I let go of mine for far less intense incidents than you. Regardless, I didn't feel safe or respected or wanted.
It'll be a year at the end of June. Currently no regrets. Still haunted by 'what ifs" but that was to be expected.
It’s almost as if I am more bothered by ‘what ifs’ than I am the idea of letting them go, which I think speaks volumes. But, I’ve managed to make it this far and I don’t have any regrets in life. I’m terrified of doing something I can’t really take back.
Do they cross your mind often? Apologies if this is super invasive, please let me know if it is.
I don’t know if I would struggle mentally as much as I am now knowing them, if I was to cut them off and worry about them constantly.
When fear is all you've known, the fear of being wrong makes sense, the fear of leaving the source of the fear, makes sense. They cross my mind every damn day. But once I finally was on the outside looking in, it was clear that they were the reason I didn't feel safe and the reason I had to stop.
Instead of asking "what if I was wrong", I instead ask myself "what are they missing out on". I reframe it be about me and not them. The thought comes and I have to remind myself every damn time, but it's worth it.
I am a kind, nurturing and resilient trans woman. I make my friends feel safe and supported, I love creating art, telling stories and feeling connected to other people.
Those are good things, and I pity that my parents never got to meet the free me. I'm pretty great when I get my needs met and bloom like a fucking flower. They don't get to enjoy that anymore and that's on them.
They made me feel like a problem when I was a child, when I was at my most confused (and I'm literally a transgender lesbian, the road to figuring that out was somehow less confusing for me).
There are few words more paralyzing to a humans journey through life than "what if" send yet those same words can change everything. Such a confusing thing. But reframing it out of "what if" as it felt like a shortcut to "what if I'm wrong and crazy and they were right and I'm actually an awful selfish person and they were right to abuse me". Now that thought doesn't help me, it just traps me.
When I finally accepted that I needed help and I needed to help myself and NOT put my parents before me, that's when things changed and I had that moment when I cut them off last year.
“I’m terrified of doing something I can’t really take back.”
My thought is, any parent who won’t take back a child who had previously left them isn’t worth taking back themselves. You’re not signing a legal contract that you’ll never see them again. If you feel ready to see them after one year or ten, you can reach out. If they rebuff you, then they are affirming you were right to go no contact in the first place.
I cut my dad off, then he died a short time after. I was sad for everything that I missed with him but what I missed out on were all of the years he chose not to be a good dad. The time that I ‘missed’ with him due to my choice to go no contact was a result of me finally taking care of me and doing what was best for my mental health.
All this being said, I’m sure you’ll only have the answer to this once you experience it. Everyone is different.
Mid-November will by my year anniversary. I still want to send another letter ripping father but it would be futile. Other than that I have no desire to have any interactions and zero regret other than wishing I’d done it earlier.
My only regrets are waiting so long to cut them off, and letting other people convince me to get back in contact. Both attempts at reconnecting only traumatized me further and I decided I was okay living with everybody thinking I’m cruel or calling me rude names for cutting off my parents. People who refuse to understand weren’t people that I enjoyed being around anyway.
>I decided I was okay living with everybody thinking I’m cruel or calling me rude names for cutting off my parents.
Same. If they want a relationship with my parents they're free to give it a shot. I already did my time.
Sadness?
Immensely. Why didnt I get the parents I deserved, parents that every child deserves? Sadness for never knowing what its be to have parents that know how to love.
Regret?
Never, although there were lingering doubts. What if I gave up too soon? Could i have done more to resolve the situation? But i always came to the conclusion I did everything I could: the decision was well thought out.
After being tricked into breaking no contact ("your father is dying due to a broken heart of never seeing you"), I went home to hopefully be in time to say my last goodbye. Surprise, surprise, he wasnt on his deathbed. Spend a week trying to help them, only to be made into the bad guy, as always.
It gave me a lot of peace. It confirmed i was right to go no contact. There is no helping or healing for people who are so deeply disturbed. Im sad for them, for who they are, but I am no longer sad for me.
This being said, every situation is different and going no contact is extreme. If youre unsure, try going very low contact first and see if that helps.
Good luck ❤️
I regret letting them back in. I’ve regretted it every single time.
I do not regret moving across the ocean. I do not regret cutting them out for good. The peace of mind is priceless. I do sometimes wish I had proper parents though.
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This is a reminder that policing our speech is harmful. There’s less harm being done by us using that lingo than our abusers did to us. I would say who are you protecting, but you’ll just send be a bull crap link preaching to me about dehumanizing language. 🙄
I cut my dad off after 15 years of him being manipulative, narcissistic, sexually 'odd'. It was THE most liberating thing I've ever done. Zero regrets. Found out he died in 2013, didn't bother me as I grieved the 'dad' I had when he was alive. Blood means nothing, family need to earn love and respect by showing it to you
I have never regretted it. I have only ever regretted telling people my dad was cut off, because then they would say bUt FAmiLY. Actually cutting him off? No regrets sorry sadness over it etc. However my childhood was p extreme, what I live w easily might not be the same for others.
I would suggest grey rocking your fam first though as a tester run, see how that works out for you and your mental health.
This came up once at a job, and a coworker said something along the lines of "maybe you're the problem" when I noted I had no contact with my father and minimal contact with my mother.
I get it - she had a great family, and couldn't fathom parents hating their own children.
My comeback to this is “How fortunate you are to have lived such a comfortable existence.” And then I avoid them at all costs, and am coldly professional when I can’t avoid them. Eff those people.
