A herd of cows is contentedly grazing in a pasture. One of them gets too close to the electric fence, gets a shock, snorts and jumps away in panic. Immediately the whole herd starts to panic. Maybe they go off in a stampede, not knowing why, but all of them upset. That's how quickly a load of anxiety can flow through all the members of a herd when just one cow gets anxious. The same thing happens with families. Mama comes home from work and she's cranky. Maybe she doesn't even know why, she just had a bad day. As soon as she walks in the door, everybody knows, "Mama ain't happy!" The whole family gets anxious. Everything was fine before Mama came home, but now everybody is upset and anxious. Mama's anxiety flows to Dad and Junior and Sister and even to the dog and the cat. Nobody knows why exactly, but nobody's happy.
Anyone can bring anxiety into the family. Anxiety will flow from one person to the next until everybody feels it. Most people don't even know what it is that they're feeling, but they know it doesn't feel good. Everybody's joy is diminished. Everybody's capacity to love and understand is diminished, too. Creative thinking goes down as anxiety goes up. The family doesn't function well. Tempers flare. Little things blow up into big things. People snap at each other. Little things that should be taken in stride throw people into a tizzy. The family isn't a fun place to be.
When this happens a few times, the anxiety will begin to settle onto some vulnerable family member and that family member will get symptomatic. Maybe Junior will become the symptom-bearer for the family: he starts getting into trouble at school, the teacher sends notes home, he isn't getting his work done. Maybe its Big Sister who becomes the symptom-bearer for the family: she starts hanging out with the wrong crowd, she gets a boyfriend the family doesn't approve, the harder the family tries to break them up the harder she holds onto him, she gets pregnant. The more symptomatic the symptom-bearer becomes, the more the overall anxiety of the family increases and the more they try to "fix" the symptom-bearer, but he or she isn't the one who is broken: it's the family that's broken, they are just bearing the symptoms of the family's increasing anxiety.
Does this sound at all familiar to you? Is your family anything like this? Then you are experiencing the free-flowing characteristics of anxiety. How can you reduce anxiety in your family? Well, becoming aware of how one person affects the whole family is one way. Mama can be sure she doesn't bring her anxiety home with her. Dad can take her aside and lovingly connect with her and listen to her and affirm her and reduce her anxiety before it spreads to the kids. Families can remember that the symptom-bearers are not the problem and stop focusing on them and work on themselves instead. The trick is to deal with anxiety before it short circuits the thinking parts of our brains and reduces us to cows stampeding around the field with no clear reason why.
By David VanDenburgh, MCL Counselor
