CALLING HOME with Whitney Goodman, LMFT - Oprah’s Estrangement Podcast and the Mel Robbins’ NYT Article

Episode Date: December 11, 2025

Whitney is fired up about Oprah’s recent podcast about going no contact. She also responds to a Mel Robbins/Karl Pillemer article titled "Life is Too Short to Fight With Your Family." She breaks down why these narratives are harmful, who they're really speaking to (and who they're ignoring), and the problematic assumptions embedded in questions like "where did you get this idea from?” Whitney challenges the toxic positivity of telling people to accept mistreatment from family, questions why we're not writing these articles to Uncle Joe who's being racist at Thanksgiving, and explains why "just accept and move on" advice completely misses the mark.Oprah’s podcast: Oprah Explores the Rising Trend of Going No Contact with Your FamilyMel Robbin and Karl Pillemer article: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/26/opinion/thanksgiving-family-fighting.html Whitney Goodman is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist (LMFT) and the founder of Calling Home, a membership community that helps people navigate complex family dynamics and break harmful cycles. Have a question for Whitney? Send a voice memo or email to [e-mail] Join the Family Cyclebreakers Club⁠⁠ Follow Whitney on Instagram | sitwithwhit Follow Whitney on YouTube | @whitneygoodmanlmft ⁠⁠Order Whitney’s book, Toxic Positivity Learn more about ad choices. Visit podcast.choices.com/adchoices This podcast is for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional mental health advice. 03:31 Oprah’s podcast 45:05 The Mel Robbins’ NYT article 58:15 Taking a break in December Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Book a visit now at 905-947-9990 or at amica.ca.ca.ca.com slash Unionville. Hello and welcome to the Calling Home podcast. I am your host, Whitney Goodman. You are getting me today extra fired up. Maybe it's the hormones, the holidays, something in the air. But buckle up because we have a lot to talk about today. Many of you have messaged me, tagged me, commented about two things that came out over the last two weeks. The first one was the Oprah podcast. about estrangement that really focused on adult child and parent estrangement. We're going to dive into that. And then the second thing was this article with Mel Robbins and Carl Pilamer. They were the two contributors to the article. And it's called life is too short to fight with your family. I am going to

include both of those links in the show notes if you have not gotten a chance to listen and read them. but it seems like most of the people that listen to this podcast have interacted with this content are quite fired up, understandably so, and would like to hear about it. Every time I do something like this, I think like a PR rep at my book agency cries a little bit inside because I am just skewering any hopes I have of ever being included in some of these conversations with some of these names that have massive followings and audiences and that are contributing to this discourse. And I'm very confused why certain people have been adding to this conversation. But let's go ahead and just get into all of my thoughts on this. Before we do that,

I wanted to let you know that we just added a really exciting new feature to the Family Cycle Breakers Club at Calling Home. And that is our private community discussion boards. So all of our members of the Family Cycle Breakers Club already have access to this feature. But if you join now, you will immediately get access in your account. These are hosted through Discord. They are completely private. Only members can get access to them and see them. And we have a bunch of different topic discussion boards, places where you can ask for advice, vent, hang out. I will be on there replying to people, not with therapeutic advice, but giving you discussion questions from our groups and resources, links to things. And you'll also be able to interact with our community

any time anywhere. This really is the answer to all of you that are like, I live in Australia or I live in India and I have not been able to access any of your groups. We know that it can be complicated and hard to show up in person and there's a lot of you. I mean, our groups are full every single week and we love seeing you all face to face, but this is a great way for you to connect outside of those groups. And when you need it most, like if you wake up in the middle of the night and you're like, I have been thinking about this and I really need some feedback or I want to see if anybody else is dealing with this. This is the place to go and do that. So if you're not a member of the Family Cycle Breakers Club yet at Calling Home, that is our

private membership community. You can join at Callinghome.com and get access to that community right away. Okay. Let's talk about this Oprah No Contact podcast episode first. In the title of the episode, she refers to it as a trend. I'm sure Oprah doesn't come up with these titles herself. Obviously, her team has done some research and figured out that this title would be clickbady, make headlines, and attract a certain demographic that is definitely trying to push this narrative. I hate the use of the word trend. I know that it can mean different things, but we all know what people are trying to say when they use the word trend in this situation. Right. Trying to show it from the perspective that like these young people think it's cool to cut off their family members and fun and they're doing it because their friends are doing it. And you guys have heard me talk about that until I'm blue in the face. It is the biggest load of BS I've ever heard. Let's get into the first part. Okay. So given what I know about Oprah's history with her family and what she endured as a child, I was a little bit shocked.

at how she started off this episode seemingly not really understanding why people were doing this or what might motivate it. And clearly, Oprah has a history of childhood trauma, of issues with her family that would lead her to have some similarities with some of these adults that are in her audience. And for those of you that haven't seen this episode, the way they set it up was actually pretty cool. So they had three experts there, all of whom have been on the Calling Home podcast. So if you want to hear more from any of these three people, I have episodes with all of them. Dr. Joshua Coleman has been on the show. He was one of my first guests that came on. I believe it's in late, 2023, early 2024. And then Nedra and I have worked together many times.

