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filled with families arguing over money, wives who are bored by their husbands' money or children who are suffocating- under the monetary weight of their parents' affection.
There are two branches of her trade: wealth psychology, and affluenza itself. What's the difference? The affluenza treatment is aimed at victims who are unhealthily obsessed with money and have fallen prey to the notion that nothing has any value unless it has a price tag attached (this have been around for a long time, of course - hence Oscar Wilde's famous quip about 'the man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing').
The cynic might suggest that affluenza victims simply hand their money over to the first deserving charity of their choice and live happily ever after in a Bedouin tent. Lami prefers to delve into the deeper reasons behind their depression. Families and their conflicts are most fertile ground - not least because when clients start planning inheritance tax issues, it often becomes clear that it is therapists they need, not accountants. Take this story from her casebook. An American couple, both of them wealthy, had three children. Their eldest son was married and distant from the parents. Their daughter was living with a boyfriend of whom her parents disapproved, and never spoke to her parents. The third son was still at school but was having problems with his work, was depressed and was close to drug addiction. The father had developed cancer that had been diagnosed as fatal, provoking a crisis within the family - not least of which was the need to resolve a will.
"Often, you find these very rich families are just living with all these problems," says Lami. "Because they are entrepreneurs, they are usually what psychologists call 'Type A personalities'. They are driven and controlling and usually very insensitive to other people's feelings."
The first reaction of the American couple was that their children must have a problem. "Often, successful families don't like what the children are doin-," she savs. "Only when we started to discuss these issues did the parents begin to realize they |
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to quote the American industrialist had a problem. After that, the family slowly started to communicate what they wanted from each other."
Lami classes that example as wealth psychology. A more mainstream case is illustrated by another sad tale from the casebook. It revolves around a young man who had suddenly inherited a lot of money from his grandfather. "People often don't understand the psychology of inheritance but it can be very complex," says Lami. "It can create a great feeling of dependency. It creates a lot of confusion. 'Who are my friends, and do they like me for who I am, or because of my money?' If you have a lot of money it can change the way you think."
This latter case was particularly acute for two reasons. One was that the grandfather had lost all contact with his daughter, who was the young man's mother: that was another sign that the family was completely dysfunctional. The boy never knew his grandfather and had grown up in a normal middle-class family expecting to have to work for a living. The second problem was the terms of the will. The grandfather, tied up the cash in a maze of sub-clauses, conditions and trusts. The boy received a large income but had no control over the money. He was not allowed to take any decisions about where he would live or what kind of car he drove - all those were taken by the trustees.
The old man could not have devised a better system for fooling with his grandson's brain if he had taken advice from Sigmund Freud himself. "[The grandson] had decided that he wanted to take the trustees to court to change the terms of the will," says Lami. She was unwilling to see this happen: "We are always very reluctant to see people start fighting each other in court." Eventually, with the rest of his family also receiving handouts from the will, he managed to persuade them to put a joint proposal to the trustees and so resolve the conflict. But the most important task was to get him to come to terms with his inheritance.
Most large inheritances create problems for the person who receives the money, Lami believes - hence the popular myth of the poor |
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little rich girl sitting alone in her mansion whilepoor kids have fun playing outside. Alcohol and cocaine are often one answer, as a weekend among Notting Hill's trustafarians will confirm.
The children of the rich, Lami argues, must be taught how to handle money. They need to have responsibilities and role models lest they turn into spoilt brats. That their parents, or at least their fathers, are often domineering bullies who want their children to become exact replicas of themselves seldom helps.
The wives of rich men are another source of patients. Back to the case studies. One woman came to see Lami because she was worried that her son was not doing well enough at school.
It quickly became obvious it was the mother who has the problems, not the boy. "She was a shopaholic," says Lami. "Shopping is a common addiction, much like drink or alcohol. All she did all day was spend money, but she was still always complaining about everything."
Despite the lavish lifestyle her husband was providing, she was constantly unhappy and moaned that he didn't make enough money. She started out insisting that for all the money that had been lavished on it, her son had a problem with his schooling. Over several months of therapy, Lami started to convince her that the problem lay with her, not with the rest of her family. "She had grown up with very little money," explains Lami, "and now -she had become very wealthy. Often that transition is very hard. They are constantly insecure and nervous about money because of their background."
Can't see your self going down with affluenza? Think again. As the GM heiress points out, you don't have to be mega-rich to suffer from aftluenza. it can be a mass-market affliction. Lami defines it in terms of a rampant, mindless materialism. "It can be any kind of dysfunctional relationship with money," she says. "It becomes obvious when people start to judge everything in terms of money. It can become like any other kind of obsessive compulsive behavior, and that is always unhealthy." She likes |
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