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Originally Posted by mhealer3
bad family dynamics or parents with mental problems/alcohol abuse??
i strongly believe problems get 'passed down' to us,
--whether knowingly or not.
only since i'm older have i been able to see the 'whole-life' patterns that
trace from unmet needs, & fears from childhood.
my own parents had terrible childhoods, so i guess
they were doing the best they could for me, but it was still terrible.
i think there was improvement though, over how they were raised.
& even more improvement in each passing generation....
but it would have helped me a lot-- as a kid-- to be told that
mom/dad were struggling to overcome their own 'junk',
it would have helped 2 know that the way we lived
was not because they hated me,
but because they were flawed people still in their own pain.
i wish they would have gotten help though, seen a professional.
(preferably before us kids came along),
but even whole-family counseling would have
spared me a lot of the confusion & shame i grew up into.
hurting people hurt people.
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Good post mhealer, kind of poetic. That's definitely part of the problem that as a child you don't know what 'normal' is, so grow up thinking whatever your parents do is normal. It's only later you have the perspective to see things as they were.
My mother has issues. Her mother was abusive to her and it came as no surprise to learn her grandfather had psychologically abused her mother. At least that little family tradition will stop here (neither me nor my sister will have kids). Whether that abusive pattern was genetic or not is hard to say. I think she definitely has Paranoid Personality Disorder and also fits the profiles for 'abusive/controlling personality' (wifebeater syndrome) but I've never been sure where that stands as a clinical condition.
My Dad's family were pretty much all quiet, humble, passive people, though no mental problems I'm aware of. He does have some slightly autistic spectrum traits perhaps. I've no doubt there is a genetic component to SA, and perhaps the coming together of a bad combination of genes. But your experiences as a young child are a bigger contribution I suspect.