And she's someone that I talk to through Instagram. I helped her host a talk for one of her books that came out when we were in New York, and she is someone that I respect and love. And then Lindsay C. Gibson, the author of Adult Children of Emotionally Amateur Parents. She has also been on the Calling Home podcast, one of our most popular episodes, and she is someone that I love to hear from as well. So they had these three experts on there. And then they had parents who are estranged from a child. I recognized some of you from TikTok. I thought that was wild. I audibly was like, oh my gosh. And then they also had adult children who were estranged from a parent. They had a hospice nurse there that interacts with a lot of

people at the end of their life who have dealt with estrangement. And she was also estranged from her father, I believe, at the time of recording this episode. And then there were some people there that were estranged from parents because of in-law issues. I felt like they did a pretty good job of having a lot of voices in the room. They also had a mother there who had ended her relationship with her son herself. She wasn't on the receiving end of that cutoff. So some diverse voices here. The episode starts with Chris speaking and he is 30 years old. And as he's talking about his story, Oprah asks him a very interesting question. She says, where did you get this idea from? And like to cut your parents out. I thought this was so interesting.

We have a 30-year-old man who's married, and I think a parent standing in front of you. This is not a child, not a 14-year-old. And you're saying, how did you come to think that you could end a relationship with your parent? And I did think that this question, whether Oprah intended to or not, was reflective of the larger discourse among parents that if your adult child decides to stop speaking to you, it's because someone planted that idea and made them think that it was possible, advantageous, a good idea, and also something that was cool and fun to do, right? It couldn't be that they thought of it in their own adult brain because of the conclusions that they have come to. It has to be because somebody brainwashed them into thinking that that was

okay. And so there's always this tension between like, I don't believe that my child could have ever thought of this themselves because they would never do something like this to me. It has to be that there was this like nefarious third party source. And sure, sometimes there is. but this question is more, I think, with the undertones of like, you never could have thought of this yourself. And I found that very interesting, especially as a way to open up this conversation. At this point in the conversation, they start talking about how to explain this to grandchildren. And I believe that this couple had a young child that did not have a relationship with the grandchildren. And they were asking, I think, in a very, what's the word I'm looking for? Like, they had positive intentions for this question. And they really wanted to know, like, what is the best way to talk about this to our kids? And Dr. Coleman responded with saying, you know, you are showing people that, or you're showing your child, essentially, that people can be cut out of your life. And I've heard this a lot. And whenever I hear this, I'm like, yeah, duh.

Like, of course people can be cut out of your life that are hurting you. I want to show my kids actually that that's possible. You know, I think so many people of the millennial generation and even Gen X grew up with parents who had this mindset that once you get married and once you have family, it really doesn't matter how miserable you are or how poorly you're being treated, you stay because to cut people out is wrong, immoral, immature, whatever these words are that we're using to describe it. And now we have parents of young children saying, no, I actually do want to show my kids that someone's title as wife, husband, mother, sister, doesn't afford them the rights

to treat me poorly with absolutely no recourse or consequence. They also can be removed or moved further away. And so I don't see that lesson being taught to kids as being a bad thing. I think there are ways to flip this. And this is where Dr. Gibson steps in and says, you know, if there are people that are harmful to you, emotionally, you do have the right to keep as much distance that you're going to have in your relationship with them. You're not giving them like carte blanche, you know, access to you or to treat you

However, and this happens at around like 24 minutes in. And I really appreciated her saying this because I think there are two sides to this. Of course, we want to model for children that, and I'm for ourselves, that relationships are not always easy. You're going to have setbacks and moments where you feel hurt or like you're not being heard or like the relationship isn't going in the right direction when someone is struggling, whatever it is. and we also have to show that when someone continues to harm you over and over and over and they are disrespecting their role in your life and not treating it as a relationship that they value, then those relationships might end because we would do that with a friend, a boss, anyone. And if anything, that role that you have as sister, brother, mother, father,

whatever it is, is so important that we should treat it with the utmost care when we are relating to someone in that position and say, you know what? Because I am their mom, I especially want to treat them with kindness and respect and all of that. And Dr. Gibson talks more about this later in the episode. So then we have this, the next adult child that says, you know, it wasn't one event. and this is something that I have heard pretty much unanimously from adults who do not have a relationship with their parents. These stories that you get where it's like everything was perfect. We had this beautiful, wonderful relationship until I went to their wedding and then they ignored me at the wedding and never spoke to me again are not reflected by the other person most of the time. I really feel

