Estrangement from Older Teens
Why it Happens and How One Can Cope with the Loss
For a variety of reasons, teenagers, as they get older and closer to adulthood, sometimes decide to stop speaking to or seeing their parents. This situation may persist for months or for years. The teenager, especially if he's left school and moved out of home already, may stop calling, writing or visiting. While this momentary or permanent decision to "divorce" one's parents may be occasioned by years of parental abuse and cruelty, more often the estrangement has its basis in misunderstandings, shame, blame and other acts of judgment.
Why Estrangement Happens
In contemporary North American society, many children grow up with an immense sense of entitlement. They expect possessions, security, freedom, regular funds, travel and a university education to be provided for them. Those children who were raised in more impoverished and unstable households or those who were reared by parents who espoused different ideals may become resentful. Having spent their childhood and adolescence comparing themselves with others who have more material items or advantages, they may decide that their own parents didn't love them sufficiently.
They may also make a similar determination if they weren't raised by a nuclear family. Children of teenage parents, divorce and other tenuous family structures can feel that they were "ripped off" in their ideal of a perfect family. They may blame their parents for not choosing their birth or not taking sufficient control over their living arrangements. If the parent has an unconventional job, works excessively or is an artist, the child can also feel neglected and rendered a lesser priority.
Children can also have mental illnesses that can lead them to feel persecuted and rejected without clear evidence. These children can lie, steal, cause harm and attempt to blacken their parents' reputations. They may believe that a parent wishes to do them wrong or that the parent hates them. For all these reasons, and others, a child may put an end to his active working relationship with his parent.
Of course, often there seems to be no rationale for the silence.
How One Can Endure the Loss
Any estrangement is painful. Estrangement from one's own child may be the most unbearable loss for a parent, even worse than the child's death. Even if one can think of reasons why one's child might be angry or resentful, it is very hard to imagine a good reason for one's teenager to decide not to speak to the parent again. While there are deliberately mean and ruthless parents, most parents try their best.
It is important to remember this. All parents face difficult decisions, trying circumstances and occasions that are beyond their control. All parents lose their tempers, say things they regret and make choices that were not perhaps the wisest ones. However, parents, for the most part, are not to blame for their child's decision to estrange himself. If the parent has made every effort to try to connect with their teenager, talk to him about his issues and has repeatedly expressed compassion for hisfeelings, then they have done all they can do in this circumstance.
Patience and continued love in the face of this detachment is the only true option. One's child may just need time and space to sort out his priorities and gain a sense of independence. Until he tells his parent not to, keep calling and writing one's child on a regular basis to let him know that the parent persists in thinking about him and in caring for him. If he sends one poisonous letters, don't respond with anger. Remain calm and keep hoping that time and life's experiences will return this lost child to you.
When an Older Teen No Longer Speaks to a Parent
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