The Conscious Parent

with him anymore. He makes us crazy.”
When Anthony and Tina told Sean that it was because of him they
were separating, they imagined this would jolt him out of his “bad”
behavior. Having found a target for their misery in their son, they
actually believed that were it not for Sean, they would be happy together.
Though they took his behavior as a personal affront, it was in truth a
painful reminder of their own failings as a couple. Sean, for his part, had
grown so accustomed to being the vessel of his parents’ anguish that he
played the part of the demon to the hilt.
It was only when Anthony and Tina were willing to see how their
negativity stemmed from their basic inability to accept their son that
they embarked on the process of transformation, a process that required
them to confront their anxiety about Sean’s differentness. As they
became aware of their unconscious patterns, they began noting how they
dumped these onto Sean, who then acted out these patterns, thereby
causing them more problems.
As Anthony and Tina realized how they had been inflicting their own
agenda on their son, they began addressing the real issue, their
relationship as a couple. After many painful months of working on the
rift in their marriage, they were able to release Sean from the burden of
carrying their pain.
While we may not endorse a particular behavior, we must always
unequivocally and wholeheartedly endorse our children’s right to be who
they are in their core state. Accepting our children enables us to raise
them without judgment, dealing with them from a neutral state.
Responding to them as they need to be responded to, instead of in a