We have such this clash of perspective taking between these two groups a lot of the time where parents are very, very focused on adulthood. They're very focused on whatever happened in the last three weeks leading up to the estrangement. And the adult children are often saying it was death by a thousand cuts. It wasn't one thing. This was something that kept happening over and over and over. And it was something that I tried to fix a million times, but that would not get better, right? And it's hard to understand what's happening in that really big discrepancy, that why is it not being reported by any adult children that have decided to cut off a parent that it was just like this one thing and then it was over? You know, why are they

reporting so many other major incidents or micro incidents along the way? And I think we're seeing here with the adults in this episode that they are also reporting. that and the parents are really focusing on adulthood. And, you know, one, one girl tells her story and then says, you know, my mom blocked me and I followed suit. And I thought Oprah really empathized with this woman that she could understand, you know, your mother has abandoned you. She's not been around. She hasn't been present. She's not talking to you. She lived 20 minutes from you and did not make an effort. And so in that situation, it was like easier for people to access empathy, all the experts included of like, this is a valid reason. And it wasn't like

you just like flippantly, you know, cut off your mom. She did things to you that are easily identifiable and recognizable. And this is where Oprah says something really important. She says in the past, people just suffered. And I think this is where we are seeing such a gap generationally. And even among people, you know, there are some voices in this space that are even close in age to me, but have a lot of those beliefs reflected in the things that they share. And I think that those are beliefs that come from certain religious communities, certain cultures that say, like, you should suffer in the name of family closeness, right? And that that is

something that we do. It is admirable. It is celebrated. It's rewarded. And that when people do that, you know, they are good people. They are family oriented. They are, you know, the kind of people that you want to have around you. And being close to your family does come with some degree of suffering. Okay. It's just the reality, being close to anybody does, that if I am going to be in a very close relationship with someone, I'm probably going to have to endure inconvenience, bad moods, you know, listening to them talk about the same thing over and over. I'm going to deal with some level of annoyance, 100%. But that doesn't mean I'm going to deal with abuse and trauma and neglect. These are two totally different things. And that's what we're going to get into more

when I talk about the New York Times article because I think we're having these conversations about families and estrangement. And some people are talking about things that are annoying and some people are talking about things that are abusive. And there's a line between the two of those things. And we cannot talk to those same groups at the same time. When we think about the narrative that people just suffered and we think about that as being either a cultural, generational, gendered, religious type of belief system that people hold. I think what happens a lot of the time is there is this inherent jealousy in a lot of ways between people who suffered and people who are walking away. And instead of feeling that feeling of like, oh, I could have done that. I had options. I don't want to

blame myself. I don't want to feel that shame or embarrassment or guilt for what I endured. So I would rather point the finger at you and say, look at what you're doing. You're destroying families. You're evil. You don't have any tolerance for conflict. We're really saying, like, I sucked it up and I endured it. So you should have to do that too. And if you're not willing to do that, that's a problem. And I actually think that you are wrong and weak. And again, destroying your family. And this is the big difference between, I think, certain people's mindsets around this is that there is a large growing school of thought now that relationships should be additive to our lives. It should be net additive, right? That they should not take from us in such excess of what they give.

And that did not use to be the case. I think the belief used to to be, I have to invest in this. I must give, give, give until I am completely drained. And I am going to do that because it's going to get me praise, social status, accolades. It will get me into heaven. You know, whatever it is that you are being told that fuels this belief system. The problem with that is, is that when you look at any family, there's usually only some people that are giving like that. And there's a lot of people that are just getting. And so that's my problem with these conversations is I feel like we are talking at the people who have been giving and getting nothing in return for their entire lives. And we are telling them

to figure out a way to continue existing with people who only want to take. And when you are in a relationship with someone where all you do is give and suck it up and stuff the feelings down. You just keep giving and giving and giving. And that person just keeps growing in size in your life. And you literally cannot function. You can't be a parent, a sibling. You can't work because everything is just taken up by them. You don't want to give anymore. And every time I listen to these podcasts and I read these articles, we are not speaking to the takers, to the people who are being harmful and abusive, who are causing the entire family to circle around them and make sure that they're okay and always manage them. We are only speaking to the people who are saying,

I'm done doing that and basically telling them, you need to keep doing that because you're the one, you're the glue. You're the one that's keeping your family together, all this stuff. And like, that just what really gets me fired up is like, I think we are speaking to the wrong people. Whenever we're talking about forgiveness, we're talking to people who need to do the forgiving of the person who hurt them. And when that person is a parent, you're essentially looking at a physical abuse survivor, a child sexual abuse survivor, someone who's severely neglected in saying, you really need to forgive that person. of looking at that parent and saying, you need to atone for what you did. You need to earn forgiveness. You need to show behavior that is worthy of forgiveness. We're always talking at the person that needs to like do the forgiving. And that's why this stuff isn't landing. That's why these

podcast episodes and these articles are getting skewered, you know, by the community at large. and people are saying, I hate this stuff. And instead, the only people that are cheering it on are those that have been cut off, are those that have been told, hey, you're being disrespectful, you're hurting me, you're emotionally immature, all these things. Those people are hearing this and they're like, finally, someone who gets it. They are like, they're right. My kid's crazy.

