Where Should We Begin? with Esther Perel - You Need Help to Help Her

Episode Date: November 24, 2025

This is a classic session of Where Should We Begin? A husband and wife are united in their desire to help their daughter, two years after she suffered a breakdown and moved home, shutting herself off from her family and friends. Esther urges them to examine the way pressure and expectations – no matter how well-intentioned – can shape a child’s upbringing. Also, please join me on Entre Nous, my new home on Substack for anyone who wants to live, love, and work with more connection and imagination. I invite you to sign up and become a free or paid member at estherperel.substack.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What you are about to hear is a classic session of where should we begin with Esther Perel. None of the voices in this series are ongoing patients of Esther Perel's. And each episode is a one-time counseling session. For the purposes of maintaining confidentiality, names and some identifiable characteristics have been removed. But their voices and their stories are real. Support for Where Should We Begin Comes from Sixpenny

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We don't understand what's happened or how to help her and what parts we even can help her with and what parts she just has to figure out. The specific things of this happened or this happened or this is going on, It's not as important as we need to get a better. I mean, whether that's next week, next month, next year, we just need to get a better. In a family, there are various couples. One, the intimate couple, the spousal couple, but the other is also the parental couple.

This couple came in not for marital issues, but for difficulties and challenges that they were having between them, and their daughter. She was diagnosed with bipolar and anxiety and depression, PTSD, all of the above in the last two years. We haven't told, we don't talk about it with our family, there's maybe two people who know. Like, I can't keep lying.

I feel like I'm lying to everybody. I'm lying to family, I'm lying to friends. I couldn't even imagine not doing this with somebody. I could imagine it tearing people apart easy, very easy. Yeah. The parents have sought help, but they received help as a couple. And it seemed to me that this couple doesn't need help as a couple. This couple needs help as parents speaking to their daughter.

This is where should we begin with Esther Perel. She's gone from a successful, motivated college student on a scholarship to spending 22 hours a day in her room. the computer talking with friends but not interacting in the world in the real world she's really contained herself maybe partly for preservation it's a comfortable place for her she's not going to school she's not working she's not interacting with family she interacts a little bit with us. She's eating and but I mean there's been days when she doesn't eat very well. She's taking medication. She sees a therapist. You know, we went from her taking credits and being

on the dean's list and, you know, traveling internationally with school to this 180 degree change in what she's able to do. As I listen to them described the voluntary confinement of the daughter in her room for such an extended period of time, two years, I'm reminded of the Japanese phenomenon of Hikikomori, where young people withdraw into their rooms, become recluse, disconnect from society, except through the Internet,

of which they are in utter control over the curation of every, every detail of the story that they live. You know, we want her to be passionate about something, to be happy and healthy in whatever her future holds. And we're trying to work with her, but we don't understand what's happened or how to help her and what parts we even can help her with and what parts she just has to figure out.

figure out. And, you know, we have a really strong marriage. I think every day about the people or doing this alone. I don't know how anybody could do that. And I'm really fortunate to be doing it with somebody that I could talk to and cry to. Who cries more? I do. For sure? He started before you here. It's something I've always done. I have a very talented crier. Tell me something. What support do you both get?

Besides each other. Yeah. We recently, like in the last month, we started to see a couples counselor who was suggested by our daughter's counselor. What's helpful actually has been able to be in a place where we can talk with somebody who is besides the two of us, who's not a friend or family member, somebody who's outside of the situation

and can listen and make some suggestions, although she doesn't have answers. Right. But do you have a group of parents? No, we're not. No. I mean, we have parents. No, but a group of parents

who have situations around it. children, their adult children that are challenging. No. No. And honestly, we haven't been talking about it a lot. So I'm not talking to somebody. And so he says, you know, I know somebody, a friend of mine, or my sister-in-law, or something like that.

We haven't been talking about it. Whenever I work with a family where there is an acute crisis like that, and they have not gotten the help they need. I think that for many therapists, there can be a trigger of wanting to have the Savior in us, that maybe I'll be able to offer something because I experience their disappointment, their depletion, their despair, and I want to jump in.

