How Family Therapy Can Improve Relationships Between Adult Children and Their Parents

In recent years, many therapists and researchers have noted a rise in adult children cutting ties with one or both parents. While estrangement can sometimes be a necessary and appropriate step, I worry that it is increasingly encouraged as a first-line solution rather than one of many possible paths. Even the New York Times’ The Interview podcast recently featured Lindsay Gibson, author of Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents, highlighting this very trend. As important as it is to validate the pain that adult children may carry, it’s equally important to recognize that reconciliation and repair are possible — and in many cases, profoundly healing.

Family therapy offers a unique space for adult children and their parents to come together and safely explore their relationship. As both a parent and an adult child myself, I appreciate how complicated this terrain can be. Parents often begin with the best of intentions but inevitably make mistakes, while adult children may carry the hurt and disappointment of those missteps, sometimes magnified over years. Therapy provides a structure where both sides can be heard, misunderstandings can be clarified, and old patterns can be examined with compassion. By fostering honest dialogue, family therapy helps families find a new way forward together.

The truth is that relationships between adult children and parents can be deeply meaningful and worth the effort to preserve. Family therapy does not minimize pain or excuse harmful behavior — rather, it creates space for accountability, repair, and growth. When adult children and parents are willing to show up, listen, and try again, they often discover a new depth of connection that had once felt out of reach. Helping families build these bridges is deeply rewarding work, and I believe more of us should give healing and reconnection a chance before resorting to permanent distance.