Family Complexes

Family complexes, early trauma
and family violence
Lucimey Lima
Instituto Venezolano de Investigaciones Científicas, Caracas, Venezuela
Mental Health Unit, AguerreDiag, Caracas, Venezuela
Presently working at Spine and Limb Foundation,
Osboine Contemporary Aged Care, Perth, WA, Australia
Content
- Imagos
- Self Constitution
- Family Complexes
- Oedipus Complex and Family
- Mirror Stage
- Pulsions
- Trauma and Family Complexes
- Parental Figures: Mother – Father
- Insufficiency and Rigidity
- Aggressiveness and Violence
- Family 1
- Family 2
Imagos
Particular and early representations
stimuli – sensations - representations
Constitution of subject
Integrate family complexes
Distinctive parental prints
Primordial fragmentation facing integral structure
Self imago: mirror stage
Self Constitution
- Functional delicate process:
construction and own knowledge
- Defects:
repression leading to aggressiveness
or violence
- Sublimation:
energy on non sexual events
recognition by others and by ourselves, resilience
Family Complexes
- Weaning complex:
maternal imago
- Intrusion complex:
the other next coexistant
- Oedipus complex:
introduction to father methaphor
- Castration complex:
differences between sexes
Oedipus Complex
and Family
The most relevant complex
Role of parental figures: mother and father
Other members: grandparents, siblings, uncles,
aunts, carers, neighbors, teachers
Transgenerational
Subject and Objects, self steem:
imaginary and symbolic
Mirror Stage
Process: several moments elaborating self concept
Crucial in the constitution of the subject
Recognizing the Self with the support of the other
Duality love/hate
Pulsions
- Life pulsion:
unity, preservation, cohesion
- Death pulsion:
destruction, aggressiveness, fragmentation
Balance
Tension
Deep internal interaction
Systemic transactions
Traumas and
Family Complexes
Does the subject feel the company?
Who is and how introducing the subject to the Self?
Concious and Unconcious events and registrations
Is there any support?
Are they alone or overincorporated?
Are they disturbed, recriminated or feeling abandoned?
Is there any major trauma?
The “Mother”?
Nourish
Absence
Solitude
Presence
Over-presence
Introducer
The “Father”?
Absence
Neglect
Discipline
Protection
Over-protection
Demands
Rigidity and Insuffiency
Rigidity and Insuffiency
“Mother” and the self image
“Father” and the law
BOTH
Excess of presence:
punishment
Deficiency of presence:
impunity
Structure
Individuation
Relations
Adaptations
Frustrations
Balance love/hate
“The Ideal Family”
Aggressiveness
Violence
Aggressiveness:
propensity through attack, provocation,
insult dealing with own vulnerabitily
Violence:
movement to action, unexpected, impulssive,
rude, damaging
Aggressiveness
Implicit
Protection
Organization and chaos
Symmetric
No power to act
Frustration or violence
Violence
Active
Subtle
Destructive
Individual, trans-generational, social
Asymmetric
Action
Bibliography
- Berenguer, E. Identidad, identificación y lazo social. La perspectiva de Freud. Instituto
de Altos Estudios Universitarios, 2008.
- Berenguer, E. Identidad, identificación y lazo social. La enseñanza de Lacan. Instituto
de Altos Estudios Universitarios, 2008.
- Bertrán, S. De la imago materna a la función paterna. www.scb-icf.net , 2008.
- Corsi, J. Violencia familiar. Buenos Aires, Paidós, 2008.
-Freud, S. La disolución del complejo de Edipo, Biblioteca Nueva, 2003.
-Hoffman, L. Foundations of Family Therapy, Basic Books, New York, 1981.
- Lacan, J. La familia. Biblioteca de Psicoanálisis, Editorial Argonauta, 1978.
- Lima, L. Los Complejos Familiares y la Violencia en la Familia, Editorial Académica
Española, 2012.