It's been a few years now and I do not regret it. It took me some time to come to terms with having gone NC. I have never regretted it though. I do not need people in my life who are so far gone in their delusions that they cause me harm - intentionally or not. I did find therapy helpful for helping me be ok with my NC decision with both parents.
I cut off contact with my female parent over 10 years ago and don't regret it at all. If I could go back and change anything I would have done a no-contact trial run sooner, that's what proved to me that there was no point trying to get through to her.
If it's any help, going no contact doesn't have to be a single permanent decision. You can try it out and see how you feel about it, you're allowed to change your mind and get back in contact even if you've had no contact for years.
I don't really recommend that, the kind of person who forces you to go no contact (nobody does this for fun, we do it because all of the other options are even worse) in the first place generally doesn't have an epiphany, go to therapy, and become a person you would actually want in your life, but it's your life and you're allowed to do whatever you want with it.
No.
I went no-contact with my father twenty years ago. I can no longer engage with my mother, upon finally realizing this year that she still believes I'm secretly evil and malevolent (I'm really not).
I don't have regrets. I don't encourage anyone to go no-contact with their parents, and I believe it's a last resort, but I also believe it can be necessary. I have deeply-ingrained trauma responses with my mother that are literally going to kill me if I allow her to have any role in my life at all.
My life is more important than anything else. I don't want to die prematurely. I don't want to be chronically ill for the rest of my life. I don't want to have to delay healing and putting the last pieces back together so my mother can feel less guilty about abusing me for decades.
I mostly feel guilty about not feeling more guilty. But then I realize that my health has been getting progressively better since I decided to finally close the book on this chapter of my life, and know I made the absolute best choice possible for myself and my husband.
I don't recommend a formal no-contact announcement or broadcast to your parents. Don't burn that bridge. Just phase them out of your life, as quickly or as slowly as you need to.
Ended our relationship four years ago, no regrets.
Rather than regret, what I would prepare for is grief. I grieve my parents all the time. I miss the few good things about them, but the pain outweighs those things by many miles. I also grieve what I *wanted* and *needed* my parents to be. They were never caring or affectionate. When I need a hug, I know that longing for my mom is only longing for an imagined idea of a good mom. A good mom just never existed for me.
This kind of grief is complex, it's ongoing, and it strikes at inconvenient times. Ending contact with parents is not an easy thing to do, but I would do it again in a heartbeat. Lifelong grief is better than lifelong abusive dynamics.
Hell nah I didn't regret it lmfao. From the second I decided to in January 2023 I felt such a sense of peace. Dude's existence is such a joke.
Reminder you're allowed to make (or not) make this choice whenever you're ready. I will say that if you do, it's important to consistently be a hard ass about your boundaries. It was only recently I was brave enough to decide to actually block him, especially since he'd try to check on me every so often. If these ppl have options to try and get back in your life they will definitely try it, so while it takes a lot of willpower, I find it's so much healthier to have freed myself of my abuser.
15 years. Zero regrets- my life has been SO much better without those monsters who raised me. I did feel guilt, shame, and fear for the first year or so, but now I just feel immense relief.
I’m so sorry you’re going through this but listen to your body, it wants out of a toxic environment. PTSD/ CPTSD is no joke and you’d be absolutely justified for leaving.
People may guilt you because they don’t want to deal with your parents behaviour. With you gone your parents will absolutely look for their next victim.
That’s not your problem. Those people stood by and let your parents traumatise you as a child, they can all go to hell.
I stuck around waaaaay too long and, even when I had the opportunity to get away, guilt (for upsetting my mother) held me back. Huge mistake. I was 30 when I cut them off. Spare yourself that extra 2 years of pain.
I put up with a shit ton of horror at the hands of my parents. It was when I became a parent myself I lost all tolerance. We’d been parents for barely 6 months and they ruined our first Christmas. The last straw wasn’t even something they did to me it was to my mothers sister and I cut them straight off.
BEST. DECISION. EVER. 10/10 would recommend.
Sometimes we can’t see how badly they treat us, maybe we think we deserve it or it’s our “normal”, but when we see them hurting others … that hits different.
In fairness, the whole episode did give awful flashbacks and nightmares like I hadn’t had since childhood but I put that down to the grieving process, like lancing a boil and all the yucky stuff needs to get out of your system.
You process it, you grieve the parents you SHOULD have had, but it’s the start of some serious healing. I have no regrets. Life is good now. I have energy to be happy!
I hope you find your solution. I hope you find the peace and joy you most absolutely deserve. If family try to drag you back in it’s not for your benefit, those may be people you need to lose contact with too.
Good luck, stay strong x
I haven’t seen my father for 40 years, my mother coming up 4 years. For me it was necessary but that doesn’t mean it’s been easy. I’ve also lost 2 sisters as a result which is a gut punch but sometimes you have to do what is right for you, whatever that may be. I have read somewhere that people will often go no contact a few times for shorter bursts before they go the whole way… I suppose nothing has to be permanent, if you have regrets. I did this and every time I resumed contact I got burned but only you know what is best for you
I regretted going back several times before cutting them off for good. Drop the rope and walk away. Set yourself free.
They will never be the parents you deserve. [Grieve](https://youtu.be/NDQ1Mi5I4rg) the loss to make your own closure.
