Unpacking Estrangement: Who Goes No Contact?  🔗 **Source:** [Unpacking Estrangement: Who Goes No Contact?](https://share.snipd.com/episode/98820ba3-c373-442a-b380-ae684cd9d8fc) ## Highlights - **No Evidence Of An Estrangement Epidemic** - Estrangement isn't exploding at epidemic rates despite media panic about No Contact. - Wren Rizek checked surveys and found no clear data showing a proportionate, epidemic rise in estrangement after the pandemic. Transcript: Gene Demby Or are we just talking about it more? Yes, exactly. Rin Reczek And so as a research scientist, I'm like, actually, I can answer this question, right? I can start to untangle this. So I went to the research literature to see, okay, what have people been doing? How are people understanding that this is an epidemic and that it's growing? And I have to tell you, I could not find good data. What I saw when people were reporting this growing trend and then it's out of control is basically reports from psychologists saying that more and more people were coming to their practice. And I know that that's not how we can measure prevalence. So to have some sort of healthy skepticism about that, I said, okay, well, I can kind of test this. Gene Demby So Wynne crunched a bunch of numbers from the surveys about how often people say they talk to their families of origin. Rin Reczek And based on the data available, I don't think that I have a definitive, no, it's not rising. ([Time 0:06:16](https://share.snipd.com/snip/80fd8049-b66f-42e2-b758-31b31fc37a3b)) - **Telling Your Story Reduces Estrangement Stigma** - Many people wanted to tell their estrangement stories but feared stigma; sharing helped both researcher and participants. - Rizek found interviewees often said it was the first time they'd told their story and that speaking relieved shame. Transcript: Rin Reczek You know, I joke that researchers are often begging people, have to pay them a lot of money to be, you know, interviewed and to be part of research projects, but not this study. I mean, I could have done interviews for years. Many people told me that this was the first time they'd ever told the story. And I thought, gosh, like that is a gift to give to me. And I'm not really in those moments really thinking about research. I'm just listening. But I felt like it was so – a lot of people felt I found that they would tell me that they did want to help other people. Right. And that they felt that telling their story would actually be helping other people. And by virtue of doing that, it helped them. And this is an important part of, in any stigmatized topic, when people feel ashamed, just speaking truth out loud is really important. And they would tell me, like, if they had mentioned that, oh, I don't talk to my mom anymore, they would experience stigmatization. People would be like, why? She's your mom. You got to do it. Or she's your sister. How could you cut her off? A lot of that they experienced, and that's why they didn't share their stories with other people. ([Time 0:07:27](https://share.snipd.com/snip/cb751845-e545-4ad4-acce-8ae39590588e)) - **Why Estrangement Is A Cultural Flashpoint** - Media attention grows because people talk about estrangement more on social platforms and because family changes serve as a cultural flashpoint. - Rizek links coverage to TikTok/Reddit chatter and to debates like divorce or fertility that signal cultural conflict. Transcript: Rin Reczek Well, I think there's probably two big reasons that's happening. The first is that people are talking about it more than ever before. So we have this happening on TikTok, on social media, on Reddit, that there are conversations that we're having that maybe weren't in the public eye. The second reason, I think, is actually a little bit more sociological. So we can think of lots of examples in history of how the family is a lens into cultural kind of conflict. So for example, we could think about this in terms of divorce rates. Gene Demby Or childbirth rates right now. Rin Reczek Child fertility rates, same-sex marriage, abortion. All of these examples are in the family. And we see the family as a bedrock of our social order. This is a commonly held belief, goes to this notion of compulsory kinship, that this is really important to, we can say America, but I think in general, it's like across the world. Most cultures have the family as an essential unit. Now in the United States, it's a little bit more important because we don't have all the social safety nets that other countries do. Gene Demby You need your family to help you with childcare and all sorts of other stuff. Rin Reczek Childcare, health insurance, housing, you know, all these various goods and services are actually relied on in the family, right? ([Time 0:09:22](https://share.snipd.com/snip/ea409f9d-8ae0-4b1d-8572-1207aca39a4a)) - **Democratized Kinship Explains Many Estrangements** - Adult estrangement often follows a clash of 'kinship scripts' where adults seek egalitarian, respectful family norms. - Rizek calls this shift toward equal, consent-based relationships 'democratized kinship' that some parents resist. Transcript: Rin Reczek Yeah. So when we think about cultural discourses in the family, things that people pull, they're not directly doing it, but it kind of is like the water that they live in. Most of us grew up in a family culture that says we should be in relationships with the people that we were raised with and who raised us. And when people transition into adulthood, there's an opportunity