He doesn't want to let me say racist words. the table and call him slurs and tell him that his relationship is a sham, like, because those are my beliefs. And like, this guy really gets me because I should be allowed to express myself and be that way. And like, we're all just kind of sitting here like, why are we giving these people more tools and more weapons to utilize against people that they've already been harming for their entire lives? I'll rest there. It just does not make any sense to. to me, why we are on this whole, like, it's like we've done this full 180 of being like believe victims, let's protect children, you know, all. And now we're like, oh, if protecting

kids means making parents be accountable for what they did, I don't know if I want to protect the kids. Like, that's what it sounds like. And, oh, maybe the kids are being dramatic. Maybe it really wasn't that bad. And we're all coming at this from the perspective and look, I am almost a mother of three. I get it. Like parenting is so hard. It's so stressful. It's overwhelming.

It is not my child's job to empathize with how hard parenting is for me or to make parenting easier for me. I made the choice. I had the kids. I did it. I got to figure out a way to be good at it and to do it right. Doesn't mean it's going to be perfect. No.

but again, not my child's responsibility to look up at me, this person with 30 plus more years on this planet than them, and say, you better figure out a way to make this feel good for me and to make me feel like I am just the best parent ever and I never make any mistakes. That's wrong. That burden should not be cast in that direction. And that is what we are asking a lot of victims to do when we publish pieces like this. Now, I want to be clear that this Oprah episode was not all bad. There were a lot of really good moments here.

And I think that Oprah starts to catch on here where we're still talking about this woman whose mother lived 20 minutes away from her and still didn't want to see her. And Oprah says, you know, people always say you only have one mother. She is recognizing that this mother was very absent. And Nedra chimes in here and says, you know, people can birth a child without parenting them. And I think that's something that we have to differentiate between is that you can be a mother in the sense that you grew a child, gave birth to a child, and not parent them, not raise them, not do the act of mothering. that child or not do it well. And I think that this is a reality that we do not want to face as a culture. And this is something that I am reckoning with as I write my book is that some people are not good

parents. Some people don't want to be parents. They're not good at it. And some people, of course, don't have the resources and the support and all of that. That's one group. And they also have a group that really they didn't want this. They don't want to do a good job. They can't. They don't have the capabilities. And I think we want to believe that the second every parent holds their child in their arms, they feel this overwhelming desire to protect them and do good by them.

And that's not always what happens. And I think we are really wrestling with that reality. We do not want to look at the facts of how many children are abused by their parents or a care. every day in the United States. That is by far in large, the largest group of people that are responsible for abusing children are their own parents and caregivers. We have to acknowledge that. We spend so much time thinking about the boogeyman in the bushes that's going to jump out and like kidnap our kids. And we're not actually looking at what are the numbers that we have in front of us about who is actually hurting children and how are they doing that. I believe that this

is Nedra Tuwab that continues talking here, you know, about how a lot of other people will tell you what you should do with your mother, but they don't understand your situation. And I think this is a very important caveat when you are consuming any content about estrangement moving forward is that it might not all apply to you. And a lot of the time it is written from the perspective of someone that does not understand this at all and is more looking at this from trends and an overall perspective and has not actually sat with you or with people to discuss what this looks like and feels like on a micro level in your unique situation. And they go on to talk about how sometimes you have to allow yourself to be angry

because anger can be a valuable emotion to figuring out what you need to do here. And Oprah said something really great in this moment that I liked as she said, you know, forgiveness is giving up the hope that the past could be different. And Nedra notes that, you know, there are different paths to forgiveness and sometimes you have a relationship and sometimes you don't. And that's okay. And I think, you know, Dr. Coleman stepped in here and validates that she did not. deserve to be mistreated by her mother. And this is valid to take that approach.

Now, I think this is where I take a lot of issue with, like, the populations that we're speaking to. And we're going to get more into that when I discuss the article in the New York Times. But I'm always being told about this specific population of adults. And this is, I'll set the scene for you. This is kind of the profile of those adults. They were raised in homes with very loving and attentive parents, good parents, and they did not face much adversity. It typically described as being like middle class, upper middle class, their parents attended sporting events and were always there for them.

And then in adulthood, something happens. Typically, they view content on social media. they meet a partner who hates their family and turns them against their family, or they have an addiction or a mental illness. And all of these adults then become very punitive. They are mean and cruel and negative. And they cut off their parents with no warning and typically do so by saying, I need to protect my peace. You never cared about me. I'm not talking to you again. And then they don't talk to their parents. This is a population that I cannot find. I cannot find these adults. It cannot get them to speak to me. I cannot get anyone to point me to where they are so that I can talk to them.

I hear from their parents, their parents describe them in this way, and therapists who primarily interact with their parents describe them this way. But I cannot find these people. And if you're listening to this and you feel like, you know what, I relate to that, I would love to speak with you, especially leading up to my book, but I cannot find you. Like, And that's where the disconnect comes from me is like, why do we keep speaking to this group? Who is this mythical group? Why are we acting like they are more of the problem and the issue here than all these kids that were abused, neglected, and harmed by their parents? We keep giving caveats to those and be like, okay, well, if they were abusive, then you totally get to cut your parent off.