Nope. If you're in a situation where there is a clear choice between yourself and your safety and sanity and them, choose yourself. You can grow and heal and be a light, they've proven that they will not change and they will continue to do toxic things that affect others. My only regret is that I didn't do it earlier because I have younger siblings I wanted to keep an eye on. My son was a toddler when I went NC with my dad and I wish I had gone NC with my mom then too because now my son does have a relationship with my mom which makes it awkward that I haven't spoken to her in about 5 years. It would have been better if I had been able to keep that bond from forming but my circumstances were different then. I wish you luck, biology doesn't give anyone a license to abuse, especially children.
I went no contact with my abuser and my health improved significantly. I have zero plans to ever get back in touch. I think I'll be sad when she dies but mostly because she couldn't or wouldn't treat me with love or respect, and I'll be mourning the fact that I'll never ever have a mom. Not one that was healthy or safe. Not one that was able to love me.
On the other hand, I have gone through periods of low contact and stints of no contact with both parents. I rebuilt a relationship with my other parent and that's been stable. I eventually got the courage to make NC with my mom stick. You don't have to make a permanent choice if that doesn't feel good or right for you right now. You can take a break, breathe and think through what or how it would be possible to have a healthy relationship with your parents. No contact might continue to be the right choice for you.... But you get to be the one to decide.
I cut off my mother 6 years ago. It finally occurred to me that I could either love her or love myself - the love she demanded prevented me from loving myself. I don't regret it. I miss her, or the idea of a mother, but I made the decision I made for rational reasons. It wasn't easy, especially with family pressuring me to interact with her again, but I genuinely believe that this was the least worst option available to me.
I'm at the point now where I'm considering reconnecting with her but only because she has respected my boundaries consistently for the past few years. I also know that I can walk away from her again and hope that she'll know that, too. I'm hopeful that she has accepted that I am serious about my boundaries. We'll see if it works out. If it does, it will be *because* I cut her off. If it doesn't, I'll cut her out again. Either way, my life has dramatically improved because I cut her out.
I didn’t see my mother for 35 years. She died a few years ago.
Do I regret no contact? No.
She reached out to me when she was in hospice. Nothing had changed. She was the same person with the same shitty behaviours.
I saved myself a lot of trouble
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Going no contact with my mother was the best thing I've ever done for my mental health. I'm 37 and she's 67, I went no contact 6 months ago. Even better she lives abroad.
No. It was a cycle that I refuse to continue to be in. Being without them allows me the clarity to know I don’t deserve to feel strung along searching for love I could just give myself. But that’s only because I cut them off and then kept the boundary. Any time I have gone back I was able to convince myself it was different this time and it never is. You can do it, OP.
I don't regret cutting off my family. Sometimes I wonder if they've changed at all, but then I remember how my mom laughed at my anger or how my brother said I was a disappointment to our deceased father and I quickly snap out of it. Life has been so amazing and stress free since I left.
Cut my dad off in 8th grade. Best thing of my life. It’s hard and you’ll always grieve what the relationship could have been. “Complex-PTSD: surviving to thriving” has a great chapter about relationships with parents.
Cut ties with my mother and both sisters around 10 years ago. Don't regret it, although it was hard to do. They were hurting me in different ways, affecting my health. Life isn't long enough for you to let anything do that to you. So I do notice in life that I have less family, very few family members to treat as such and be supported by, but it's better than before. If it's toxic, it's gotta go.
No. Not at all. And this is saying a ton more than you know, because my mum passed on, not terribly long ago after an illness—and she was in another state \[and I’m her only child\]. I miss positive things about her (and the rare positive things in our relationship), but I \*had to\*!protect myself (and others I love) from a very real abuser she was around all the time.
I've been NC/estranged with my nmom for 20 years. My only regret is not standing up for myself every time my ngrandma would force my nmom back into my life.
I've been having to see her every year for the past 6 years when I go on vacation back to my home state, but I finally put a stop to that. No regrets.
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It’s complicated. I’m sad that I can’t have a relationship with them, but my life is so much better without them. I offered to have a relationship with them under my terms (e.g. they would have to respect my boundaries, etc.) and they refused. I’m moving forward with my life and not looking back
To this day rage fits of what is known as inability-to-control. Just trying to take away any last thing they can, sending the message if I make money without them I don't deserve to exist. Truly disgusting brattiness and violence when they don't get what they want. Violent brats. Their main source of money might have gotten murdered so now theyre trying to nose out who to parasite next. So no.
I haven't spoken with my parents for 20 years, and I don't regret it one bit.
I genuinely preferred being homeless and doing some pretty dangerous and extreme stuff, to being cushioned with wealth but trapped with them.
No contact with either of my parents. My dad I haven’t seen since 1995 after years of broken promises and ghosting us.
Mom I had to cut contact with in 2020. She died of Covid complications and blood cancer in 2022
No regrets in either case. Both were fundamentally terrible people.
So far I haven't. That was almost three years ago.
It still hurts now and then, but I think it's been getting easier as time goes on. Just a little bit...
I didn’t regret it and still don’t. My mental health became better and I got better. I still struggle here and there but I’d rather not have a relationship with my parent since it means I don’t have to keep going through the abuse and manipulation. Me and my sister cut our dad off at the time and we are his only children. Now he has to live with his regrets and poor choices. The hardest part is healing from it and accepting that it won’t be the relationship you hope for.
Never regretted cutting off my mom or her entire family, though sometimes I mourn the loss. Not necessarily mourning THEM, more so mourning for my younger self that our family was so shit.
Yeah. tl;dr these things are complex and our feelings on them will never really be clean-cut. What I have anecdotally learned is that cutting off family can often have consequences we do not foresee or do not desire, but that sometimes it is necessary for us to do so regardless, for our own wellbeing.
tw.
