Excerpts and affirmations built from: Breaking Free of the Co-dependency Trap, Barry K. and Janae B. Weinhold, PhD’s, New World Library, Novato, CA, 2008.
Counter-dependency (six to Thirty-six months)
Separation and Individuation
Child:
Completes the psychological separation process with parents.
Learns to safely explore his or her environment.
Learns to trust and regulate his or her own thoughts, feelings, and behaviors in socially appropriate ways.
Internalizes appropriate physical and social limits
Develops healthy narcissism
Resolves internal conflicts between oneness and separation
Bonds with self
Continues to build secure internal working model
Completes his or her individuation or psychological birth process
Parents:
Offer timely help in healing any narcissistic wounds or developmental traumas that interfere with resonance
Give the child permission and support to safely explore his or her environment; they give the child twice as many yeses as nos during this time
Rearrange environment to provide safety
Understand and respect the child’s need to develop internal regulation of emotions, especially shame
Help the child identify self-needs, as opposed to the needs of others
Model how to directly ask to have one’s needs met
Use nonshaming responses in limit-setting and discipline
Give positive support for the child’s efforts to develop an autonomous Self
Adult Caregivers:
Help the child quickly reestablish the resonant connection with the mother when it’s disrupted
Offer empathy and compassion as the child learns to regulate his or her conflicting emotions, thoughts, and behaviors
Offer authentic mirroring and validation of the child’s essence
Offer permission for the child to be a separate individual and to trust his or her internal impulses
Independence (3 to 6 Yrs)
Mastery of Self and Environment
I did not:
- master self-care.
- master the process of becoming a functionally autonomous individual separate from my parents.
- develop and trust my own core values and beliefs.
- learn effective social engagement skills.
- develop a secure internal working model of myself/other.
- bond securely with my peers.
My parents did not:
- support development of effective internal limits and consequences.
- help me learn appropriate deferred gratification of wants and needs.
- help me learn effective emotional self-regulation and control.
- help me learn to trust my inner sense of wisdom and guidance.
- provide me with experiences for the safe exploration of nature.
- provide for reciprocal social interactions with other children.
- help me develop cause/effect problem-solving skills.
Immediate and extended family members were not available to offer nurturing, supportive, and consistent contact.
Other adults were not available to model win-win solutions to conflicts.
Independence (Three to Six Years)
Mastery of Self and Environment
Child:
Masters self-care
Masters the process of becoming a functionally autonomous individual separate from parents
Masters object constancy
Develops and trusts his or her own core values and beliefs
Has secure bonding experiences with nature
Learns effective social engagement skills
Develops secure internal working model of self/other
Bonds securely with peers
Parents:
Rearrange home environment to support the child’s mastery of self-care (eating, dressing, and toilet training)
Support the child’s development of effective internal limits and consequences
Help the child learn appropriate deferred gratification of his or her wants and needs
Help the child learn effective emotional self-regulation and control
Help the child learn to trust his or her inner sense of wisdom and guidance
Provide the child with experiences for the safe exploration of nature
Help the child develop sensory relationships with nature
Provide for reciprocal social interactions with other children
Teach cross-relational thinking, including empathy and respect for others
Help the child develop cause/effect problem-solving skills
Immediate and extended family members:
Offer nurturing, supportive, and consistent contact
Adults:
Model win-win solutions to conflicts
Inter-dependence (Six to Twenty-nine Years)
Cooperation and Negotiation Skills
Child:
Learns to cooperate with others
Learns to negotiate with others to get his or her needs met
Learns to accept responsibility for his or her personal behaviors and life experiences
Experiences secure bonding with peers and other adults
Develops a social conscience
Bonds securely with his or her culture
Bonds securely with the planet
Lives his or her life as an authentic adult
Bonds securely with own children
Understands the influence of incomplete developmental processes on his or her life and how to successfully heal developmental traumas
Suggested Experiences for Completing the Essential Developmental Processes of Individual Evolution
Parents:
Model effective cooperative social engagement skills in couple, family, and peer relationships
Child:
Seeks to learn negotiation skills to get his or her needs met in healthy ways
Seeks solutions to his or her conflicts that honor the needs of all parties involved.
Seeks adult validation of the importance of keeping his or her relationship agreements.
Seeks an adult model that can teach him or her empathy and compassion for others
Seeks adults who can teach him or her intuitive language and thinking skills
Seeks nurturing, supportive, and consistent contact from immediate and extended family members
Seeks support from parents and other adults on how to build sustainable relationships with other adults and how to find a primary love partner
Seeks adult input on the values of his or her cultural group and how to overcome any limits imposed by family and culture
Seeks personal meaning and a personal mission within the context of the “global family”
Seeks information and skills for healing his or her developmental traumas
Seeks assistance in developing systemic and trans-systemic thinking
Adults:
Encourage the development of an internalized “safety parent” allowing safe risk-taking behaviors
Had they been properly equipped, my parents would have modeled effective cooperative social engagement skills in couple, family, and peer relationships.
Had I been properly equipped, I would have sought to learn negotiation skills to ensure that my needs were met in healthy ways.
Had I been properly equipped, I would have sought solutions to my conflicts that honored…
Had I been properly equipped, I would have sought adults who could teach me intuitive language and thinking skills.
Had I been properly equipped, I would have sought nurturing, supportive, and consistent contact from immediate and extended family members.
Had I been properly equipped, I would have sought support from parents and other adults on how to build sustainable relationships with other adults and how to find a primary love partner.
Had I been properly equipped, I would have sought adult input on the values of my cultural group and how to overcome any limits imposed by family and culture.
Had I been properly equipped, I would have sought personal meaning and a personal mission within the context of the “global family.”
Had I been properly equipped, I would have sought information and skills for healing my developmental traumas.
Had I been properly equipped, I would have sought assistance in developing systemic and trans-systemic thinking.
Had they been properly equipped, the adults around me would have encouraged the development of an internalized “safety parent” allowing safe risk-taking behaviors
If Mom had said these things, my life would have been easier:
I cherish you. I adore you. I am here for you.
Take your time. Take the time you need.
Your needs are okay with me.
I accept you just the way you are.
I want to support you while you explore who you are.
I celebrate you.
I am strong enough to support you.
Let’s find out who you are.
I can take care of myself.
What she said and how it was harmful:
Some people are givers and some are takers (shame around receiving from others)
Praise for what I could do to serve others selflessly (Mom’s “right hand.”)
Don’t ask
Don’t make waves.
Positive and negative ways I’m like my mother:
Controlling
Interested in food/nutrition
Fiercely Independent
Strong
Intuitive
Deeply spiritual
Low self esteem
Not good enough
Self denial
Positive and negative ways I’m not like my mother:
Liberal/conservative
Adhering to tradition, old ways
Expansive, open
Choosing love instead of fear