Cutting Ties With Your Parents

This book is a practical, workbook-style guide specifically tailored for adult children dealing with voluntary estrangement from parents — an area where resources are often limited.

Powerful tools to help you accept your decision, manage intense emotions, and thrive. Estrangement from one or both parents—even by choice—can take a huge emotional and psychological toll. If you have cut ties with a parent, you may have lingering feelings of anger, loneliness, guilt, and shame. You may question or second-guess your decision. And you may have trouble setting or keeping boundaries with your parent, as well as others in your life. This workbook offers evidence-based skills to help you heal the emotional wounds of your past, so you can finally move forward. With this compassionate guide, you'll identify the reasons why you cut ties, so you can accept and feel validated in your decision. You'll discover powerful tools to help you manage intense emotions, develop healthy coping strategies, and build a lasting and trustworthy support network. Most importantly, you'll learn to cultivate self-compassion and live your life authentically — on your own terms. You'll also find step-by-step guidance to: grieve your losses and release guilt, anxiety, shame, and anger; understand and overcome the effects of difficult family relationships; manage difficult days and occasions like holidays, weddings, and funerals; and maintain boundaries and build healthy relationships.

“Sharon Martin's Cutting Ties with Your Parents is a helpful workbook and guide for adult children navigating the challenging journey of detaching from difficult or abusive parental relationships.” — Mari A. Lee, LMFT

“When we make a brave decision to break the cycle of generational trauma … this book adds something really special to the field, and is a strong tool for helping adults decide for themselves how to manage family relationships.” — Becca Bland, DLitt, family-estrangement researcher and founder of Stand Alone.

“Sharon Martin has created a masterful and practical gem of a workbook … a clear and direct path toward accepting this decision, so the reader is left with no stone unturned. Bravo!” — Sherrie Campbell, PhD