When Brooklyn Beckham used his social networks to make his desire to get away from his family official, he did so with a blunt phrase composed of six words that inevitably made one think of the distancing of Enrique from England and Meghan Markle with respect to the Windsors. “I don't want to reconcile with my family.” Family distancing remains taboo despite the fact that more and more people decide to distance themselves from their families, and those who have done so believe that eliminating the stigma will allow more people to leave unhealthy family relationships without feeling shame or guilt.
Alejandro Ferrer, systemic-relational psychotherapist from FEATF and psychologist, explains that family distancing remains a taboo because it touches on one of the deepest beliefs of our culture: the myth of the united family. "Under this narrative, blood ties are placed above any conflict. From a systemic perspective, this is not coincidental. Invisible loyalties operate in every family: deep emotional commitments that link us to the system beyond consciousness. These loyalties are transmitted from generation to generation and sustain us in the sense of belonging, but they can also trap us. Many people remain in dynamics that harm them not due to lack of awareness, but due to loyalty to the family system," he says. He comments that physical distancing is usually the last step of a long and silent process, since the denial of one's own needs and emotional distancing occur first. “That is why separating, distancing ourselves or setting limits can activate intense guilt and be considered taboo, not only because of the feeling of challenging what is socially and familiarly expected of us, but also because of challenging a part of our identity,” he adds.
Ferrer believes that today, as new generations have grown up with greater access to information about mental health and emotional limits, younger people can identify dynamics that were previously normalized or not even named. However, he warns that there is a risk of overdiagnosing or pigeonholing complex situations with simplified labels. "Not all conflict is abuse, and not all discomfort requires a breakup. Differentiating between specific difficulties—which are part of any family—and persistent patterns of harm is essential. Furthermore, distancing does not always solve the underlying problem," he comments. Because although sometimes it allows you to breathe and gain autonomy, if there is no internal work, it can become a way of building a parallel life without really integrating your own story.
Dr. Joshua Coleman said on the Where Parents Talk podcast that distancing between parents and children was “kind of a silent epidemic” and that ideas about the need to stay with family have been replaced by a much more identity-based perspective that believes that if a relationship does not convince, it is best to walk away. "Protecting mental health has become a big priority. There are many adult children who move away from their parents, certainly for reasons of abuse and neglect, but also for much more psychological, subtle and political reasons, and that is causing a lot of disruption," he says.
"I don't want to have anything to do with my parents either now or in the future. When they get older and the severe downturn comes, let's see how we can address it in the most aseptic way possible. It sounds horrible to have to talk like that about parents but it is reality, because they did not do the same with their responsibility towards their daughter," said Inés Hernand in an interview with El País. Believing that family should always be placed above any other priority can push some people to remain in deeply unsatisfying or even harmful relationships, under the premise that breaking the bond would be an unforgivable betrayal. It can also fuel dynamics of guilt and emotional pressure that make it difficult to make free decisions. The myth that the family must stay together at all costs views the family as a compact block, almost as if it were a single voice with identical thoughts, emotions, and experiences. It is forgotten, therefore, that each member has their own identity, desires and ways of understanding life. Precisely ignoring this diversity can generate invisible tensions and silenced conflicts, sustained by the idea that questioning unity is equivalent to putting the family bond at risk.
“It is as valid to decide to cut family ties as to continue in them if you feel that now you are going to be able to do it in a truly healthier way,” he writes to Marta Martínez Novoa in Families that hurt (unintentionally) (Zenith, 2026). "Cutting a family bond is not only a personal decision, it is also a deep emotional movement that can remove very old wounds, activate fear of rejection or loneliness, and even make you doubt yourself, says the psychologist. José Antonio Sande Martínez, author of Emergency Manual for Abused Women (Desclée De Brouwer, 2026) believes that young people have been born in a society in which the emotional world was already present from birth. "Let us not forget that this 'revolution' emotional' arises to a certain extent after the publication of the book Emotional Intelligence (Editorial Kairós, 1996) by Daniel Goleman and that the birth and evolution of neuroscience has largely based attention to the emotional world. Young people today are more aware and informed, even with movies, series and books. This makes them more proactive in protecting their emotionality," he says. "Currently there are many ways to deal with situations of toxicity in the family or relationships. Perhaps the first could be family mediation work for the simplest cases and with good will on all sides. In more complex cases, emotional therapy and psychological therapy in their many variants can be of great help,” he indicates.
Alejandro Ferrer considers it essential to differentiate between limits and rupture. “Boundaries are designed to define how far a relationship goes; Distancing implies, in many cases, a total interruption of contact. They are not always the same nor do they fulfill the same function. A useful question might be: 'Is this distance protecting me or is it keeping me away from something I still need to work through?' Sometimes that restorative relationship is not with the family of origin, but with the family that we build in adulthood, with friends, a partner or even with ourselves in a symbolic way," she explains. Inés Hernand herself, when she presented La Familia on TV, assured that "the family is an institution that must be reversed like the traditional concept we had and taken to the family you choose."
But family estrangement doesn't have to be forever. The key is not to go back to the way things were before, but rather that there is recognition of the damage and a real willingness to change. "Without that basis, any attempt at reconciliation tends to repeat the same pattern. Repairing involves being able to talk about what hurts without escalating the conflict, choosing appropriate moments and learning to regulate oneself emotionally and in relationship. In some cases, repairing does not mean recovering the previous closeness, but rather redefining the type of possible bond: perhaps a more limited contact or, if there are profound changes, a more transformed relationship," explains Alejandro Ferrer, who indicates that the essential thing is that the responsibility be shared, not allowing all the effort to fall on the person who suffered. the damage. "Reparation is not about erasing the past, but about integrating it to build a different relationship. And if that is not viable, it is also legitimate to redefine the bond in a way that protects the dignity and well-being of each person," he says.
The delicate thing about moving away from family and advocating zero contact is that in a digitalized world, being able to inadvertently find out about those from whom someone is moving away is very common. As if that were not enough, since the online universe is covered by a filter of constant happiness 3.0, it can be mentally destabilizing for those who have discordant relationships to encounter the past and discover that apparently, the lives of those people from whom they distanced themselves are absolutely happy without them. "Never in our history have we been so accessible to our family and friends. Social networks, on the one hand, allow us to quickly connect with those we love. On the other, they give those we love, or those we once loved, enormous power to reach us and hurt us from almost anywhere in the world," commented psychologist Joshua Coleman, a specialist in distancing, in an article published in The Guardian in which he explained that after having distanced himself from his family some time ago, he had to make immense efforts to also distance himself from any attempt to digital approach.
The essential thing is to remember that as in love relationships, both parties need to be willing to reconcile in order to return. Ferrer clarifies in conclusion that in cases of serious abuse it may be the only possible option but in others internal work can open different paths.
