The short answer is no. You cannot fix your family.
I have noticed a significant reoccurring pattern in several of my client’s stories these past few weeks and thought it might be helpful to share my thoughts on this with others.
There are some amazing families out there who are loving, securely attached, have healthy boundaries, and fulfill individual emotional needs in balanced ways. They handle big feelings and give grace for the human imperfections that are in even the best of us. They address conflicts and repair hurts in relationships. Yet, many of the adult clients who end up in my office do not come from such a family. Often, a big part of their recovery is identifying patterns they learned from their family of origin, such as attachment styles, communication, and handling conflict.
I love this quote from Brené Brown, Rising Strong, about an exercise that she does with people:
“Folks write down the name of someone who fills them with frustration, disappointment, and/or resentment, and then I propose that their person is doing the best he or she can. The responses have been wide-ranging...One woman said, 'If this was true and my mother was doing the best she can, I would be grief-stricken. I'd rather be angry than sad, so it's easier to believe she's letting me down on purpose than grieve the fact that my mother is never going to be who I need her to be.'"
The bad news is that you cannot heal the dysfunction in the family you grew up in. If that was hard to read, read it again. It is not your role to save your parents/caregivers now, nor should it ever have been your job growing up. Let that responsibility go. It is keeping you stuck, sick, and sad. Maybe they will change and maybe they won’t. It is not up to you and it never was.
There is a very real grief process that comes along with the acceptance of that reality. All of us have expectations and dreams about what we hope life looks like, and this includes our family relationships. To lead healthy and wholehearted lives, we must make peace with the very real limits of others.
The good news is that you can change your own life.
You can grow.
You can parent differently and stop those generational patterns.
You can accept yourself as worthy of love and belonging.
You can freely give empathy because of the struggles you endured.
You are not doomed to repeat the past.
You can learn new ways to communicate.
You can set boundaries.
You can take the good parts of your family and limit the parts that are harmful.
You can make a new family.
You can cultivate authentic relationships based on love, emotional/physical safety, deep connection, grace, compassion, courage, joy, and showing up for each other. Not sure where to start? Give our office a call at 309-713-1485.