The 6 Assigned Roles in Family Dysfunction

Where the roles of the siblings are concerned, it’s best to think of it like being thrust into a play without an audition, much less, a script. There could be a specific role you wanted but you’re under orders from a tyrannical director to become the role you were assigned…or else! It’s opening night and the show must go on. You have eighteen years to learn to adapt and develop into this role. Your livelihood as an actor depends on it.

The scapegoat and the golden child get the leading roles, for they are the primary supply people for the tyrant. Due to the splitting and projection (Trauma Glossary 1) which goes on in the mind of the Cluster B (Trauma Glossary 1) parent, the tyrant needs the supply child for mirroring the good they want to see in themselves. The tyrant also needs the supply child who gets accused of having all of the bad traits the tyrant actually possesses.

In a two sibling household, it isn’t uncommon for at least one sibling to be assigned a dual role. However, the more siblings that get added to the household, the more roles are dispersed by the tyrant. Last week, I addressed the 7 Types of Covert Abuse and in a lot ways, this week is an extension of that. For the house tyrant will deliver different types of abuses that hinge entirely on which role the tyrant has assigned to each family member. The golden rule in the house of the tyrant is, no one is ever exempt from abuse.

This visual aid will demonstrate the point, as well as serving as an “overview” for the spectrum that runs among the enmeshed children. It’s unlikely that you’ve heard of the Mini-Me or Surrogate Partner until now. They are the result of the ongoing discussions in my group that led to both the discovery, and naming of these types. There are distinctions, not just in their ability to function as adults, but in the developmental trauma, itself, as you will see.

Scapegoat:

This is the “all bad” child, according to the house tyrant and enabler parent, and is therefore the primary target for the most overt abuse. The tyrant consistently and relentlessly uses both baiting and reactive abuse (Trauma Glossary 1) on the scapegoat in order to deceive the children into believing it’s the scapegoat’s fault they’re being punished. Conversely, the scapegoat is blinded to the silent, or covert abuses their siblings are also enduring. This is the most crucial aspect in creating triangulation (Trauma Glossary 1) among the scapegoat and their co-victims.

Due to acting as the primary target in the home, the scapegoat finds much needed relief every time they leave the home. The scapegoat will often find solace in at least one teacher, friend or relative, gaining the validation that’s poorly lacking in the home. However, the house tyrant is motivated by a need to be validated on how others see their scapegoated child, and will go to great lengths to thwart any such relief.

Fueled by both jealousy and a refusal to take responsibility for anything that has gone wrong or will go wrong, the tyrant will commit social abuse on the scapegoat. Due to how easy it is for the tyrant to abuse parental authority, the tyrant is capable of isolating the scapegoat from any social event they choose, and as often as they want.

The tyrant is determined to make the scapegoat see themselves as both faulty and bad. Therefore, overt emotional abuse, as well as spiritual abuse is added to the equation. Note here that spiritual abuse is more than religious abuse, it’s about engineering any kind of false beliefs in general, like brainwashing (Trauma Glossary 1). Isolation, combined with continual attacks on one’s identity, is the very recipe for the type of brainwashing used in POW camps. Let that sink in.

This is how, more often than not, the very sibling who experienced the most relief with the outer world, will develop social anxiety (Trauma Glossary 2). The very one who sees the dysfunction most clearly and the one most likely to cut ties as a result, has already endured significant damage to their self-esteem. Self-doubt gets magnified like a cancer at each unfortunate encounter with the victim shamers in their own community.

Parentified Child:

This one was the true parent of the household who, sadly, will never receive a mother/father’s day card from their siblings. This is because the parentified child made most of the sacrifices while the tyrant took all the credit. Like its namesake, this one is programmed to act as surrogate parent, both to the siblings as well as the parents. The emotional drop off point and problem solver, regardless of age. The parentified child was thrust into a grown up role and did the best they could by their limited ability and power. Unlike the house tyrant, of course, who loves to make the claim that they were the ones who did the best they could.