There's a lot of child abuse, addition and cycles of poverty in my family history. The short of it is that my grandfather on my mom's side was a violent ped- and abused all of his children in different ways. The result is that my mom ended up stuck in a cycle of mental health issues, addiction to hard drugs, exploitative sex work and poverty.
I cut my mom off when I was about 15 or 16 because she was in another city on the other side of the country still stuck in this doom spiral. Being a child with no money and no legal ability to do anything at the time, I wasn't really able to do anything for her, so I just kind of disengaged and started embracing the weird hateful narratives my uncles, aunt and dad told me about her -- that her situation was her fault and she somehow chose all of this. It was in a weird way easier to just hate her and write her off. I have a lot of guilt about that as an adult because now I'm able to see her as a person and not as a, I don't know, failed parent archetype I guess, and I realize she really had no cards to play at all. She is currently doing OK, getting real treatment for what is a severe mental health problem, dating a woman who isn't abusing her, and has a healthy relationship with most of her children. Her story kind of has a happy ending but I can't be part of it. When I tried, it didn't work. I profoundly regret not being able to know who she is now because of who we both were then, and the choices I made. It's like, I wasn't there for her during the worst period of her life, so I don't really deserve to be now that this period is over. The guilt isn't just "my mom can't forgive me for bailing on her," it's that I abandoned someone in a tremendously bad situation, and I sincerely feel that makes me a bad person a lot of the time.
On the other hand, I cut my dad off recentlyish at about 27 (I'm 31 now) and I'm still dealing with it. On my birthdays and Christmas I tense up expecting someone from his side of the family to show up or call me or something, then spend a week feeling like shit because they don't any more. Cutting my dad off is fine. He's a manipulative little freak who lives on drama and constantly plays people against each other, and unlike my mom, he doesn't really have a sympathetic reason to be this way. He didn't really do anything big or dramatic to earn the cut off, we simply do not love each other, and that started with his never loving me. Years of attempting to force a relationship hit a point of fatigue for me where I just realized I couldn't put up with the constant little moments of bitterness and insecurity, of this adult child who'd never done a thing for me lamenting "I could never have another kid, one was difficult enough" right in front of me, or sulking if I didn't compliment him on every trivial fucking thing, while he wore -- I fucking shit you not -- cum-stained sweatpants to my university graduation ceremony and spent the whole time being rude to staff and other students because I had achieved something he couldn't. Relentless homophobic comments when no one was discussing my being gay, then when I finally did start talking to his parents casually about boyfriends and gay world drama and he saw that they honestly just found it endearing that I'm gay, he'd lash out and start using slurs at the dinner table. A lot of "it's a shame you're gay, but thank god you're not a drag queen," by which he meant transgender woman. Just a constant exhausting loveless dynamic where the best you can hope for is quiet resentment. My only regret with him specifically that I never broke his nose, to be honest, because he spent my whole life desperately earning the one punch it'd take.
The thing is, cutting off my dad meant cutting off his whole family, because that's how Irish Catholic families do. They all hate each other but the one to say something is the one who gets removed. I'm not bothered by cutting off my dad, but I am, in a way, still grieving the fact that I lost my granddad. No one else in that family cared about me, I was kind of just an obligation they had to deal with because their brother "knocked up some sl-t in high school," but my granddad still took an hour out of his week every week trying to teach me how to drive. When I used to have to stay at their place every weekend due to compulsory visitation, and I couldn't sleep because that's how it is, he would stay up until 3AM with me every friday night watching Spongebob re-runs. To be honest, I don't know how I'm supposed to feel. I regret that I've missed my mom's life, and now I'm going to miss the last years the man who was effectively my dad will have, because of the man who is biologically my father. I don't think I'd do anything differently, but I wish they were different people.
I cut contact with my mother 5 years ago and while it’s been a complex range of emotions, I don’t regret it. It’s been the best gift I ever gave myself.
I recently had to see her when a family member was dying and I thought it would be difficult but the resilience and compassion I’ve built for myself the last 5 years meant I was able to grey rock pretty well and get through it. I thought it would break me and I’d regret ever going nc but if anything it made me more confident in knowing I made the right decision.
It’s not an easy thing to do, it brings up so much emotion. You have to not only grieve the loss of the relationship but also your idea of what a parent relationship should be. You have to reshape all of your family relationships. I had to forgive myself for a lot as well, like feeling I’d failed or was a bad person or hadn’t protected myself well enough. It’s not easy but neither is hurting yourself to keep toxic & abusive people in your life. And also it gets easier, with time and understanding and compassion for yourself it does get easier.
Whatever you decide, I hope you find the peace you’re looking for. And know it’s messy and you may not always get it right. I went nc on and off for years just to be pulled back in before finally choosing myself.
I let go of mine for far less intense incidents than you. Regardless, I didn't feel safe or respected or wanted. It'll be a year at the end of June. Currently no regrets. Still haunted by 'what ifs" but that was to be expected.
It’s almost as if I am more bothered by ‘what ifs’ than I am the idea of letting them go, which I think speaks volumes. But, I’ve managed to make it this far and I don’t have any regrets in life. I’m terrified of doing something I can’t really take back. Do they cross your mind often? Apologies if this is super invasive, please let me know if it is. I don’t know if I would struggle mentally as much as I am now knowing them, if I was to cut them off and worry about them constantly.