But that's actually the moment where I have to hold back a little bit. Okay, here's what I'm going to suggest. We're going to talk together. I'm going to think out loud, but that doesn't mean I'm right. Okay, the last thing I want to do is barge in as if I have answers. I don't, but I have some ideas sometimes of, or at least I ask questions out loud, and then we can kind of, like for example, this idea that you think you are protecting her by colluding with her

in the withdrawal from the world because you are withdrawing from the world as well you're doing a parallel process she's not talking you're not talking she's hiding you're hiding so you're trapped in her approach and there is no help that can come in

I understand I think that pretty well sums it out You need help to help her. You understand? You need the input so that you can then help her. The idea that you are protecting her by colluding in the same silence as her and by withdrawing from the world like her

is creating shame for you, isolation, and I'm not sure it's helping her. Isolation only works when you have content. disease for pneumonia. She does not have a contagious disease. You need the presence of others. And if you go into the silence, it only adds to the shame and to the lying

and to the feeling that you are more and more removed from the world. And so now it's happening to her and now it's happening to the parents too. Is there an alternative? Yes, the alternative is, I don't have a clue what the diagnosis is. what the diagnosis is, but there's too many labels. What we know is you have a girl who was vivacious, talented, motivated, but with enormous pressure on herself and wanted to do well.

It may not have known to say, this is too much, or I don't want to do as much, or this is a little too hard for me, and fell apart. And as a result, is retreating, but not completely. The beautiful Internet allows her to type away for 14 hours a day. And she's talking about something with somebody. And for all we know, she may be talking with a group of other kids like her, because there are lots of them who are also locked up in their rooms.

So that's very good. and I would continue to encourage her connecting with those people but so do you need to connect with the people because if you don't get support you won't be able to help her and you don't need support so much as a couple you need support actually as parents

of a child who broke down in the midst of thriving and needs to rebuild herself slowly step step And it happens to the brightest of them. And sometimes they saw it coming, they felt something, but they didn't want to say.

They don't want to disappoint. They don't want to disappoint the parents. Everybody's riding on them. There is pride, you know, of all what she's accomplishing. And so there's the sense of I'm letting everybody else down, let alone myself. Am I describing you her somewhat? Yeah. You know, the labels to me are,

important, but they don't describe anything. They don't describe the experience. They just give you a framework. I need to know her experience. And that means I want to help you have conversations with her. Who did you talk to today? You know? What are you discussing?

Try to re-engage in a normal conversation that is anything but we're trying to get you to be better. She talks to both of you or only one of you? She decided recently that she doesn't want to have a mother-daughter relationship. I'm not sure what relationship she wants, but she called me by my first name the other day instead of mom. I didn't. I just let it go. I didn't react to it.

If that helps, I'll take it. Yes, but inside it was like, aye. Yeah. Well, I can think maybe down the road it'll turn around. You know, I can look forward enough to see that. Do friends visit her? Nobody comes to see her. No, she's really, as far as I know,

like, you know, her friends were trying to reach out for, you know, quite a while, but I think she just kind of blew them off or whatever over time. So it's been several months since she's seen any friends face to face. Even family friends. friends, who she's friends with the children, the last time we got together, it was really

hard push getting her to come out of her room and join us. And when she did? Well, she told me she would, but she told me she would not speak to me after that. I think to both of us. She was angry because they're literally at our door waiting. to go to a restaurant, and she wouldn't, she had the covers over her head and just wasn't going to come out. So I think she got mad because I took the covers off her head or something. So she came out and interacted. We went out to eat. We got in the car after dinner.

Yeah, right after dinner, we got back into our car and things, oh, wasn't your meal good? Or, you know, just a small talk and she didn't answer. And I thought, oh, she's doing exactly what she said she was going to do. Did you congratulate her for her determination? No, I started crying. But that would have been a good answer. That would have been a great answer. I love that you haven't lost your spirit. You always were strong-minded, and that is still there.

I'll take it. Oh, okay. What do you think? I agree. Yeah, we haven't done that. I don't understand the anger that comes out. And I think she will admit that she's just very angry at her. Mom is angry at daughter.

No, no, no, no. I think there's just very deep, the way this whole thing came out with, you know, I really don't want to really a mother-daughter relationship. when she told me. And I said to her, I said, you know, you have to. You can't just not say that and not carry through and tell her and then tell her why. Write it down. You said you told your daughter.

