March 7, 2022 • 26 mins
What do you do when someone cuts you out of their life? How do you back away slowly from someone you really don’t want to be around? Boundaries are part of all human relationships, but they are TRICKY. This week, part one of our show about boundaries - how to make them, how to keep them, and sometimes, how to breach them - with special guest Dr. Alexandra Solomon, host of Reimagining Love.
Want your questions answered on the show? To submit your questions by voicemail, call us at (323) 643-3768 or visit megandevine.co
In this episode we cover:
- Why relational self-awareness is the key to all good relationships
- Can step-parents and adult step-kids get along after a loss in the family?
- Why relationships based on conscious choice are so important
- How to negotiate the relationship you want when the other people maybe don’t want you around
- The difference between “letting go of outcome” and setting yourself up for success
Guest Bio:
Dr Alexandra Solomon is one of the most trusted voices in the world of relationships. She’s a licensed clinical psychologist at The Family Institute at Northwestern University and the author of two bestselling books: Loving Bravely and Taking Sexy Back. You might know her from her popular instagram channel, or from her podcast, Reimagining Love. Find her at https://dralexandrasolomon.com.
Questions to Carry with you:
- Check back next week for part two of this special episode on boundaries to get your Questions to Carry With You
Resources:
Want to train with Dr. Solomon? Check out her current training courses at https://dralexandrasolomon.com
Need a place to tell the whole truth about what you’re going through? Check out the Writing Your Grief course and community, from Megan Devine. Registration for the next session is open now.
Looking for more training as you navigate grief on the job and in your life? Check out megandevine.co for upcoming workshops
Get in touch:
Thanks for listening to this week’s episode of Here After with Megan Devine. Tune in, subscribe, leave a review, send in your questions, and share the show with everyone you know. Together, we can make things better, even when they can’t be made right.
To submit your questions by voicemail, call us at (323) 643-3768 or visit megandevine.co
For more information, including clinical training and consulting, visit us at www.Megandevine.co
For grief support & education, follow us at @refugeingrief on IG, FB, & TW
Check out Megan’s best-selling books - It’s Okay That You're Not Okay and How to Carry What Can’t Be Fixed
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is here After, and I'm your host, Megan Divine.
Each week we tackle big questions from advocates, therapists, and
regular old humans trying to show up with skill and
kindness after life goes horribly wrong. This week, it's all
about boundaries, how to make them, how to keep them,
and sometimes how to breach them. With special guest Dr
Alexandra Solomon, host of Reimagining Love. This is part one
(00:23):
of a two part special on boundaries. So stay tuned, everybody.
We'll be right back after this first break. Before we
get started, one quick note, while I hope you find
a lot of useful information in our time here together.
This show is not a substitute for skilled support with
a license mental health provider or for professional supervision related
(00:47):
to your work. Hey friends, So, one of the questions
I get asked the most often is some variation of
how do I get this person to do what I
want them to do when they don't want to do it?
That sounds a little bit creepy, right, It sounds manipulative.
How do I get this person to do what I
want them to do and they don't want to do it.
(01:07):
Here's the thing, though, It's normal for people to want
things from other people, things like connection or some kind
of action or a change in behavior. Requests of other
people are not manipulative, not by their very basic nature.
That relational give and take between people is normal, but
it does get tricky when you've got conflicting needs and interests.
(01:31):
That results in some relational lines drawn in the sand
that might not feel very good. So we either need
to create boundaries in order to keep somebody out of
our lives or some aspect of our lives, or we're
encountering barriers somebody else has put up when we'd really
like to be let back in. Now I've actually put
off a show on interpersonal boundaries for a bit, waiting
(01:53):
for just the right guest to dive into this tricky territory.
Boundaries and relationships are really messy, So you know who
I turned to when relationships get complicated. Dr Alexandra Solomon.
Dr Solomon is one of the most trusted voices in
the world on relationships, and her work on relational self
awareness has reached millions of people around the world. She's
(02:16):
a licensed clinical psychologist at the Family Institute at Northwestern
University and the author of two best selling books loving
Bravely and taking Sexy Back. You might know her from
her popular Instagram channel or from her podcast Reimagining Love.
