When Families Fall Apart
If you would have asked me 6 years ago, if I thought that this would ever have happen to me, I would have said “no way”. But I am sad to share, that this has happened to me and my heart is breaking.
I have worked with clients and people within a local charity who have had to endure these awful experiences, never would I have envisaged this happening to my family. While we are all unique in our experience of estrangement, the pain of these people I now share.
Estrangement is happening to more people that you maybe aware of and the reason why they are not talking about this subject, is because they feel shame.
I am curious, what was the first thought in your mind when you started to read this article? What has “she” done? She must have done something? This is the root of misperception which usually can be sorted out in conversations.
Parents do mainly blame themselves for the situation that they now find themselves in or justify (as I have been doing to a degree) why the person has created the estrangement between themselves and their family.
I stayed in that space that I often talk about (justifying) until I decided to be responsible. To be responsible for my own self, my health and how I am showing up in the world for people like you.
The first thing I understood for sure was that I was grieving. I was grieving the special family I had with my late husband and two sons. I was grieving the special relationship I had with my son. I was grieving not being allowed to be apart of my granddaughters lives.
I had kept a distance to help my son and his partner both find their feet as parents which has been misinterpreted by my son, with the help of his partner that I do not care about him through gaslighting. Now, the once caring person I knew is battling with his own issues, and I have become the easy target for their aggression.
What Action Can You Take?
I want to share with you what I have discovered for myself, once I acknowledged the grief. I stepped out of justifying my situation and started to take responsibility for my own mental health. I started to do some research.
Where do most people turn to at my age in life? The “How To” section of Youtube. I have recently been uploading videos to Youtube and thought there is bound to be people on there who like me are showing up to help others and perhaps about this heart breaking subject of estrangement.
Prior to this video, I had invested in a mediator to help me with my situation, and from the work I do, I understand that conflict of any kind is brought about by misperception. If we can establish from the start that we all see things differently, then this can lay foundations for a resolution to be found. All it takes is for both parties to be willing and open to having a conversation. However, mediation does not work if one or both of the parties are not wanting to participate. Sometimes this can take longer than hoped, after years of conflict, before situations can be resolved.
The video I found and watched was called “Rules of Estrangement: Why Adult Children Cut Ties & How To Heal The Conflict – Josh Coleman, Ph. D.” I have since ordered his book and will do a book review later.
He suggests that a letter of “amends” is created in which we acknowledge the mistakes that we have made and to try and find that kernel of truth.
Josh suggested that when you are creating your letter, you say something along the lines of “I know you wouldn’t cut of contact with me unless it was the healthiest thing for you to do”. This makes sense to me as my son has felt like he has had to “pick sides” between myself and his partner. His two daughters mean the world to him, as they do me. So in that statement, I can surely find peace. He is doing what he has been taught to do by his family, that family comes first.
When you are still in some communication with your child, Josh further suggests that by creating a letter of amends for the adult child, that this puts him/her in the context of growth and happiness. This really helps the adult child to be seen and heard – by adding “take the exact time you need. If there are things you need me to work on in the interim, I am happy to do that.” Using that language validates the person.
Josh now talks about the Mothers Wound. He admitted to not knowing much about this, but I can for sure relate. You have given birth and raised this child to the best of your ability. Nurturing, supporting and doing in my case a lot of compensating for the difficult circumstances we found ourselves dealing with. As much as we did not discuss Andrew’s health with the children, children are not stupid. They absorb their environment. I discovered much more about that as I completed my NLP training. As a loving mum, this was part of my heart ache which I acknowledged and grieved.
Because I have a great understanding the ‘misperception part’ of this ongoing issue and having worked on myself, I can be in a stronger place emotionally for the conversations that may follow. Examples below for you to understand the tone.
Josh said “anything that the child comes back with say, I hadn’t really though of myself that way. Is there anything you can suggest I can read or find out about it (issue raised)?” This takes the conversation off labels and onto behaviours. “What would you like us to work on/family therapy?” These are a few of his suggestions, of the type of language to use.
A side note here about the use of parts language. This will help the person that you are speaking with understand that they are not “all bad” that we have sad parts, happy parts, loving parts, challenging parts. Particularly when used with small children – “you are a naughty girl” (all of you is bad) to “what part of you felt that it was ok to do xyz”.
Resist saying that you are proud of them. To say that continues the feeling of parent/child. But say that you are impressed by them. By doing this you elevate them, which then allows for the parts in the relationship that didn’t feel good, to be healed.
He went on to say, that you don’t have to like what is being said, but this is about building a relationship once again.
