Family · Baseer Maroof, LCSW
The Family Rules
Every family runs on rules nobody wrote down. Find yours, see what they cost, and write new ones.
Naming it isn’t betrayal. Most parents were handed these rules too.
Private. Your picks stay on this device only. Nothing is sent anywhere, not even to Baseer.
1 · The unspoken rules
Which ones ran your house?
Tap any that fit. Each one made sense back then.
2 · The roles
Which ones did you play?
Kids take on jobs that keep a stressed family steady. Tap a card to open it. Most people played more than one.
The roles I played
Roles aren’t who you are. They’re jobs you took on, and they can shift over time, like when a sibling leaves home.
3 · The patterns
A family moves like a mobile
Tap any piece.
Move one piece and every piece moves.
4 · Rewrite the rules
The adult version
Pick a new version of each rule, or write your own.
Which rules do you want to rewrite?
5 · Changing your part
You can only change your part
That’s enough to change the dance. Tap “Try it” to keep a move on your list.
If it was more than rules
If your family involved abuse, The Mending is a gentle place to start.
If drinking or drugs shaped your family, you’re not the only one. Al-Anon is for people affected by someone else’s drinking. Adult Children of Alcoholics & Dysfunctional Families (ACA) is for adults who grew up in homes like that, with or without addiction.
Bringing this to therapy helps. These patterns are easier to see with someone outside the family.
My new family rules
About these ideas
Claudia Black, writing about children of alcoholics, named three rules many families live by: don’t talk, don’t trust, don’t feel. Hero, scapegoat, lost child and mascot are the family roles most associated with Sharon Wegscheider-Cruse’s work on families shaped by addiction. Picturing a family as a hanging mobile is a classic family-therapy image, often credited to Virginia Satir. “Change back!” reactions is Harriet Lerner’s phrase.
The other rules and roles here are plain-language terms that therapists and recovery groups commonly use. They’re lenses for reflection, not diagnoses, and you don’t need an addicted parent for any of them to fit.