Dr Solomon and I recorded an episode for her podcast
a few weeks ago, and now she is back in
the studio with me for this week's show. Alexander, I
(02:38):
am so glad to be together with you again, one
of my favorite people in the world. I like where
this relationship is heading. I'm here for I love this
relationship building right now on air. Everybody, Okay, one of
my favorite things about your work is how you dive
straight into the complicated heart of things. It's also why
we're friends. So no fluff or anything. On your website,
(03:01):
you wrote something really interesting. You said, our best and
bravest work is to practice relational self awareness so that
we can meet differences with curiosity and compassion rather than
criticism and derision. So that is a bit of a
mouthful if you're trying to follow that, everybody, a bit
of a mouthful out of context. But you and I
are about to dive into some complex interpersonal boundary work.
(03:23):
So can you tell me a little bit about how
you see that relational self awareness? As like, I don't
know the gateway to navigating differences with curiosity rather than criticism.
What do you mean by that? Relational self awareness is
the through line of all of the work that I do.
And one of the principles of relational self awareness is
(03:43):
that we are willing again and again to kind of
run a complicated relationship dynamic through the following formula that
I call the golden equation of love my stuff plus
your stuff equals our stuff. It's so easy in relationship
to get caught up in these cycles of blame and shame.
(04:05):
Right blame is when I imagine that our stuff is
because of your stuff. Right shame is when I believe
that our stuff is because of my stuff. And so
we we come back to curiosity and care and mindfulness
when we piece apart. Okay, so what am I bringing
(04:26):
into this dynamic and what are you bringing to this dynamic?
And how is that creating the Petri dish? You know
of interplay where I misunderstanding you and you're misunderstanding me,
and I'm stepping all over your old wounds and you're
stepping all over my old wounds. Those are the conversations
where we don't fall into easy answers. We sit in
(04:48):
the complexity. Yeah, and I love that. What did you
call it? The golden equation of relationships, the golden equation
of love, the golden equation of love. I love I
love love equations. It's the only kind of mouth I
really like. What I really really like about what you
just said is you know this, this tendency we have
because we are human, is to think that either everything
is all about us, or everything is all about the
(05:10):
other person, right, they're doing this terrible thing to me,
or I'm not getting what I want in this relationship
because I'm doing something horrible. And I've said this a
million times, like binaries don't work on humans at all,
and this one person is all right and the other
person is all wrong. I mean, that's a binary system
that doesn't work. Right, That's right exactly. And I think
(05:31):
sometimes we miss it because by the time we start
analyzing what's going on, we've become so polarized, right, our
positions have become we've become cut off from each other,
or we've said things that are so big and so extreme.
You know, I spend so much time in therapy and
teaching rewinding the tape, right, rewinding, So in chapter five,
(05:51):
it looks like you are behaving like a complete a whole.
But in chapter one, you know, I've said something that
hurt your feelings and you bit your tongue and then
you pulled back, and when you pulled back, then I pursued,
and when I pursued that and then we got to
the point where we were so polarized. So it's that
a lot of that, like looking in the rear view
mirror to understand how did we get here in the
(06:14):
service of going forward, right, we don't look in the
rearview mirror in order to assign ultimate blame. We look
in the rear view mirror to see what was the
first moment of misunderstanding that we didn't tend to, What
was the first moment where I bit my tongue instead
of inviting you to sit with me in a little
bit of truth. And that's oftentimes what leads up to
these big, big explosion, the big cut off, the big drama. Yeah,
(06:38):
so a lot of this sort of relational detective work.
And I love that that the way that you talk
about that it's rooted in kindness, right, It's actually rooted
in loving action that we're not sort of doing this
relational review in order to find more facts to persecute
somebody more fully, or to persecute ourselves more fully. We're
(06:59):
really doing this as a way of looking at what's
actually happening here, and how do we treat what's happening
with kindness and tenderness. Yeah, I mean I feel like
I'm sure you feel like this too, Like as a therapist,
like I have infinite compact, Like when I'm sitting with
a couple, Oh my gosh, I my heart is just
like wide open to both people right about. Oh my god,
that moment must have been so painful for you, and
(07:22):
this moment must have been so painful for you, right
that it's it's not hard to hold. I mean, sometimes
the things we do when we feel hurt are really
gnarly and shady McGrady. But the pain underneath, the self
protective strategy, the pain underneath, it's so easy to have
infinite amounts of compassion. For I felt so unseen, I
(07:44):
felt so devalued, I felt so afraid of losing you. Right,
those kind of core tender pieces just pull you know,
so much compassion forward. Yeah, I mean, these are the
complex interpersonal and personal relationship issue us that you you
deal with with such I don't know the word I
(08:04):
want here, like precise compassion. I really really love that
about your your language and your approach here. So that
foundation that you have of greeting those complex interpersonal relationship
issues with both kindness and self awareness is obviously why
I wanted to have you on specifically this week to
talk about some challenging interpersonal boundary stuff. This week, we've
(08:26):
got to listener questions related to keeping someone in your
life when they really aren't so happy to be there,
and then cutting somebody out of your life when they
really want to stay close to you. So two big,
thorny boundary interpersonal issues. Are you ready to dive into
the first one with me? I'm okay, let's do it.
