Am I Activating Old Stuff
Both of my parents are emotionally cut off from themselves. When I went off to college I found the emotional connection to myself. Over time I slowly learned to trust myself in most of my relationships until now. I am in a long term relationship with a guy who says all the right things and […]
Miss Having A Partner
I am a stay at home mom with 2 small children and I am completely miserable in my marriage. I feel like a single parent because my husband wants nothing to do with me and the children. He financially provides for our family yet is not the least bit interested in interacting with us. He […]
My Parents Marital Issues
After I graduated from college last year I landed the most incredible job. My parents set me up in a very chic two bedroom apartment that they bought as an investment in Manhattan. At their insistence I pay almost nothing in rent and they come into the city now and then and spend the weekend […]
He Found Our Stash
My husband and I smoke marijuana recreationally. Yesterday our 14 year old son found our stash and confronted us asking if it was all right for him to smoke marijuana? We responded by saying that when he becomes an adult he can make that choice for himself. Should we have responded differently to our sons […]
Father’s Day
It is almost Father’s Day, that one day that I think to myself ‘so what! Where was that asshole when I was growing up?’ Because I receive a card and phone call from him on every appropriate holiday I find the polite part of myself wanting to return the favor. In the store I read […]
I Never Feel Like I Am Enough
I really struggle with feeling like I am enough. Everything that I have accomplished I thought I was doing for myself but I always seem to be looking for recognition from others, especially my father. He expects everything from me that I expect from myself but I just want to feel like he is proud […]
Should I Stay Or Should I Go
I really do not want to be married any longer but I am afraid of splitting up our family. My own mother left my father when my sisters and I were little and I always resented her for that. I thought that my parents should have worked things out between themselves and kept us all […]
Progressive Parenting
We just had our first child. I have been thinking about how I was raised with so much disapproval by both of my parents as their way of controlling me. I would like my husband and I to do things completely different. Ideally I would like to never use the word NO with our son. […]
Can I Break This Chain
My great grandfather beat my grandfather, my grandfather beat my father and my father beat me. I guess you could say it has been the family chain of pain. I swore to myself that I would never have children for fear of repeating this god awful family tradition. I am engaged and my fiance is […]
My Alcoholic Parents
I started telling stories about my family in the second grade. It was then that I began to understand that my parents were different from the other kids parents. Both of my parents are alcoholics. I have spent my childhood, adolescents as well as a good portion of my adulthood trying to cover up this […]
What Is Going To Happen To Our Family
My parents are getting a divorce and I feel like my life is over. They have never fought in front of my sister and I and even though my dad travels a lot for work we never for one minute thought that they were having problems. My mom will not discuss the details about what […]
Have Never Prayed Harder For Anything
The happiest memories of my childhood are from the times spent with my mother. I was an extension of her and she loved and adored me with all of her heart. I wanted to be a mother myself one day too share this sweet relationship with my own child. I am 34 years old and […]
Worried For Our Mom
My parents got divorced when I was 13 and my brother was 14 and we have always lived with our mom and saw our dad some weekends when he wasn’t busy with his girlfriends. We are now 17 and 18 and our mom has not been out on one single date, that we know about. […]
What Was I Thinking?
My 16 year old daughter has been interested in boys since the young age of 13. Since this time she has either been crushing on boys or dating boys. She has repeatedly told me not to worry because she knows what she is doing. I have believed this to be true until last week. I […]
Wanting Verification
My sister is one of those people who looks on the bright side of every situation. I really appreciated that about her when we were growing up. The problem is that now I cannot get her to admit to having had the same horribly dysfunctional childhood that I know for a fact that we both […]
Taking A Stance
Is there a difference between taking a stance and being clear? Great question! When we take a stance we are in essence proclaiming something. There tends to be a lot of resistance in that action. It is like we are having to completely reject one thing in order to accept another. Clarity feels different. When […]
Money Worries
I worry about money all the time. When I have money I worry, when I have less money I worry. If it is not about the money, than what is it really about? You have already figured out the most important part of your worries and that is, it is in fact NOT about the […]
Getting Our Needs Met
If we only have unconditional relationships with people how on earth do we ever get our needs met? The way that you have asked this question leads me to belive that you believe that our needs are meant to be met by others. I have a different senseability about this. Our choice to unconditionally love, […]
Career Change
I have been living on my own since leaving my dysfunctional alcoholic mother and her big time loser live in boyfriend. As a straight A student in high school I used to dream about going to college and actually making something of myself. I have been supporting myself by waitressing at a diner in the […]
My Double Life
I have always felt as if I am living a double life. Where I came from is not anywhere that anyone that I know could ever imagine or understand. I have successfully escaped the nightmare that I call ‘my childhood’, so I thought. The identity that I have created for myself is reflected in my […]
The Mantra In Our House
When I was growing up the mantra in our house was “be happy with what you have”. I have always been happy and always wanted more of everything for myself and my family. My parents saw me as an ungrateful only child and discouraged my desire to want more. As an adult I have become successful […]
Vibrations That Are Not Our Own
What do you do when you know that you have picked up vibrations that are not your own? I love your question. We all have actually unconsciously picked up all kinds of vibrations from our family of origin that are not our own and have little to do with us. It is a wonderful opportunity […]
My Unfaithful Husband
After almost 40 years of marriage I just discovered that my husband has been unfaithful. He admitted to me that he has been so at different times during our marriage but currently this is not one of them. This discovery came to my attention a few days before one of our grown children was to […]
Their Choices Have Consequences
How do we as parents make our children understand that the choices they make today have consequences that will effect their entire lives? I do not believe that we can make our children do anything. What I do believe is that we can assist our children in tuning into themselves and trusting themselves to make […]
