Play

I have been mulling over a repeated theme played out by a little girl at the children's home (suspected to be physically abused by an adult in the family). So she wants me to be the wicked queen whilst she be the long suffering maid being bullied by the queen. This theme has been played for a couple of sessions now. When I show signs of kindness she will stop me in the act and instruct me to be harsh and rude. No letting out in ill treatment is allowed. Sometimes the theme develops into the queen being imprisoned repetitively by the police for the abuse, only to be released with the maid's help and resumes the ill treatment over and over again.  Now I know in psychology there is this behaviour called 'repetitive compulsive disorder' where a person seeks circumstances which allows him/her to re-experience the 'trauma' over and over again. A common example is the chronic dysfunctional relationships a person seeks in a partner where he/she will once again be the subject of physical or emotional abuse or neglect. Freud ascribes it to a dysfunctional relationship at childhood with a parent. Subconsciously the 'inner child' is trying to relive the experience with the hope that if he is good, smarter, more helpful etc he will win back the love and approval of his parent. It is a sort of defence mechanism which avoids the sinking into despair, hopelessness, anger and depression over the rejection. In rewriting history the inner child hopes to do it right 'this time round'.

A form of catharsis  involves the acceptance of the feelings ie. to swallow the bitter pill. So after 3 sessions of the long suffering maid seeking incessant misery, I revise my script a bit albeit to my client's displeasure. I passed remarks like " I don't want to bully you anymore because you are a good girl" and "you should not allow others to bully you, you don't deserve it". Whether by coincidence, at the last session, the behaviour of the 'maid' turned really aggressive and angry with her shouting " this castle doesn't belong to you" and "get out of my castle". You know sometimes I can not control my reflex reaction. "Whoa why are you so angry and fierce?", I remarked instead of the normal observation remark I should be giving which is "the maid is very angry with the wicked queen". The story ended with her using magical power to send the wicked queen trapped and blown away in a bubble.I wonder what is her next theme though.

One thing that really keeps me going is this opportunity to observe the children's themes at play, do some research on them and relate to their underlying rationale.