(08:47):
So this listener wrote, I have two adult step daughters
that have cut me out of their lives since my
husband passed away from sudden cardiac arrest late last year.
I feel like I want to reach out to them,
but I have so many concerns about how to do
the We haven't had any context since about a month
after he died. My husband's birthday is coming up and
I would really like to reach out to his daughter's
(09:08):
But should I, if I do, what do I say?
I doubt myself in everything these days? So where do
we go with us? Mm hmm. There's a lot of
layers here that that I'm really I'm grateful that she
sent this question to you, because I think there's this
this is going to land. I think different parts of
it will land, you know, for different listeners. You know,
(09:30):
I was so touched in this last sentence of I
doubt myself and everything these days. And I know you
have so much to say about grief and self doubt. Right.
This is while she probably was a she was a
stepmom for some length of time, and it was very
likely the first time in her life she ever had
been a stepmom, which, by the way, I think is
probably one of, if not the most difficult role in
(09:50):
the family system. And so that was her first time
being a stepmom. And then she lost her husband, and
so it is her first time being a widow, and
so self doubt makes so much sense. It's so understandable
because these are spaces she has not been in before, right,
And her emotions are big and I'm sure threatened to
(10:10):
overwhelm her at times, and now she's approaching the first
birthday without her husband. There are so many different moving
parts to this. I love that you said this is
the first time she's had to do these roles or
sort of act in these roles, and that is something
that we don't want to underestimate the power of or
the pressure of, to be honest, like, I don't want
(10:32):
to screw this up. I need to do this correctly.
And I really hear that in this listener's question, like,
tell me exactly what I'm supposed to do here, because
this relationship is really important to me and I don't
want to screw it up. We're talking a bit more
of these days about cutoffs, and my understanding of the
research around cutoffs, is this the way this one is
playing out. It's it's pretty typical that most often it
(10:53):
is the adult child generation that cuts off the parent
generation cut off to go in that direction more often
than a parent generation cutting off a kid and then
um families. You know, blended families are more at risk
of cut offs than not blended family So in some
ways they've got a couple of risk factors here for
(11:15):
this to happen. And this you know, the man, this
man was kind of the fulcrum of the system. Right.
He was the tie for the daughters, and he was
the tie for this wife. And so these two women,
the stepdaughters and this step mom, they don't have a
tie a blood tie, right, If and as they were
to continue their relationship, it would be really based on
(11:36):
choice someone of history. We don't know how much history,
but it really would be a relationship truly of choice,
not duty, not blood, and you know all that factors in.
That's a really good point that you brought up there,
that we don't know the backstory here. We don't know
what kind of relationship this listener had with the stepdaughters
before her husband's death. Was it a tense relationship, was
(11:57):
a good relationship. We don't have a lot of back
store there. But I think that we can make some
guesses here that the relationship right now feels broken or
tenuous and tender. I love what you said they're about.
If they're going to move forward with a relationship, it's
a relationship of choice, right, It's not a relationship of
(12:18):
obligation or duty or you know, even something that really
has a good road map to it. No, Yeah, that's right.
There's not these would be three women choosing a kind
of relationship that certainly has got his memory as part
of it, like as sort of the connective tissue. But
it would be a relationship that they would choose, and
to see each other, I imagine highlights perhaps the pain
(12:42):
of his loss. Right when she's looking in those women's eyes,
maybe they look like if they look like him, right,
So she has face to face with all the ways
that he lives on in them, and they when they
look at her, they see the marriage, whatever that marriage
meant to them. So I imagine there's potentially pain that
maybe these daughters are protecting themselves from, but also then
(13:05):
a really important gateway to reminiscence and memory. And yeah,
I think there can be a real longing. And I
hear that in this listener. This this real longing for
a continued relationship. Right. It sounds like not only her
husband died, but she also lost a relationship that mattered
to her, whatever that relationship looked like. Right, So she's
(13:26):
in a way grieving three losses. And that's something that
we want to bring into the room here too. So
there's there's just really that longing and it's not like
being connected is going to solve anything for anybody. You
brought up how much pain there is involved in all
of this. You know, we don't know if these adult children,
one or both of them, if it's too painful for them,
(13:47):
Like we don't know what's going on for them. We
don't really know what's going on for any of them
until we sort of get to the point where we
can have that conversation. Well, that's one of the things
that I was thinking about, Like this question, is the
step mom story, is that the daughters have cut me off?