The parentified child is primarily developed under emotional abuse. They are the “mature and responsible one” according to the house tyrant and enabler parent. Resistance to this role is met with so much toxic shame (Trauma Glossary 2), such as, “You’re so immature, irresponsible, selfish!” that the child has no choice but to surrender one’s childhood and grow up fast.

The tyrant repeatedly overwhelms the parentified child with responsibilities, usually under the guise of the one-two punch for compliance: 1) “Helping out around the house” and followed by the threat of shame 2) “You’re not a guest and I am not the maid/servant around here.” The parentified child gets so hooked into proving their value, it barely registers that they are, in fact, pulling most of the weight, if not all of it.

The tyrant is crafty enough to throw the occasional alms of appreciation at the parentified child for being “so mature” and “so responsible”. Unfortunately, due to how the parentified child’s value was measured entirely by their usefulness to the tyrant, the parentified child gets stuck in not knowing of any other way to validate themselves. CPTSD already tends to produce self-abandonment (Trauma Glossary 2) issues. The Parentified Child has this in spades.

It is not uncommon for the parentified child to suffer from a hijacked Fawn amygdala* (See note on this in closing paragraph). Its primary tell is an over-compliance with others to the point where one often says “yes” in the moment while inside their head they are screaming “No!” The parentified child is often stuck in believing they have to do everything themselves, because no one ever validated their right to ask for help. The parentified child often shocked to learn that their occasional needs to be “selfish” was worded wrongly in their head. It was freedom they craved; they were simply programmed into associating freedom with selfishness. (Amygdala is in Trauma Glossary 3 under section 1: Brain – Limbic System)

Lost Child:

There are children who “feel invisible” and then there is the Lost Child who actually wants to be invisible. This is the child who perceives one’s only hope of day-to-day survival is in maximizing both physical and verbal invisibility. The lost child stays in one’s room as often as possible, dissociating through imagination, television or even music to escape what they cannot physically escape. “Don’t make waves and I will be safe” is the lost child’s mantra.

The tyrant reinforces this by throwing laurels at the lost child for being low maintenance. The tyrant is not above occasionally making decisions for the lost child, without a thought to their feelings. After all, to the tyrant, the lost child is the one who “never gives me any trouble.”

In such moments, the lost child can be misled into feeling like the golden child and in fact, both endure the same covert mental abuse. However, the tyrant isn’t interested in being enmeshed with the lost child. The tyrant is simply showing approval for the child’s ability to stay out of the way and never using their voice. It’s in this regard that the lost child also endures covert social abuse.

All children of adverse homes cope by dissociating. The lost child was simply given more “freedom” to utilize this handy survival tool. As is always the case (unfortunately), an overabundance of anything leads to more harm. It is not uncommon for the lost child to have large gaps in their childhood memories. Essentially dissociated their way through their entire childhood and therefore, more ongoing problems dissociating as an adult.

One could even go a step further and say that the lost child achieved accidental mastery of “gray rock”. If you don’t know what gray rock is, it’s a tool that’s designed to be used temporarily as a means of coping into the gradual escape from the Cluster B. It has many behavioral features in common with the lost child, in that it requires shutting down emotionally and becoming as uninteresting as possible. It is not a tool that’s meant to be used long term, for there could be dire consequences. For the lost child, having gray rocked their way through their childhood, they have gotten stuck in gray rock mode.

The lost child often has difficulty finding direction in life, due to how their childhood coping mechanisms reinforced approval by simply being insignificant. It becomes their truth (or, better put, their false belief in themselves). The years of coping by not being seen or heard thwarts their ability to assert themselves. The lost child typically isolates as an adult, and shies away from social settings. CPTSD is an adult attachment disorder (Trauma Glossary 2), in itself. But for the lost child, who never stood a chance at practicing the basic human need for connection, will often form an extreme attachment to material objects and/or dissociative activities, in general.

Golden Child:

Something must be said here on the distinction between the golden child and their “evil twin”, the mini-me. The argument on nature versus nurture applies to their outcome. The golden child tends to have more of a laid back approach to life itself, is less sensitive to harsh realities and possesses more self-awareness in their basic nature than the mini-me. It’s these most basic traits the golden child is born with which ensures that no matter how much the tyrant supplies them with toxic validation, it fails to crack the golden child’s basic goodness.

