As we go through our everyday lives, we don’t think much about this business of giving and getting. Even without consciously considering them, we have tight, unspoken rules that dictate what we give to others and what we expect in return.

Giving and receiving are closely aligned with power. If I give something to you, you are now in my debt; we both know that. What I have given, how much it is worth, whether you are able to return something of similar value…all play a part in how much power I accrue as the giver of the gift. The classic example is of a parent or spouse who gives gifts of great material value and in return expects to control the receiver.

Just as in giving, there is also power in receiving. Do I receive graciously, with sincere gratitude, or do I make it clear this gift is of little or insufficient significance? Do I even bother to provide a signal of thanks? The refusal to receive graciously is a refusal to participate in the relationship. It is, in essence, setting oneself above the other.

In positive and equal relationships, giving and getting stay in relative balance. Neither party gets too far ahead, and each enjoys the process of receiving as well as of giving.

Balanced Giving and Receiving in Healthy Families

In healthy families, everyone contributes in some way, and everyone also receives. We help meet the needs of the family and, in return, our needs are satisfied.

Individual contributions are, of course, in accordance with the ability of the individuals and the needs of the family. The same is true of receiving; the needs of some are greater than others.

An infant relies completely on the family and, although much appreciated, is expected to give nothing. But even a small child understands and wants to help, whether to help fix dinner or maybe just to set the table.

This dynamic of balanced giving and receiving holds true in all human relationships. When we receive, we want to give something back. The drive to maintain some sort of balance causes us to feel uncomfortable when someone gives us a gift, whether it is a material gift or the gift of time or assistance. We want to do something for that person in return.

In families, this balance is supposed to be skewed in favor of the children. Parents are expected to give greatly, while children need to receive gratefully. The cycle dictates that the children, then, will give to their children (the next generation) when they become parents.

This careful balance goes awry when a child essentially becomes the parent and does the giving while the parents receive. For example, a child who is expected to always make Mom or Dad happy or who becomes a go-between for the parents, trying to hold them together, is not in a balanced giving-receiving relationship. This give and take can be made even more off kilter when the child becomes a confidant or even an advisor for a parent, which sometimes happens in single-parent homes.

Are you saying that in a marriage the relationship has to be 50-50?

Well, in a great marriage, of course, both people are always giving 100%—and they will acknowledge that they receive 100% as well. However, marriage is a partnership. It is based on an often unspoken understanding about who gives what and who takes what. If one person alters the implicit agreement, the relationship may be threatened. (Example: an auto accident that disables one of them or one makes a unilateral decision to stop working or to have a child.)

What about a situation where a child is disabled and requires an overwhelming amount of care but cannot give in return?

This, of course, is an extremely demanding circumstance for the entire family. Not only do the siblings of such a child receive less attention, more may be expected of them in helping care for the disabled child: in sacrificed opportunities because of the financial strain on the family and even in social isolation.

Still, the disabled child belongs fully and equally to the family, even if that child eventually must become a ward of the state. And a healthy family will maintain contact and recognition of that child throughout its life.

Families who have succeeded in these situations are families where everyone pulled together and feels that what they received in love and humanity from the disabled member more than compensates for what they gave.

A close friend who has an adult daughter with autism told me that, before her daughter was born, she and her husband simply wanted the good and material things of life. After Emily arrived, the important aspects of life shifted to their love and caring for one another. Nonetheless, the day her daughter was moved out of their home and into an adult care facility—at age 21—my friend felt herself relieved of an enormous burden. She was truly physically exhausted, but she was an extraordinary success as a parent and grew personally in ways that few people have the opportunity to do.