Originally Posted by
happybeingme 
Thank you both. Promise not to laugh? I was struggling with the list of 25 questions listed to identify whether or not I am an adult child. Turns out as long as I said yes to at least3 of the questions I may be an adult child. Well thanks for the vagueness.
I am also not sure whether or not I should try to make my father a part of this thing. He is an alcoholic but I was very close to him until he left my mom when I was 7. Over time I did continue to see him on visitation and such I believe he had little influence on my life. Add to that my mothers systematic destruction of my image of my dad and I dont think at this time his role should be a part of my recovery work. I think it would be wiser to spend seperate time trying to reconnect with my memories of him before adding his influences to the mix.
So, here I sit reworking the words and phrases to fit my situation and I am not sure I will be successful with it
Any of this make sense?
Only having to identify with 3 of the 25 shows how few things can actually have large adverse effects as I see it. I identified with the Laundry list traits primarily.
By reading more of the book, meetings, forums etc I gained greater insights into the dysfunction and the who's, whats etc etc. More became clear.
On page 33 of the BrB it says;
"For those of us who doubt a connection between childhood events and adult behaviour, then why do we identify with the majority of the Laundry List traits?"
BTW I'm not saying you doubt, nor that you identify with the majority of LL traits, nor am I diagnosing you.... I'm simply saying that identification with the LL traits for me was enough to satisfy me that I am an Adult Child. More reading etc etc gave me greater understanding AND identification.
In regards to who should be a part of this, for me; it started with just my Dad, then just my Mum and later came to realise that there were bits of both and sometimes not what or who I thought it would be...
My Dad was mostly absent and that in its self gave rise to certain issues. There was not day to day direct impact, but simply not being there meant 'day to day' I felt unwanted and unloved by my Dad.
I too, at first, wondered whether I was 'really' an Adult Child - in the same way as I wondered if I was really an alcoholic early on (back in the day) - more became clear as I read the book and as I spoke to others (yourself included).....
I also found it interesting to note that the book says the term Adult Child and Co Dependent can sometime be used interchangeably (I paraphrase - see page 6 and page 100 in the BrB for clarity)