Estrangement can be one of the most painful and least talked-about experiences a person can go through. Whether you've chosen to distance yourself from a family member, or someone has pulled away from you, the grief that comes with it is real, and it rarely follows a straight line.

In recent years, estrangement has become more visible. More people are naming it, more therapists are talking about it, and more young adults in particular are making the difficult decision to step back from relationships that are causing them harm. But visible doesn't mean easy. And understood doesn't mean uncomplicated.

What Estrangement Actually Is

Estrangement is the breakdown or deliberate distancing of a relationship, usually within a family, due to ongoing conflict, harm, or incompatibility. It might mean no contact at all, or it might mean limited, carefully managed contact. It can be initiated by one person or be mutual. It can happen suddenly or slowly erode over years.

What it almost always involves is loss, even when it's the right choice. You can grieve a relationship with someone who is still alive. You can miss someone who hurt you. You can feel both relief and devastation at exactly the same time. These things are not contradictions. They are the messy reality of estrangement.

Research suggests that adult children are more likely to initiate estrangement than parents, and common reasons include emotional abuse, feeling unseen or dismissed, differing values, lack of support for mental health struggles, and toxic family dynamics. For many, estrangement isn't a dramatic decision, it's the conclusion of years of trying, communicating, and hoping things would change.

This doesn't mean it's easy. Many young people who choose estrangement carry enormous guilt, because we live in a culture that places immense value on family loyalty. "But they're your family" is a sentence that can silence people for years, even when the relationship is causing genuine harm.

If You've Been Estranged From

If a family member has distanced themselves from you, the pain is also real and valid. It can feel like rejection, confusion, and grief all at once. It's worth sitting with some honest questions: Have I listened to their concerns? Have I given them space to be who they are? Is there something they've tried to tell me that I've dismissed?

Sometimes estrangement is about protection. Sometimes it's about someone needing to grow into themselves outside the weight of family expectation. Understanding this doesn't make it hurt less, but it can shift the lens from blame to curiosity.

Finding a Way Forward

Whether you're the one who has stepped back or the one who has been stepped away from, estrangement benefits from professional support. It brings up deep questions about identity, belonging, and worthiness that are hard to hold alone.

Some estrangements are permanent. Others are temporary, a pause that eventually leads to a different kind of relationship. Neither outcome is a failure. What matters is that you're navigating it in a way that's honest, boundaried, and kind, to yourself and, where possible, to others.

You don't have to have everything figured out. You just have to take the next step.