Family estrangement: Why adults are cutting off their parents

a reply to: surfer_soul
So you think
"Give me a child until the age 7 and I will show you the man."
is pretty much true then?

a reply to: Itisnowagain

It depends on wether you’re using predictive programmable behaviour techniques or not. People can be re-programmed much later in life too. It’s far more effective on children as it’s just easier.

I’ve heard one method that’s been used is to traumatise a child so much that you split their personality. This other personality can then be programmed manchurian candidate style. MkUltra delved in this too but with adults..

You of all people will realise how very little of our thinking is are own and we aren’t even mindful of it.

a reply to: surfer_soul
I didn't assume that it was about certain techniques.....
I was thinking more along these lines..

'This be the verse'

They # you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.

But they were #ed up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another's throats.

Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don't have any kids yourself.

By Philip Larkin.

a reply to: Itisnowagain

The difference is one is done more or less subconsciously as in the poem above, and the other is done deliberately for a desired outcome.

Not that parents aren’t trying to achieve desired behaviour for their kids and even project on them issues they have etc.. the thing is, parents are trying to do the right thing by their children, where as other outside influencers are doing it to manipulate them for their own ends.

I’m sure if we didn’t all have kids and take Philip Larkins advice it would be eugenicists wet dream.

originally posted by: ElGoobero
BBC article about adults 'cutting off' their parents

Formally known as ‘estrangement’, experts’ definitions of the concept differ slightly, but the term is broadly used for situations in which someone cuts off all communication with one or more relatives, a situation that continues for the long-term, even if those they’ve sought to split from try to re-establish a connection.

“The declaration of ‘I am done’ with a family member is a powerful and distinct phenomenon,” explains Karl Andrew Pillemer, professor of human development at Cornell University, US. “It is different from family feuds, from high-conflict situations and from relationships that are emotionally distant but still include contact.”

not surprisingly a lot of this is about politics

experts believe at least part of the context for this is increased political and cultural polarisation in recent years. In the US, an Ipsos poll reported a rise in family rifts after the 2016 election, while research by academics at Stanford University in 2012 suggested a larger proportion of parents could be unhappy if their children married someone who supported a rival political party, which was far less true a decade earlier. A recent UK study found that one in 10 people had fallen out with a relative over Brexit. “These studies highlight the way that identity has become a far greater determinant of whom we choose to keep close or to let go,” says Coleman.

personally I'm seeing a huge value rift between old / middle aged persons and kids over values, traditional / Christian vs 'progressive' anti-traditional anti-Christian.
shame we can't better agree to disagree.

I feel like there are a lot of ungrateful kids that, now they are grown, don't need their parents so they're cutting them off as a nuisance.
very sad.

Given the emotional and physical abuse my wife endured from her parents all through her younger years - to the point she had to leave and live with friends - to the ongoing psychological abuse from them until she cut the out five years ago. She’s never been happier.

My folks are kept at arms length.

There are many, many parents say 65+ who believe their adult children should be listening to them about what to do, what to think, etc. Basically, they’re stifling and holding back a whole lot of people from their own self-actualization.

That’s why I left after college - I knew if I didn’t I would turn into them. I wanted a life that fits my values and ambitions better. I found that without them.

The amount of unacknowledged issues adult children put up with from their parents can be staggering - I’d bet 7/10 people I know either hate their parents, avoid them or communicate just enough to know what’s going on and HATE when they come to visit.

It is sad, but, I don’t lame the children. It’s largely on the parents - and I know that now 100% to be true as a father of three myself.

Bad parenting causes SO many problems in the global scale, I am amazed it's allowed to continue, when some simple information would fix a lot of the situation.

Some parents are well-meaning, but clueless. Others are monsters and demons, that cause lifelong traumas in their bodies' offspring.

Kids are not as much fault, because nothing shapes a kid as much as their parents and parenting - good or bad. If the parents are distant and cold, the kid is going to be a monster. If the parents drown the kid in love, without giving proper discipline (rules, boundaries, limitations), the kids will become even worse.

There's of course the violence and yelling to kids that parents do a lot (which is basically child abuse), because they don't know any better (because they're too dumb to watch a few episodes of Supernanny for some reason), and so on.

It takes a lot of inner strength and course corrections throughout decades to become a good human being after such parenting. Most people are probably not up to it, and a lot of them just snap at some point, which can lead them into trouble with 'authorities' - the parents first abuse the kid, and when the kid grows up, the system then starts punishing that adult.

Is it no wonder kids leave their parents?

Of course there are also spoiled brats that don't know how well they have it, that naturally have only disdain and disrespect for the 'old fools' - but where does that come from? That's right, bad parenting.

With mandatory parenting lessons and a breeding license - although I really don't advocate government to butt into people's lives any more than absolutely necessary (peace officers are a good example, to protect people's rights), this planet's denizens have proven to be -so- stupid, -so- ignorant and so clueless about parenting and such, that at this point, I don't see it causing more harm than good.

This way, Idiocracy might be preventable, as dumb, violent, toxic, hostile morons, drug users, alcoholics and single mothers wouldn't be able to breed or raise kids. I know, it's a bit of oxymoron to say 'single mothers' when talking about someone that isn't allowed to breed, but I hope the reader can allow me this slight illogical statement to illustrate a point.

If single mothers could be prevented, a LOT of psychological and property damage could be avoided.

I don't think anyone would 'cut off' good parents, so think about it.. when do we ever really see good parenting, except in the TV show 'Supernanny'? (And I mean the older, british version)

saw quote on internets

"If you raise your children, you can spoil your grandchildren.

if you spoil your children, you end up raising your grandchildren."

For a long time that was something I really wanted to believe, that the best thing to do was to cut them off until I had my own child. Her light made me see my own darkness and my toxic ways, I was confronted with myself and my own fears that made me do things and act in a certain ways that made me understand my parents a little better. Their fears were bigger than their love and I wasn't going to let that pattern go on. With growing, getting to know myself, my unprocessed traumas and why I feel and act the way i do, brought me closer to the truth and truth is, you can't bury your past and create luck on broken ground because the more you chase luck on that new ground, the more unprocessed past comes knocking on your door in some way. Through your own children or through anything that reminds you of your past. Because if you like it or not, parents are connected with you, connected to the energy you are part of, it is a mirror. Somebody must break the spell. What you are suppressing, they mirror. The easy way is to cut them off, the hard way is to dig in your own suppressed feelings towards them. That doesn't mean they will change or do something that will free you but by digging in yourself and your past/traumas, you can understand their fears that made them do what they did. Understanding is not for them but for you, to release that tension towards them. By releasing that tension/anger/sadness will also release the energy that they mirror towards you.

I had cut them off for years and we are from a culture where everything vulnerable or feelings were ridiculed, i have always been the black sheep until I stopped feeling a victim. I was just a victim of a pain pattern that went on from generation to generation until I stopped it by sitting, dwelling in my pain in every way possible until I understood. If I know the dark side of them and myself so well then I can know the light side of myself and them too. So the more I understood and the more I worked on my own doing. My own character, the more I changed, the more they changed. I think when your energy towards them change because of some understanding, the more their energy changes towards you. Because it is a mirror. ♾️As if by magic their approach to me changed. I'm not even exaggerating, I'm still in awe sometimes when I think about how it was and where we are now. First it will feel not fair when this process starts because it feels like why do they not try to understand but it is for yourself. The release gives you power. That power then makes your nervous system calm down and creating boundaries will feel very natural because your energy also has an impact on their energy. Anyway I can never type in simple and short way so sorry for that felt the need to share..