Dr. Joshua Coleman
speaker
727 appearances
3 recordings
2 series
first heard May 2026
last heard 9 Jul
Dr. Joshua Coleman’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 3 in all, peaking in May 2026 with 2.
Appearances
Good Life Project · Healing Family Estrangement: What To Say, And What Never to Say. · 9 Jul 2026
podcast
From the adult child's perspective, estrangement's working for them.
I mean, they may have guilt about it.
They may have sadness.
They may have regret.
But they wouldn't be doing it unless they thought it was in their best interest.
And in fact, when I tell parents to reach out, the adult child, I tell them to say, I know you wouldn't do this unless you felt like it was the healthiest thing for you to do.
Now, the parent may not feel like that, but the adult child does.
And unless the parent can really position themselves in that way, then no good is going to come of their communication.
Right.
Yeah, it used to be, you know, I'm Jewish and I had a Jewish mother.
And so when I moved to California, she could call me up and say, oh, so Mr. Fancy Psychologist, you're too busy to call your poor mother in Dayton, Ohio, you know.
And I wasn't going to label it as, you know, emotional abuse on her part or narcissism or whatever.
It was just kind of how she communicated and people of that generation communicated.
communicated but that that ship has sailed now guilt tripping your kid using guilt as a motivator is going to be experienced to the adult child as uh as a form of emotional abuse or gaslighting them or a boundary crossing um and it's just not going to get you what you want the the adult child is going to come back into contact with the parent of their own volition they have to feel like it works for them it's not going to be if guilt worked they probably wouldn't be estranged
But it wouldn't work because the adult child needs to feel like the relationship is something that really feels inviting and safe and reasonable to them.
So yeah, guilt just doesn't, is not persuasive.
Yeah, that's a big one.
It's a mistake that I see a lot of parents, a lot of therapists of the estranged parent make, which is, well, you need to set limits on your adult child and you need to tell them what your boundaries are.
And, you know, you need to not let them talk to you that way.
And I mean, there's a place to be assertive about one's, you know, how one's being spoken to.
Showing 181–200 of 727 · page 10 of 37
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