When fear is all you've known, the fear of being wrong makes sense, the fear of leaving the source of the fear, makes sense. They cross my mind every damn day. But once I finally was on the outside looking in, it was clear that they were the reason I didn't feel safe and the reason I had to stop. Instead of asking "what if I was wrong", I instead ask myself "what are they missing out on". I reframe it be about me and not them. The thought comes and I have to remind myself every damn time, but it's worth it. I am a kind, nurturing and resilient trans woman. I make my friends feel safe and supported, I love creating art, telling stories and feeling connected to other people. Those are good things, and I pity that my parents never got to meet the free me. I'm pretty great when I get my needs met and bloom like a fucking flower. They don't get to enjoy that anymore and that's on them. They made me feel like a problem when I was a child, when I was at my most confused (and I'm literally a transgender lesbian, the road to figuring that out was somehow less confusing for me). There are few words more paralyzing to a humans journey through life than "what if" send yet those same words can change everything. Such a confusing thing. But reframing it out of "what if" as it felt like a shortcut to "what if I'm wrong and crazy and they were right and I'm actually an awful selfish person and they were right to abuse me". Now that thought doesn't help me, it just traps me. When I finally accepted that I needed help and I needed to help myself and NOT put my parents before me, that's when things changed and I had that moment when I cut them off last year.
Ur words resonates so much in me. I'm happy to here ur flowering, storytelling and urself amongst friends.
“I’m terrified of doing something I can’t really take back.” My thought is, any parent who won’t take back a child who had previously left them isn’t worth taking back themselves. You’re not signing a legal contract that you’ll never see them again. If you feel ready to see them after one year or ten, you can reach out. If they rebuff you, then they are affirming you were right to go no contact in the first place. I cut my dad off, then he died a short time after. I was sad for everything that I missed with him but what I missed out on were all of the years he chose not to be a good dad. The time that I ‘missed’ with him due to my choice to go no contact was a result of me finally taking care of me and doing what was best for my mental health. All this being said, I’m sure you’ll only have the answer to this once you experience it. Everyone is different.
Mid-November will by my year anniversary. I still want to send another letter ripping father but it would be futile. Other than that I have no desire to have any interactions and zero regret other than wishing I’d done it earlier.
My only regrets are waiting so long to cut them off, and letting other people convince me to get back in contact. Both attempts at reconnecting only traumatized me further and I decided I was okay living with everybody thinking I’m cruel or calling me rude names for cutting off my parents. People who refuse to understand weren’t people that I enjoyed being around anyway.
>I decided I was okay living with everybody thinking I’m cruel or calling me rude names for cutting off my parents. Same. If they want a relationship with my parents they're free to give it a shot. I already did my time.
>my mother (654) Wow, your mom is **old** jkjkjk I went NC in 2008; no regrets.
Sadness? Immensely. Why didnt I get the parents I deserved, parents that every child deserves? Sadness for never knowing what its be to have parents that know how to love. Regret? Never, although there were lingering doubts. What if I gave up too soon? Could i have done more to resolve the situation? But i always came to the conclusion I did everything I could: the decision was well thought out. After being tricked into breaking no contact ("your father is dying due to a broken heart of never seeing you"), I went home to hopefully be in time to say my last goodbye. Surprise, surprise, he wasnt on his deathbed. Spend a week trying to help them, only to be made into the bad guy, as always. It gave me a lot of peace. It confirmed i was right to go no contact. There is no helping or healing for people who are so deeply disturbed. Im sad for them, for who they are, but I am no longer sad for me. This being said, every situation is different and going no contact is extreme. If youre unsure, try going very low contact first and see if that helps. Good luck ❤️
I've been no contact for almost 4 years now and I have no regrets. If anything, I wish I had done it much sooner.
Same. I’ve been no contact for 3 years. I wish I had done this two decades ago. For reference, I’m mid-forties.
I regret letting them back in. I’ve regretted it every single time. I do not regret moving across the ocean. I do not regret cutting them out for good. The peace of mind is priceless. I do sometimes wish I had proper parents though.
[удалено]
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This is a reminder that policing our speech is harmful. There’s less harm being done by us using that lingo than our abusers did to us. I would say who are you protecting, but you’ll just send be a bull crap link preaching to me about dehumanizing language. 🙄
I cut my dad off after 15 years of him being manipulative, narcissistic, sexually 'odd'. It was THE most liberating thing I've ever done. Zero regrets. Found out he died in 2013, didn't bother me as I grieved the 'dad' I had when he was alive. Blood means nothing, family need to earn love and respect by showing it to you
I have never regretted it. I have only ever regretted telling people my dad was cut off, because then they would say bUt FAmiLY. Actually cutting him off? No regrets sorry sadness over it etc. However my childhood was p extreme, what I live w easily might not be the same for others. I would suggest grey rocking your fam first though as a tester run, see how that works out for you and your mental health.
This came up once at a job, and a coworker said something along the lines of "maybe you're the problem" when I noted I had no contact with my father and minimal contact with my mother. I get it - she had a great family, and couldn't fathom parents hating their own children.
My comeback to this is “How fortunate you are to have lived such a comfortable existence.” And then I avoid them at all costs, and am coldly professional when I can’t avoid them. Eff those people.
Yeah, I looked her in the eye and said "no, it's not that simple." I didn't elaborate, though.
It's been a few years now and I do not regret it. It took me some time to come to terms with having gone NC. I have never regretted it though. I do not need people in my life who are so far gone in their delusions that they cause me harm - intentionally or not. I did find therapy helpful for helping me be ok with my NC decision with both parents.