You know, we were saying before, like the way in
which these these sort of like chapter five may look
(14:08):
like the girls cut her off. But I wonder if
the girl's story is in chapter one she didn't follow
up after the funeral, or she didn't do this, or
when we asked for this she didn't know respond there.
There may have been things in which the daughter's story
might be she really pulled away from us. And that
is not I am not saying that at all in
any way to blame or put responsibility on this question writer.
(14:31):
I am just inviting the possibility that she has put
together the data in a particular way that may not
be the way this story lives inside of one or
both of the daughters. And that's really what you said
when we when we first started chatting here, is like
we want to widen out the scope of the story
(14:51):
and wonder about the other characters and what's their perspective
and what what is their reasoning, what does their story
look like, and how do those stories compare. I think
sometimes we can be like, oh, the step mom clearly
did something terrible and that's why these people don't want
to talk to her anymore, right, Like, I don't know,
maybe we we certainly don't have enough information on that.
(15:12):
But one of the things that you really said so
clearly is that nobody is to blame in any of
these directions, Right, We really just need to be curious
about sort of the full breadth of the story in
order to build this relationship of choice. Do you think that,
in terms of like applying just a really strict grief lens,
(15:33):
do you think it's possible that the step daughter is
like in an effort to almost like bind the enormity
of the grief, it's sort of like easier to somehow
blame like the yeah, if she if she hadn't blah,
blah blah, then Dad would still be here, I think,
especially with a sudden death. Certainly certainly happens in other
kinds of losses as well, but in a sudden death
that really sort of messes with your understanding of the
(15:57):
safety and predictability of the world. There is a big
temptation to point a finger, and I think for a
lot of people, anger is a much easier emotion than
intense sadness. It's easier to sort of be hot and angry.
And if you hadn't done this, this wouldn't be happening
like that as a normal human impulse. So we really
(16:18):
don't know the full story here, and honestly, in a
lot of ways, I don't think we need to know
the full story in order to talk about where does
this listener go from here? So you said something on
your Instagram recently that kind of speaks to where where
do we go from here? You wrote the difference between
walking on eggshells and quote handling with care is whether
(16:39):
you can talk together about how tender the dynamic feels.
Handling with caution is a kindness we can offer each other,
building trust without compromising authenticity. So one yet another awesome
thing that you write on your Instagram, everybody should follow you.
But what are what are some ways that this listen
(17:00):
or might handle this tender dynamic with caution. I really
do love the idea of her reaching out. If she
can do it with zero attachment to the outcome, right,
and of course she's going to have preferences of how
it goes or doesn't go. But if she can, if
this conversation helps her feel really grounded in curiosity and
(17:23):
care and love, then I imagine whatever words she chooses
to reach out with will convey that, and then that
way she can just allow their reaction to be what
it is, right, and it can be sort of almost
like a data gathering like that. She's you know, she's
doing her work to ensure that she doesn't have an
(17:44):
angle or an axe to grind. She is reaching out
with curiosity and care and love and then just releasing
the outcome, which is so darn hard to then whatever
happens next, then she gets to go from there, right,
She's got to. There's this beautiful Martin Luther King quote
about how hard it is to take the first step
(18:04):
when you can't see the full staircase. That's what I
would invite her to do if it feels like she's
you know, well resourced and she can do this without
feeling like then the outcome will devastate her, you know,
or be too much for her, then I would like
her to kind of take it that first step, even
though she can't see the full staircase. I love that idea,
(18:25):
idea and air quotes here the idea of letting go
of outcome. This is sort of like the whole like,
don't care about the outcome? No, like that. Okay, so
that's not really gonna happen. However, I think we can
have sort of as a practice or an operating principle
that I will reach out, I will take this action
with as much skill and self awareness and reflection as
(18:49):
I am able to access, and I can't control their
reaction to that. Love it. That's I think that's just
slightly different, a different approach than like, I don't care
what happens whatever the outcome is, like no, no, no,
like that. Let's let's be realistic here. But I do
think that it can take some of the pressure off
to feel like it's all on you to do this perfectly,
(19:11):
and if you don't do it perfectly the future relationship
is screwed, right. I think that is that is undo
pressure agreed to me. This is really about taking the
time to really ask yourself what am I hoping for here?