to kind of shift how they think about family relationships. And that is a really pivotal moment. Now, people might estrange at that time. Some data suggests that the first initiation of estrangement might be around 23 or so. So what happens is, like, I can see this in my seven-year now, right? He's like, oh, this is our family culture. This is the things we do. I'm going to agree with it. I don't really have a choice. I'm a child. I have no power here. I have to live in this. When people become adults, then they start to be able to make their own decisions about the family cultures that they abide by. And when we become adults, we start partnering with new people. We start maybe having children of our own. We start in talking to like people at the workplace and learning more about them and learning about how they interact. And so as a process of doing that, we might learn new communication skills. Gene Demby We become open to other modes of being and other kind of familiar arrangements, right? ([Time 0:12:45](https://share.snipd.com/snip/9cd0a883-0328-4194-8a41-e4b493e3e149)) - **Seeing A Healthy Family Changed His Expectations** - A guest described how meeting a stable, affirming in-law family revealed new relationship possibilities and made him want different ties. - That exposure helped him see alternatives to his violent, conflictual childhood family and prompted desire for change. Transcript: Rin Reczek And so as a process of doing that, we might learn new communication skills. Gene Demby We become open to other modes of being and other kind of familiar arrangements, right? Exactly. When I told someone I was working on this episode, a friend of mine told me that when he was dating his wife, and he met her family, and her family was really stable and affirming, and he Came from a home in which he was, like, you know, on really bad terms with his dad who put his hands on him, and he was like, it took him so long to be comfortable in a family, like, to see his Wife's family be very supportive of each other and resolve conflict in a way that, like, didn't involve threats. He said it was this thing that sort of, like, he was surprised at how much he like he like wanted it. And like his body sort of rejected at the same time. I was like, oh, like what am I supposed to do with this this sort of this family culture, as you said, that is so unfamiliar to me. He was used to it. Yeah. Yeah. Rin Reczek I think a lot of people describe that. This might be why when you ask parents why they think their child is strange, they note an in-law but that is not what the people i talk to say and that your example would suggest i'm not Saying he's strange but like it's actually that they see a different way of relating and that changes them they're like oh i can be different and i want to be different that's the key they Want to be different and they don't necessarily want to operate in relationship as they always have. ([Time 0:14:00](https://share.snipd.com/snip/3010f3eb-2d82-4246-81aa-b403e6fa9a31)) - **Why Black Mothers Stay Connected And Black Fathers Drift** - Race and family structure shape estrangement patterns: Black mothers show low estrangement while Black fathers show high estrangement. - Rizek ties high estrangement among Black fathers largely to nonresidence driven by structural factors like incarceration. Transcript: Rin Reczek Yeah. So this goes back to the quantitative survey that I did that started this whole project. And what this survey showed is that on average, about 6% of adult children had an experience of estrangement with their moms and about 26% had estrangement with their dads. But the most striking finding for me was this finding about black mothers being the most secure relationships out of every other racial ethnic group and gender group. So black mothers had the lowest percentage of estrangement relative to any other group in the study. And by contrast, black fathers had the highest, almost twice more likely to be estranged than people with their white fathers. And I think these are related to each other. It's almost entirely explained by co-residents. Gene Demby Right. The correlation between not living with your child and estrangement later estrangement. Rin Reczek Yeah. There's a big association. Like if you don't live with your father in childhood, the rate of estrangement is much higher. So in particular for this cohort, we see the incarceration boom really hit this group of men. And that is a huge barrier to a relationship with a child. Because, of course, it's incredibly hard to maintain relationships when incarcerated. ([Time 0:16:59](https://share.snipd.com/snip/eedeb802-cf86-44a0-b4d9-45752edb0b91)) - **The Missing Missing Reasons For Estrangement** - Parents often say they don't know why a child cut them off, but the root is cultural: children seek different relationship norms, not just specific events. - Rizek labels this the 'missing, missing reasons' where parents misread estrangement as inexplicable rather than a clash of expectations. Transcript: Rin Reczek I think it goes back to this notion of like a cultural value around what family is. So you can imagine if you're a parent and you have a notion of compulsory kinship that says these relationships are sustained no matter what, it doesn't matter, right? Unconditional love, unconditional relationship. Gene Demby Or at least unconditional proximity, right? Rin Reczek Exactly. Unconditional access. Joshua Coleman uses this word. He works a lot with parents and he uses