Relationship psychotherapist Nicholas Purcell writes that while physical abuse leaves visible marks, covert dysfunction is absorbed as normal and can remain unrecognized until a spouse, friend, or therapist points it out. In his column for The Guardian, Purcell describes how many adults unknowingly live out the dysfunctional patterns inherited from their parents.
The Invisible Water of Dysfunctional Families
Purcell references writer David Foster Wallace's parable of two young fish who don't know what water is. He applies this to family dysfunction: a child doesn't know their childhood is unhealthy. Covert dysfunction, unlike physical abuse, is absorbed as normal, and most people don't question what feels normal.
According to Purcell, who practices in Adelaide, Australia, people inherit more than eye color and bone structure from their parents. They inherit rules, silences, habits, beliefs, and the shape of their parents' presence or absence. In his therapy practice, he meets people re-enacting childhoods, becoming the parents they despised, and clinging to survival strategies that are slowly killing them.
Oliver's Story: Narcissistic Mother and Avoidant Father
Purcell presents Oliver, a composite client whose mother was a narcissist and father was avoidant. Oliver's father spent the last 15 years of his life sleeping on a pullout sofa in his study, using Post-it notes to communicate with his wife. Oliver's mother had strong but warped opinions, such as telling Oliver he couldn't date a woman who worked in a shop because 'people like us don't associate with people in service.'
Young Oliver heard that his family was special, but not the silent second part: that they were alone and unable to seek help because needing help meant they weren't special. Despite rejecting his mother and idealizing his absent father, Oliver had taken on features of both. He was highly avoidant in relationships and chased sexual conquests with the same desperate energy his mother pursued social status.
When a family member urged Oliver to try therapy, he cut contact. When his long-term partner left him, saying 'You're exactly like her, you know that?', Oliver spiraled into depression and eventually found his way to therapy. He was enraged at the comparison, but after being challenged by Purcell, he eventually glimpsed himself and it nearly broke him.
Kate's Story: The Loneliness of Neglect
Purcell also describes Kate, a composite client who survived 25 years in a marriage where she felt completely alone. The answer lay in her childhood: she spent her early years alone in her bedroom silently eating toast she had made herself. At age six, she was making and packing her own school lunches. By seven, she was taking her younger sister to school on public transport. She learned early to never ask for help.
For Kate, neglect was normal. She swam in loneliness. As a nurse, she took a long time to open up in therapy. She understood intellectually the connection between her lonely childhood and lonely marriage but admitted feeling deeply uncomfortable being vulnerable. In their last session, Kate sat with her arms wrapped around a cushion, looking at the carpet. They had been talking about what it might mean to leave her marriage and what it would require of her: to believe she deserved something better.
The Challenge of Recognizing and Escaping Dysfunction
Purcell notes that seeing the water is hard, but getting out is harder. Some clients, like Kate, choose to stay submerged. The alternative—opening yourself up when you've spent a lifetime closed—means feeling everything all at once, and for some people, that doesn't seem survivable.
What haunts Purcell is not so much the patients sitting in his office, but those who never arrive. He wonders how many people are losing decades—entire lives—in water they can't see. Not every adult escapes their childhood. Some do, slowly and painfully, one breath at a time, but for many, the water is just too deep.
Ongoing Work and Hope
Oliver comes to Purcell on Thursdays. The work of learning a new way of being—one without his mother's narcissism or his father's avoidance—is ongoing. Sometimes Purcell sees his mother's snarl superimposed on his face, then his father's silence dominates, and then there is Oliver showing up, catching himself. Purcell doesn't know who will win, but now, at least, Oliver knows what water is.
Purcell concludes: 'Kate stayed in the water. Oliver is trying to surface. I don't know which takes more courage: the staying or the struggling. Maybe they're the same courage, just differently expressed. Maybe we're all just doing the best we can with the inheritance we got.'
All clients described are fictional amalgams. For support, in Australia contact Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636, Lifeline on 13 11 14, or MensLine on 1300 789 978. In the UK, contact Mind on 0300 123 3393 or Childline on 0800 1111. In the US, call or text Mental Health America at 988 or chat 988lifeline.org.