Yes. To tell mom why she doesn't want to have a relationship. Right. Communicated somehow where there's a continual flow so you get all of it out so that we can understand. the question is very you seem to have very strong feelings about mom and and you seem to have given this a lot of thought because you wouldn't be arriving at such a conclusion what's been on your mind that way you're not telling her to do anything yet and i wouldn't say talk to mom you wouldn't no no if I would in this moment if you're the one she can she's

willing to speak this too you can go tell mom or you don't get to mom the pet you know that's separate thing but the first thing I would just say tell me one of the things that emerges is that the father is triangulated he's caught in a a triangle between his wife and his daughter. And on occasion, the daughter wants to speak to mom by speaking to dad. And at times, that needs to be redirected. And it is accurate for that to say,

this doesn't belong to me, tell mom directly. But other times, when the daughter says, I am having struggles with my mom, I don't want my mom to be my mom. She's not the mom I want her to be, those kind of things. I think the opportunity is for him to simply say, How did you get to that conclusion? That's such a painful conclusion.

What's going on for you? And not try to direct her. In fact, just offer the ear and offer the opportunity for her to be in conversation with them rather than just in conversation with her inner depression. You know, the question that often will emerge after that is, is the parent who is having those private conversations with their child meant to keep this for themselves,

Or is this actually meant to become a conversation that is then relegated to the other parents? And I think it really varies. In this instance, I don't think there is a secret. The daughter wants the mother to know how she feels. The daughter doesn't feel she can tell the mother directly. The daughter uses the father to be her mouthpiece and her messenger to the mother. We have to take a brief break. Stay with us.

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There's something about the identification there. Not always, but, you know, she was living out your dream. She was living out her dream too, but it was your dream as well. And the turmoil about letting you down, I don't want to do it, but I also let you down. Your reaction to her, which is part helplessness and part rage, because of how helplessness you feel. Rach is often the flip side of helplessness and if I cut you off then I cut off my guilt toward you

my feeling of how much I let you down and my resentment for the pressure that I feel to please you because I always was the great daughter that pleased you and I don't know how to get from under this whole thing it's a jumble Yeah, I could see I could see how that could be

that there could be something to that And why wouldn't she have the same reaction to me? Because you're a different person Because maybe you're not disappointed in the same way Because maybe she thinks you would love her no matter what She doesn't have to please you in the same way Because I don't know, you tell me I have no idea

No? Mm-mm. she's adopted and we thought maybe that she was having that a conflict with that and related to self-esteem and you know who she is and there's been a few things that happened in her high school time that she talked to us about one she looks at different than all the like most of the other kids in her school and so I think she had self-esteem issues because kids sometimes teased her she looked different she was different she was born in South Korea and we went to us she went to a school that

was mostly Caucasian kids thinking at the time it seemed like the right right place for us but you look back on it and go it's just having no diversity at all just It was not good. Not good at all. You know, and within our family, we accepted and didn't, the diversity wasn't even there. Is you just a family? No. You know, I've always said our son was born through a pregnancy that I carried.

She was born, you know, on the other side of the world. They're both miracles. Like, it's just, and we've always treated both of our children. that they're just miracles, and this is our family. I mean, it just is. And we forgot that other people don't see that. And also just her being adopted. You know, kids are cruel.

She was told she was a mistake. But we didn't know this till afterwards. She held this kind of stuff in. And then I don't think either of those two things are the cause of this, but I think she internalized internalized a lot of things over time that we weren't aware of. It's exactly what you say. When things go well, you think it's the right place. When things don't go well, you start to question all kinds of decisions you made.

