This is a long post, but I thought you might all find it interesting.
One of Knowing Nantes's members, a body-centred psychologist, Malachy Coleman, is holding a KN event next Friday about The Transgenerational Effect. I met him for a coffee recently and he told me this really interesting story about what effect our ancestors can have on our current lives, both physically and mentally.
He told me the story of a lady he had been treating for depression. She always wore black and always looked sombre. She went to him saying that when she was depressed she felt like she was looking into a long dark pit. After a few sessions, he asked her to go home and see if there was anything at home that was from her ancestry. She said that she had nothing, but when she returned the following week, she brought with her a large shell from the First World War, which had been sitting on her mantlepiece for many year, without her even thinking about it.
She told the story of the shell, it had belonged to her great Grandfather, and he had died in the First World War and this had been passed onto her by her grandmother - the shell had his initials on it, which coincidentally, were the same as hers - she had not even realised this.
He asked her to go away that week and find out more about her Great Grandfather's death. When she returned the following week, she looked and said she feeled totally different - like a large weight had been lifted from her body. She had rung and spoken to her grandmother and had found out that her Great Grandfather had died in a trench in a very bloody battle. The shell had been in found with his initials on it, close-by and was sent back with the few other belongings he had.
Suddenly things fell into place for her, the shell on her mantlepiece had become a sub-concsious reminder to her of the way her grandfather had died, and had manifested itself in her in this depression and her feeling like she was going to fall into what she realised was her G Grandfather's dying place, the trench!
Following this, a few weeks later he saw her again. She was no longer wearing black, she had no reason to mourn the death of her ancestor, and she was feeling and looking great.
The spooky thing was that I told Malachy that I wore a lot of black, he told me that SOMETIMES this can mean that you can be mourning for someone who has died. He did a little chart which I cannot describe now, but asked me if anyone had died 3 months before I was born. I told him that my grandfather had died but I wasn't sure if it was 3 months before, and that my mother had hoped that he would live to see me but unfortunately he did not. So, he said, your mother was mourning for her father whilst she was pregnant with you, which could result in you also feeling that mourning very strongly being in her tummy at the time...Interesting stuff heh!
Have any of you experienced anything like this? Can you think of anything now that could be a part of this transgenerational effect? Bruv, I for one, find it spooky that Nanny Woolway had polio in both her legs and a leg iron on one leg - I am not sure which, and we both have troubles with our right feet, and I wore large metal pins sticking out of my leg for a year when I had my accident!
The reason that I have put an image here of aborigines is that there apparently is a very interesting book called Trauma Trails about the Transgenerational Effect on Aborigines, and the way in which they have been treated throughout history. There is also a TE study being carried out on the wives of the victims of the world trade centre, who have since had children.
I have also just read a book called 'The Secret River' which I really enjoyed. It is also the story of English convicts in the 1800's who were transported to Australia, were eventually pardoned, and then stole the native land off the aborigine's or 'black savages' as they called them to set up their homes and new lives. Its a really interesting read and has been well researched by the author. I would really recommend it.
6 comments:
Wow!!!!! Swan, this is a great story! And makes so much sense to me. My grandmother had a birthmark on her calf and my sister Les was born with one on her calf. Same shape, same place. Leslie was the first born out of my siblings. But my grandmother was alive when Les was born. I suppose it may not matter what phase the spirit is in when we get passed down certain traits, etc....
What an incredible story. Thank you for sharing. I'm going to have to give some thought about what may have been passed down to me. I'd like to think I hold the "brains" in the family! ;-)
Hugs, Lynn xo
very interesting swann. when i first went into therapy many years ago , my therapist work alot with the collective unconcious , that Jung describes. It was to do with my jewish imprint on my fathers side.
It has resonance with what you're talking about in this blog. I felt always that there was something of a scapegoat in me , which biblically , and historically is true for the Jews...
and of course I had to work on that aspect ...truely interesting stuff.
Hi Swann,
What an interesting subject. I am sure there is much truth in this.
There are two strands, one is the inherited traits which may give us physical characteristics in common, such as our families weakness in the foot, which are passed down the generations with our DNA. The other side, the mental transference of beliefs and emotional responses, raises the question, is there another mechanism for passing on mental traits?
We can see the obvious ones of acting like our parents but what about things like beliefs, eg Fuchsy's inherited jewish cultural attitudes. Or is it that we subconsciously absorb them from our family when very young.
To give an example of what I dont understand about this; I have a springer spaniel, a gun dog, called Sophie. She was taken from her litter at a very early age. In fact she was so small that she sat in the palm of my hand. Yet when I first said 'Birdie' to her she instinctively looked up to the sky and got very excited running around and barking. Yet to my knowledge no-one ever told her what the word 'birdie' represented so how did she know this. Also when she was young she came across a dead fish on the beach and instinctively lay on her back and wriggled on the fish to get the scent on her. She has done this ever since with every dead animal she comes across. I never taught her this and she was too tiny to have learnt it in the litter. So she has two behaviours which do not appear to be learnt or to relate to her survival instincts.
In hypnotherapy class we are taught how people pick up their instinctive responses at a very early age. For example, the mum and baby sitting on a rug having a picnic; down plops a spider and the mother screams in fear; from this the baby has now learnt its lifelong response to spiders! And if it had happened when the baby was already agitated about something else, the effect may have been enough to produce a phobia about spiders.
As babies spend most of their nurturing time with their mother, it is likely that most the mother's responses to life will be embedded in the baby's psyche without it realising it, ie subconsciously. So in this way the emotional responses of our mothers are handed down through the generations. It would be interesting to see which ones you are handing down. When I explained this to one of my patients who suffered high anxiety, she said in wonder, 'So that is why I do that'. And then the penny dropped and she said 'Oh my God Ive been teaching my kids to act that way too!'.
interesting stuff, thanks Swan.
Love Bruv x
Bruv, yes its really interesting to think about what phobias we give our kids. I dread to think about what I have passed down to mine!
I have a very good example of these phobias being passed down, I have a friend who is absolutely terrified of birds. He cannot bear to walk anwhere near a pigeon or sparrow - terrible when living in London! And when I was once with him on holiday in Ireland, we were walking past some birds who were on the other side of the road, when they all flew up in the air at the same time. He started going mad, running away down a road off the high street going absolutely mad.
When he had calmed down, over lunch, I asked him where this came from and he said that his Mother was also scared of birds.
I think you are right about the mother having the most effect in this 'effect' as the baby, son and man been a part of her body, but I feel that both parents are equally able to pass on their phobia's and fears, ans also many positive things too.
I have mentioned before that when I was little I was not allowed to play with anything dangerous, and this made me fearful of everything, so much so, tht when I grew up I wanted to fight this and take risks, push myself past my boundaries.
I have tried not to let this fear be instilled into my children, they have bikes, rollers, skateboards and I try hard, although it does not come easy sometimes, to allow them much more freedom than I was given.
How about all of you? Do you have any stories to share like this about phobias, fears etc?
Much love Swanx
By the way Lynn, I also have a birth-mark on my leg, and do does my Mum, not in exactly the same spot but the same type of birthmark, faint and mottled, rather like a little outline of a country.
xx
Sorry for the typos in my comments they are terrible today, its called blogging on the hoof!
Love Sawn, (just a joke!)
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