Josh then went onto talk about the area which is in my field of expertise, grief. Using the typical thoughts parents have as mentioned and the questions above, I started this process of healing my pain. I used the Grief Recovery Method (GRM) programme on this situation! I had to heal the pain of the loss of my relationship with my son, in order to help me be in a better place to move forward in hopefully healing our situation.
These are typical questions a parent might use. How do I live like this? (meaning living in grief). You have given birth, nurtured during their growing up and feel like you should be doing more. Now it is important for you to decide between suffering and pain. We are going to feel pain, our hopes, dreams and expectations of the relationship that we have dreamt about, being apart of has gone, at least for now. We also go through the suffering by going through all the mental processors that tie us to the pain, such as “what if I don’t see my child again”. From this can come social isolation, guilt tripping yourself, and getting mad at yourself.
Josh suggested some processors that you can learn to help yourself. Meditation, radical acceptance, (all as it is) or my tip is you could do the Grief Recovery Method (GRM) on this situation. As in the above comment made by Josh, the guilt tripping term is used in his explanation. Now in the GRM, we education the reader/client to know that guilt means to imply harm, so if you had murdered someone, then that use of the word is correct. It is misused in every other context. What you feel is sad, the feelings of which are fueled by you staying the cycle of blaming, shaming and justifying yourself and/or the situation that has been created in the estrangement.
Josh said “The more we fight our misery the longer the path out of hell, the more we struggle, the worse we will feel” He is so right. For your own health, mental and physical you need to put yourself in a place of acceptance (that doesn’t mean liking it) by working on yourself with some of the tips above. To forgive does not mean to condone what you feel was done to you.
Feelings of fear about the returning to the “relationships” can also happen, which is where building a pathway and strategies can help. If they need space, respect that for one year. Having compassion is the gift of joy. From their perspective, they may then allow a window into their life through social media. And so pathways can be rebuilt.
What about when you are met with silence, (no communication) and everything you try is met with silence? Josh recommends a really good amends letter, take responsibility and send after 6 to 8 weeks “just checking in”. Again if you hear nothing, do a follow up in a couple of months or a year. Clearly continuing to reach out.
For the contents of that letter, do not go on about what is fair. The son or daughter in law maybe gatekeeping the letter, contact or email. You do not want the amends letter to be about them, or doing things for the audience of that person. Continue to be loving parents instead of creating back lash for your child.
When There Is No Communication, What Can You Do?
Keep a journal or letters for your son/daughter and grandchildren. Do not make these critical, but fill with love and share the parts of your life that they are currently missing out on. Josh also suggests that you do not cut your child out of your Will, (and a few friends have suggested this to me). Unconditional love.
Again let us briefly look at misperception.
Things are not always as we see them. We can both experience a chick flick, I think it is great, while you wonder if you will ever recover from the hour and a half that you feel you have just wasted!
There are so many factors to these situations, particularly in estrangement. Is what is happening that persons fault (your son/daughter)? or do they have a mental illness? Mental abuse can be as bad if not worse than physical abuse, the emotional damage without the physical injury to be evidenced. We know as a society that there are so many disorders out there that these must be considered. You may not recognise these in your child, but in the behaviours of their partners.
Has you child been visiting the doctor for depression, anxiety and sleep apnea. If you are not sleeping well, from stress, you are not getting into REM Sleep cycles which exasperates the situation. This will continue until the child looks at their part/responsibility. That is up to them to arrive at that decision and for us parents to be open for when they may ask for support.
“You can’t change what you don’t acknowledge, but change is inevitable. Are you going to take action or be in reaction?” Diane Parker!
As A Parent, What Can You Do?
The only thing that you are in charge of and responsible for is you. In this scenario, the action would be to reclaim your life and your part as a parent. My family was close. My sons had become so close as in ‘we had friendships’ when they had became adults. I felt like they were friends I could rely on for sure. In my own grief (before GRM) I found this to be a great comfort. But one son was under increasing pressure as he become a father so closely after loosing his own father. This was to become the start of his journey to where we find ourselves today.
So empower yourself by healing your pain of loss, by letting go of your hopes dreams, and expectations. Using the information above in that process will help you in regaining your strength back to cope with this situation. If you chose not to, then that is your choice as well, and in suffering you will remain.
Josh suggests that you get on with your life. As much as you have been a good parent it is time for you to exercise your own trust in you. As a parent, you did the best job that you knew how to do.
In the meantime, join groups for support. Keep reaching out making the light touches mentioned above. True unconditional love.
To my son, my door is always open, my arms ready to hold you and to know you never left my heart.
Bye for now
Love Diane x