Fault Lines: Fractured Families and How to Mend Them

by Karl Pillemer

Scientists have shown us another fact about chronic stress that helps explain the unending distress of estrangement. It’s not just the actual events that stress us; additionally, simply thinking about the situation has almost identical negative effects. Psychologists call this source of stress “perseverative cognitions,” or what we laypeople might call rumination. Even if the stressor is not actually present—say, for example, the big argument with a child or parent occurred months ago—we re-create the event in our minds. We play the scene over and over in our imagination, ruminating about it long afterward. This kind of thinking has the same psychological and physical effects as the event itself, so we suffer by keeping the stress alive in our thoughts. Indeed, that’s why it’s called “chronic.”