With the purest intention, the parents so wanted their daughter to be integrated and not to feel any different, that in the end, she couldn't be who she was, which de facto was different, at least racially different. And they now realize that by putting her in an all-white environment, she was isolated, bullied, taunted, and that she couldn't come and talk about it with them. And so the question that we do have to ask ourselves is when a child doesn't come home to say,

I've been bullied at school, we do need to ask, is there something in the dynamic in the environment at home that silences the child. It is where it is now, and she has been sharing all kinds of difficulty that she had. And sometimes there's not much to say, but just to hug her and just to say,

I'm so sorry, I didn't know that you were hurting so badly. I wish you had been able to come and tell me sooner, but I'm here now. and I'm so glad I can hear you, tell me. Because what happens now is that you're so scared that you're becoming paralyzed. And that has the strange effect sometimes of sending the message to the kid I was right not to tell

because you can't handle it. Because you become so upset when I tell you something that now I have to deal. with the fact that you're upset rather than you deal with the fact that I'm upset. Mm-hmm. And what she's trying to say when she says, I don't want to talk to mom, you know, does this, that would be my question. Is it because you don't feel that you can legitimately be her child? That she thinks that?

When we are down, we have crazy thoughts. Crazy in the sense that we put ourselves down. We don't think we're legitimate. We don't think we deserve. And then I guess maybe because then she's so isolated and she's talking with people who aren't part of our, we don't know, they don't know us. I think possibly she's confirming whatever she's thinking

that I'm a terrible this or that. Or that she doesn't deserve you, that you're not really her mother is what she's trying to say. But not because you haven't been a good mother. but because she doesn't feel legitimate. This is not a statement about you as much as a statement about her. And the hardest thing is to keep that in mind so that you don't feel so upset that you can't be there for her.

Right. And that's why you need support. This is super hard to do. It's easy to say for me, but it's really hard to do. do. And we need in those moments help, support. But that's what we'll make it different. Not waiting and hoping that at some point it will get better. That is not exactly how it works. Yeah, I think we've been focusing on that chemistry, you know, that... You've been focusing on the brain and I'm focusing on the life. Yeah, because I think it seems that, you know, her doctor is

focusing just on the chemistry and doesn't, there's no counseling, that's medicine. Then she talks to somebody, you know, to help her work things through. And I've felt this over time, because we thought at first you go to a doctor, you get fixed. You know, your children are sick, you wear sick, you know, you go to the doctor, they tell you to do this and this, and you eventually get better. This isn't a world I know, like I know about. I told you. Totally not. And I feel inadequate about not knowing more about it. And so I think we were focusing on the illness. You know, she got a diagnosis and you get a medicine and you talk to somebody and... Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm with you. Just not working.

For me, this is a family issue. A family is made up of inter-debut. and some of the parts are the parents and the grandparents and the children. But they're all interconnect. And when one of the parts, when one of the members changes their role because they are sick, because they have a breakdown, because something is knowing at them because they're struggling, anything. The whole system adapts has to change, to make up

for this, to respond to this. But the isolation is also part of how the system is reorganizing. You know, for example, if she's depressed, I have no idea, but if she's depressed, one of the things that happens when we're depressed, and we don't feel like we can get ourselves out of our own hole, is that everybody around us tries to get us out of our whole. And they come up with one idea after another. Why don't you do this? Why don't you do that?

And the only power we have is to say no. And so we defeat everybody. So there's very interesting dynamic occurs in which I feel powerless because I'm down. And I've checked out from all the things that used to be my life. But every time you'd say do something, I say no. And in the end, you feel as defeated as her. So now we create a loop of helplessness. Do you see this one?

You're both shaking your hands. And you're rolling your eyes. Like, I know this all too well. Yes? Is that it? You know, it's a bizarre thing. The person who is the most down, in the end, has all the power. Because they have the power to disempower everybody else's fantastic ideas

and make them feel as helpless as them. And so we all end up in the same spot. Yeah. It just needs music. The choreography is set. That is one of the things that family therapy wants to help you with or would help you with. How you step out of the, why don't you do this? Why don't you do that?

That pressure has to go. Not because it's not a great motivation, but because it's not happening this way. I understand that you're struggling rather than here's what you can do to stop the struggle. How do I join her differently? So any situation where she can address you and speak, and there is actually another person so that you don't have to be moderating each other like that could be very helpful.

And that you say to her, look, we have challenges. There's some things between all of us that this is a great opportunity. I think you have really highlighted that, you know, Despite our best efforts and everything, there's certain things between us that are causing you great pain and that we need to address all together and we can handle it. And we're going to go find a place where we can safely talk. As long as she doesn't exercise that ultimate power again and say no. You'll still go alone. You'll get good coaching and it may take three, four sessions of you going alone until you find the right way of bringing her.

