The Bermuda Triangle and the Threatened Loss of Selfhood
Unhealthy Accommodation
A significant number of people I work with are, what I refer to as, Unhealthy Accommodators. Unhealthy Accommodation is when we automatically and reflexively suppress or repress our own needs and wants in favor of the needs or wants of others. There is no experience of choice.
In the case of Unhealthy Accommodation, the needs, wants, and requests of others become our requirement to fulfill. As example, a group of friends want to go out for pizza. You had pizza for dinner the evening before. An unhealthy accommodator will simply agree to join and not “rock the boat” as opposed to saying, “I’m not in the mood for pizza I just had it for dinner last night, how about Chinese?”
Healthy Accommodation
Healthy Accommodators prioritize the needs or wants of others by choice. As example, we love to play tennis and have a regularly scheduled Saturday game. Just before leaving for the game, however, we get a call from a distraught friend who has had an abrupt breakup of a primary relationship and needs to talk. Healthy Accommodation means we have the choice to talk to that friend at that moment or after our tennis game. The healthy accommodator knows how, in each moment and each situation, to prioritize his or her primary needs and when to defer to the needs or wishes of others.
Origins of Unhealthy Accommodation
The roots and development of Unhealthy Accommodation begin early in life (Berhard Brandchaft, M.D., Toward an Emancipatory Psychoanalysis). When we are young and helpless, it is essential to maintain a survival attachment to our parents or caregivers (referred to as parents going forward) for our physical, emotional, and psychological survival. Equally important, is the developmental task of establishing separateness, building autonomy, and creating selfhood. Integral to this task is to be able to delineate a healthy boundary, particularly saying “No.” Skilled parents appreciate the vital importance of both of these developmental necessities and how to navigate to nurture both of them.
Unfortunately, there are no perfect parents; we are all flawed to varying degrees. There is also no required education or handbook for being a healthy parent. Some individuals are lucky to have parents who either came from a lineage of good mental health and emotional intelligence, or had parents who worked through their own developmental problems in psychotherapy to become healthier parents.
When there is an absence of psychological health, emotional intelligence, and knowledge on the part of parents, there will be larger and more frequent misattunements/malattunements and failures to meet the needs of the child. In addition to unmet needs there can also be bonified injury and trauma (gross neglect, manipulation, and verbal, physical or sexual abuse).
When our emotional and psychological needs are not being met, and if we are additionally being injured, as children we learn very quickly what is safe and what is not safe and we will accommodate our parents in any way necessary to maintain the survival attachment.
When this happens, however, the second developmental task of creating autonomy and self-hood becomes sacrificed.
It is important to note that the vast majority of parents are well motivated and love their children. Most derailments stem from a lack of psychological understanding of child development and/or psychological problems on the part of parents.
Family Dynamics that can Create Unhealthy Accommodation
An overarching dynamic responsible for Unhealthy Accommodation is conditional love from parents. This means that in order for the child to feel approved of or loved, conditions have to be met. This is opposed to unconditional love where we feel loved and cherished simply for who we are.
Conditional love requirements are expressed both explicitly or implicitly. Some examples include: 1) that we not express our feelings 2) that we not express our needs, 3) to be a good child, 4) to be an over achiever, 5) to be an entertainer, 6) to be a model for or parent to younger siblings, 7) to provide emotional support or soothing to a parent, and 8) to be “the good spouse” in an unhealthy marriage.
Therefore, the more that approval and love is based on conditions, and the higher the level of parental malattunment and injury sustained by the child, the greater the level of Unhealthy Accommodation becomes necessary.
A good analogy would be an indoor plant. If a plant receives good sunlight and room to grow, it will thrive. If the plant, however, does not receive good sunlight and moreover is carelessly placed behind a chair or desk, to survive, it will have to morph its vines in any way possible to reach sunlight. Like the vines of the plant under these conditions, we must go through the same emotional and psychological contortions to survive.
The modeling effect can also be a source of unhealthy accommodation. We learn how to be in the world through identifying with and observing our parents as models. When this happens we are not only displaying one or both of our parent’s behavior but we are also internalizing the feelings of our parents that drive Unhealthy Accommodation.
It should be noted that adverse circumstances can necessitate Unhealthy Accommodation including financial struggles and poverty, illness or death of a parent, or an environmental calamity (i.e. hurricane, flood). As stressful or traumatic as the above may be, I consider these adverse circumstances to be less harmful to a child from a psychological and emotional standpoint.
In extreme cases, often with highly strict or abusive parents, some children will rebel, become entrenched in combativeness and in some cases physically spin out of the family system (i.e., runaways). Some of these children can be at risk for developing an Antisocial Personality Disorder and are unable to form a healthy attachment.
The Two Drivers of Unhealthy Accommodation
Unhealthy Accommodation stems from two drivers: Fear and Unhealthy Guilt.
The Fear that drives Unhealthy Accommodation is of a dreaded relational consequence on the part of one or both parents including: displeasure, anger, a distraught or crying parent, the withdrawal of love, neglect, and finally abuse.
The other driver of Unhealthy Accommodation is Unhealthy Guilt. Healthy Guilt is an important social emotion that is necessary for relationships and society to function. As example, if we hit a parked car causing damage and leave without posting a note, we hopefully will feel guilt immediately or at some point after. Healthy guilt occurs when we violate social norms, morals, and a code of ethics and is necessary for a society to function, as well as the development of our personal integrity.
Unfortunately, Healthy Guilt feels exactly the same as Unhealthy Guilt and the confusion between the two is where the problem arises.
Unhealthy guilt is not based on a violation of morals or ethics but rather in response to the emotional reactions, initially on the part of parents, and expanding to others. Children idealize their parents. Therefore, they are the arbitrators of truth about who we are. If a parent is disapproving, becomes angry, cries, neglects or abuses us, we invariably conclude that it is our fault (Unhealthy Guilt), that we are to blame for their emotional reaction. Toxic beliefs about ourselves will follow, i.e., I am bad, I am not lovable, I am not competent, I am destructive. Moreover, we have to unconsciously adopt this truth in order to maintain the vital tie to the parent or parents.
This, of course, does not mean that parents are always happy and approving of a child’s behavior. The parent, however, must separate a child’s behavior from unconditional love. As example, saying, “I am not happy with your behavior,” as opposed to, “I am angry at you,” or, “I am disappointed in you.” Conversely, saying “Good job!” as opposed to “Good Boy!” If a parent expresses the latter, then when that parent is upset, the child will naturally conclude that they are a “Bad Boy.”
As Unhealthy Accommodators, because our needs are not met and our feelings are not recognized, we learn very early that we don’t have the right to have them met. This can even extend to a global feeling of guilt for our very existence that I refer to as “existential guilt.”
If we do not have the right to meet our own needs, therefore, it is the needs of others that are supposed to be met, and for our survival, have to be met.
I utilize the model of a triangle for the above-described constellation. Unhealthy Accommodation is on the apex, and resting on the two corners are the drivers of Fear and Unhealthy Guilt.
I have coined this configuration “The Bermuda Triangle,” because in the real Bermuda Triangle many ships and planes have disappeared. As in the real Bermuda Triangle, if our needs and wants are comprehensively subjugated and repressed, as time goes on, our very selfhood is at risk of disappearing as well.
In my work with individuals, I illuminate the threatening process of losing one’s identity and selfhood and help my patients to extricate themselves from the fear and unhealthy guilt that binds them, thus removing the mystery that enshrouds “The Bermuda Triangle.”
Copyright © 2024 Bruce A. Howard, Ph.D. All rights reserved.