What would be the best possible outcome in the situation,
and what is it that I really want to convey
(19:32):
to these people that I very clearly care about, right,
and spending some time in that self reflection, that relational
self awareness that you talk about, spending some time in
that so that you can show up with skill to
a very tender dynamic. I think that's a really important
distinction that you're making, and that she will right. There
(19:55):
are particular outcomes that she has a preference for and
particular outcomes that she fear or dreads, and if it
goes in a way that it is one of the
feared or dreaded outcomes, I would I would wish her
sadness but not shame, right, I would wish that she
could kind of stay with sadness and notice if there's
an urge to kind of turn it against herself, right,
(20:16):
that that any sort of like sense that she did
it wrong or this happened because of some aspect of
her character which is why I think it's so important
how you're focusing her on the kind of skill and
gentleness going in that will help her hopefully sit with
whatever next step happens on there, and that she has
absolutely no control, absolutely no control. Yeah, and having just
(20:40):
come off of the loss of her partner over which
she also had no control. Lack of control is really challenging.
So really, briefly, if we want to talk about some
scripting maybe for this person, So I would suggest something like,
you know, after you've done your reflection, after you've really
looked at what's my goal here? What would I really like?
You don't want to really like dump all of that
information onto somebody after no contact, you know, like here's
(21:03):
a text that's seventeen thousand words long. No, maybe something
more like, don't send a text to both of the
adult children at the same time. So individual contact is
important here, And to say something like, I know we
haven't been in touch since your dad died, and I
have wanted to really respect your privacy and your timing.
His birthday is coming up, and I just want to
(21:24):
let you know that I would love to continue a
relationship with you, whatever that might look like. I feel
like my whole chest open as you as you provide
that scripting, keep going nice. I love that. I love
a visceral reaction. It's it's really what we're going for.
Here is some elegance in the difficulty. And of course
you know, when when I give you or when Alexander
(21:45):
gives you suggestions for scripting, you want to make things
sound like you and not like us, right, because you
want to be able to maintain it without having to like,
you know, go back and listen to us. But I
think the message here is I've wanted to respect your
space and your timing, and I want to extend an
invitation and let you know that I would love to
(22:06):
see what kind of relationship we might grow together, if
there is one, and what that would look like like.
There's a real permission giving in there that I really appreciate.
There's a complete and total absence of should or obligation
or duty or good people x ys that you know,
there is just permission and some vulnerable Right, there's a
(22:28):
bit of vulnerability on her part. I would love to continue.
So she's she is stating what she would like, and
that's vulnerable. It's vulnerable to state what you would like,
But in that language, you're inviting her to say, I
would love to continue a relationship with you. However that
would look to you. I mean it sends a very
strong message, doesn't it. I think that the subtle or
(22:50):
maybe not so subtle messages like I am aware and
skilled enough to do a really skillful, elegant request of
you into this really awkward territory, or like I think
we're always We're always We're always demonstrating our skill set
to other people, right, We're always demonstrating what we're standing on.
I love that you came up with shame there, Like
if you instead you did a message like your dad
(23:12):
would really want us to keep in touch, like O
red Flag City. If I am the adult child, I'm
like delete not talking to you. So we we really
do want to be mindful of like, no matter how
high the emotion is, no matter how much we desperately
want to have that connection. For a multitude of reasons,
you want to watch for a language that will accidentally
(23:33):
send the other person running away, and certainly any kind
of should language or your dead dad would want us
x y Z Like, oh, that sort of omniscient stuff
doesn't work in any kind of support, but especially when
you're in this this sort of tender navigation of love,
you want to be mindful of the message that you're sending. Megan,
(23:53):
why did you start by saying that you think that
she should send a text to each of them individually.
Texting to each one of them individually recognizes them as
individuals rather than a unit. I think that's really important.
