Dan Said:
He asked me whether he should accept his mother's request to have no further
contact. I sat with the question overnight. My response was to ask him a
series of questions: What will you do when you read her obituary in the local
newspaper? Do you go to the funeral? After she dies, can you respectfully
contact your siblings? If yes, must you wait until she dies before doing so?
I do not have good answers for these questions. One concern is that to the
siblings, he is the excluded one. It would not surprise me if one of them is
suffering on his behalf.
Dear Dan,
I've had many adoptees through my workshops if late, things seems to go through
themes, Adoption has been a recent one. Without knowing your client and havin
not witnessed his constellation, it is a little difficult to give a full or
totally appropriate answer for him specifically. In some cases, the adopted
child needs to accept that he has been 'given up forever' othwerwise his entire
life could be held hostage to the dream that his mother may one day take him
back. On the other hand, he represents a family secret which we all know will
more than likely have an impact not only on his siblings, but possibly on their
children too as he becomes the 'secret uncle'.
Recently, a client of mine did meet her biological mother, the meeting did not
go well. The mother started calling her every day, making demands etc. One of
her demands was that my client did not contact her brother or her grandmother,
so she came to me to ask me what she should do, so we set up a constellation.
Both the brother and the grandmother were clearly moved by her presence. We set
up the constellation not informing any of the representatives what the topic
was. Her mother continued to call her, some of the calls, according to my
client, were of a threatening nature, telling her that she would cause great
damage if she saw her grandmother, brother, and now also an uncle, so my client
asked again, 'what should I do'. My simple answer was that not only did she
have the right to a grandmother, but she also her grandmother had the right to
a granddaughter. We had a long convesation about this and my client was very
clear that her motivation was not out of 'revenge' or a need to 'punish' her
mother by exposing the secret. There is another twist to this story. My client
is Afrikaans, but has been through the process of converting to Judaism.
Neither her adoptive parents nor her biological mother are Jewish, all
Afrikaans, and she had a burning desire to also find out why she had always
felt Jewish. My client also happens to be bi-polar.
Anyway, to cut a long story short, she has since met her grandmother and her
brother, and the reunion was good and now her mother has refused to have
anything to do with her, is essence, nothinng has changed, her mother did give
her up. My client said that she felt a little guilty for upsetting the apple
cart in her family, but pointed out that there was nothing for her to feel
guilty about, her brother and grandmother were happy and that she must
respectfully leave her other with the consequences of her actions.
She broached the Jewish question with her grandmother, at which point she
reports that her grandmother 'clammed up'. We did a futher constellation in
which my client 'bowed to the secret'. The only thing we do know is that her
mother once lived on a kibbutz in Israel, but long before my client was born.
In essence, I do not believe that your clients mother can speak for your
clients other siblings, that is a matter between siblings. It would though be
wise I believe to check with him what his motivation may be. Does he wish to
shame his mother through contacting his siblings, or does he really want to
have brothers and sisters?
I am also accutely aware that this kind of story is very close to my heart. My
grandmother's existence was kept a secret for many years, in fact I was told
that she died in the war and discovered just by pure chance in a conversation
in a pub with a complete stranger, that my grandmother was alive and well. I
discovered that I had three uncles and and aunt that I never knew about.
Exposing this secret cost me a lot, my mother threatened to disown me and he
whole story made me the 'black sheep' for several years. I do know first hand
that secrets are very damaging. My own constellations have shown that both
myself and both my brothers, on of whom has bi-polar , have been very entangled
with our grandmother, her other children etc. Like my client above, my eldest
brother mysteriously converted to Judaism some years ago, and I too have been
strongly attracted to Judaism. In the unravelling of the family secret, it
turns out that my grandmother was in a refugee camp during the war, and that
the father of her other children was a Jewish man.
When I met my uncles and aunt, against my mother's wishes, they were delighted
to see me, many tears flowed and my aunt in particular reported feeling
'included'. It was a long time ago, but her words were something like "finally,
someone sees as" and "I always prayed that someone from your side of the family
would come one day'. With regards to my own motivation, I simply had a burning
desire to know what this woman, my grandmother, had done in order to suffer the
fate of being declared dead. I was 18 yrs old when this all happened. I carried
a photo of my grandmother in my wallet for many years, until I finally gave it
to my mother just one year before she died suddenly in April 2004. It was
relief to give her the photo, I finally felt that I no longer 'carry the
story'. It was a very moving moment and my mother embraced me and kissed me on
that day for the first time in many years.
John
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