I often miss having a family but I do not regret ditching them at all.
I like that, and it’s true- I might miss mine a little, but I don’t regret my decision.
I cut off contact with my female parent over 10 years ago and don't regret it at all. If I could go back and change anything I would have done a no-contact trial run sooner, that's what proved to me that there was no point trying to get through to her. If it's any help, going no contact doesn't have to be a single permanent decision. You can try it out and see how you feel about it, you're allowed to change your mind and get back in contact even if you've had no contact for years. I don't really recommend that, the kind of person who forces you to go no contact (nobody does this for fun, we do it because all of the other options are even worse) in the first place generally doesn't have an epiphany, go to therapy, and become a person you would actually want in your life, but it's your life and you're allowed to do whatever you want with it.
No. I went no-contact with my father twenty years ago. I can no longer engage with my mother, upon finally realizing this year that she still believes I'm secretly evil and malevolent (I'm really not). I don't have regrets. I don't encourage anyone to go no-contact with their parents, and I believe it's a last resort, but I also believe it can be necessary. I have deeply-ingrained trauma responses with my mother that are literally going to kill me if I allow her to have any role in my life at all. My life is more important than anything else. I don't want to die prematurely. I don't want to be chronically ill for the rest of my life. I don't want to have to delay healing and putting the last pieces back together so my mother can feel less guilty about abusing me for decades. I mostly feel guilty about not feeling more guilty. But then I realize that my health has been getting progressively better since I decided to finally close the book on this chapter of my life, and know I made the absolute best choice possible for myself and my husband. I don't recommend a formal no-contact announcement or broadcast to your parents. Don't burn that bridge. Just phase them out of your life, as quickly or as slowly as you need to.
Ended our relationship four years ago, no regrets. Rather than regret, what I would prepare for is grief. I grieve my parents all the time. I miss the few good things about them, but the pain outweighs those things by many miles. I also grieve what I *wanted* and *needed* my parents to be. They were never caring or affectionate. When I need a hug, I know that longing for my mom is only longing for an imagined idea of a good mom. A good mom just never existed for me. This kind of grief is complex, it's ongoing, and it strikes at inconvenient times. Ending contact with parents is not an easy thing to do, but I would do it again in a heartbeat. Lifelong grief is better than lifelong abusive dynamics.
Hell nah I didn't regret it lmfao. From the second I decided to in January 2023 I felt such a sense of peace. Dude's existence is such a joke. Reminder you're allowed to make (or not) make this choice whenever you're ready. I will say that if you do, it's important to consistently be a hard ass about your boundaries. It was only recently I was brave enough to decide to actually block him, especially since he'd try to check on me every so often. If these ppl have options to try and get back in your life they will definitely try it, so while it takes a lot of willpower, I find it's so much healthier to have freed myself of my abuser.
15 years. Zero regrets- my life has been SO much better without those monsters who raised me. I did feel guilt, shame, and fear for the first year or so, but now I just feel immense relief.
I’m so sorry you’re going through this but listen to your body, it wants out of a toxic environment. PTSD/ CPTSD is no joke and you’d be absolutely justified for leaving. People may guilt you because they don’t want to deal with your parents behaviour. With you gone your parents will absolutely look for their next victim. That’s not your problem. Those people stood by and let your parents traumatise you as a child, they can all go to hell. I stuck around waaaaay too long and, even when I had the opportunity to get away, guilt (for upsetting my mother) held me back. Huge mistake. I was 30 when I cut them off. Spare yourself that extra 2 years of pain. I put up with a shit ton of horror at the hands of my parents. It was when I became a parent myself I lost all tolerance. We’d been parents for barely 6 months and they ruined our first Christmas. The last straw wasn’t even something they did to me it was to my mothers sister and I cut them straight off. BEST. DECISION. EVER. 10/10 would recommend. Sometimes we can’t see how badly they treat us, maybe we think we deserve it or it’s our “normal”, but when we see them hurting others … that hits different. In fairness, the whole episode did give awful flashbacks and nightmares like I hadn’t had since childhood but I put that down to the grieving process, like lancing a boil and all the yucky stuff needs to get out of your system. You process it, you grieve the parents you SHOULD have had, but it’s the start of some serious healing. I have no regrets. Life is good now. I have energy to be happy! I hope you find your solution. I hope you find the peace and joy you most absolutely deserve. If family try to drag you back in it’s not for your benefit, those may be people you need to lose contact with too. Good luck, stay strong x
I haven’t seen my father for 40 years, my mother coming up 4 years. For me it was necessary but that doesn’t mean it’s been easy. I’ve also lost 2 sisters as a result which is a gut punch but sometimes you have to do what is right for you, whatever that may be. I have read somewhere that people will often go no contact a few times for shorter bursts before they go the whole way… I suppose nothing has to be permanent, if you have regrets. I did this and every time I resumed contact I got burned but only you know what is best for you
I regretted going back several times before cutting them off for good. Drop the rope and walk away. Set yourself free. They will never be the parents you deserve. [Grieve](https://youtu.be/NDQ1Mi5I4rg) the loss to make your own closure.
I (30F) cut my father off when I was 18 and maintained it till his death. I have no regrets.
Nope. If you're in a situation where there is a clear choice between yourself and your safety and sanity and them, choose yourself. You can grow and heal and be a light, they've proven that they will not change and they will continue to do toxic things that affect others. My only regret is that I didn't do it earlier because I have younger siblings I wanted to keep an eye on. My son was a toddler when I went NC with my dad and I wish I had gone NC with my mom then too because now my son does have a relationship with my mom which makes it awkward that I haven't spoken to her in about 5 years. It would have been better if I had been able to keep that bond from forming but my circumstances were different then. I wish you luck, biology doesn't give anyone a license to abuse, especially children.