This is the “all good” child, according to the house tyrant and enabler parent. The golden child’s perspective is developed under equal parts survivor’s guilt and frustration with the scapegoat for “constantly triggering” the house tyrant.

The golden child adapts by keeping perfectly natural parts of oneself hidden from tyrant and enabler, so as not to become a target like their scapegoat sibling. Over time, the natural parts that the golden child has kept hidden in order to survive, becomes a lost sense of their own identity. It is still there, of course, but on a deeply subliminal level. The reward of parental love and validation overrides the basic human need for self-acceptance. The golden child will likely disown such parts of their identity, calling it “bad” in lieu of the parental bond that becomes enmeshment.

Mental abuse is the most difficult type of abuse to detect and, like the lost child, the golden child is ensnared in this. Instead of becoming invisible, the golden child develops as the rule follower, who never has a differing opinion from the house tyrant and enabler parent. The golden child observes what’s happening to the scapegoat and wonders, “Why does the scapegoat always have to be so defiant? Why does the scapegoat have to upset the peace in the home?”

The golden child simply cannot see the baiting and reactive abuse for what it is. The golden child only sees the scapegoat’s emotional reaction to the tyrant, who is merely calling the scapegoat on their character flaws. This is because the tyrant confides the laundry list of problems the scapegoat gives them to the golden child. No matter how much the golden child cares for the scapegoat, they can’t help but resent them for being the cause of any trouble and strife in the home.

Such beliefs exist, unchallenged, until the day the golden child threatens the bonds of enmeshment. Be it embarking on their career or announcing their engagement, the tyrant feels threatened that they won’t be the golden child’s priority anymore. The tyrant will try to undermine this at every turn, eventually revealing their true selves to the golden child in a way that’s a complete shock.

Seeing the tyrant in the same light that was before, only revealed to the scapegoat, the golden child goes through a sort of crisis of cognitive dissonance (Trauma Glossary 1). The golden child is forced to question all of the false truths they had been led to believe and in so doing, start to question their own identity.

Surrogate Partner:

This is the one who never leaves the family home or gets very far in life. This one has resigned to their “fate” in a world that has proven to be too chaotic for them. The surrogate partner is developed out of emotional neglect, covert social abuse and extreme overt financial/education abuse (emphasis on education abuse, as you will see).

They experience multiple setbacks and disappointments that erode confidence and self-esteem with the outside world. The surrogate partner is almost always developed out of being the primary target for bullies. Due to the overt nature of the outer world abuses, the surrogate partner doesn’t fully realize the covert abuses which are taking place in the home.

When the surrogate partner comes home to confide what’s happening, they are denied the space to fully process the trauma. In fact, they aren’t often validated at all, and often advised to “just ignore” the bullies. The tyrant and enabler parent never stop to consider how the bullying has been escalating purely because the surrogate partner, confused on how to handle the situation, is already doing nothing.

Emotionally abandoned, and armed with useless advice, the unresolved stress deeply impacts the surrogate partner’s ability to concentrate on their school work. As their grades suffer, the tyrant and enabler, dismissing the child’s earlier cries for help, begin to engineer false truths into the surrogate partner’s psyche. “Slacker; learning disability” being most often used and promptly becoming a part of the surrogate partner’s narrative.

It’s the subliminal nature of the abuse which takes place in the home that slowly whittles down the human spirit. No one ever bothered to tell the surrogate partner that they could do anything meaningful with their life and therefore, they lack motivation to challenge their defeatist thinking. Over time, the child sees one’s place in the world as a lost cause and comes to view the very one who orchestrated this severely covert level of brainwashing as the closest they can get to feeling safe.

It’s unsurprising that, as an adult, the surrogate partner isolates as much as possible and holds themselves aloof. This is not to say that the surrogate partner doesn’t work. Quite the contrary!

The surrogate partner is capable of getting and maintaining a job. The bad news is, they tend to stay at the same company and working in the same position for the rest of their lives (at least until they dare to start healing). Since no one ever told them that they could do anything significant with their lives, they tend to believe trying to get ahead poses too many risks to their survival.