People like to be seen as who they are. We
also don't want to assume that both of these adult
step daughters have the same reasons for radio silence. If
(24:17):
you think about it, like we always have different relationships
with different family members, I'm sure that she didn't have
the same relationship with each one. Like they don't come
as a unit. I mean, maybe they present as a
unit sometimes because they're good friends. But these are individuals
that we're talking about. Each one of those stepdaughters had
an individual, unique relationship with their dad. They probably each
(24:37):
have different fears, annoyances, desires as it relates to their
grief and any ongoing relationship with their step mom. I
think there's a measure of respect in addressing them as
individuals because they are individuals, So we aren't kidding everybody.
When Alexandra and I say that almost every issue can
(24:59):
be like boiled down to this is a boundary issue.
We had so much good information to discuss and dissect
around boundaries and relationships that we split the show into
two parts so that you can do what we've been
talking about, which is some you know, self reflection and
some questioning into your own ideas about boundaries. So Part
two is coming next week, and that's also when you're
(25:20):
going to find your questions to carry with you. Don't
miss that next week, friends. You know how most people
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(25:43):
Let people know it really isn't all that bad. In here.
We talk about heavy stuff, but it's in the service
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Subscribe to the show, download episodes, and send in your questions.
(26:05):
Want more Hereafter? Grief education doesn't just belong to end
of life issues. Life is full of losses, from everyday
disappointments to events that clearly divide life into before and after.
Learning how to talk about all that without cliches or
platitudes or simplistic think positive posters is an important skill
for everyone. Find trainings, workshops, books and resources for every
(26:29):
human trying to make their way in the world after
something goes horribly wrong at Megan Divine dot c. O
Hereafter with Megan Divine is written and produced by me
Megan Divine. Executive producer is Amy Brown, co produced by
Kanya Jujas and Elizabeth Fossio, Edited by Houston Tilly, and
studio support by Chris Urin. Music provided by wave Crush
This is here After, and I'm your host, Megan Divine.
Each week we tackle big questions from advocates, therapists, and
regular old humans trying to show up with skill and
kindness after life goes horribly wrong. This week, it's all
about boundaries, how to make them, how to keep them,
and sometimes how to breach them. With special guest Dr
Alexandra Solomon, host of Reimagining Love. This is part one
(00:23):
of a two part special on boundaries. So stay tuned, everybody.
We'll be right back after this first break. Before we
get started, one quick note, while I hope you find
a lot of useful information in our time here together.
This show is not a substitute for skilled support with
a license mental health provider or for professional supervision related
(00:47):
to your work. Hey friends, So, one of the questions
I get asked the most often is some variation of
how do I get this person to do what I
want them to do when they don't want to do it?
That sounds a little bit creepy, right, It sounds manipulative.
How do I get this person to do what I
want them to do and they don't want to do it.
(01:07):
Here's the thing, though, It's normal for people to want
things from other people, things like connection or some kind
of action or a change in behavior. Requests of other
people are not manipulative, not by their very basic nature.
That relational give and take between people is normal, but
it does get tricky when you've got conflicting needs and interests.
(01:31):
That results in some relational lines drawn in the sand
that might not feel very good. So we either need
to create boundaries in order to keep somebody out of
our lives or some aspect of our lives, or we're
encountering barriers somebody else has put up when we'd really
like to be let back in. Now I've actually put
off a show on interpersonal boundaries for a bit, waiting
(01:53):
for just the right guest to dive into this tricky territory.
Boundaries and relationships are really messy, So you know who
I turned to when relationships get complicated. Dr Alexandra Solomon.
Dr Solomon is one of the most trusted voices in
the world on relationships, and her work on relational self
awareness has reached millions of people around the world. She's
(02:16):
a licensed clinical psychologist at the Family Institute at Northwestern
University and the author of two best selling books loving
Bravely and taking Sexy Back. You might know her from
her popular Instagram channel or from her podcast Reimagining Love.
Dr Solomon and I recorded an episode for her podcast
a few weeks ago, and now she is back in
the studio with me for this week's show. Alexander, I
(02:38):
am so glad to be together with you again, one
of my favorite people in the world. I like where
this relationship is heading. I'm here for I love this
relationship building right now on air. Everybody, Okay, one of
my favorite things about your work is how you dive
straight into the complicated heart of things. It's also why
we're friends. So no fluff or anything. On your website,
(03:01):
you wrote something really interesting. You said, our best and
bravest work is to practice relational self awareness so that
we can meet differences with curiosity and compassion rather than
criticism and derision. So that is a bit of a
mouthful if you're trying to follow that, everybody, a bit
of a mouthful out of context. But you and I
are about to dive into some complex interpersonal boundary work.
