sentimental image of the family that we present publicly is really a defense for the pain of proclaiming family for what it is: a sometimes comforting, but often times absolutely devastating task of life and memory. To deny or to disown any part of our experience is going to leave us dangerously incomplete and vulnerable to our shame.
For people struggling with shame one of the healthiest things they can do is to name their reality—to name the shame-based messages that they have internalized and that they continue to operate from today, in order for them to become separate from that shame. When I talk about shame, I’m referring to toxic shame—an internalized belief system that says there is something inherently wrong with who they are. Many people think of shame as a feeling. I actually believe the more you come to believe that who you are is not okay, the more disconnected you are from your emotional self. So I think of shame as more of a belief system.
I think that as people integrate the belief that “who I am” is not okay, they have many feelings they experience in that process: shame, humiliation, anger, fear, sadness, etc. But for the sake of semantics, I think shame can also be defined as painful feelings embedded in the common belief that there is something inherently wrong with who you are.
We use a lot of different words that reflect shame. People don’t typically use the words, “I am in shame.” They are more apt to think of themselves or to verbalize the words that indicate they feel inadequate; they feel insufficient; they feel less than; they do not feel okay about who they are. Sometimes they will use the word “ugly” when talking about themselves, an internal kind of ugliness, or they may refer to themselves as stupid, and when they do they say it with a tone of disgust. They may think of themselves as damaged and sometimes they even think of themselves as “damaged goods.” When people use words such as dirty, damaged, or damaged goods, I find that they are further along the continuum in terms of the integration of this unhealthy and toxic shame.
To live with shame is to live with a sense of defeat, a sense of alienation—a profound sense that you are absolutely unique in your unlovability. Our culture teaches us a lot about shame. It dictates to us that which is acceptable and unacceptable. We are not born afraid to speak our truth or our reality or to tell our stories. We are not born with fear that as we get older, we lose value. Those are concepts we learn. Shame is something that comes from the outside.
Sources of Shame
Shame comes from messages and expectations from both our culture and from our family. So much of the shame people internalize comes from impaired family systems. But what comes from the inside is a very human need to relate and to belong. Much of the work that we do as professionals is with families of extremes, as I call them—families of extremes in terms of their functionality. I think the greatest cause of dysfunction and impairment in families today is the result of addiction. Predominately substance addiction, followed by process addiction. Certainly we recognize the impairment and dysfunction that comes from living with serious mental health issues, and often times these co-occur with addiction. Of course we recognize the impairment that comes with family violence; however, a lot of impairment within families that can create shame is less blatant and is more subtle. But regardless of whether or not there is addiction, violence, mental health issues, or something more subtle, the consistent common denominator is going to be that of loss.
Let me share with you a few dynamics that create loss. One such dynamic is that of rigidity, in other words, to be raised in a family system where there is rigidity in the parenting of children. One of the things we know is that children need structure, but what I am talking about here is a lack of fairness regarding family rules and expectations, and in the experience of a child, a sense of imprisonment.
I’m also talking about being raised in a family where parents have extremely unrealistic expectations. They may expect a six-year-old to behave as if he or she has the resources of a twelve-year-old; a twelve-year-old to behave as if he or she has the resources of an adult. Consequently, what happens is that as these young people move into adulthood, they have difficulty perceiving options that could be available to them. They see things from an all-or-nothing perspective. They don’t recognize the choices that are available to them.
The consequence of this is that as someone once had unrealistic expectations of me, I too, now have unrealistic expectations of myself. And when I’m operating under those unrealistic expectations, no matter what I do, it is never good enough, and that just reinforces those shame-based messages I received so long ago. But I also have unrealistic expectations of you, my co-worker, and the message I give you is no matter what you do, it’s not good enough. I have unrealistic expectations of you, my partner, and the message you get from me is no matter what you do, it’s not good enough and that you are a disappointment to me. And should I have children, I am going to pass that on to them as well, so now it becomes a message transmitted from one generation to the next that whatever this child does, it is not good enough.
The loss may have to do with emotional isolation, as opposed to social isolation, though that can certainly play a role. Emotional isolation occurs in family systems where it is not okay to speak your truth. An example of this is the time I asked a young girl to draw me a picture about what life was like for her at home. She drew a picture of the family house, with the bedroom and living room disproportionately larger. In the living room, she drew her parents arguing with each other. Their mouths were opened in cartoon-like fashion, with word balloons that had swear words and big exclamation marks behind the swear words. Then there were two sets of footprints that left the living room and went to the bedroom. She had drawn herself and her sister hiding in the bedroom. As children do, the sisters looked a lot like their parents. Their eyes were bug-eyed just like she had drawn her parents with big bug eyes. The sisters’ hair was standing on end just as she had drawn her parents with spiky hair. What was different though was she had drawn herself and her sister with expressions of terror, their mouths closed, and the two siblings on opposite ends of different beds across the room from each other. At a time of fear, a time of terror, they did not have the ability to reach out to bond or to be of support to each other. That is what I mean by emotional isolation in context of the family.
I’m not talking about social isolation as much as emotional isolation because I really want to reinforce that people can live with emotional isolation in their families even when they have the ability to surround themselves with other people in their lives. Some of them, as part of their survival strategy, learn incredible social grace that they are able to apply superficially.
In the field of addictive disorders, we work with a lot of denial, but it’s not just the addicted family and the addicted person who engages in this denial process. Other types of families also engage in denial processes. To live in a family where people chronically engage in denial is another form of familial loss. There are other words that we can use that might help people become willing to own that dynamic within the family system. Is this a family that tends to minimize? Is this a family that tends to discount? Is that a family that tends to rationalize?
A young girl once said to me, “In our family, we just pretend that things are different then how they really are.” I often ask clients—whether or not it is an addictive family or a non-addictive family—“In your family, do you find that you pretend things are different than how they really are?”
The consequence to this is that as you move into adulthood you are skilled in minimizing, discounting, and rationalizing. That interferes with your ability to recognize situations for what they are and to be able to problem solve before there is a crisis. It severely impacts your perception of things within a relationship, be it a personal or professional relationship, and it gravely impacts your parenting skills.
One of my biases is my belief that all people raised in chronically troubled families experience shame. I think the depth of that shame varies, and how that shame gets acted out varies, but I don’t think you can be raised in a chronically troubled family
