Is there any way to prevent unhappy or dangerous relationships between men and women?
Some experts would say, yes! Find out all you can about your sweetheart’s parents and childhood. Then consider it statistically most probable that the unsolved emotional issues, and traumatic patterns of communication, will appear in your future relationship with him or her.
“The apple does not fall far from the tree”
The tree and the apple, the plant and it’s fruit.
This is not a new perspective. Remember the old saying; “the apple does not fall far from the tree.” But what does it mean exactly? And is it true? Does it really apply to parents and their offspring, – you and me? Even to criminals and murderers?
As you probably know, the original meaning of this saying is already apparent in the metaphor, plant or “tree” and its fruit, – here “the apple”. We might also add to the picture, the embedded knowledge of Newton’s gravitational law. Figurately this means that you and your parents are very close in many ways. That you resemble each other both physically and psychologically so to say.
In earlier days this was most commonly referred to as a consequence og family genes. Today there is no evidence of inheriting psychological traits and behaviour from genes. http://www.selvuniverset.com/2016/07/12/psychological-shifts-perceiving-infants-children-genes-environement-3/
A typical family may carry many hidden burdens under it’s facade.(illustration only)
How can you avoid recurrent bad relationships?
A patient of mine seemed to follow the theory of the experts. After several years of therapy, she told me that before she would even consider incorporating a new man in her life, she would thoroughly check his parents. – What do you mean by checking the parents, I asked. She looked at me with a decisive expression, before she answered in a long tirade. – Casually ask the man about their behavior towards him. How they solved conflicts. Their blind spots. What he loved about them, and hated them for.( Check my own experience with my father and his mother: )http://www.selvuniverset.com/2016/07/06/genetics-and-environment/
(And my newest perspective on genes and psychology): http://www.selvuniverset.com/2016/07/31/i-am-like-an-unfinished-novel/
– Physical punishment
Was he ever punished physically? Did he ever see mother or father beating each other? Was there any form of psychological abuse? Not to mention sexual abuse? What about infidelity. Did they cheat on each other? Did they ever separate or divorce? What about alcohol or drugs?
– And even more important, she continued: Did he get physical closeness and love from both mother and father when he grew up. How close was he, or is he still to his mother, or father? Is this closeness by any means unconditioned, or is it an unbreakable bond that would be difficult for a partner to compete with, or stand up against? That is; will his loyalty to mother or father threaten the expected loyalty to a future sweetheart or spouse?
– Interviewing her sweetheart’s parents.
Then my patient said she would see for herself. – Yes, she assured me, – talk to his parents and check how they treated each other. Find out if they had had much arguing or fights! Did they have conversational tools to solve disagreement? Did they still show affection for each other after 20,30 or more years of marriage, or togetherness?
What about his brothers and sisters? How did he treat his sisters, or they him? How much jalousie or envy existed among them? And could he and his brothers cooperate on a friendly basis.
– To safeguard her love life in the future.
– Wow, I am impressed by your scientific approach, I said to my patient after this lecture on being prepared for her next partnership. – You sound like a psychologist, being afraid off ending like many of her patients, in relational despair after several unsuccessful love relationships. – I am, she admitted, – very much afraid! But I will safeguard my love life in the future. I nodded, very much in agreement and understanding of her new approach. – Don’t blame me for not being spontaneous any longer on these matters, she replied. – That’s your profit after many years of confronting me with my choice of wrong or bad men.
From troublesome and unsuccessful relations to very dangerous ones.
Why does he feel abandoned by his own kin? Why does he turn his back to his mother? And why does she appear distancing herself from her son? And where is daddy in the picture? (ill. only)
– Criminal minds and their relationships to parents.
There is a new series on Netflix, called “Mind Hunters”. Here two FBI officers start a project, interviewing serial killers. They meet the many serial killers that kill women in different prisons all over the US. They interview them to understand how the men’s relationship to their parents have been. Especially their relationship to their mothers.
Kathleen Turner in the Movie; “Serial Mum.”
The Mind Hunters get a professor in psychology as a leader of their small team. She works out a questionnaire to use for systematic research. But meeting the different killer’s whims and strategies, transcends the frame of the questionnaire. It demands much improvisation from the FBI officers Holden Ford and Bill Tench, to get the crucial information for the project.
Characters Bill Tench and Holden Ford in “The Mindhunters”.
– The mothers of serial killers.
In most cases shown in season 1, the serial killers have absented or alcoholic fathers. Their mothers are most likely extremely invading and aggressive. There is much psychic and physical punishment involved in the upbringing. The imprisoned men were all either overinvolved and sucked into the field of their mother’s problems and erratic whims. Or they were depreciated regularly, to an extent that their self-esteem was severely impaired. Worst case is of course when this torture end with killing their child.(see photo under)
Lacey Spears poisoning her 5 year old son Garett to death. (How was Lacey’s relationship to her mother, we may ask)
– The killers psyche.
In my opinion it seemed that they all suffered from severe minority complexes, often denied psychologically, and outwardly compensated with an unrealistically inflated self-representation. In short: Instead of killing their hated mothers, which they fear and feel totally controlled by, – they kill other women after a long session of controlling them in captivity. Their hatred is in other words displaced.
