On Going "No Contact"

Relationships are hard sometimes.

Especially relationships with family. Amiright?

The discord that can arise between family members once everyone hits adulthood can upend even the steadiest of us. Years upon years of difficult relational experiences can pile up. If it’s hard now, it was probably hard for a long time before now.

The tendrils that connect us to our earliest experiences, where we were (hopefully) held, nurtured, and guided—possibly, probably, imperfectly—by our parents or guardians…well, they are easy to tug at.

And where those tendrils hook into the juicy meat of our tenderest selves, slights from those same people, people who changed our diapers and screeched with delight at our first steps, can pull at us so deep that it feels like evisceration.

From those folks, micro aggressions can feel downright macro, and outright aggressions, slights, manipulations, or lack of acceptance of our identities intolerable.

Ouch, ouch, ouch.

In recent years, going “no contact” or “very low contact” or “no contact” with family in response to this kind of strife has become much more common and socially acceptable.

A New Yorker article on this topic cites a figure of 27 percent of adults surveyed having become estranged from a relative all the way back in 2019. I’m guessing the numbers are significantly higher by now.

Pablo Picasso, The Tragedy, 1903

As someone who tends toward an avoidant attachment style, I am familiar with the strategy of walking away and cutting ties when a relationship feels thorny.

I’ll admit that I’ve listened to friends talking about some ugliness in an important relationship and thought, “well, geez. Forget about that person. Walk away. What’s the downside?”

Watching the unfolding story of a steep rise in family estrangement, though, I feel a bad feeling in my tummy.

This is not because cutting ties isn’t the best, healthiest solution in some cases. Where there is abuse, frank maltreatment, and so on, well of course you save yourself and the people you care about.

And. But. I wonder how often these cutoffs are about challenges that don’t quite reach this bar. I personally know of a few that definitely are not.

To me, this trend seems to reflect and amplify another trend: fragility.

(The link above is to a chapter on fragility and its causes by one of my favorite authors/thinkers, Jonathan Haidt.)

Refusal to lean into that which challenges us—especially that which challenges us almost to the edge of what we can endure—doesn’t strengthen us. It makes us more fragile.

Choosing cutoff rather than seeing a tough relationship as an opportunity to further define ourselves, show up as the best possible version of ourselves, and rise to the occasion of standing by and with ourselves even in relationship with someone with whom we disagree, or who we feel offended by, et cetera…

…makes us more fragile.

The more fragile we become—the more we protect ourselves against and cut ourselves off from what scares or upsets us—the more likely we are to suffer from depression and anxiety.

Therapists know this. We are trained to help people face and endure what scares, angers, and irritates them. To build their tolerance for discomfort and distress. To marshal increasingly solid internal and relational resources so they can live their lives without avoiding much of anything.

They might still feel unpleasant feelings (anxiety, frustration, hurt, rage) when encountering what they have been avoiding. But they will have the strength, self-knowledge, and courage to tolerate those feelings.

Sure, it feels better to nix something from your life when it’s hurting you.

Such a relief! No more holiday drama! No more homophobic comments! No more Trump-y expostulations! Freedom!

Um, also, it feels better to a person with social anxiety to not be in social situations. It feels better to a person who is depressed to stay in bed all day.

These are short-term fixes. We call ‘em “safety behaviors” in therapeutic lingo.

When people engage in those behaviors, they don’t get better.

When they choose to step toward or into the discomforts they are resisting, they do.

Sometimes they need therapeutic support to do this. That’s okay.

If we believe that our well-being is contingent upon not being around “toxic people,” we increase our fragility.

By the way: I dislike that term “toxic person.” It’s reductionist and dehumanizing. A person in pain, lashing out? Probably. A misguided, ignorant person who’s getting their information from Fox News? Possibly. A scared person reacting from a need for self-protection? Maybe.

We can learn to navigate difficult relationships. It’s hard, but in doing so, we grow. We become better. We can learn how much to let “toxic people” in to minimize the harm we experience in those relationships. We can learn to use assertive communication skills to show up strong and clear even when those assholes are trying to tear us down.

This is an important way we learn boundary making and the tough skill of holding a boundary when it is threatened.

We become stronger.

Staying connected to family members who do not share our beliefs doesn’t hurt us. Even if we feel hurt by those beliefs, sticking around at least in some small way means we aren’t bubbling ourselves off with only people who think and believe as we do.

People siloing themselves only with people who think and believe as they do is a big reason why humanity is facing the problems it currently faces.

Also, beliefs aren’t everything. There are other reasons to be connected.

Have you read Rebecca Solnit’s book A Paradise Built in Hell?

It’s all about how people who face disasters like earthquakes and massive fires and tropical storms show up for each other in heroic and loving ways, regardless of belief or socioeconomic class or any of the other things that tend to divide human beings when things are more steady and peaceful.

If we can’t do this in our families, I fear for our ability to show up for each other when it really matters.

In my humble opinion, right now, in these times…

It really matters.