The Potter family

Scenario

A teaching example for social work students learning genogram notation. The Potter family is fictional but emotionally rich — death years, a marriage date, cross-family emotional relationships, and three distinct relational patterns (cutoff, hostile, close) all in one diagram.

Annotation key

• [male/female, birth_year, death_year, deceased] — person with death marker
• "m. 1978" — marriage date label on the union line
• index — marks Harry as the identified patient (proband)
• -cutoff- — estrangement; drawn as two parallel bars across the relationship line
• -hostile- — conflict; drawn as zigzag line
• -close- — enmeshment/closeness; drawn as double parallel line

How to read

Read each indented block as a family unit. James and Lily (index generation) both died in 1981. Harry's emotional world is defined by three relational lines: cutoff from Aunt Petunia, hostility toward cousin Dudley, and closeness to his deceased mother.