That's been done. Okay. That's been done. Okay. There's a good family therapist, no to work with kids who don't want to show up. Teenagers or school are burdened children or, I mean, you know, to you, she feels like she's, you know, this unmovable thing. But she may. I don't know.

I'm just... But they will also give you the right frame of... They'll analyze with you more, you know, they learn from you more about your daughter so that they have a good idea of... how you can present it to her in a way that fits what is going on. To say to her, you know, you've said some very important things here about mom, about us, and I think we need to listen to you because you've been trying to tell us quite a few things and I don't know that we've been as attentive as we could be.

And so we have chosen a framework where somebody is going to help us listen to you. What I'm conveying to the parents is that without having ever met the daughter, I have a sense this daughter has been trying to say something to the parents. And I have a sense that she will welcome a different response from her parents towards her. I like that. Okay. I like that. I understand.

And it's true. That's very different from, we have found a person who's going to have. help you get back on track. Right now, the back on track is us not feeling that every slight decision is become an existential decision. If I say come for breakfast,

am I keeping her alive or am I killing her? Do I continue to treat her like she still is the girl I knew? And this is the family we are. Right. Or is everything out of normality now? and i have to forego everything i built and stood for and that feels so wrong to me but i don't

yeah i don't know has she been suicidal yes yeah in the spring attempt mm-hmm yeah you called an ambulance and called me home from work and so she was in the hospital for a few days She said that she did that because of me. I think she was really mad at me. I wasn't part of the conversation that morning. And I think that conversation really angered her. Or maybe not anger is not the right word, put pressure on and did whatever. That morning was just another morning of more of the same.

Get a job, do something, we need a passion, what's the matter? Mom trying to prop the daughter up with the best intention, but completely ineffective. And that morning, the daughter said, get off my back. I can't do it, I won't do it, I don't want to do it. I don't want to do it. Enough is enough. We are in the midst of our session, and there is still so much to talk about.

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Um, I don't know. I never would have thought she would have done that, tried to do that. We don't think it was plain. Not that it matters, I guess, but we didn't think it was something. She gave a whole lot of thought about, but did it in the moment. We haven't really processed any of that either. No. We just haven't had time to.

Together or with her? Either. At all. At all. It feels overwhelming. I don't even want to think about it. I hope she never does that again. And I think what we've realized, not realized, but...

Like, we can't control that. If somebody wants to do that, they're going to find a way because we were trying to, like, keep everything, like, not have anything out. I mean, and then you've realized you can't. That's right. I mean, that's my head saying in that, not my heart. Your heart, you'd run and put yourself in front of the bus.

Right. But we honor our lives. Oh, God, I want her to be. passionate about something so bad. She's so talented. She loves music. She plays instruments. She has taught herself languages. She's artistic and paints and cooks. She's smart. And I just like, I just want her to fall in love with one of them and do it, love it, and be passionate. and just see all the good in life. And we can't do that for her.

What's happening to you when she speaks like this? It's just been tough. Say more. I mean, we've... I meant a few words, but say more. We've done all this together, so... I don't think, you know, it's not easier for one of us. I guess I don't know how we would do this

without having somebody that we can go through this with. I don't, I don't, I couldn't even imagine not doing this with somebody. I could imagine it tearing people apart, easy, very easy. Yeah. Do you have clothes for? friends? And they've still, and you have not talked with them either? I've talked with two close friends.

You have got to. This is like a medical recommendation. I'm going to go home with a prescription for friends. Yes. Friends or family, but other, you, you can't keep this. Right. It's not an embarrassment. It's not a shame. It's not going to determine what's going to happen to her, but it's going to deal with you not creating a parallel life

in which you end up doing what she's doing without a diagnosis. I just don't have that kind of a network. Not that I wouldn't mind. Maybe a prescription would help. I'm assuming that your girlfriends are, people that you also see with the partners. I don't want to... Burden them?

Yeah. And part of it is, again, it's not particularly their business, but it's also why talk about it? If somebody came to you and said, we're struggling with a situation, would you feel burdened or would you feel honored that they trusted you. I get that, no, I would feel honored.