But what about all these people? What about this massive group of adults, young adults? And, oh, and they're always young. They're always like 18 to 28. We need to talk to them because they are unfairly cutting off their families. They are evil. They want to ruin society, all that. We're so fixated on this group that I think is absolutely the minority.

I have no proof, no evidence to believe that the majority of estrangement, between adults and their parents is being caused by that group that I just described to you. And so when we focus on that group and make them the audience, we completely stigmatize, harm, further neglect, and hurt a population of people who actually needs help. To me, this is the same thing as being like, we're talking about sexual assault against women. And we're like, but some people lie. And so we spend every day, every article, every podcast talking about the one less than one percent that have lied about being sexually assaulted. That's what's happening here. And it's insane to me. You can tell like it gets me

heated because I don't understand why every day people are waking up and saying, let's create content for this mythical group that certainly is not the large population that needs help with this. And I think this article in the New York Times plays into that theory as well. We then hear from an estranged mother. And this estranged mother does not have contact with her daughter. And she validates that her daughter, you know, did have to choose when her parents were going through the divorce and that their divorce was difficult for the children. She goes on to say, you know, we had repaired after a previous reconciliation. We made TikToks together. We got tattoos. We went on vacation together. And then she, you know,

shares that they are estranged again at this moment in time while she is online. And she says, you know, I feel like she lacks conflict resolution skills. We are villainized. We didn't get the opportunity to discuss it. She continues to say it was a little thing and she didn't get her way. And this is a phrase that several of the parents say in this episode, which I think is very telling because it's something you say about a little kid. Like, they didn't get their way. So they threw a tantrum. Like, that's not an adult type of commentary. I like what Dr. Coleman said in this moment where he said, you know, you need to tell your child that you believe that they wouldn't do this. unless they thought it was the healthiest thing for them to do and that the parent really does

need to find the kernel of truth in what their child is experiencing and saying about the relationship. And I found it really interesting that, you know, I think Oprah asked this parent, like, does your daughter know that you want to talk to her or that you would like to discuss it. And her response is, I'm sure she's seen my TikToks. And I just want to throw this out there that making TikToks as a parent about your relationship with your child, I know that that might give you access to support and community and it feels good. And it's an outlet. But I am a very firm believer that it is absolutely never going to help you repair. It is not going to bring your child back, recording social media posts for public consumption is also not a invitation to your child

to reconnect with you and to have a conversation. I don't think that that type of reconnection should have an audience or needs an audience. And so it's just something to consider for any parents that are thinking, like, I want to reach out. I want to have a conversation. That's not the way that I would recommend approaching it. And I don't think that it has a high rate of success when it is approached in that way. This woman also talks about having good relationships with her sons and not with her daughter. And this is something that we hear a lot, especially when it's estrangement from a mother to a daughter. It's possible for you to have good relationships with some of your children and not others. And it's still not be your child's fault. Because all of them

have had very different experiences of you. And all of them have lived different childhoods, different lifetimes. They also have different personalities and temperaments and different things about them and their experience that causes the two of you to relate to each other in very different ways. So using this as a defense, especially in conversation with your child, of like, well, your brothers like me, they say I'm a great mom, does not promote conversation or healing or reconciliation. It actually just puts people on the defensive a lot of the time and makes them feel like, okay, see, you still think I'm fully the problem here. And you're not trying to understand my experience. You're just refuting my experience by using my

siblings experience as, like, your evidence that I'm wrong. And that doesn't feel good. It also drives siblings apart in the process. We then hear from a woman who went no contact with her son. And I want to say this, that if your adult child is threatening you with physical, verbal, financial abuse, you know, this womanless, all of them, then you have a right to protect yourself as a human being, no matter who is doing that to you, even if it's your child. However, this mother also says, you know, it's because he didn't get his way. And I thought that that was interesting. And I want to know more, not as a way to blame or shame this woman for what she's doing in

the moment, because she may very well need to do so. But I want to know more about the relationship leading up to this point. this mother is remarried. I believe that she does have a quite popular account where she shares stories about her life as a mother who is estranged from her adult son by her choice and that they did endure some things as a family that can often lead to no contact or issues in adulthood. And so this is again just another example of like, yes, what you are doing is justified and right. You're allowed to protect yourself. You're allowed to set boundaries. You should not be exposing yourself to any type of harm or threat like that at the hands of anyone, even if it's your child.

And as a parent, can we look at how we got here? Can we empathize with what it led us to this point? Can I speak about the situation in a different way, even if that means that I still can't have a relationship with my child? I think that that can still be very important. and lead to some healing in the end. We also have the dad who has reconciled with his daughter. And I thought it was interesting to hear from him. He is one of the only parents, I think, up there to my recollection, that showed a lot of reflection, accountability, emotional intelligence, and Dr. Gibson points this out.

