Family estrangement is painful and isolating. What are the reasons that family members cut each other off? How can we cope with or prevent broken family ties?

Welcome back to savvy psychologist. I'm your host Dr Jade Wu and every week I'll help you meet life's challenges with evidence-based research,

a sympathetic ear and zero judgment. So family estrangement is one of my most requested topics from listeners who are coping with loss and

isolation that they feel when someone cuts off family ties.

In a way, the grief of family estrangement can be more painful, or at least more complicated,

than the grief over a loved one who has died.

When a family member voluntarily walks away, you may miss them and feel confused, ashamed even,

frustrated, especially if the hope of reunification is dashed.

So why do people excommunicate their family members and are there any ways to cope or remedy

the situation?

Well there hasn't been too much research about family estrangement, in part because it's a difficult thing to study.

Many people don't want to talk about their parents or children cutting them off.

But in recent years, researchers have been paying much more attention,

especially to estrangement between parents and adult children. So today, let's talk

about some things that they've learned.

Number one, estrangement between parents and adult children

is more common than you probably guessed.

So given how much we talk to each other about families, in the news, in the movies, in our

daily getting to know each other small talk, and even in our complaints about family disputes, you would think that almost all families are intact,

even if there is conflict. In a large survey of young adults who were all college and graduate students at universities in the

Northeastern U.S. Researchers found that about 17% experienced estrangement from an immediate family

member, most commonly from the father.

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