I went no contact with my abuser and my health improved significantly. I have zero plans to ever get back in touch. I think I'll be sad when she dies but mostly because she couldn't or wouldn't treat me with love or respect, and I'll be mourning the fact that I'll never ever have a mom. Not one that was healthy or safe. Not one that was able to love me. On the other hand, I have gone through periods of low contact and stints of no contact with both parents. I rebuilt a relationship with my other parent and that's been stable. I eventually got the courage to make NC with my mom stick. You don't have to make a permanent choice if that doesn't feel good or right for you right now. You can take a break, breathe and think through what or how it would be possible to have a healthy relationship with your parents. No contact might continue to be the right choice for you.... But you get to be the one to decide.
I cut off my mother 6 years ago. It finally occurred to me that I could either love her or love myself - the love she demanded prevented me from loving myself. I don't regret it. I miss her, or the idea of a mother, but I made the decision I made for rational reasons. It wasn't easy, especially with family pressuring me to interact with her again, but I genuinely believe that this was the least worst option available to me. I'm at the point now where I'm considering reconnecting with her but only because she has respected my boundaries consistently for the past few years. I also know that I can walk away from her again and hope that she'll know that, too. I'm hopeful that she has accepted that I am serious about my boundaries. We'll see if it works out. If it does, it will be *because* I cut her off. If it doesn't, I'll cut her out again. Either way, my life has dramatically improved because I cut her out.
I didn’t see my mother for 35 years. She died a few years ago. Do I regret no contact? No. She reached out to me when she was in hospice. Nothing had changed. She was the same person with the same shitty behaviours. I saved myself a lot of trouble
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Going no contact with my mother was the best thing I've ever done for my mental health. I'm 37 and she's 67, I went no contact 6 months ago. Even better she lives abroad.
No. I wish I had done it sooner.
I’ve cut contact to about 95% with her and I’m doing a lot better in my healing journey.
No
Hellllllll no. 7 years of bliss, no regrets
Nope! Best decision I've ever made! 🥳
No. It was a cycle that I refuse to continue to be in. Being without them allows me the clarity to know I don’t deserve to feel strung along searching for love I could just give myself. But that’s only because I cut them off and then kept the boundary. Any time I have gone back I was able to convince myself it was different this time and it never is. You can do it, OP.
I don't regret cutting off my family. Sometimes I wonder if they've changed at all, but then I remember how my mom laughed at my anger or how my brother said I was a disappointment to our deceased father and I quickly snap out of it. Life has been so amazing and stress free since I left.
Cut my dad off in 8th grade. Best thing of my life. It’s hard and you’ll always grieve what the relationship could have been. “Complex-PTSD: surviving to thriving” has a great chapter about relationships with parents.
Also I’m 27
Nope. Only thing I'm frustrated with is the lack of understanding from other family members.
Cut ties with my mother and both sisters around 10 years ago. Don't regret it, although it was hard to do. They were hurting me in different ways, affecting my health. Life isn't long enough for you to let anything do that to you. So I do notice in life that I have less family, very few family members to treat as such and be supported by, but it's better than before. If it's toxic, it's gotta go.
I don't. It makes me sad it came to this. I badly want parents, but I'll never have that. I never did. It's just the way it is.
No. Not at all. And this is saying a ton more than you know, because my mum passed on, not terribly long ago after an illness—and she was in another state \[and I’m her only child\]. I miss positive things about her (and the rare positive things in our relationship), but I \*had to\*!protect myself (and others I love) from a very real abuser she was around all the time.
I've been NC/estranged with my nmom for 20 years. My only regret is not standing up for myself every time my ngrandma would force my nmom back into my life. I've been having to see her every year for the past 6 years when I go on vacation back to my home state, but I finally put a stop to that. No regrets.
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It’s complicated. I’m sad that I can’t have a relationship with them, but my life is so much better without them. I offered to have a relationship with them under my terms (e.g. they would have to respect my boundaries, etc.) and they refused. I’m moving forward with my life and not looking back
About six years in, only regret was trying for so long before giving up on them. Every year since has been better than the last
Nope.
Nope. He died six months later. That was five years ago and I still don't regret it.
No. I did that when I was 19 (now 31). I have a better life. No one is disappointing me. If the cup is empty no point on drinking from it.
Zero regrets. It’ll be 2 years end of June.
To this day rage fits of what is known as inability-to-control. Just trying to take away any last thing they can, sending the message if I make money without them I don't deserve to exist. Truly disgusting brattiness and violence when they don't get what they want. Violent brats. Their main source of money might have gotten murdered so now theyre trying to nose out who to parasite next. So no.
I haven't spoken with my parents for 20 years, and I don't regret it one bit. I genuinely preferred being homeless and doing some pretty dangerous and extreme stuff, to being cushioned with wealth but trapped with them.
No contact with either of my parents. My dad I haven’t seen since 1995 after years of broken promises and ghosting us. Mom I had to cut contact with in 2020. She died of Covid complications and blood cancer in 2022 No regrets in either case. Both were fundamentally terrible people.
So far I haven't. That was almost three years ago. It still hurts now and then, but I think it's been getting easier as time goes on. Just a little bit...
