Public health advocates report there is a growing mental health crisis among young people, especially since covid. One outcome of mental health challenges is an emerging therapeutic estrangement fad on social media. I’m referring to the trend of TikTok therapists and sociology gurus on YouTube counseling young adults on becoming estranged from family members. The New York Times told the story of a college student from Asia, whose parents incessantly badgered her to fulfill their expectations for her life. Their goals for her life and career were about their happiness, not hers:
That’s when she discovered Patrick Teahan, a licensed social worker from Massachusetts with tousled hair and a massive YouTube following. Mr. Teahan’s videos introduced her to a new idea — that to heal from childhood trauma, it may be necessary to “go no contact” from abusive parents. Around half of Mr. Teahan’s clients restrict or sever ties with their families, which he describes as “brutally hard” but, when it is appropriate, deeply rewarding.On Mr. Teahan’s website, you can fill out a “Toxic Family Test,” which measures your family on a 100-point toxicity scale… You can join his “Monthly Healing Community,” where clients support each other in the lonely endeavor of disconnecting from family.
Whether therapists should promote family estrangement is hotly debated in the mental health community. Among mainstream therapists, estrangement is considered extreme and usually reserved for the most toxic of relationships. The message that you can divorce your parents apparently gained a following with young people, and it’s turned into a movement. One recent survey found that about one-quarter of Americans claim to be estranged from a family member.
Research suggests that it is relatively common for people in their 20s to estrange themselves from a parent, more often a father, and that usually the rift is not permanent.But promotion of estrangement as a therapeutic step is clearly on the rise, thanks mainly to social media. TikTok is coursing with first-person accounts from users who say cutoffs vastly improved their well-being. There is an expanding canon of self-help books on the subject, from “A Christian’s Guide to No Contact” to “Set Boundaries, Find Peace.”
Some young people are clearly better off setting boundaries (a phrase that us older people use). Others seem to dredge up false memories of childhood trauma and poor treatment that siblings and parents don’t recall. The New York Times contacted estranged family members to get their side of the story and sometimes recollections were very different. One mother likened estrangement to being “shunned,” although she admitted she had not been the best parent, due to alcoholism, borderline personality disorder and causing a volatile household while raising her kids. I’d probably want to shun her too.
By contrast a middle-aged Dallas therapist was blindsided when his 18-year-old daughter went no contact, claiming he always favored her brother and she struggled to get his attention. He described the estrangement as more painful than anything you could imagine.
As a result of more (mostly young) people cutting off their parents, support groups are springing up for people estranged from their family members. The parents too can join support groups of parents who’ve been estranged by their kids. One therapist who works with parents estranged by their kids explained it in plain terms:
“In my practice I see the generations talking past each other,” Dr. Coleman said. “Younger generations who are in therapy, they are coming to their parents saying they were traumatized, abused, neglected — and the parents are like, ‘What the hell are you talking about?’”Behind this wave of estrangements, Dr. Coleman says, is an ever-lower threshold for what we view as “trauma.”
I recall back in the 1980s there was a psychology fad called Recovered Memory Movement. Under hypnosis or psychoanalysis counselors would supposedly help patients unearth long-forgotten memories of childhood trauma. Many people believed the memories were fabricated. An archived article in the New York Times recalls:
This was a time when therapists proudly advertised their ability to help clients unearth supposedly repressed memories of childhood sexual abuse; the accusations that followed shattered families and communities across the country.In 2005 a Harvard psychology professor, Richard McNally, called the recovered memory movement “the worst catastrophe to befall the mental health field since the lobotomy era.”
It’s hard to know what to make of the estrangement therapy movement. In 30 years, it may be remembered like the Recovered Memory Movement, or it may have evolved into a more nuanced therapy about setting health boundaries.
Read more at The New York Times: No Contact America.
Read more about NYT: The Forgotten Lessons of the Recovered Memory Movement
I have to believe this is more about young people getting back at parents for some perceived slight than a therapy for mental health. It’s also about some unscrupulous therapists taking advantage of young peoples’ angst in order to build a social media presence. If this were really about patients it would be “The Establishing Appropriate Boundaries Movement.”
This is a movement to destroy families, the strongest structure in a civilized society. TikTok is replete with videos to teach young adults and teens how “toxic” their parents are. Therapists coming out of today’s training programs are well versed in “validating” so-called traumatic events.
Why Tiktok? Is it because young people naturally flock there? They get their health care advice there: https://thehill.com/policy/technology/4774795-tiktok-gen-z-health-advice/
I am estranged from one of my adult sons, and have a regrettably distant relationship with the other. I know that I was not a perfect parent, having come from a very dysfunctional family myself, and I was estranged from both of my parents for many years due to physical mental and emotional abuse and neglect. I know the difference! I swore to be a kind, attentive, caring, and involved and loving parent to my two sons. There was no physical or mental or emotional abuse. I was an attentive and involved mom who cared about how they felt and was very supportive of what they wanted to do. Their dad was solid, pleasant and attentive to them as well, if not so much to me. To this day neither one of them can tell me what I did (or didn’t do) that made them so polarized toward me. I’ve reached out to friends and acquaintances from when they were kids to look for frank answers, blind spots, etc. and I am ready to hear the truth. I’m now in ACA, the adult children of alcoholics and dysfunctional families 12 step program. I would like to make amends for things that they found hurtful. I cant get any feedback. My family and friends who were there say things like you were a good mom, you were very involved, supportive and loving. And that’s the way I remember it too. I talk about this to friends in my social circles, and find that many of my peers are in the same situation. This is very painful. I don’t think a therapist should be promoting estrangement. Families are so important. I made peace with my parents knowing that they would never be perfect or meet my needs. This allowed growth on both mine and their parts. I think this is a dangerous trend that leads to more alienation of people, it doesn’t promote healing in the long run. I don’t know the answer. I do know this is intergenerational, and it hurts me to know that despite my most sincere efforts my sons see me as a not a good enough parent, and worthy of nothing more than being discarded. And, yes due to my poor upbringing, I have struggled to overcome low self esteem throughout my life. Maybe this is a factor in how they now treat me. I’m really curious about this alienation phenomenon, and see my situation as an opportunity for deeper personal growth, but feel like there is a deeper force at work here that we need to learn about.