ABSTRACT
As the family moves forward in time it has to deal with pressures that come from the predictable course of development. In family life cycle terminology, the time dimension of development is called a horizontal process (Carter and McGoldrick 1989). These provide their own stressors, ones that arise from the history of the family, which include patterns of relating and functioning that are transmitted down the generations (transgenerational stresses). These stressors include all the family attitudes, taboos, expectations, labels and loaded issues with which each member grows up.
