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July is Parent Performer Month

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Pineapple Support will host a free support group and webinar to help adult performers build and nurture strong, supportive relationships with their parents and other family members.

The free Parent and Performer Support Group will run Sundays for six weeks, July 12 to August 16, from 3 to 4 p.m. (PDT). For more information, click here.

A Pineapple rep described the group as “an educational and mild process group that focuses on relational ties in the family. This group will cover the various emotions around the performer discussing or revealing their career choice to their parents and the parents’ reaction to the information and how to communicate and listen in a healthy way as a family and how to accept and support each other.”

The free webinar is titled “Challenges of Family Members of Adult Entertainers” and is scheduled for July 21 at 12 noon (PDT).

The session is designed for “adult entertainers and their family members to discuss the unique challenges to their relationships, which sometimes lead to conflict, estrangement and harmful interconnection,” said the rep. “This webinar addresses many of these challenges with the goal of providing greater understanding and tools to develop healthy methods of interaction.”

Click here to register and for additional details.

Leya Tanit, founder of Pineapple Support, chose the month of July to focus on “providing support to performers to help improve their relationships with their parents or other family members.”

“We are encouraging performers to contribute by sending us videos or writing about their experience with parents and family members discovering they are in the industry, which we will share on our social media platforms,” Tanit continued.

Those who wish to participate should email contact@pineapplesupport.org for details.

Pineapple Support was founded in 2018. The organization, a registered nonprofit in the United States and a registered charity in the United Kingdom, has connected over 1,000 adult performers to mental health services, including free and low-cost therapy, counseling and emotional support.

Find the organization online and on Twitter for the latest updates.

Addiction & Recovery – Family

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Tips and coping strategies from week 5 of the Addiction Recovery workshop with therapist Nicki Line.

Family

Here are a few concepts that may be relevant to some of your experiences.

 

Differentiation of Self v Fusion

Differentiation of self– The ability to be in emotional contact with others yet still remain independent in your thoughts, feelings, and emotional functioning. People who are well differentiated from others are able to face difficult, emotionally charged problems, and not feel compelled to preach about what others should think, feel, not rush in to smooth the problem over immediately, and not pretend to be attached emotionally.

Fusion– This is essentially the opposite of a well differentiated self.  People who lack differentiation typically set aside individual choices, thoughts and feelings in order to achieve or maintain harmony in the relationship system (this can be a family system, friend system, etc). Fusion occurs when people form intense relationships with others, and their actions depend largely on the condition of this relationship at any given time. When experiencing fusion, an individual’s decisions largely depend on what others will think and how others will react, and if the decision will upset the intense bond of the relationship. People who are not well differentiated may feel that everyone in a relationship system needs to think and feel the same way or else the bonds will be broken. So either they must mold themselves to fit others, or pressure others to think feel and act the same way they do.

 

Transgenerational Trauma

We briefly discussed how trauma can be passed down through our families. Here is a brief overview of transgenerational trauma in families if this feels relevant to you, or you’d like to look more into it.

Transgenerational trauma refers to trauma that passes through generations. The idea is that not only can someone experience trauma, they can then pass the symptoms and behaviors of trauma survival to the next generation, who then might further pass these along the family line.

Transgenerational trauma can negatively impact families as a result of:

  1. Unresolved emotions and thoughts about a traumatic event
  2. Negative repeated patterns of behavior including beliefs about parenting
  3. Untreated or poorly treated substance abuse or severe mental illness
  4. Poor parent-child relationships and emotional attachment
  5. Complicated personality traits or personality disorders
  6. Content attitude with the ways things are within the family

 

Family Genograms

We discussed that not only trauma, but certain patterns of behavior and interaction can pass through families and influence families. One way to take a closer look at patterns in your own family is to construct a family genogram.  A family genogram is structurally similar to a family tree, but it includes information about relationships, interactions between family members, mental illness, substance usage, and more information.  We typically take a look at three generations using a genogram.

 

Here is a guide on family genograms:

https://www.therapistaid.com/therapy-guide/genograms