Second Quest: Know how the Spell Causes you to Act
The spell that was cast upon you
has caused much anguish and heartache. It is always there between you and others. It determines how you act, think and feel at all times during the day. It shields you from your true self and the beauty and wonder that is you. The next two tasks will enable you to slowly take off the cloak of the spell and reveal your beauty. It will give you new power to determine your own actions, thoughts, and feelings.
Recognise Old Roles
Slowly but surely the roles forced upon her were coming undone. Recognising them as no longer workable, she cast them off and stood up straight for the first time. In this task she sees herself as in a mirror. In seeing, she gains understanding and compassion, and begins to breathe.
I learned early on that if I acted in a certain way, predictable things would happen. If there was tension in the house and I didn’t know why, I would do something silly to make everyone laugh. If Mum was sad, I would try to cheer her up or look after her in some way. Sometimes I would shepherd the smaller children away from the raised voices, to the bedroom where I would read to them. I would tidy up. I would work hard to make things better. I sometimes diverted attention by breaking something. Or by fighting with a sibling. But most often I would go away and read a book. By myself. Out the kitchen door, down the path, past the shed and the vegetable garden. Past the old rusting car Dad was fixing up. Past the garage where Mum and Dad and their friends would play darts and pool all weekend. I would head for my tree. I loved that tree. It was a pear tree and was easy to climb. The pears were delicious. There I would hang out with my imaginary friends Alice in Wonderland, Tarzan of the Jungle, Katy, The Famous Five; anyone I could get my hands on. I would go into their world; they welcomed me. Pears are still my favourite fruit. They represent safety to me. I can see how things haven’t changed much since I was a child. If a tense situation comes up, I either make a joke or disappear. There are more effective ways of dealing with tension.
My quest, is to find out more about the spell that was cast on me, and how it has shaped me. I thirst for this knowledge, because I know deep within me that this is the way to find the counterspell.
All children play their roles in any family; addictions or no.
The clown, the scapegoat, the clever one, the naughty one. The easygoing one. The sporty one. The popular one. The antisocial one. The TV show Modern Family is a classic example of children’s roles in a family. Hayley is the people-smart, pretty, popular one. Alex is the nerdy, unconfident over-achiever. Luke is the goofy one. In a non-addictive family, children get to try on different roles. We call these children well-rounded. The clever child may take up a sport, or the clown may become serious. Their lives don’t depend on their roles. In the addictive family, the children’s roles are born of fear and shame. As a result, they become locked into those roles. We base our roles on our perception of what we need for survival. We adhere to our role to such an extreme that what was positive becomes negative. There is no choice of a different role, no way to learn balance and acquire the skills to change. We become solidified in the spell. Where can you go as an adult to practice different roles? How can you learn new roles? We are going to look into this later in this chapter.
I’ve read much about the role I assumed in my family of alcoholics. I came to see the nature of the spell. How helplessness and powerlessness had conditioned me to stop expecting anything. To survive, I had to fill everyone else’s needs. Whatever they were. I didn’t have any needs. If we look at the family as a system, we see that each person takes on a particular role. When one person tries to change their role in the system, it forces others to change their own roles. If the acting-out child became the family hero, the system would collapse. This helps to keep us locked into our roles. Even though I am the oldest child, I was never the responsible one; my younger sister took on that role. My younger brother played the role of acting out. My youngest brother I don’t know about. He was only four when I left home. Knowing him now as an adult, I suspect he took on the Mascot role when I left.
The family roles
I sometimes played a combination of roles. Sometimes I was the Adjuster, who would adapt to any situation. The one who opted out. The avoider. Also called the Lost Child. I preferred to be the child that we call the Placater, also known as the Mascot. I would adapt to any situation and even make those involved feel better about it. As a child, I mediated fights between my parents. Nothing affected me. We’re going out for dinner – awesome. Oh, we’re staying home now? Awesome, are you ok? No Christmas present? No problem, it doesn’t matter. Do you like the present I bought you? I could accept any situation and make the best of it. As a child, I perfected making others feel better. If there was any tension at all, I would make everyone laugh. I became very good at clowning around. Because everyone loves the Mascot, they shelter us from what’s going on.
Everyone else knows what’s going on but them. My sister astounded me a couple of months ago with all sorts of knowledge that she had about the family; things I had no clue of. I never knew that she stayed home so much to look after the little ones. I knew that Mum went away after her suicide attempt, but I didn’t know where or why. I didn’t even know it was a suicide attempt until I was 30!
This is how the Placater role works out for me today. The time when my children were little was the best time in my life. I could make them feel better all day, every day. We laughed a lot. Now, I work as a massage therapist and am training to be a psychotherapist. “I want you to feel better”. Everyone agrees that I’m nice and caring. My ethos is “if I am nice, you will like me”. It’s easy for Placaters to be warm, sensitive, caring, and to listen. Everyone likes us. As children, we had to survive, and to do that, we had to look after everyone else. As adults, we choose professions that enable us to work to our strengths. Nurses, teachers, counsellors, massage therapists, beauticians. This is not a bad thing; we need more caring in the world. But it becomes a bad thing if the giver can’t receive. Their motivation is “if I look after you, you won’t leave me”. We are able to function adequately and look like a normal person, but when the pressure is on, we revert to our predominant roles.
We are going to examine the roles in the next lesson - you may recognise yourself in the roles. This is the way in which the spell has formed you.