I get that part, but I guess what I'm saying is I wouldn't want to, you know, we get together on a Saturday night to go out to dinner. We're not talking about this becoming the subject of every gathering. I just want you to have the opportunity of people saying, how are you? Do you need anything? You don't want to feel like you live with a secret. Life is not lived alone and these kind of situations you don't have to confront alone. You're not there to talk about her, you're just to say, I'm going to something really difficult.

The way you're, the way that we're approaching it in here with it being more holistic rather than focused on a particular illness, it really seems to make sense to look at it as a family dynamic, not as a person who has an illness and that that's the cause of things. You know, because we don't have control over that, but we can work on the family dynamic. We do have control over that. And so to realize the parts that are within our grass, That's right.

That has the ability to have an effect where we've been trying to have an effect in a way that we're not effective. The idea of it being a conversation where we talk about the experience that we're having with our family or friends, I think we've really gotten to to a point, or I've gotten to a point where, like, I can't keep lying. I feel like I'm lying to everybody. I'm lying to family. I'm lying to friends. And I'm like, I just can't do this anymore.

I'm not somebody who lies. Right, but it's not just that. It's that you're pretending that life is normal as usual. And that's what she feels she did for all those years. She feels that she's been lying. That's what she's telling you. And without knowing it, you're doing the same thing now. That's the parallel life as well.

Right. That really sucks. I never thought of that. I didn't until now either. In the moment that the mother realizes, the impact of her lying, she also instantly understands the lying that her daughter has been struggling with and maybe for the first time she actually understands her daughter in a way that she has not before that the daughter has been trying to get her too and we are connecting some very

important dots so she got to the point where she just couldn't do it anymore and i'm going i can't do this anymore that's right But I just heard it with you. And I could see how that makes it worse. Because, you know, every time, like, something comes out of my mouth, I'm saying something else. And to myself. And why?

You deserve all the support you need. Yeah. Both of you. I mean, are we saying something? It sounds so obvious, though, but I think I was just so in the... So in the thing. If I am in the weeds, I'm as blind as you. Understand something.

This is not because of who you are. This is because when we are drawn in a vortex, our vision shrinks. It's easy for me to see. I'm not in it. But if I was in my own, you'd be the visionary. Thank you for that. I mean that. I completely mean that.

I was, and you probably know, I was very skeptical of coming. I didn't really think anyone could help. I think you have. First of all, I highly respect you're being skeptical and coming. I always respect the skeptics more. The others, it's easy. You know, you always want to ask the others if they would go to something that they're skeptical about.

And now tell me how it was helpful. Well, I think, you know, we've been so focused on what can we do to help her illness that we didn't really see that how we're reacting to her and her illness is making it worse. It makes a lot of sense when you see it from the outside, you know, when you just step back for a minute and go, of course. You know, you should have, we should have seen it two years ago. But when you see it, it's clear. And what is it you see? Well, I think we don't have control over her illness.

We do have control over our actions and how we react to her illness. So the best way that we can help her is to, I don't mean to say, be more normal but we should be more normal and find ways for us all to communicate what's going on with her so that we can deal with it as opposed to just trying to deal with something we have no control of it.

When Mom speaks of the holistic view, the way I would define it is this. I am a family terrorist. I think systemically. I think about problems in context, problems in an ecology, not just what causes them, but what maintains them. How is the relationship system? How is the family organized around the problem? And by having kept the focus so narrowly onto the daughter and on her mental health diagnosis, the entire family relationship system was left out of the equation. And yet the resources, that the family can bring to helping the daughter, we're all in that relational system. And so I try to tap into the natural healing resources that are available in the family,

not just a medication. You just heard a classic session of where should we begin with Esther Perel. We are part of the Vox Media podcast network and partnership with New York Magazine in The Cut. To apply with your partner for a session on the podcast for the transcripts or show notes on each episode or to sign up for Astaire's monthly newsletter, go to esterperelle.com.

Astaire Perel is the author of mating in captivity in the state of affairs. She also created a game of stories called Where Should We Begin? For details, go to her website, Esther Perel.com. Thank you.