side view of father talking to depressed son at home

Every relationship in our lives, past and present, contributes in some way to who we are in this very moment. The relationships we all encounter are generally those with a parent/s, siblings, extended family members, friends, work colleagues, and authoritarian figures. In this post, I will focus on how a past relationship, between a father and son, impacted on a client’s personal life choices, belief and value systems, emotional world, and relational bond with his own adolescent son.

A few years ago, a man in his early 50’s, made an appointment for counselling. His wife suggested he talk with a counsellor about his anger, and the challenges he was experiencing with their then adolescent son. We spent a short period of time in the first session exploring his past relationships, especially with his own father, who was deceased. He spoke lovingly of the man who raised him, and I gathered he was raised with a strong work ethic, a solid value and belief system, and most of all, a fierce loyalty to family, and protecting those he loved. It is important to understand how the past can frame our belief and value system. These are the very systems which provides our lives with a sense of direction and meaning.

My client reflected on the narrative of his father’s life; he grew up in extreme poverty with a father who worked on the mines, and a mother who worked as a midwife. Whilst his father would be down a mine, his mother would occasionally be called upon to assist with a birth. At these times, there would be no one to care for her son, and she would tie his one foot to the kitchen table, leaving him a bottle of water and something to eat, until she returned a few hours later. My client reiterated his father’s family was extremely poor, and the family needed the money. There was no social security, and no family support.

By the age of 15 my client’s father’s parents were both deceased, leaving him an orphan, and he started working on the mines as a welding apprentice. An old man took him under his wing, and taught him how to save as much as possible from his meager wage, and used this to pay for a university correspondence degree. During this time my client’s father would often go to bed hungry, having had a measly meal, which consisted of a fishcake, and tomatoes, he would steal from a local vegetable farmer.

His life circumstances, and those early relationships had a profound impact on him as a person, and shaped his value and belief system, how he viewed the world around him, and the importance of family. He became a successful business man, who accumulated much wealth over his lifetime. My client experienced his father as a confident, strong, self-assured, and sometimes harsh man, who did not suffer fools. Yet, in his adolescent years my client recognized his father was deep down, a fearful and anxious man, who saved every cent he earned, and never allowed himself to enjoy the more pleasurable moments of his life.

It is important to understand our two-million-year old brain isn’t designed to make us happy, it is designed to make us survive, and the two emotions which drives this survival, is anger and fear. My client’s father operated from a place of fear; his son needed to be strong, because the world was a cold and ruthless place, which he needed to survive. This resulted in my client being sent to extra math classes in the afternoon after school, starting in primary school already. Teachers in those years could physically punish children, and my client was the recipient of such punishment most days.

At home my client experienced his father as a tyrant, with brutal arguments, and emotionally destructive confrontations, which he believed created a resilient young man, with a vicious temper, who rebelled at all forms of authority. My client had an above average intelligence, and could have been a successful lawyer, doctor, or whatever he desired to be professionally. He dropped out of college, and refused to enter university, as the desire to escape his father’s influence was a major overriding factor.

The pattern was set, and my client treated his adolescent son in the same tyrannical way, believing this was the way to make sure his son would survive the world. Not because he didn’t love his son, but because he did. My client referred to this as their ‘generational inheritance’. This contained statements such as:

❣ ‘I must be tough on my son, because he needs to be a man.’
❣ ‘The world is a cold, hard place, and you don’t cry in front of anyone.’
❣ ‘I was brought up tough, and I am fine.’

I asked two questions:

❣ What did he fear most when thinking about his son?
❣ What did he desire most when thinking about his son?

He was familiar with the fears; they have been carried through the generations. He needed to consider what he desired. I knew, when he could expand on what he desired most, that which he hungered and yearned for, is what would reduce the fear and anger, and his life would become larger and fuller.

This man did not need to be fixed, he wasn’t broken. There were parts of him which were sad, hurt, alone, angry, and felt betrayed, and those will always be with him. Sad, hurt and alone, because even as an adult, he felt the loss of a loving relationship with his father, a deep sense of exclusion from his wife, and children, as if he did not belong, and the cost of not pursuing a career in law, which he knew he would have excelled at. Betrayed by the father who loved him, and the relationship which nearly cost him a relationship with his own son. Anger, his protective emotion, which sheltered all the painful emotions, and the substantial losses in his personal life.

There were parts of him which were loving, compassionate, kind, loyal, and passionately protective over his loved ones. Those were the parts of him he needed to put in charge of his life. Where he lived emotionally was the key to his quality of life, and the well-being of the relationship not only with his son, but also with his wife. Change was a must for him, and he was willing to put all his resources towards stopping the family generational inheritance patterns with him.

My client generously gave permission to share his story, and I want you to start considering how your behavior, beliefs and values, may be impacting those you love. We all mean well, we love our families, but when we do not consider what drives our behaviors, beliefs and values, we may be maintaining a ‘generational inheritance’ without being aware. If you realize this is the case for you, this inheritance could end with you……

The smart way to build a family bond and harvest forgiveness…

In my experience as a family counsellor, I’ve found some keys methods that produce effective, gratifying and long term results. When these methods are applied properly, conflict tends to dissipate and the subject family members naturally start to bond and embrace into a solid family unit.

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