“What have you done to your mother, my bad, bad son. “(illustration only)
For some people this may sound like a cliché. For others it sounds rather theoretical, but also quite plausible. What does Psychological Universe think about this very complex issue?
In the child’s head mother and father are the prototypes of a man and woman.
There is no doubt that mother and father play the most crucial role in the child’s life, from infancy to adulthood. When the killer to be, is an infant, parents have fully access to his mind and body. They represent life and death to him, both psychologically and physically.
How mother perceives her child when he is a totally dependent and innocent love yearning baby, will be engraved in his psyche and body for the rest of his life.
This treatment will never help the child to behave in the long run. On the contrary research have proven.( Check post A “New Image of Man” and Chapter: “Violence in the upringing of children.” http://www.selvuniverset.com/2017/03/27/new-image-man/
How his father supports or abandon, shows affection or disgust for his mother, and later help raising or undermining his self-esteem, has enormous effect on the young man’s psyche and behavior. It takes a huge effort of caretaking, love giving, positive behavior reinforcement, and constant trust testing by other grown- ups, to repair this psychical damage.
Behavioral problems that may escalate to serious crime in adolescence and adulthood.
This is, not the least because the child or adolescent is so emotionally disturbed. Anger and hate, swarms just below the surface, and may explode right in front of even benevolent helpers. Because of his distorted psychological universe, the young man is expected to constantly test the limits of his new caretakers’ trustfulness or unconditioned love for him. That is, if he by any chance at all, are young and lucky enough, to get substitute caretakers or foster parents.
Does anyone dare to help him out of his difficult family frame, before its too late?
Hopefully there is still a beautiful, nice and sincere love seeking child within him, that stretches out his arms to the world hoping for a new and better start in life. This will increase his chances of finding some foster parents to love and take care of him.
Give the child yearning for protection, recognition and love, a new chance, when mother and father can’t manage. (illust. photo only)
Paradoxically this seemingly innocent appearance of his, together with a charming attitude, can be fatal to the persons he attracts later in life. If the disappointments, wounds and traumas that his biological parents have inflicted upon him are not yet healed. Then small disagreements and confrontations can ignite a fury in him, that tragically enough can end with violent black out, and even murder.
He is angry for sure, – oh yes! But the root of his anger is not you, but his mother. But is the chair meant for her head this time, or yours?
– “I would rather be killed by him than tortured for the rest of my life.”
I recently had a patient that initially said she’d preferred been murdered by her psychopath husband than being psychologically tortured by him for over thirty years. – So, you did not leave him then, I asked. – Her head sank in shame. – I had our children to take into consideration. Thru his lawyers he would no doubt get custody over the children. Besides I thought the wrecked marriage was my fault, she told me. – That I was the one to blame, because I did not always placate him or live up to his standards, she admitted. Standards that I, her therapist, found out he never lived up to himself, but always demanded of others.
– I did not even think he was evil, she continued in my first interview with her. – I pitied him, for never being satisfied with me. Then I read about sociopaths and psychopaths. And I saw a film about such persons. My husband fitted perfectly into that group. So here I am, she sighed.
– “I’m going to destroy you”, he said.
When she later, with my relentless support, tried to leave him, she was almost killed twice. I was also threatened by him. – I’m going to destroy you, he promised. My patient could not even tell her friends about this dark side of him, because they would never believe her. His roleplay as a successful businessman and family father was unprecedented.
Take care, do your research, and make your life’s choice.
I hope I haven’t scared you too much. I just want you to beware the traps embedded in entering in to a relationship with seemingly nice persons with very destructive family backgrounds. I also know that my focus on the quality of your boyfriend’s or partner’s parental relationship, also mirror back on the relation to your own mother and father.
Has this relationship to Your own parents been good enough to secure your boyfriend a good enough and giving love relation with you? Or has it been good enough to help you choose basic quality in him, from superficial and seductive charm?
If both of you have had troublesome relations to parents with much miscommunication and distrust, there is little chance of succeeding together. At least you need to take therapy sessions alone and together to make sure you don’t fall into the same pits as your parents. Or scold each other undeservedly for the lack of interest and love from your parents.
The end and the beginning.
I often take a walk by the seaside or a big lake in my neighborhood. I do it to clear my head and do some exercise in beautiful surroundings. This special afternoon I’m going to tell you about, I saw a couple walking hand in hand looking very happy together. Then it occurred to me that I somewhat knew them. Fortunately, my recollection did not fail me this time. It was her! 
A nice woman winking, like my patient did, when it seemed she’d eventually succeeded in finding the right man for her.
The decisive woman with her almost scientific “questionnaire” for parents. We greeted politely, both smiling when passing each other. Some seconds later she and I turned our heads. Then I noticed her winking at me somewhat implicitly, still smiling . Had she really succeeded with her parental interview, or was she out on thin ice again? I still cling to the first alternative!
These walks around the lake, make therapists, couples, sweethearts and lovers, even children and dogs happy.
“Just follow my advice”, she says