the word like helping understand that they're not entitled to another person's time, even their own child. So I think a lot of times that just isn't expected. I can totally understand that. Again, I have a little kid, but like I can understand. I'm like, I put a lot of effort in here. I did a lot of work. And I also might, you know, as a parent, I know my brain like sometimes is not working properly or like I do things that I'm not proud of. And it's actually really hard to to to reconcile that within myself. Parents that don't have, you know, I don't know, access to therapy or resources or, or the knowledge, or even dealt with their own childhood issues, right, that they're still swimming In that. And they think because that's true was true for them, that no matter what happens, they did it, they stayed in relationships with their parents, even though their parents did stuff To them that they were like happy with, right. And so they come at it with this framework that says it shouldn't matter. It shouldn't matter what I do because it didn't matter what you did when you were a kid. Right. So that's their framework. And I think like if we can put it in those terms and make it less personal, that's what I hear over and over and over again and see in the sort of parent side of things. The adult child is coming at it from an entirely different perspective. And that's the clash that we aren't able to kind of come to terms with. That's the missing, missing reasons. Because when the parent, and this happens, when the parent can see, oh, it's not about these specific things. It's actually not about what happened in childhood. It's actually not about this specific event. It's not about the in-law. It's not about whatever it is. It's not specific. It's actually cultural. It's that the child desires a type of relationship, and I want to be able to give that to them. Then we can reconcile. ([Time 0:24:05](https://share.snipd.com/snip/c3d94c22-f57e-49ca-a33e-db80e13a83b6)) - **Reframe Conversations To Bridge Estrangement** - Seek to reframe estrangement as a clash of relationship expectations rather than purely personal failings. - Rizek suggests parents reading children’s perspectives might help reconcile by seeing cultural rather than individual causes. Transcript: Rin Reczek The adult child is coming at it from an entirely different perspective. And that's the clash that we aren't able to kind of come to terms with. That's the missing, missing reasons. Because when the parent, and this happens, when the parent can see, oh, it's not about these specific things. It's actually not about what happened in childhood. It's actually not about this specific event. It's not about the in-law. It's not about whatever it is. It's not specific. It's actually cultural. It's that the child desires a type of relationship, and I want to be able to give that to them. Then we can reconcile. And that's, again, I know it might be hard for parents to read my book because it is from the perspective of the child. But I think like, okay, if you could, if you could read it from someone else's story with a little distance, could you maybe see their perspective? Could you maybe understand where they're coming from? ([Time 0:25:54](https://share.snipd.com/snip/3b3da1cb-a5cd-4708-84d5-6a628016c19c)) - **Estrangement Complicates Expectations About Elder Care** - Adult children worry about future caregiving but don't necessarily remain in harmful relationships to secure it. - Rizek notes people love their family yet worry whether they could or should provide elder care if ties are strained or intentionally severed. Transcript: Rin Reczek This is one of the hardest things, I think, for the people I talk to. Gene Demby Who watches my mom or my dad when they can't take care of themselves anymore. Rin Reczek Everyone I talked to really still loved their family, and it was very painful to think about them. I actually would ask like, what would allow you to reconcile? And then they would often bring up, oh, if my mom, you know, maybe was on her deathbed or something like that, what would I do? That's just different than caregiving, of course. I think at the stage that I talked to a lot of people, they were not sure what would happen if their parent called the needed caregiving help. In my other job as co-director of the Center for Aging Families, we do a lot of research on caregiving and spouses are the number one caregiver followed by adult children. And so it is a really important question. I think maybe I would ask, when we have children, setting up the expectation that this is like a sort of tit for tat, that I cared for you when you were a kid and now you... Gene Demby Now it's my turn. Exactly. Rin Reczek Yeah, a child can't really make that agreement. Yeah. And I think that that's a really challenging thing and something that is being challenged for many parents today. I personally don't expect my seven-year to be able to agree that when I'm older, he's going to care for me. Of course, I want a relationship, but I think that that's something that, particularly right now, the aging generation expects to happen. I think actually overall, when we think about aging parents, my colleague, Rachel Margulis has work on kinlessness, so people who don't have children, who will care for them? I think this expectation that our children care for us, which many communities across the world have this expectation, we might need to question a little bit. 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