Games people play...

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Have you read that book? Have you ever seen some of the things discussed in action? I've seen something recently which made me go "hmmmm....". A family I know has a lot of difficulty with their youngest child who they insist is special needs and has behavioural problems, etc. In particular, his father is the main care-giver and is almost constantly on the go with the kid. The child has recently gone to stay at a camp for a couple of weeks and, lo and behold, someone else in the family, the mother, is suddenly causing chaos and displaying very needy behaviour and demanding that the father attend to her. Now, I have noticed that the child copies a lot of the mother's behaviours and mannerisms and now I wonder how much of the difficult behaviour is learned and not anything to do with the special needs? I think the father doesn't help either because he's something of an enabler who likes to feel needed by running around after others. It just seems really strange to see this kind of process happening in front of you and to recognise exactly what it is. How about you, have you seen situations where in a family or group when a person with a specific role is absent someone else immediately takes it on?