Know How Your Family Communicates Anger, Pain, Sadness, and other Negative Emotions

It is very easy to see how other families operate when a relative is the favorite, troubled, successful, jealous, bitter, etc.  But what about your own family?  How does your family communicate with you and others when one is labeled, placed in a category, banished, and so on?

I noticed that in my family we have our share of individuals who will make certain people favorites as long as they are willing to be the accomplice in the following:  getting others to respond to whatever they need/want, participate in a scheme or other shady behavior, act in a drama, add to gossip--you name it!  But when one is not a character in the mayhem, one doesn't have a clue about the issues until they show up in one's home. 

In every family, favorite status has to be earned and usually one's moral judgment is put to the test.  If your standards aren't that high, or you are one that goes along just to get along, then you are a perfect candidate.  But those individuals who don't like drama, not interested in getting any future benefit/service from anyone, and just like keeping to themselves, they are the least favorite.  They are the ones who while they are away, the cat will play with minds, reputations, and other things just because one is an unwilling participant in another's bag of tricks.  But can you see when this is happening?  Do you recognize when your family is playing games with you?

When family communicate with one another usually by the typical means of communication like the telephone, there is often a certain sound to one's voice that says one is upset, happy, in pain, and so forth.  There are those relatives who just might act (I mention this in another blog entry) to get their needs met.  Short conversations, meaningless phrases, and sometimes silence on the phone are clear indicators you aren't liked with some relatives I know.  But if you aren't in touch with what a relative is communicating whether openly or hidden, you might be negatively talked about by those busybody, petty types who have nothing more to do with their time but meddle in other people's affairs.  "She just doesn't get it...why does she bother talking to me?  When I last talked to her she didn't pick up on what I wanted, so I'm done with her..."  Meanwhile, the unsuspecting don't know about the war that is brewing, because most likely that person has a life and it doesn't respond to one's negative emotions.

Too often the unsupecting relatives (who aren't in the know about too much of anything) will fall for just about everything, believe half-truths, pick sides, place blame, and more, because they just don't get what is really going on with the family, nor do they care--unless they stand to lose out on a benefit.  So the unsuspecting fail to recognize the verbal and non-verbal language of feuding relatives.  They can't see, what some of you readers can see.  The harmless rather walk or run away, then stay and play, so to speak with the harmful--or dare I say it, the toxic.

If you are in touch with your family, more-so than others, then you have front row seats into their worlds even when they fight to make you see only what they want you to see.  You are a witness to the truth.  For some readers, you know when relatives are angry, sad, happy, troubled, and so forth.  But do you know when they are acting this way with you or certain other people?  Some people can only see what they want to see when they want to see it and when others pick up a mirror and show them, they say, "I didn't know...I don't want to see that...Why do you want me to know that?"  Maybe today mom understands grandma's plight, but next week not so much.  Maybe favorite relatives love you today, but then you hear that tomorrow they don't.  Did you see the signs?

Knowing how your family communicates with one another is important if you are trying to build a relationship with those who may not like you so much.  But for those you are already getting along with, you may want to use what you know to help others build or restore a bond with those family members who mean them well.

Nicholl McGuire