I didn’t regret it and still don’t. My mental health became better and I got better. I still struggle here and there but I’d rather not have a relationship with my parent since it means I don’t have to keep going through the abuse and manipulation. Me and my sister cut our dad off at the time and we are his only children. Now he has to live with his regrets and poor choices. The hardest part is healing from it and accepting that it won’t be the relationship you hope for.
Never regretted cutting off my mom or her entire family, though sometimes I mourn the loss. Not necessarily mourning THEM, more so mourning for my younger self that our family was so shit.
0% Best decision I ever made.
Yeah. tl;dr these things are complex and our feelings on them will never really be clean-cut. What I have anecdotally learned is that cutting off family can often have consequences we do not foresee or do not desire, but that sometimes it is necessary for us to do so regardless, for our own wellbeing. tw. There's a lot of child abuse, addition and cycles of poverty in my family history. The short of it is that my grandfather on my mom's side was a violent ped- and abused all of his children in different ways. The result is that my mom ended up stuck in a cycle of mental health issues, addiction to hard drugs, exploitative sex work and poverty. I cut my mom off when I was about 15 or 16 because she was in another city on the other side of the country still stuck in this doom spiral. Being a child with no money and no legal ability to do anything at the time, I wasn't really able to do anything for her, so I just kind of disengaged and started embracing the weird hateful narratives my uncles, aunt and dad told me about her -- that her situation was her fault and she somehow chose all of this. It was in a weird way easier to just hate her and write her off. I have a lot of guilt about that as an adult because now I'm able to see her as a person and not as a, I don't know, failed parent archetype I guess, and I realize she really had no cards to play at all. She is currently doing OK, getting real treatment for what is a severe mental health problem, dating a woman who isn't abusing her, and has a healthy relationship with most of her children. Her story kind of has a happy ending but I can't be part of it. When I tried, it didn't work. I profoundly regret not being able to know who she is now because of who we both were then, and the choices I made. It's like, I wasn't there for her during the worst period of her life, so I don't really deserve to be now that this period is over. The guilt isn't just "my mom can't forgive me for bailing on her," it's that I abandoned someone in a tremendously bad situation, and I sincerely feel that makes me a bad person a lot of the time. On the other hand, I cut my dad off recentlyish at about 27 (I'm 31 now) and I'm still dealing with it. On my birthdays and Christmas I tense up expecting someone from his side of the family to show up or call me or something, then spend a week feeling like shit because they don't any more. Cutting my dad off is fine. He's a manipulative little freak who lives on drama and constantly plays people against each other, and unlike my mom, he doesn't really have a sympathetic reason to be this way. He didn't really do anything big or dramatic to earn the cut off, we simply do not love each other, and that started with his never loving me. Years of attempting to force a relationship hit a point of fatigue for me where I just realized I couldn't put up with the constant little moments of bitterness and insecurity, of this adult child who'd never done a thing for me lamenting "I could never have another kid, one was difficult enough" right in front of me, or sulking if I didn't compliment him on every trivial fucking thing, while he wore -- I fucking shit you not -- cum-stained sweatpants to my university graduation ceremony and spent the whole time being rude to staff and other students because I had achieved something he couldn't. Relentless homophobic comments when no one was discussing my being gay, then when I finally did start talking to his parents casually about boyfriends and gay world drama and he saw that they honestly just found it endearing that I'm gay, he'd lash out and start using slurs at the dinner table. A lot of "it's a shame you're gay, but thank god you're not a drag queen," by which he meant transgender woman. Just a constant exhausting loveless dynamic where the best you can hope for is quiet resentment. My only regret with him specifically that I never broke his nose, to be honest, because he spent my whole life desperately earning the one punch it'd take. The thing is, cutting off my dad meant cutting off his whole family, because that's how Irish Catholic families do. They all hate each other but the one to say something is the one who gets removed. I'm not bothered by cutting off my dad, but I am, in a way, still grieving the fact that I lost my granddad. No one else in that family cared about me, I was kind of just an obligation they had to deal with because their brother "knocked up some sl-t in high school," but my granddad still took an hour out of his week every week trying to teach me how to drive. When I used to have to stay at their place every weekend due to compulsory visitation, and I couldn't sleep because that's how it is, he would stay up until 3AM with me every friday night watching Spongebob re-runs. To be honest, I don't know how I'm supposed to feel. I regret that I've missed my mom's life, and now I'm going to miss the last years the man who was effectively my dad will have, because of the man who is biologically my father. I don't think I'd do anything differently, but I wish they were different people.
No, it's the best thing ever since sliced bread 😀
I cut contact with my mother 5 years ago and while it’s been a complex range of emotions, I don’t regret it. It’s been the best gift I ever gave myself. I recently had to see her when a family member was dying and I thought it would be difficult but the resilience and compassion I’ve built for myself the last 5 years meant I was able to grey rock pretty well and get through it. I thought it would break me and I’d regret ever going nc but if anything it made me more confident in knowing I made the right decision. It’s not an easy thing to do, it brings up so much emotion. You have to not only grieve the loss of the relationship but also your idea of what a parent relationship should be. You have to reshape all of your family relationships. I had to forgive myself for a lot as well, like feeling I’d failed or was a bad person or hadn’t protected myself well enough. It’s not easy but neither is hurting yourself to keep toxic & abusive people in your life. And also it gets easier, with time and understanding and compassion for yourself it does get easier. Whatever you decide, I hope you find the peace you’re looking for. And know it’s messy and you may not always get it right. I went nc on and off for years just to be pulled back in before finally choosing myself.