Genograms Maps of Why we are Who we are

Families are amazing micro universes from which we are launched into life and adulthood. The people within our families who are known to us and even those who are unknown to us are linked to us in so many ways.  The ties are strong and last generation upon generation. Behaviours are handed down to us.  The family like the country we are born in form cultures that make us who we are. I remember my mother and aunty traveling to Scotland to find our family roots.  They excitedly returned with a prayer from a church they found in Keltie.  It went something like this: "Lord I pray that my family always have good food, a hot bath and a good strong cup of tea".  We all had a good laugh.  These things are important to most families I would say.  The prayer should have also said "Lord I pray that I can control my urge to be hyper-critical, cynical and Judgemental of those I love while completely ignoring my own failings as a human being" I'm pretty sure these things are also pretty common among families around the world.  I hope not too common.  To change anything in our lives the first step is knowing what the problems are.  A genogram is one way of exploring the family patterns, understanding the culture or the system of the family. Once you know what you are dealing with then you can keep what you like and discard what you aren't too happy about.

The first thing you will need is a nice big piece of paper.  Get yourself some colourful pencils and an eraser. Start by drawing your family tree. I think we've all done one of those in primary school. Circle for Women, Square for Men, a little cross for dead people.  Now for the exciting bit. The lines of connectivity between the members of the family.  You can draw whatever lines you like to signify  those connections or you can go to last week's youtube link or this one as a guide. Now you can add things like abuse, depression, academic success, careers really anything that is part of your families big picture. Try not to worry about doing a great job like the ones on youtube just do something meaningful to you. You might like to choose to look at how many men cheated on their wives. There might be a theme that emerges as you work your way through your genogram.  There might be a few themes that pop up through the process of doing your genogram.  You could phone up your parents and ask them about things like what was Grandma's mum like.  I found that there was a real pattern of depression going back three generations by asking my Grandmother a few things about her life and her parents.

Once you discover where things like abuse or depression come from it helps with understanding and also treatment.  It's possible to change the culture of your family and to create something meaningful and positive for the following generations.  When the next generations come along they can see where all the bad stuff stopped and all the good stuff began.

When you do your genogram it might bring up a few tears, in fact you might feel a gamut of emotions.  I highly recommend that you do yours slowly with a therapist if you can or a good friend. Have a packet of tissues handy.  Use images that mean something to you, for example my mother drew black dogs to signify depression and I drew black clouds. Try to include some of the strengths for example all the women in my family had paid employment some even dressed as men to get the jobs they wanted.  My mother drew a dollar sign.  I drew a stack of books for the women who worked.

I do hope you have a lot of fun in the end doing your genograms and shed a few cleansing tears.  I hope you find themes that help you to really understand yourself and your family members.  I wish you luck.  Feel free to contact me  via facebook or by calling 0425 730 629 if you are having a hard time with it or need help. I am offering 6 months of free counselling as part of my placement so this might be a good time to get into a genogram with my help. Good luck :)

References

Chizastowski "A narrative perspective on genograms: Revisiting classical family therapy methods" in Clinical Child Psychology and Psychiatry (2011) Vol14(4) pp 635-644 Sage Publications

Galindo, Boomer & Reagan "A family genogram workbook" publisher Educational Consultants (2006)

McGoldrick "The Genogram Journey: Reconnecting with your Family" publisher Norton & Company (2011)