Article with some data on estrangement between adult children and their parents

[treesgrowslowly]

Newly published article online about estrangement:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/tech-support/202210/why-adult-childparent-reconciliation-is-often-impossible

Overall, this article is going to be 'preaching to the choir' for those of us who have been through issues with parents. One thing I like about this article is that she writes that "there is no middle ground when it comes to parental mistreatment". As someone who had been through years of wondering how to manage LC or VLC, this rings very true for me. That middle ground was just not tenable - despite my hope that it would be.

Sometimes it can help us, to read the same ideas in different words - so if you are new to NC with parents, this article might help.

Thankfully, estrangement is no longer so taboo and so misunderstood by so many...We don't yet live in a world where the average person is educated on dysfunctional family systems. But I *think* we do live in a world where we can expect the average therapist or counsellor to understand the points in an article like this, when they are working with those of us who have been through the battlefield.

I also read through the article trying to imagine the perspective of an adult whose parents were 'good enough' most of the time, but had some annoying tendencies (i.e. like a healthy parent who insists on some specific 'odd' family ritual at Christmas time).

In other words, if I had a friend who wanted to understand my NC, would this article explain my NC to them? If said friend said things like "well my parents weren't perfect either" (which I know some people come across when looking for support from their friends).

I honestly don't think this article would be the one to use to educate a friend on how your experience, as the adult child of a narc, was qualitatively different from theirs. This particular article does not specify, with examples, how these are parents who have engaged in a pattern of disrespect and / or abuse, over a long period of time, and have no intention of taking any responsibility for it. It isn't about the isolated incidents or the one time they bought us a weird gift. No parent is perfect - but we did not just deal with odd gifts and isolated incidents.

The start of the article does nod to that stereotype about estrangement - that we are adult children who just can't 'deal'. Thankfully this stereotype is lessening in general.

This article is not intended to educate that particular audience, but I mention this because I know some of us try to get friends / others to learn what we actually went through, and get them to understand why we ended up with estrangement.

I think where the article does some work towards that is where she describes estrangement as part of a long process. Our friends might think we impulsively cut our parents out of our life - and this article states that is rarely the case. That is quite validating to read.

Trees

[moglow]

Most children experience gaslighting in these families, normalize abuse because that's all they know, and are quick to blame themselves rather than their parents (it's less scary) so the recognition of parental mistreatment is usually glacial in its pace. The moment of real recognition, often decades into adult life, is a big deal, psychologically, if a painful one. It's not validation that the adult child seeks from his or her parents but something more important: that the parent take ownership and responsibility for how the child was treated. It won't surprise anyone that it's threatening, hard, or impossible for many parents to do exactly that.

PREACH!! For a short article, she speaks a mouthful of my truths. Reconciliation as I/we might recognize within normal relationships just isn't going to happen and she pinpoints exactly why and in a way I recognize.

[NarcKiddo]

The thing that first sprung out to me is how long it takes for the adult child to realise the truth of the situation. I didn't even start waking up until my 40s. I'm now 54 and have only just started therapy, and I am still in contact.

I read a book called "My Mother the Psychopath" and many of the behaviour patterns of that mother apply to mine too. But not the overt ones, where outsiders can see just how odd it is if they witness them or if the child speaks of them to a friend. I told my therapist that while the behaviours in the book were in many ways worse than those I endured, in some ways at least it made it easier for the girl to break away. And she did, in her 20s.

Everyone things my mother is wonderful, at least at first.

The article comments on the gaslighting and this is another key factor. A child has no way of knowing they are in an unhealthy environment. It is their normal, however unpleasant, and they had to live with that normal. Sometimes they must gaslight themselves. So the parents have abundant excuses going forward. They did their best etc. The child was fine with it for years, why are they now making complaints? The article mentions these. But also a decision that might seem sudden or capricious to an outsider has actually been a lifetime coming. The thick fog gradually gets a bit less thick but in my experience we don't suddenly start questioning everything and we certainly don't start telling our friends all about our problems. We can hardly process them ourselves at first.

I agree that there is no middle ground, to the extent that if I went NC there would be no going back. I would have exhausted all possibilities first, and I think most (if not all) other people would too. Unless there was some sudden severance of the relationship, such as the parent getting violent and the child running for their life, most scenarios involve the child bending over backwards to cope and accommodate. I am trying to navigate LC at the moment but it is my choice to be there, and there is no going back from there.

I think I'm rambling now, but thank you for posting the article, because it is a worthwhile read.

[Srcyu]

Yes, Peg Streep often talks good sense based on the experience with her own mother.
I like the 'ownership' reference she makes concerning the parental behaviour.

I won't be going to see a 'gifted' therapist or otherwise though.

Peg has a public Facebook page for those who are interested.