FYI: Demythologizing your Parents

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Below is a passage from Bradshaw's book titled _Homecoming_

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Demythologizing your Parents

from Bradshaw's book, _Homecoming_

" The images that we have of our source figures are almost always

unrealistic and dehumanized. All young children deify their source

figures. They need to do this for their survival......If a child could

grasp that Mom is severely dysfunctional, the line of thinking would be

" Since mom cannot take care of me, I will die. " Children cannot let

themselves think that. So the child develops a deep trance composed of

positive hallucination and negative hallucination. The child sees Mom as

a good, loving mom and stops seeing Mom as she really is. " Mom is always

good " the child fantasies. " I am the one who is bad. " This image of the

mother might change as the child grows older and is able to grasp the

neglect, abuse, and abandonment. The new image might be Mom, the wicked

no-good witch. The child now hates and resents the mother. The internal

image is still polarized.

" Resentment is a chronic state in which the person refeels the negative

feelings. Resentment is also a way for the person to stay attached to

the mother. For no matter how much conscious hatred is engendered, the

wounded and mystified inner child " magically " believes that leaving the

mother would mean death. To chronically cycle waves of hatred is a

negative way to stay attached. As Fritz Perls said, so long as we hold

onto the resentment for our parents, we never " grow up " .

" Resentment is the classic example of unfinished business. Resentments

keep us as bonded to our survival figures as idealization does. Both

resentment and idealization keep us from finishing the past. Either

extreme keeps the wounded inner child frozen in mystification. You

cannot see your source figures as the real human beings they were if you

keep viewing them through the eyes of your wounded inner child. If you

hold onto the relationship you had when you were a child, you will

always remain a wounded child and they will always be your godlike or

monster parents. We must demythologize our source figures. "

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