- Linares, J.L. Del abuso y otros desmanes: El maltrato familiar, entre la terapia y el
control. 1ra. Edición, Editorial Paidós, 2002.
- Perrone, R., Nannini, M. Violencia y abusos sexuales en la familia. 2da. Edición 2007,
Editorial Paidós.
- Roudinesco, E. La familia en desorden. Fondo de cultura económica, Argentina, 2007.
- Ubieto, J.R. Familias del siglo XXI: nuevas subjetividades, nuevos vínculos. La revista
del COPC, 201, 2007.
- Violencia familiar. Diccionario de Psicoanálisis. www.tuanalista.com
- Weiss, J.W., Gritta, Benda, A., Molina, S., Adán, M., Ramírez, G., Urbina, J.
Violencia y maltrato. Ricardo Vergara Editores, Buenos Aires, 2007.
Family One
Family One
Felicia is a lady living in her house of marriage; she was
divorced after 20 years. It was a very difficult relationship,
with infidelities, verbal abuse, behavioural violations, and
her passiveness. She belongs to a very “Traditional
Family”, a “Controlling Father” and a “Submitted Mother”.
The Father was not supporting her, and the Mother was
always disqualifying her. Over qualifications were given to
her two Brothers. However, she went to University and she
is a Dentist. She learned to be the last one. Sons are
overtaking her for “help”. She assisted for consultations
because her Daughter, who has mental retardation, and
then the family was involved, the two Brothers, three
children and her. Only her Daughter and she continue with
therapy.
1935
1923
79
91
1926 - 2004
78
Mother
Father
1948
66
1950
64
B2
1947
1972
67
42
B1
1963
1940
51
74
1942
1963
72
51
Felicia
2000
1976
14
1975
38
1974
39
40
2010
2014
4
0
1972
1972
1975
42
42
39
2004 2004
10
10
Family One
Father: control
Mother: manipulation
Brother 1: indifference
Brother 2: distance
Husband: emotional abuse
Temporal partner: broken
Sons: emotional abuse
Daughter: fusion
Family One
Family: rigidity
Main Objectives: to recognize family history, to
acknowledge the benefits, to critic treatments and
reactions, to change permissive behaviour, to
introduce flexibility.
Goal: changing YES-NO when it is logical and
necessary.
Results: ability to avoid duties not to be in charge
of, Brothers recognized how much they “ignore”
Sister, Sons learned to reduce demanding
behaviours, boundaries: limits instead of frontiers
were established.
Family Two
Family Two
Kim is a young adult with lots of expectations and motivations,
but little satisfaction and no drive. She changes from one to
another activity, always enthusiastic for the very beginning, but
never successful. She comes from a mixed family, European and
Latin-American, divorced parents. She is taking cough
medication frequently, which contains codeine. The Father lives
in another town and keeps telephone contact. The Mother is
working and never disposed to attend her. Her Sister left home
as an independent worker, everyone is proud of her as designer.
Her Brother, going to University, is introverted; he has acne and
paranoid traits. The Mother has a boyfriend who does not come
home. Kim smokes, brings friends to stay over without
permission, drinks, and fights with the Mother. The words they
use are very violent, and she always violates the “laws”, without
proper restriction. Mother, Brother and she assisted for therapy,
and she continued alone.
D. 1990
D. 1970
D. 1995
D. 2011
Family Two
1945
1949
1948
69
65
66
Father
Mother
1975
39
S
1978
36
B
1979
35
Kim
Father: distrust
Mother: violence
Father-Mother: distance/hostility
Sister: breakdown
Brother: conflict
Mother-Sister: admiration
Mother-Brother: harmony
Brother-Sister: harmony
Family Two
Family: insufficiency
Main Objectives: to establish parameters of
coexistence, to respect the other space, to
communicate properly, to recognize differences
in a positive manner.
Goal: encouraging individuation.
Results: violent communication was reduced,
still some violations of agreed behaviours,
Brother felt better, Mother was reducing her
expression
of
differences
between
her
“children”, Kim continues with the syrup.