They will often be plagued by intense emotional flashbacks from the years they were targeted by bullies. The surrogate partner holds in a lot of anger from their thwarted abilities to defend themselves. They’re often brooders, because they know they were cheated out of a thriving existence.

Mini-Me:

This is the golden child gone terribly wrong, the most treacherous of all the siblings. When you hear a scapegoat talking about their “golden child” sibling with venom, chances are, they’re referring to the mini-me. The mini-me is the one who grew up benefiting from the family toxicity, the one who earned approval from the house tyrant by turning against his/her own sibling/s.

The mini-me is groomed for its role from birth; for the tyrant, incapable of love, including self-love, is looking for their perfect mirror. The tyrant takes love bombing (Trauma Glossary 1) to the extreme and gets hooked on the adoration reflected in the eyes of the mini-me. The tyrant is loving themselves vicariously through the eyes of this one and will jealously guard its prize. This is where the most covert of all abuses begins.

The mini-me is almost always infantalized (Trauma Glossary 1), for child development is seen as a threat. The mini-me, equally hooked on the tyrant’s love bombing, complies with the tyrant. The developmental arrest (Trauma Glossary 2) that happens to the mini-me is already apparent by the time they start school. Extreme social awkwardness and emotional immaturity, even among kindergartners, makes it difficult for the mini-me to make friends. The teacher’s most basic instructions are seen as a threat through the eyes of the mini-me, who hasn’t experienced structure of any kind until now.

This is how trauma develops for the mini-me. Whereas the scapegoat can’t help but find some relief whenever they leave their home, the mini-me is continuously traumatized by the outside world. This is due to the multiple shocks and “setbacks” the mini-me has been groomed for experiencing with the outside world, all of whom won’t see the mini-me as “perfect” as the house tyrant has led the child to believe.

This results in a perpetual “loop” of the mini-me leaning more on assurance from the house tyrant, their primary source of validation. The tyrant is only too happy to inform the mini-me: “You are right, they are wrong.”

The tyrant will even fight the mini-me’s battles for them, from blaming the teacher when the mini-me misbehaves, to taking over minor child skirmishes between the mini-me and the scapegoat. This is how the mini-me takes pleasure out of witnessing the punishments inflicted on the scapegoat. Their admiration for the tyrant grows, believing they are so lucky to have a parent champion for them in such a way.

The scapegoat gets the last laugh once they reach adulthood, however. For the mini-me, who hasn’t experienced resolving conflict or practicing accountability, who has been continually traumatized by the harsh realities of the outside world, is the least equipped for coping in the adult world. The mini-me, who has gotten hooked on the supply of the tyrant’s toxic validation cannot face the crisis of facing up to the pain of invalidation. It’s what drives the mini-me to stay enmeshed with the tyrant.

If the mini-me is not a full fledged Cluster B disorder, then they have strong traits of one. Hence its namesake, the tyrant’s “mini-me”. The mini-me will go to great lengths to protect their primary supply person, the tyrant. This is why the mini-me will deny that they witnessed any abuse committed against their siblings and will even act as chief flying monkey against any sibling who dares to break contact with the family.

The mini-me is capable of making any sibling who stands in their truth look like liars to outside observers. After all, the mini-me has such a close relationship with their parents; so surely, the sibling who is crying abuse is lying, right? Except for anyone who gets to know what lies behind the mask of the mini-me will notice certain tells that point to the mini-me being an unreliable source of information.

This article’s purpose was to bring clarity, both on what happened to you and your siblings and the ongoing problems you may have as a result. Believe it or not, there is hope for each of the sibling roles (except for the mini-me, who I confess I care nothing about). Don’t worry, there are dime-a-dozen support groups for mini-mes, so let the cluster B support groups take that one in.

Next week, we will look at the trauma types and explore the various ways we can work through those trauma responses. It’s also noteworthy that there are actually some benefits in each trauma type that can be used as an asset for fueling your healing. If you want a taste of what this will cover, go to Trauma Glossary 2 and scroll all the way down to Trauma Type (4F).