And he talks about learning that you have to parent your children at different stages. differently and how maybe he had been controlling or like a helicopter parent over his child. And you know, this changed him. And she also had to learn how to start communicating with her dad and knowing that her dad was going to listen to her and be receptive to her opinions as an adult woman. Okay. And this is where, you know, he again says they don't get their way. Like this, this was so strange how many of them said this. And this again, to me, shows this like, I am the adults in a position of authority. I'm not giving you your way as the child. This isn't a relationship. It's about me withholding something. And then like, you just need to learn to deal with it.

And that doesn't mean like, yeah, you give your kid everything they want. You give them money and all that. I'm not saying that. But using this type of language, I think, is eye opening into how the dynamic is functioning between a parent and their adult child. Now, Oprah says something here where she says some of this is good, you know, reaching a state where you can protect yourself is a good thing, but have we gone too far? And this is always the question, right? And my question is, like, what is too far? Like, what are we talking about here? Again, are we pandering to this mythical group that maybe makes up 1% of these cases? Or is this actually something? Or is this actually something that is happening. And I loved what Nedra stepped in and said here, where she talks about

if someone isn't coming to us, we have to ask ourselves why. We have to ask ourselves, why do they not want to talk about these things? Like, parents have to figure these things out and understand them as well. And you have to have the willingness to self-reflect and ask, is there something I did? Nothing can change until that happens is what they're trying to highlight here. And you have to bring up each person's reality and try to understand each other's reality. And Dr. Gibson says something here that I think was missing from this entire conversation and that we need to highlight even more, and this needs to come up in every situation,

is that you need to be aware that you may have more power than you think you do. And this is something that I think a lot of parents miss here, is that you and your child are not equal. You never have been equal. And emotionally, you might not be equal until they are like looking at you in a hospital bed or in a nursing home. And even then I still hear adults say that their parents still have this deep emotional hold over them and they would give anything to hear an apology or I love you or I'm proud of you.

And that shows how off this power imbalances. These relationships between parents and their children are hierarchical relationships where the child has zero to no power for almost 18 years of that relationship. We cannot look at these as adult peer-to-peer relationships that were established in adulthood between equals. The conversation is over when that is how we try to look at it because that isn't accurate. It doesn't exist. We have to look back and say, what did this relationship look like?

When I was the ultimate authority and power figure in this child's life, I chose where they slept, what they ate, what water they drank, where they lived, who they were exposed to, what they listened to, who their friends were. I was the arbiter of all of that for a significant portion of their life. And if we don't acknowledge that power differential, we've lost the plot in this entire conversation. And that is, I think, what really bothers me about these talks is that we're acting like these are two friends who have a relationship on completely equal footing and that they both need to be accountable and respectful. And of course, all adults need to be responsible for their behavior and their actions and their feelings. But there is a lot more

nuance to this discussion than just that. Now, the hospice nurse is what wraps this all up. And then at the end, there's like two minutes where I think the experts on the podcast had some really wonderful things to say. The hospice nurse talks about how it's death by a thousand cuts and how she often has these parents, you know, laying there on their deathbed saying, I want to talk to my adult child or I want them to come visit me. And then if their adult child chooses not to see them or doesn't pick up the phone, she says, why don't you write a letter? And I'll give it to them. And I thought it was very fascinating that most of the parents decide not to write the letter. And I thought this hospice nurse, I hope nurses everywhere who deal with these types of issues

can listen to her because I thought she had such a great perspective on people's separate realities offering dignity to everyone that is involved and also noting that, you know, it sounds like it's one thing, but no one does it over one thing. And I, at the end here, Dr. Gibson talks about the state of the world and how stressful things are today and that we don't really have the time and space in our lives to micromanage these relationships that are so taxing or abusive or difficult and we just want to have some type of ease in our lives. And she says you need to treat your family member like a treasured friend. And I think that's something we can all take away from this episode is that this isn't about who's right.

right, who's wrong, who's doing what? It's really coming back to what I treat other people in my life like this. And I think a lot of these parents, unfortunately, their children see that they treat people at their church better than they treat their own kids. They treat their friends better. They treat the random stranger at the grocery store better. And they've been witnessing that for a lifetime. And so they know that their parents have the capability. And they're just not doing it with them. And that gets old after a while. All in all, I think this podcast episode had some strengths, some weaknesses. I appreciate that they tried to bring a lot of different voices into the conversation. I think each of these experts, you know, had their own lens and things to

contribute. And I think Oprah kind of came around in the end, maybe saw it a little bit differently. I would have liked to have seen a little more pushback on some of the things that the parents were saying, but I understand that the experts were not there to be therapists. This was a very controlled environment. They likely were time limited and they don't know these people. You know, they couldn't like, you can't like go toe to toe with some of the things being said in this environment. But I appreciate what was done and the attempts that were. made here. Reason number 37 why Nissan is built for our winter.

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bonus on remaining 2025 models. Visit your local Nissan dealer today or nisan.ca for more details. Least term for 48 months with 1,249 down conditions apply. Now let's talk about the second piece on Estrangement that came out over the last two weeks, and that is the New York Times opinion piece that is titled, Life is Too Short to Fight with Your Family. Mel Robbins and Carl Pilamer contributed to this article. I want to say that Dr.

