Ep 127: How to Heal a Broken Bond

Dr. Joshua Coleman, author of Rules of Estrangement and When
Parents Hurt, offers insight on how to repair fractured
relationships. Plus, why parental estrangement is becoming
increasingly common and what we can do to prevent it in the first
place.


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Full show notes


After all the blood, sweat, and tears of raising a kid, any
parent would want a good relationship with a son or daughter
that’s reached adulthood. But sometimes, conflicts that start
small during the teenage years grow more intense, and
parent-child relationships are ruined by resentment. Many parents
find themselves painfully estranged from their grown children
after they’ve left the nest. The sad part is, these rifts could
have been mended before teens grew into adults, if only parents
knew the right approach.


Oftentimes, parents do attempt to remedy deep conflicts with
teens, but they go about it in the wrong way. Although they have
the kid’s best interest at heart, they find themselves using
defensive language, or fail to truly empathize with their
children. If you want to keep your kids from distancing
themselves as adults, you’ll have to really connect and hash
things out from the heart.


To teach us how to overcome bad blood between ourselves and our
teens, we’re talking to Joshua Coleman, author of Rules of
Estrangement: Why Adult Children Cut Ties and How to Heal the
Conflict. Joshua became estranged from his own daughter when he
went through a difficult divorce. It became worse when he
remarried and had kids with his new wife.


He was eventually able to reconnect with his daughter, but the
pain of the experience was unforgettable. He decided to dedicate
his efforts to researching parent-child estrangement, becoming an
expert. He now hosts weekly Q&A’s and writes a regular
newsletter on the subject, along with publishing several books
about it.


So what can Joshua teach us about healing our relationships with
our teens? In our interview, he talks about how part of the
reason why kids distance themselves is a change in culture. We
also talk about how your co-parent can push kids away from you,
and how you can begin to breach the divide even when it seems
like you’ll never get your kid back.


The Significance of Cultural Changes


Many of us think that kids should always remain grateful and
loyal to their parents, because that’s the way we were raised. We
were taught that family is an indispensable part of life, a duty
that follows you forever. However, with millennials and
generation z facing a more troubled economy, a tougher job market
and a higher price of living, they’ve had to become more focused
on their own survival. Jonathan and I discuss how this has led to
an overall shift towards an individualistic mindset instead of a
collective, family based lifestyle.


There’s been a stronger focus on mental health in recent years as
well, with more people than ever before entering into
psychotherapy. Young folks are significantly more likely than
older generations to think deeply and critically about the
effects of their upbringing on their wellbeing. This leads to
more young adults justifying anger towards the ones who raised
them.


As a mother or father, this can be incredibly frustrating. It’s
not as if parents have become less attentive or careful. In fact,
Joshua has found that parents nowadays are more doting towards
kids than ever before. However, this can actually lead kids to
want to distance themselves even more. If kids have always felt
as though they were under a microscope, they’re likely to strive
more intensely for individualism, pushing parents away in the
process.


Joshua and I talk further in the episode about cultural changes
that have led to more conflict between kids and parents. In
addition to cultural changes, this alienation can also be caused
by one parent poisoning the image of the other in the child’s
mind.


When Parents Put Each Other Down


For some kids, especially when divorce is involved, a kid’s anger
towards a parent might be fueled by the other parent. When things
are complicated between co-parents, it’s easy to fall into a
pattern of dissing the other person when the kid is in earshot.
Even when a parent isn’t actively trying to paint the other as a
bad person, it can happen as a result of a fight or feud between
the two of you.


Joshua stresses the importance of remaining grounded and
affectionate toward your co-parent, at least in front of your
child. Talking bad about the other person isn’t going to help
your relationship with your kid. Even if your co-parent is
constantly throwing you under the bus, kids need at least one
parent to remain stable and keep things collected.


So if your co-parent is rocking the boat by filling your child’s
mind with bad notions about you, what can you do to keep your kid
from turning against you? Joshua suggests challenging your kid to
think critically about the comments being made in an attempt to
tarnish your image. He also suggests listening to the concerns
your kid may have now that you’ve been criticized, and empathize
with them to understand where you might be misstepping as a
parent.


Empathy actually plays a big role in reconnecting with a kid.
Joshua and I get into this in the episode.


Listening and Empathizing


When your kid is pushing you away, citing every choice of yours
as a reason for distancing themselves, it’s pretty darn tempting
to get defensive. It’s incredibly frustrating when kids don’t
understand that you’re trying your best. Despite the frustration,
however, Joshua emphasizes the value of coming from a place of
understanding when trying to bridge the gap with your kid.


Joshua uses a story about his work with paranoid schizophrenics
to explain how you should speak to a teen who’s hurt. Joshua
found that if he made schizophrenic patients feel as if their
delusions were ridiculous, he couldn't get through to them at
all. In order to truly help them, he had to validate their
beliefs, and understand where they were coming from. Only then
was he able to prompt them to question their illogical beliefs.


Even if you think your kid is throwing baseless accusations at
you, Joshua believes it’s imperative that you find a kernel of
truth in what they’re saying. Making kids feel selfish or mean
will simply turn them off from working towards unity. Using
phrases like, “I’m open to hearing your thoughts and feelings” or
“I want to be better going forward” can help you make progress
towards finding peace with one another.


In the episode, Joshua goes over two examples of letters from
parents trying to make amends. Although the two examples are
similar, one comes off as defensive and blames the child, while
the other conveys understanding and respect for the child’s
feelings. We discuss this empathetic approach in depth,
explaining how you can lead with kindness instead of bitterness
when patching up broken bonds with your teenager.


In the Episode….


Joshua speaks from the heart in this week's episode, making for a
moving interview and great advice for parents who might be
grappling with reconnecting to teens. In addition to the topics
discussed above, we talk about: