Nice summary of FOO. I think you mirror my thoughts on this too. I want to add a few extra ideas, because I don’t think there is enough exploration of FOO. This is why. IMO the people in this board make up one of the worst subsets of relationships. Those couples with really bad marriages D and generally move on from this board, maybe to Mojo’s new home. Those with not so bad issues can resolve them with some help and guidance and then leave this board. So those who are here are mostly those how are stuck and have significant issues. Anything that can help resolve these issues is important. FOO is just one of these tools.
Off the top of my head I can think of several categories of issues that keep couples stuck:
FOO issues Communication issues Empathy and compassion issues Boundary Issues Self esteem and respect issues Ignorance
This list may not be complete, it may be all wrong, but I think much of it reflects what I have seen. I can think of many problems in my M and drop them into the above categories. Each category requires a different approach to resolve its issues. If you cannot categories your issues, how do you know that you are doing the right work to cure it? Not everything lends itself to CBT.
LFL,
You talk a lot about how people on this board deflect. Maybe you are using the FOO issues to avoid making legitimate changes in yourself. Not that you are not changing for the better, but I think you may get a lot farther by not focusing AS MUCH on the FOO.
I can tell you that identification of FOO issues with myself and my W were critical for us to overcome our problems in the initial stages of recovery. There was so much anger and resentment and things were so tangled up, it was very difficult to identify exactly what our complaints were. The value of understanding your FOO is that you can identify which issues are due to you, to your spouse, to your parents, etc. Once those have been segregated, then each can be addressed and resolved individually, or not. It’s very hard to fix something if you don’t know what is broken. Step one always is to identify the problem.
It's like the person who has cancer and all they focus on is how they got it instead of looking for workable treatments. Wastes a lot of precious time.
Your argument assumes emotional trauma can be cured by treating symptoms without it ever coming back. That is not true. You know PTSD requires desensitization to the trauma. There is little other way to deal with these types of things. CBT is only partially successful with PTSD. The adult attachment approach seems to have one of the better success rates. That involves addressing the source of the trauma. In the case of CAC, that means his FOO. IMO your cancer analogy is not comparable.
You can blind yourself to other approaches when you see things in such a narrow way. But like you said, you are certain you are on the right track so I'm sure you won't seriously consider this option.
Actually I think I do subscribe to all other approaches, but for CAC, I do not think he is quite ready to begin that yet. In my M, we do not focus on FOO anymore. I would say we are in the CBT stage, doing things for one another because of our new awareness of each other’s needs, as well as each other’s hot buttons.
Maybe other's will not get so bogged down on the FOO stuff though. We CAN re-write our histories Cobra.
Of course we can rewrite history, once we know what needs to be rewritten.
Anyone who has gone through a horrible childhood and manages to become a highly functioning adult does it all the time. I think it is safe to say they do not blame their childhoods on how they act and think today.
Are you really sure about this? People can become highly functioning, and they can do so without blaming their childhood, but they might also end up blaming their spouse, like CAC is doing. Or Lil’s BF.
If any of what you say is true, then why have you been stuck in your M for so long? You are a professional, so I assume you practice what you preach. Yet it seems that only recently you can to some FOO based insight about being judged that helped move you and therefore your M forward. You were able to see why you were reacting as you were and where that came from. Why couldn't CBT do that for you? Because it’s the wrong tool for that particular category.
I have no problem with CBT, but if there is a major FOO issue underlying things, no matter how much CBT you do, those issues and the associated feelings and anxiety will still keep coming up and you will keep needing to apply one CBT bandage after another trying to find peace. There is no one size fits all approach, but I see FOO as step one, and many here on this board are still at step one.
I think it is safe to say they do not blame their childhoods on how they act and think today. I doubt they blame their parents or call them narcissistic, or harbor lots of anger at how their mother treated them.
Do you think I suggest people blame their parents for their problems? Dysfunctional parent do not mean to harm their kids. They are ignorant. They kids adapt as they must to survive in a toxic environment. It is what is, it is not anyone’s fault. Resolving FOO is not meant to harbor resentment, but to understand and let go of resentment. FOO is generational, so stopping it is very important, especially for the kids.
And even if they have done the most complete FOO psychological research, they probably did not become healthy and happy until they made a conscious choice to do so.
Agreed. But how can you make a conscious decision to be happy when you don’t even know why you’re upset? Why are depressed people depressed? They can take medication, do the CBT thing, and still remain depressed. What is the MLC thing all about? Can they segregate their issues into categories like I suggest above? I’m not saying FOO is the cure, but it could help, it could help a lot, it can augment other approaches, and I’m petty sure it won’t hurt.
