Fault Lines: Fractured Families and How to Mend Them

by Karl Pillemer

Bridging the rift requires abandoning the urge to align the past.

The second strategy is based on this principle: Time spent waiting for an apology is time wasted. Third, they offer a strategy that many found effective: Focus on building a new future that can eclipse the past.

individuals involved develop narratives based on what is necessarily selective memory.

The creation of such ego-centered narratives is not in itself a problem.

Some reconcilers admit that they gave up imposing their view of the past at a cost to themselves. They did it because they believed the restored relationship was more important.

The issue is not one of “Apologize for this thing you did to me.” Rather, the demand is “Apologize for how you have treated me for my entire life.” It is asking others to abandon their lifelong narratives, to which they are equally attached. Narratives form our sense of identity; we do not give them up easily.

Therefore, the reconcilers focused on changes in behavior in the present relationship, rather than repentance for past infractions. Many came to understand that a verbal acknowledgement of long-ago bad behavior would not be as satisfying as the actual end of the behavior.

We took the attitude of “operant conditioning.” You know, rewarding positive behavior, and backing off when they went to the negative behavior.

Once the relationship was reestablished, the relative began to feel, and eventually express, remorse.

I’m glad I didn’t wait any longer for an apology, because she could only make it after we reconnected.

These reconcilers told me that the key to bridging a rift was to focus on what could happen

next in the relationship, rather than what had already happened.

decided that if it feels like there’s no way forward because of the past, find something new to own together in the future. I remember at the time thinking: ‘I see what’s happening here. I am going to invest in this strategy.’”

It should just be something that’s not in your history that you can enjoy together, that’s a completely clean slate. That worked for us.

“Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.” If you are struggling with the role of the past in an estrangement, let that saying wash over you for a bit.

Kirkegaard

However, when it is time to reconcile, the relationship must be lived forward. For many people, the attempt to create a shared “backward understanding” will fail, because our narratives are our own and form part of our identity. If you are considering an attempt at reconciliation, you must ultimately move forward together, whether or not the two pasts can be aligned.

long as you think everything is the other person’s fault, you’re never going to have any kind of communication. If you want to reconcile, you have to have some understanding of that and stop throwing blame totally on the other person. In fact, drop the blame altogether and say, “This is the situation, and this is what happened” and accept that.

This hardened position shows up in a phrase I heard over and over from estranged family members: “It’s not my fault.” And my research revealed that few greater barriers to reconciliation exist than an absolute belief in that statement.

Estrangement is rarely one person’s responsibility. This insight may sound simplistic, but it is in fact one of the most important points in this book.

The claim “it’s entirely his or her fault” is almost never accurate and forms a major barrier to reconciliation.

Social psychological research on interpersonal relationships reveals that humans have a natural response to a traumatic event like estrangement, which paradoxically protects us in the short term but can harm us in the long term: our propensity to defensiveness.

Research suggests that we possess a mental system that is designed to preserve a high level of self-esteem. When our self-esteem gets damaged, we try to repair it. One of the most common mechanisms we use is dismissing negative feedback as irrelevant, biased, or just plain wrong. That is, we get defensive.

Defensiveness can give us back our self-esteem, but at the expense of ignoring the underlying reason we got the negative feedback in the first place. Instead of actually confronting the problem, we simply adjust to it psychologically.

What keeps people from an objective evaluation of their own role in a rift? Through my interviews, I discovered that many estranged persons adopt a stance of what I term “defensive ignorance.” This standpoint cuts them off from information that might help them understand their relative’s perspective and stands in the way of reconciliation.

the paradox of defensive ignorance.

Reading this narrative, it’s easy to ask: How is it possible to both describe relationship-long conflict and a volcanic incident while simultaneously feeling that one is entirely in the dark as to the causes of the estrangement?

Defensiveness encourages us to selectively edit information we receive, treating as “facts” events that help protect our self-esteem, and discounting those that may threaten a positive perception of ourselves.

Defensive ignorance puts up a formidable barrier to exploring one’s own role in the estrangement: dismissing and disregarding concrete reasons that are actually provided by the relative.

Defensive ignorance helpful handle

There is both a desire to know why the estrangement occurred and simultaneously a dismissal of the reasons provided.

Third, they propose that you go beyond the network of people who are already on your side to more objective outsiders.

Taking on the other’s perspective requires hard thinking and mental endeavor.

the reconcilers suggest writing about the other person’s side of the story. That is, take on the perspective of the person from whom you are estranged and write his or her view of grievances, incidents, and problem behaviors.

“step back to move forward.”

The point is to find a way to step back from your own highly emotional reactive viewpoint and write the history from another perspective.

big factor that leads to people not to talk to each other is the idea “Oh, I’m very right, and they’re very wrong.” I would give the advice to be a little bit selfless, consider the other person’s perspective, and try to work through it.

just have to let go of your expectations for the person. It is liberating. You stop wasting emotion expecting something that’s not going to be there.

Expectations are resentments waiting to happen.”

“Disappointment is unmet expectations, and the more significant the expectations, the more significant the disappointment.”

Research demonstrates that parents are more invested in their adult children than adult children are in their parents.

Because of their investment, parents see their children as a continuation of themselves—their legacy. The offspring, although attached to their parents, strive for independence and autonomy.

In general, parents care more. They, therefore, have more to lose in an estrangement.

A parent may pride himself or herself on having been a good provider. A child, however, is likely to view providing a stable childhood as a basic expectation of the parent-child relationship, not one that requires lifetime loyalty in the face of a pattern of aversive interactions.

“Expectations are relative, not absolute.” The reconcilers assert that it is a fool’s errand to expect the other person to become someone he or she is not. It will almost certainly leave you angry and unfulfilled. Not everyone is able to adjust their expectations, which is a primary reason why they remain in rifts.

deeply expresses the sense of acceptance of the other person “as is,” which for many people is key to the journey back.

you bring your expectations in line with the other person’s reality, it’s possible to reconcile with them.”

In contemporary self-help literature, there is an ongoing campaign against “settling.”

“You can go home again—but it won’t be the same ‘home.’”

It’s like a ghost that disappeared in the light.

We have seen in earlier chapters that a major reason that rifts endure is anxiety. People considering reconciliation worry about being overwhelmed by demands, criticism, requests for support, stressful interactions, and falling back into unwanted family roles. There is a fear of being reabsorbed into a maelstrom of family problems. The last-chance alternative can serve as a powerful method of self-protection—and as a way out, if need be.

“navigating the edge.” She