Is Estrangement Between Parents And Adult Children Avoidable?

Parents today are more involved in their children’s lives than ever before. Adults routinely sacrifice their own desires to make sure that their children are successfully launched into independence.  And yet, a significant number of adult offspring are estranged from their parents. Often it's the children who initiate the estrangement... but not always. An increasing number of parents are cutting ties with their children as well. 

What's causing this rift in parent/child relationships and how can we improve the situation? 

Dr. Joshua Coleman assessed the problem in a recent article in the Atlantic.

The History of Family

While, in the past, families were held together by duty, religion, and economic necessity, things began to change in the late 19th century when society shifted to an emphasis on personal growth and happiness. This shift caused many adult children to reflect on their emotional status and often attribute a lack of happiness to failures in their upbringing.

The historian Steven Mintz, the author of Huck’s Raft: A History of American Childhood, noted that: “Families in the past fought over tangible resources—land, inheritances, family property. They still do, but all this is aggravated and intensified by a mindset that does seem to be distinctive to our time. Our conflicts are often psychological rather than material—and therefore even harder to resolve.”

These changes are not necessarily negative. Today, people feel less bound to abusive or hurtful family members and more free to surround themselves with people who reflect their deepest values. Often, however, the fracture in families is not about something as clear-cut as abuse… but rather a reflection of changing expectations. 

Who is to blame for estrangement?

A 2015 survey of more than 800 people found that most estrangements between a parent and an adult child are initiated by the child. But, that doesn’t mean that the child is necessarily to blame for the estrangement.  A complicated mix of changing societal norms and expectations is driving the division. 

Common reasons given by the estranged adult children for cutting off contact with their parents were emotional, physical, or sexual abuse in childhood, “toxic” behaviors such as disrespect or hurtfulness, feeling unsupported, and clashes in values.

Divorce is another major contributing factor to estrangement. In a survey of over 1,600 estranged parents, more than 70 percent of respondents were divorced from the estranged child’s other biological parent.

Reasons for this increase in estrangement in children of divorced parents can be attributed to several factors: realignment of long-held bonds, the tendency of one parent to turn the children against the other, and the introduction of stepparents.

Sometimes estrangement is even born of love. The extreme focus and worry devoted to children can make them feel as if they need to have distance from their parents in order to find themselves. Anxious parenting may also result in adult children who feel responsible for their parents’ happiness. That responsibility can feel like a burden that is too heavy for the child to bear and so they abdicate any obligations to their parents. 

Many of these causes for estrangement can be linked back to the changing expectations of parenting. The University of Chicago philosophy professor Agnes Callard explained that “today, the boundary of parenting is unclear. If receiving shelter, food, and clothing is enough, then most of us should be grateful to our parents, irrespective of how our lives go.” 

If the expectation of parenting has now changed to include raising happy adults, then adults who are unhappy may see their parents as the ones to blame, leading them to distance themselves further. 

When the parent is the one who initiates the estrangement, the reasons often stem from a sense of inequity.  They may feel that, despite the amount of energy that they put into parenting, the adult children remain largely unavailable.  This may be compounded by a feeling that the parents gave far more attention to their children than they themselves received in childhood. These parents may have difficulty understanding what more they could have done to make their children happy.  

Whatever the reasons, the resentment and bad feeling that fueled the estrangement usually continue to get worse unless some positive action is taken. 

How can we help keep our families together?

Dr. Coleman suspects that the individualist nature of America may make us blind to the pain we create when we leave behind family members. He notes that, while some problems may be irresolvable, many can be repaired. 

Coleman explained that “It is sometimes tempting to see family members as one more burden in an already demanding life. It can be hard to see their awkward attempts to care for us, the confounding nature of their struggles, and the history they carry stumbling into the present. It can be difficult to apologize to those we’ve hurt and hard to forgive those who have hurt us. But sometimes the benefits outweigh the costs.”

Perhaps, in this time of rapid social change, we can try harder to remember that transitions are difficult and often family relationships can be salvaged with mutual respect, empathy, and forgiveness.