From the author: Family is a system. In the system, all elements are interconnected and interdependent. A change in one element in the system entails a change in the entire system. how it works and how it doesn’t work, let’s look at examples from practice. Why does a family need therapy? “Fix my child, he has begun to behave badly” A mother’s request at one of the consultations with a child psychologist And the clause “fix it” is by no means accidental. The child’s bad behavior, problems with adaptation, increased child trauma, aggressiveness, and fears are perceived by parents as a separate event, in no way connected with the family system. As if there is something in the child himself that prevents him from feeling optimally, and when this interfering factor is eliminated, the child will become different, satisfying the expectations of the parents. And they most often turn to a child psychologist to “fix” this broken mechanism. At the same time, systemic family psychology suggests that a child in a family can act as a stabilizer of the family system, i.e. at points of tension in the family, the child takes on the functions of discharging or unloading an overly tense system. How does this happen? For example, like this. Parents often quarrel, the family is on the verge of divorce, and five-year-old Masha falls ill. During a child’s illness, mom and dad, who love their child, direct their attention to their daughter and quarrel much less. Mom is no longer angry with dad, because at such a crucial moment for the family he was there and took care of her daughter. The father, concerned about the child's condition, begins to spend more time at home, helping his wife. Balance has been restored. At what cost? At the cost of the girl's health. What do you think will happen next time the tense situation in the family repeats? Yes, the child will get sick again, this time perhaps with something chronic, in order to maintain the fragile family balance more or less constantly. Or, 4-year-old Misha behaves aggressively in kindergarten, breaks toys, and often fights with other children. In the family: dad is quite authoritarian, the so-called “head of the family”, his opinion is inviolable and categorical, mom, who devotes herself entirely to caring for her husband and children, does not have the right to vote in the family. In addition to the lack of the right to vote, mom has difficulty expressing so-called negative feelings: anger, irritation, rage. And they are certainly present with such a balance in the family system. And who then expresses these feelings instead of mom? Of course, the youngest in the family. The kid does a great job, and not his own job. Those. uses his energy not for his own growth and development, but for doing the work that mom or dad doesn’t want or can’t do. He does this out of love for his parents, thereby telling them, I will take care of you, since you cannot take care of yourself. And what does he get in response? “Doctor, help, he’s unbearable.” If an honest parent came to the reception, then his request for consultation could sound like this: “Please help me, I’m too lazy (reluctant, scared, inconvenient, no time) to deal with my development, so I want you to do (correct, repair) ) behavior (health) of my child.” And then, an honest psychologist or psychotherapist could answer: “Such a symptom did not arise in your family system by chance and is a consequence of some processes in your family, and even if I take care of your child, nothing will change in the system itself, then the symptom may not return, but another one may arise. Because the symptom solves an important problem for your family, which you adults do not want (can) solve. Therefore, there is an option to deal with the entire family system as a whole, or to deal with your child’s emerging symptoms over and over again.” The choice is yours, dear parents! Love yourself and your loved ones. Yulia Minakova, family systemic therapist.