Posted by fallsfall on September 3, 2003, at 22:22:33
In reply to parental invalidation, posted by Reva on September 3, 2003, at 7:44:40
You bring up interesting questions.
1. What is the effect of invalidation? I think that there is a long continuum, and the effects on one person would not be the same as on another.
2. Family therapy is not likely to happen when the children are still living in the family. If the parents were enlightened enough to get family therapy, they probably wouldn't be invalidating.
3. The only way for a sufferer to recover is to confront the invalidators. I don't believe that this is true. I think that it is ONE of the ways, but not the only way. In my case, my parents loved me and tried to do their best. But due to a psychological issue for one, and workaholicism for the other they couldn't give me what I needed. I can see NO benefit to showing them how they hurt me. They aren't going to change now. It would make me feel awful to hurt them.
4. Confrontation must be done without a therapist. Why do you believe this? How would a therapist's help make the confrontation less useful? I don't understand.
5. Can Babble provide support for a confrontation like this? Babble provides support, but does not provide therapy. There are also types of issues (i.e. someone is suicidal) where local, real live support is essential. My personal opinion is that it would depend on the magnitude of the hurt, and the initial state of the relationship between the parents and child, and all of their personalities. I, personally, would feel better if Babble provided support in addition to a therapist. I would certainly defer to the Babble experts.
poster:fallsfall
thread:256589
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20030814/msgs/256778.html