informative and insightful. DO YOU LOVE TO BE NEEDED, OR NEED TO BE LOVED? was published about 6 - 7 years ago. I’m happy to say, it’s been popular among CoDA (Co-Dependents Anonymous) groups and psychotherapeutic professionals.