Emi Nietfeld
Appearances
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
Joyful. It feels like a huge relief has been lifted off of me.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
I love my mom. My mom loves or loved me. But... Throughout my whole adolescence, there was so much fighting, there was so much feeling blamed, so much of trying to navigate her own issues with trying to keep myself sane, that when I eventually made the tough decision to cut ties, I expected that my whole life would fall apart, that I would just miss her all day, every day.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
And I was totally shocked to find out that actually my life has been so much better since I made that decision. When I was about 11, my parents' divorce was finalized and my mom won custody. And she had... a problem with compulsive shopping and hoarding. And it got really intense after the divorce.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
And that was also when my other parent moved across the country and we never had contact really since then. And so my mom was all that I had, but she could not tell that she had a problem. And so when I was in middle school, she brought me to these therapists and psychiatrists and really pointed the blame at me and said, okay, Emmy is disorganized. Emmy is chronically late. I think she has ADHD.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
And I was sent for medication. I took Adderall. I took Ritalin. I took Prozac, Zoloft, antidepressants, antipsychotics, a dozen drugs in two years. And it only got worse from there. I spent nine months in residential treatment when I was 14. I spent time in foster care. I got out of foster care, went to boarding school, but spent time homeless.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
My relationship with my mom just kind of got worse and worse. Because... I, you know, it was like, okay, well, why did I spend that year in foster care? And she was really like, you were troubled. Like you had to get your angries out on another family. You were too much for me to deal with. And there was, I was ready to take 90% of the blame, but I couldn't take 100% of it.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
And this especially came to a head when it came to the way that my mom had handled my sexual assault when I was 17. And in the aftermath, my mom sent me this email where it was like, you know, you shouldn't have been drinking. You should have said no loudly and clearly. Just all these things that I should have done differently happened. I was really, really struggling with PTSD.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
I was having an impossible time, like letting go of my own self-blame. But this whole time, everybody just assumed that I should have a close relationship with my mom. And it was never even a question of could I cut ties with my mom? Could I distance myself from my mom? It just was something that I had to do and was expected of me.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
And I started to realize, okay, I'm blaming myself thinking the very same things that my mom told me. And my mom clung to that. Like, she would not change her views. She would not let me off the hook. And I eventually was like, I'm not going to be able to get better if I'm still in contact with her.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
When I called my mom, I really did not want to believe that that was the conversation that was going to end our relationship. But, you know, and I confronted her about it. I was like, I really am struggling with how you are dealing with this assault. And she was like, what could I tell you that would make you believe that I don't think it's your fault?
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
This is my polite reminder that if you are no contact with your parents, that is okay. So one thing I really did not expect when I became estranged from my parents was that I was going to have to be consoling other people about it like semi-frequently.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
And I told her, I was like, you could say it's not your fault. But she actually would not say it. It was just silence. And I was like, wow, I really feel like I have to do this. And this is the right decision for me. It was so hard to hang up the phone. I just said, I love you again and again, knowing that that might be the last time that I said, I love you to my mom.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
Immediately. But then I started getting all of these text messages, all of these emails from my mom, just pretending that nothing had happened. And I think when the media talks about estrangement, it's often framed as like the moment of estrangement is the moment that you lose somebody. But what I experienced, and I think a lot of people experience, is that we've already lost that relationship.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
Or we've already lost the sense of love and safety that we want to have with somebody that makes them feel like family to us. It felt more like letting go of a lie than letting go of my actual real-life mom.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
I ended up getting a cousin to orchestrate my mom meeting my daughter. And so my husband took her over to a coffee shop. They spent, you know, an hour and a half together. And, you know, my mom got to hold her. My daughter's too young to remember it. But I... I think it was really important for me because it helped me believe that I'm not trying to punish my mom.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
And I think that the taboos against estrangement really push people to justify cutting ties in ways that aren't really healthy. You know, there's no estrangement police. There shouldn't be an estrangement police. And this is America. We have the right to never speak to our parents again. Really, like, if you're like, oh, duty, obligation, it's like, that is not American.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
Just think of all the people at Ellis Island holding a suitcase, thinking, I'm never going to see my family again, and being overjoyed that that's the case. Yeah. Back then, you really got a clean break. And now you almost have to estrange yourself because the person you don't want to talk to can text you all day, every day.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
No, it's true because people talk about estrangement like it's a technology problem as if like TikTok and Instagram are just infecting everybody's minds with this idea. I think it's a technology problem in the other way where we're way too accessible and there's no more etiquette anymore.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
So all we have left is boundaries and sometimes the ultimate boundary of saying I will never speak to you again.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
I mean, I would be heartbroken, and I definitely think I would try to understand it. What I hope is that parents focus way more on how do I build a relationship of reciprocal affection, kindness, respect with my kids. Because there's a lot of people who are like, you owe your parents. They say your parents raised you.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
The least you can do is suck it up and stay in this relationship that's making you really unhappy. And I just don't think that that tracks with the modern world or with modern life. People point out this breakdown between the generations. And I actually think that there's truth to that.
Today, Explained
Breaking up with your parents
I really think that there's not this continuity between, you know, parents and children and grandparents anymore. So I can actually totally see a world where most people are estranged from their parents. I could totally see that coming. And do I think that that would be a good thing? No. No. No. But do I think that would be understandable? Absolutely.