Pilamer has done some amazing research on family estrangement. He is one of the foremost voices in this conversation and has done one of the longest studies on family estrangement out of Cornell. And I have used some of his data and read his book fault lines. And I think that it's really wonderful. Where I think that this goes totally wrong is when we are maybe not combining the data with also what else we have learned about family estrangement, why it happens, and who is contributing to this discussion over the last decade. Mel Robbins, I have no idea why she was tapped for this piece. Let's break it down. I mentioned this in the part where I was talking about Oprah's podcast episode, and this article is a perfect example of this. Why are we

targeting estranged people with this information? This is such the perfect, like, Mel, of my two areas of expertise or of passion of toxic positivity and dysfunctional family relationships. This article is dripping in toxic positivity. And this advice of like accept it and move on, you can choose so much to dwell on it. Guys, it's so old. It's so played out. It's like, are we really still doing this? Are we really still trying to tell people like, hey, you're going have so much fun at Thanksgiving if you just accept it and move on it. And you get to choose how much you dwell on it. You get to decide when your uncle who sexually abused you is sitting across the table and everyone's pretending like it didn't happen, you get to decide how much that

bothers you. Like, are you insane? Truly, I don't understand how anybody with their pulse on this issue whatsoever would think that not only is that a good take, it's worth publishing and that it's helpful. I cannot wrap my head around it, truly. Because there are no caveats here, really, except for at the very beginning of the article, you know, where they say, like, yes, there are important reasons to cut ties with certain people intentionally. But we're not just cutting people off. We're letting our closest relationships disintegrate through neglect. busyness and an unwillingness to move past the things that bother us. Unwillingness to move past the things that bother us. Do you really think that's why people are going no contact? Like be straight up,

be so for real. Do you really think that's why? They just don't want to get over it. They just think too hard, moving on. Like again, we are speaking to the few and hurting the many with takes like this. And it's like, it just sounds so simple, right? It's like, change your thoughts, change your life. La-di-da-da-da. And it's, oh my gosh, it truly, it pains me to read this. So they give, they give that little caveat, and then that's it. So there's no real explanation in this article of saying, like, hey, this article is not for anyone that has been abused, neglected, harmed by their family or continues to be abused, neglect, and harmed by their family.

This article is just for people who are a little bit annoyed with their family, who think that, like, their cousin has some weird takes or, you know, that their aunt is annoying or, like, someone chews loud at the table. Like, that's what this article's for. No, they're purposefully still casting a wide net and victim blaming people who decide that they don't want to sit down with family members that are awful. to them. And I was having a conversation with someone about this the other day that I am so tired of this take that like, and they say this in here, they talk about like the dad that has like

crazy political takes online or something like that. Let me find this. Okay, yeah. Your husband's side of the family has politics that bother you or your college age kids don't call as much as you'd like, accept it and move on. Would you want to spend your last Thanksgiving resenting your father's politics, or avoiding your sister for something she said last Christmas. Guys, who are these people? Who are these people who have, like, perfect, lovely relationships with their family members? And they're like, oh, she made that one offhand comment. And so I'm never going to see her again.

Because, like, they are not talking to me. They are not telling me these stories. They're not attending my groups. They're not in session with me. They're not in my DMs. Like, I genuinely, I said this early in the episode, like, call me, email me, me, I want to talk to you. I want to speak to these people who are truly cutting off their family members because of an offhand comment one year that existed in an otherwise fine

relationship. My phone isn't ringing and it's really frustrating me to keep asking these questions and like you get no response, but yet this just keeps getting regurgitated over and over and over like there are all of these people out there that are doing this yet we cannot interact with them for some reason like they're not wanting i i don't know how you know this but no one else can find these people that's what's very confusing to me and i will share personally like i've shared this in other episodes before i disagree politically with a huge percentage of the people that i interact with on the holidays i would think i maybe it's 50 50 these days but historically I was in the minority, and I'm in the minority in quite a few family situations that have to do

with politics. There is a difference between someone having a different opinion than you and someone being an asshole about that opinion. So if my family members can't find a way to interact with me without spewing all this stuff, calling me names, being like, oh, hey, snowflit, like being derogatory and rude, then we're probably not going to hang out. But if I have people in my life who have certain opinions and they can otherwise be engaging, respectful, kind, talk about other things, not be huge assholes, like, then we have a chance. I think what a lot of people are talking about is that they go to Thanksgiving.

