Q&A: Overcoming a Dysfunctional Family - Rabbi Daniel Schonbuch

[Music] my name is rabbi Daniel Sean Bock I'm a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist based here in New York and around the world via Skype often we answer your questions that come from around the world that have to do with marriage relationships and family issues the first letter comes from a listener who writes that he came from a very dysfunctional family and because of the dysfunction he experiences a lot of anxiety and he's worried how he's treating his wife and his children and looking for ways to see if I can help them dear rabbi Sean Bock I come from a dysfunctional family and suffered abuse as a child I often suffer from anxiety which makes it difficult for me to be calm in the house of my wife is there any therapy thing it helped me resolve my issues dear viewer it sounds like you had a really hard time as a child and they could really empathize with you because we know it's psychologists that if a person has serious family of origin issues it can often have a direct impact on their daily life it can affect how they feel about themselves and most importantly it can affect how to relate to people in their homes there's no question that a child needs to experience a sense of calmness in his or her home what does calmness really mean commas means that there's predictability in a child's life for example there's a father there's a mother there's a place to sleep there's food to eat there's predictability the father and mother at home at certain times while other times the father mother may be ad the house but despite that there's somebody to take care of the child this is what we call predictability it's also an important factor that the parent is predictably kind to the child for example if a parent is losing their temper if he or she is screaming or god forbid they're abusive to the child this creates not only a lot of instability and unpredictability it also causes a lot of emotional distress but most importantly if a child experiences a lot of instability during their childhood years then that will define most likely how they feel about themselves years later on don't get me wrong it's very possible and I've met hundreds of people that have come from very difficult and dysfunctional families and are doing fine but for others because we had this function as a child they're suffering a lot now in their current life and need some extra help let me share with you a very brilliant understanding of how to help yourself understand your family more effectively I want to show you on the board behind me something called a genogram a genogram is about 60 years old and it was invented by certain psychologists that wanted to help individuals understand more about themselves by first plotting and understanding their emotional family history the genogram has some very interesting rules number one is that squares are men and circles or women so for today let's take an example of a family here we see a circle that's the mother and a square that's a father and underneath them are three children a girl a boy and a girl we go from the oldest age to the youngest age now these are just simple lines to show us here's a family with three children we can also go back one generation so let's take the father's side the father had two parents and he was the third child of four children there was a boy a girl a boy and a boy and therefore we see three generations grandparents parents and children now what's very interesting about this system is that once we've mapped out who was actually there then we started putting all types of notations and lines and squiggles to tell us what were the relationships like between these different people so for example in this family the person that wrote to me with problems in their life was telling me that their father was very abusive so to note the abusiveness in that relationship we're going to draw a squiggly line between his father which is a square and himself which is a square below him so this person we know suffered a lot from an abusive father one of the other things we know is that the mother was distant from this child as well that is noted by a dotted line so this poor person that called me this person that went through a lot of suffering as a child both experienced the abuse of the parent as well as distance from the other parent what's important to note in this chart is not just that there's men women and children but there are important relationships we could deeply affect the person many years later so for example here we see two parents and the father in this case is the person that wrote the email to me the problem with him is that his father was very abusive to him and one way to note the abusiveness is a squiggly long line unfortunately his mother was also very distant which we'll note by this dotted line between his mother and him one of the things we know about this person is he himself is having a hard time relating to his children and is often very anxious around his wife as well but what we can see from his genogram is the reason the person is suffering was pretty obvious as a child he experienced abuse and distance from his mother meaning he had no one to turn to when he was going through a lot of distress in his life that must be so hard for him right now he grew up in a family where there was abuse and distance but no one to turn to many and no one to find relief he had no one to experience peacefulness with he had no one to turn towards to get help and that therefore tells me that the most important thing the listener can do is reach out and talk to somebody else in his life that makes a difference let's introduce somebody else that he could for example speak to perhaps he can speak to a therapist perhaps you could speak to a rabbi whoever he chooses it's important to develop a relationship with them on an ongoing basis let's say a person would see a therapist once a week or maybe this person could see the personality that will listen to him at least once a week as well I suggest that the viewer goes and speaks to this person once a week to talk about some of these issues in his family of origin it's extremely important if you're experiencing anxiety currently in your life and came from a dysfunctional family to speak to something about what you experienced as a child this is so so important many people that experience this distress as a child what they do is they hold on to all this pain for so many years and they suffer they find it hard to form relationships and when they form relationships they heart they find it difficult to keep those relationships in the healthy way but it's very important to look at their genogram to understand they came from a dysfunctional family and therefore they experience a lot of pain as a child and therefore they may be acting out with a lot of this anxiety in their marriage and with their children as well and also on a personal level one of the most important things they can do is to talk about what they experienced as a child and hopefully the person they turn to could help them understand that their current situation meaning with their wife in this case or with his children are not a cause for distress rather he needs to work on it inner issues learn how to work through the pain experience as a child and in fact the Torah tells us it says dyg a believer ish all the fears in a person's heart yeah Jenna they should cast them down it also means yes Akana they should speak them out to somebody if a person holds on to all this family pain for many years with no one to talk to they're going to build up a lot of distress anger and anxiety but the most important thing is yes kinda they should spill them out but from the word see auctioneering to discuss them when a person begins to open up and review and explore with somebody else some of the distress they experienced as a child they will experience a decrease in the anxiety that they're experiencing currently in their marriage and with their children as well welcome to this new series in Hebrew called marriage matters my name is rabbi Daniel shomba and I'm a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist based in New York and around the world we'll start on this important series I will be answering your questions you have about Mara relationships dating parenting and about any issue doing with family and relationships but more than what I have to say I want to hear what you have to say so please email to this address and send in your question and I'll try to answer as many questions on this Michel