by Mary and Allegra
[Another friend asked about why members of a system wouldn't want to share the weight of working through feelings and trauma.]
Well, here's how we see it: If John Q. Singleton has a traumatic
experience, he has to take care of his own healing process. He can
reach out to his wife or his best friend or his T for support, but
ultimately it's up to him to "own it" and heal.
Same with us as
individual system members. If Charity has unresolved feelings of
abandonment regarding our mother, or unresolved anger toward a
neighborhood girl who hurt us when we were in the third grade, those are
her traumas to resolve and her feelings to work through. We're not
her, so we don't experience what she experiences. We can be loving and
supportive, but we can't do the work for her. It's not fair of her to
ask us to do so, and it's not fair to her if we do for her what she can
and should do for herself.
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