Client Considering Cutting Off a Difficult Parent

This is a common scenario in which a client has “had enough” of a parent and is considering ending all contact.

The client is processing this strictly in terms of whether this will reduce personal stress. From a relational ethics perspective, the therapist is also thinking about the impact on the parent and other family members who will inevitably become part of the family drama of a cut off relationship.

As for all cases, assume that the therapist is also exploring the psychological factors and significance for the individual client. The focus here will be on the relational ethics consultation part of the therapy.

Relational Ethics teaches LEAP-C skills, which I will spell out in light of the case.

THE CASE

35 year old woman whose divorced father has remarried and expects the client to engage with his “new family.” The client has experienced her father as a very negative, critical presence in her life since childhood. At a time when she is facing other life stresses that have brought her into therapy for treatment of anxiety, she sometimes feels it’s time to “walk away” from any relationship with her father. She has siblings and children of her own who are part of the relationship picture.

Listen

For concerns the client expresses about the effects of a cutoff for her father and other members of her family of origin
For concerns she expresses about the consequences of a grandparent cut off for her children

Explore

Begin by summarizing the client’s personal stake in setting limits in her relationship with her father, and why she is considering a cutoff.
Ask about the details of what she has in mind, for example, no in person contact, no calls/texts, no birthday acknowledgements, no family gatherings with him present, no family holiday celebration, no acknowledgement of grandparent gifts, no hospital visits if her father becomes ill?
Ask about what this new arrangement would be like for her father, her siblings, and other relatives.
Ask the same with regards her children.
How might she tell her relatives and children about the cutoff, and are there things she would be asking of them—for example, to not talk about her father?

Affirm

Appreciate the emotional work the client is doing on this issue, including taking into account the other people involved.

Perspective (sample statements)

“This is so much more complicated than ending, say, a personal friendship that is just a one to one relationship. As you’ve been describing things, there are lots of people involved here who will all be affected.”
“What I’m hearing most strongly is that you want to set firmer boundaries, to have more self-protection from your father. A complete cut off is one way to do that. There may be other ways as well that do not involve so much collateral damage.”
"I’ve learned over the years that there is a big difference between having minimal contact at what I call “state occasions”—Thanksgiving, major birthdays, weddings, funerals—and a complete no-contact where everyone is nervous about whether they can invite you and your father to the same event. On “state occasions,” you show up, are civil and careful around your father, and there is no “elephant in the room” about who was not invited or who failed to show up because the other would be there.”
“With your kids, it isn’t so much they would miss a really close relationship with their grandfather; they don’t have that kind of relationship now. However, having zero contact with a nearby grandparent is another thing for kids; they usually can’t understand why, and they can get caught up in extended family drama.”

Challenge (mostly used when the client denies a potential impact on a third party, and delivered with big doses of empathy for the client's distress with her father)

“As I listen to you, I end up feeling that you may be minimizing two things. The first is your ability to learn to set better boundaries with your father. I think you have that ability, and I’m willing to help you. The second thing I worry is that you are not seeing is the distress that a zero contact policy can have on others in your family. A cut off is like barbed wire fence that everyone in the family has to navigate—and usually people get hurt in the process.”
“I appreciate how you’re letting me raise red flags about this, knowing that it’s your decision and I’ll be there for you no matter what. So, here’s another red flag: Cut off decisions can create a legacy for our children about how to deal with family conflict. I’ve seen family cutoffs get passed on through generations.”
“I have a hard question for you, maybe even an upsetting question given how you feel about your father right now. Imagine he is seriously ill and nearing death, and he asks your siblings to reach out to you to visit him before he dies. If you have had years of no contact, you would have a painful choice at that moment—whether to let him die without the opportunity to make peace with you.”