The Trouble with Family Vacations: On FOOA and The Roles We Play

Hi. How are you? It felt good to be back in a routine this week after a family vacation. I hope you enjoyed some fresh air, outdoor play and community gathering time over the holiday. I’ve found that time with family also brings up a lot of past patterns and triggers and that is where I want to start today! Let’s dig in.

TOOLS

I learned a new term last week called “Family Of Origin Amnesia”. It’s this idea that we totally forget our family of origin dynamics as time goes on and we’ve created space. It’s a natural tendency - one that is part survival mechanism and part optimism. Regardless of the family you grew up in, most people when visiting with family again hope for the best, think maybe this time things will be different and ultimately let down their boundaries.

Summertime calls for lots of travel, vacation, loose structures and routines. But when we let our guards down and our standards of self-care fall to the wayside, we can be left vulnerable. We forget about the way things were, why they haven’t changed and why we have grown into our own versions of ourselves. This FOOA is a helpful tool to label a super common experience.

GRATITUDE

While I was on vacation I noticed myself becoming irritable, passive aggressive, gossipy and judgmental. In noticing this behavior I then got even more irritable because I couldn’t figure out a way to stop it. While grateful for the awareness, I couldn’t identify why and from what source. I just was mad, annoyed and lashing out.

It wasn’t until I literally “reset” on a walk one day that I was able to clear my mind. I was able to identify why I was frustrated and why I was acting out. I realized I wasn’t acting with integrity. I realized I had reverted to a version of myself I had been working for over a decade to let go of and heal from.

You see, we all have parts or roles we play in our families of origin. We also have these roles within friend groups, amongst colleagues and even in a group of strangers. Our roles are meant to protect our insecurities, hide our fear and avoid our shames.

So many of us live in these roles with out even noticing they are simply an act. We think that is us when in reality it is a trauma response.

For example, as I debriefed with my therapist this week we talked about how I could prepare myself for an upcoming vacation with family, I was able to identify the role I typically play based on the insecurities triggered when I’m in my sibling unit. I know that historically I would take things personally, become sensitive, feel inferior and blame others for how I was feeling like they did something to me and on purpose.

For most of my childhood and early adult life I had been acting out of the perceived threat that I was being put-down by my siblings and thus I had to play a role to manage that threat. Before doing the work, so much of my life had been about proving myself that I am good enough, even better than those that I have felt inferior to. Whoosh. That’s heavy. So naturally when I feel triggered in this space my old habits can arise.

INNOVATION

BUT NOT THIS TIME! And really, for a while, thankfully, have I not reacted in my old roles.

But gosh, the triggers are still there. I still am managing and dissecting the pressure to prove myself to others and how it shows up in so many roles I end up playing in different interpersonal relationships. I also am able to see that in effort to prove myself to others, I let myself down and end up a self sabotage spiral. Awareness is FUN! Haha.

But I want to go back to the perceived threat language. Do you know that almost every single human is living with a story of perceived threat?

This is trauma!

Trauma is your reaction to what has happened to you. So even though my feelings of insecurity are not and were not actual threats to my survival, I perceived them as such for so long. This is also because our ego has a super hard time discerning between real and perceived threats.

Just think about that for a minute: how many people then are walking around in trauma response? In role playing? Not in awareness of their authentic selves?

99% of the world is not awake to these roles they are playing based on perception.

FEELS

So what do we do when we know we’re being triggered?

For me, it’s essential that I stay true to myself. Now, I am lucky that I know who my true self is. I know the version of me that is the version I feel most proud of so I have a centering compass to return back to when I get out of alignment.

I also know the practices I must do on a consistent basis to protect my energy and hold onto this best version of me.

I know I must have quiet time, read, reflect, journal, meditate, move, and sleep 7+ hours a night. By practicing a consistent self-preservation routine (this is NOT the same as self-care!) I can handle the perceived threats, the triggers and the parts of me that want to revert back and play.

If this work feels new, confusing or even intriguing to you, I encourage you to reach out to our team. All of our therapists can help you understand your habits, your parts and help you develop the ways to return back to the best you.

One last thing. I was talking to a mom the other day about her son, and her being upset by his anger outbursts. She was telling me how when he loses a video game he lets out a blood curdling yell. He’s 8 and it really upsets her. She said she yells at him to stop and she thinks he needs anger management tools.

I quickly reframed the situation for her. I asked her what was it about his yell that triggered her? She admitted his temper upset her because she too has a temper and it reminds her of her difficult childhood. Because of this, she was missing what happened after his yelling.

You see, he was also then creating new shame based belief systems for himself, telling himself that he was a loser, he never won at anything and he wasn’t good at anything. That was her intervention point, not the yell.

When we’re stuck in our roles and distracted by our own perceived threats, stories and fears, we miss seeing things clearly.

So take a step back. Build awareness. What have you been blind to?