And these family members who have differing opinions are being mean and rude and condescending. They're bringing this stuff up and they are deliberately trying to get a rise out of them. They're being cruel. There's also a big difference between a difference in belief and telling someone, like, I think your marriage is a sham. I don't think that you should have rights. I think that your wife should get kicked out of the country. like these aren't just opinions. I hate when people frame it like this, like that there is

no impact. And again, why can't dad or grandpa or mom or Aunt Susie keep their opinions to themselves on a holiday? Why is it up to me to endure it and to sit there and to be like, oh, that's just Uncle Joe. He's always being racist and hateful. I better move on and get over it. it's weird. Why don't we write these letters, these articles to Uncle Joe and tell him, hey, people might not want to hang out with you because of the way you talk and the things that you say. So again, this article is just speaking to the wrong people. Like we all need to learn how to get along and accept each other. But you're asking the person who is being vilified and attacked and ridiculed to accept that treatment of them because it's a holiday and because it's their

family will never make sense to me. And I don't understand how asking that of people is promoting families and making families stronger. I do not understand that, especially when the advice is accepted and move on, you can choose how much to dwell on it. No thanks. Come on. Now, There's one good part of the article where they talk about how receiving unsolicited advice is stressful and that you shouldn't spend Thanksgiving trying to change people like your parents, fair. I agree with that. And I think that we have to meet people where they are, accept them for who they are,

and then we can decide if and how we would like to relate to them in those situations. Now, this line really got me. Let your parents make their own mistakes, even if you have to deal with the consequences. Okay. What kind of mistakes are we talking here? Like a hoarding parent who has boxes stacked up to their ceiling in every room of their house and I have to clean it out after they die. A parent who spends all their money on alcohol, drugs, and gambling.

So I have to pay all their medical bills and house them in my home. The parent who keeps getting married and divorced. over and over and using me as their therapist and their dumping ground. What kind of things are we talking about here? Because I think these mistakes need to be elaborated on. Some of these mistakes are huge with reverberating consequences that hurt generations of families to come because of the impact that they have. And again, we are not talking to the parents about the burden that they are putting on their

children. we are telling the children to suck it up and deal with it, make it make sense. Again, it doesn't make sense to me. Maybe I'm the crazy one here. And then they asked this question of like, imagine if you had a year left to live. Every estranged adult who is estranged from a parent that I have spoken to that has been dealing with abuse, contempt, criticism, severe mistreatment and neglect for their entire life. I may be putting words in their mouth, but based on the conversations I've had with them, if I asked them to imagine if they had a year led to live, they would say they do not want to spend it enduring this treatment for one more second. And I think if anything, it might

make them engage and cut off faster. This is just like reeking of toxic positivity. I mean, they tell this story of like a woman who grew up in poverty and now she has access to like a bath and clean water like come on you guys i really thought we were past this of this so just like be grateful you got anything kind of rhetoric instead of saying you know what maybe we all deserve better maybe everyone deserves access to clean water and a bath like maybe kids deserve to grow up in homes where they're not being neglected or abused and they shouldn't have to grow up and try to do all these mental gymnastics to figure out why the person who was supposed to take care of them hurt them. Like, this has to stop. I don't know who we think we're speaking to with these

articles because I really think they are doing so much harm to the people that actually need to hear, hey, you don't deserve to be treated like that. And also, are we placating abusers and people who are causing serious harm by telling them, you know what, if your family can't deal with you, they can't handle you at your worst. They don't deserve you at your best. Like, we're handing that to them on a silver platter. And I think it's insane. This is where I will get off my soapbox because I know I had a lot of emotions in this episode, but I hope for some of you it was helpful to get some of your feelings validated or to feel a little bit more understood after maybe taking in some of this content and being like, is this a me thing?

Am I supposed to like this? Is this supposed to feel good for me? I hope that hearing some of my thoughts and my feelings helped you feel a little bit less alone. This is going to be my last episode before the new year. I am going to be taking two weeks off from the podcast over the holidays. and going into the new year. You will get a new year episode from me on January 6th. So until then, I encourage you to go back and listen to previous episodes, anything that you've missed. Let me know what you want to hear about next year. In January, we have a really exciting topic at Calling

Home, and it is going to be how to become more emotionally mature. This topic was my most popular podcast episode of 2025. You can go back and find that episode and listen to it to see if this is a topic that you would be interested in. But we are going to start that content and those groups on January 5th. This is for anyone that would like to improve their emotional maturity and really become someone that is able to feel their feelings, express their emotions in healthy ways, and also be in emotionally mature relationships with others. I think all of you will benefit from this. And I am so excited to see you in the new year at Calling Home. For the rest of the month of December, you can find me inside the family cycle.

Breakers Club. If you're missing this podcast, there will still be groups with me all month, including a special holiday group on December 22nd right before Christmas and at the tail end of Hanukkah and leading into the new year. We also have all of our other groups going on this month. And we have our discussion boards now where you can come and interact with me and members online in a private community. Thank you all so much for listening to the podcast this year. we saw tremendous month-over-month grow of this show. And I know that I could not have done it without you and without the people that help make the show possible and support us. So thank you. As always, please leave a review, comment, like, subscribe. Wherever you're listening to this,

it really, really helps us. And I'm hoping to take the podcast even further and bigger next year. Thank you all so much. Have a great rest of your day. And happy new year. The Calling Home podcast is not engaged in providing therapy services, mental health advice, or other medical advice or services. It is not a substitute for advice from a qualified health care provider and does not create any therapist, patient, or other treatment relationship between you and Colling Home or Whitney Goodman. For more information on this, please see Collingholm's terms of service linked in the show notes below. Thank you.