(03:23):
So can you tell me a little bit about how
you see that relational self awareness? As like, I don't
know the gateway to navigating differences with curiosity rather than criticism.
What do you mean by that? Relational self awareness is
the through line of all of the work that I do.
And one of the principles of relational self awareness is
(03:43):
that we are willing again and again to kind of
run a complicated relationship dynamic through the following formula that
I call the golden equation of love my stuff plus
your stuff equals our stuff. It's so easy in relationship
to get caught up in these cycles of blame and shame.
(04:05):
Right blame is when I imagine that our stuff is
because of your stuff. Right shame is when I believe
that our stuff is because of my stuff. And so
we we come back to curiosity and care and mindfulness
when we piece apart. Okay, so what am I bringing
(04:26):
into this dynamic and what are you bringing to this dynamic?
And how is that creating the Petri dish? You know
of interplay where I misunderstanding you and you're misunderstanding me,
and I'm stepping all over your old wounds and you're
stepping all over my old wounds. Those are the conversations
where we don't fall into easy answers. We sit in
(04:48):
the complexity. Yeah, and I love that. What did you
call it? The golden equation of relationships, the golden equation
of love, the golden equation of love. I love I
love love equations. It's the only kind of mouth I
really like. What I really really like about what you
just said is you know this, this tendency we have
because we are human, is to think that either everything
is all about us, or everything is all about the
(05:10):
other person, right, they're doing this terrible thing to me,
or I'm not getting what I want in this relationship
because I'm doing something horrible. And I've said this a
million times, like binaries don't work on humans at all,
and this one person is all right and the other
person is all wrong. I mean, that's a binary system
that doesn't work. Right, That's right exactly. And I think
(05:31):
sometimes we miss it because by the time we start
analyzing what's going on, we've become so polarized, right, our
positions have become we've become cut off from each other,
or we've said things that are so big and so extreme.
You know, I spend so much time in therapy and
teaching rewinding the tape, right, rewinding, So in chapter five,
(05:51):
it looks like you are behaving like a complete a whole.
But in chapter one, you know, I've said something that
hurt your feelings and you bit your tongue and then
you pulled back, and when you pulled back, then I pursued,
and when I pursued that and then we got to
the point where we were so polarized. So it's that
a lot of that, like looking in the rear view
mirror to understand how did we get here in the
(06:14):
service of going forward, right, we don't look in the
rearview mirror in order to assign ultimate blame. We look
in the rear view mirror to see what was the
first moment of misunderstanding that we didn't tend to, What
was the first moment where I bit my tongue instead
of inviting you to sit with me in a little
bit of truth. And that's oftentimes what leads up to
these big, big explosion, the big cut off, the big drama. Yeah,
(06:38):
so a lot of this sort of relational detective work.
And I love that that the way that you talk
about that it's rooted in kindness, right, It's actually rooted
in loving action that we're not sort of doing this
relational review in order to find more facts to persecute
somebody more fully, or to persecute ourselves more fully. We're
(06:59):
really doing this as a way of looking at what's
actually happening here, and how do we treat what's happening
with kindness and tenderness. Yeah, I mean I feel like
I'm sure you feel like this too, Like as a therapist,
like I have infinite compact, Like when I'm sitting with
a couple, Oh my gosh, I my heart is just
like wide open to both people right about. Oh my god,
that moment must have been so painful for you, and
(07:22):
this moment must have been so painful for you, right
that it's it's not hard to hold. I mean, sometimes
the things we do when we feel hurt are really
gnarly and shady McGrady. But the pain underneath, the self
protective strategy, the pain underneath, it's so easy to have
infinite amounts of compassion. For I felt so unseen, I
(07:44):
felt so devalued, I felt so afraid of losing you. Right,
those kind of core tender pieces just pull you know,
so much compassion forward. Yeah, I mean, these are the
complex interpersonal and personal relationship issue us that you you
deal with with such I don't know the word I
(08:04):
want here, like precise compassion. I really really love that
about your your language and your approach here. So that
foundation that you have of greeting those complex interpersonal relationship
issues with both kindness and self awareness is obviously why
I wanted to have you on specifically this week to
talk about some challenging interpersonal boundary stuff. This week, we've
(08:26):
got to listener questions related to keeping someone in your
life when they really aren't so happy to be there,
and then cutting somebody out of your life when they
really want to stay close to you. So two big,
thorny boundary interpersonal issues. Are you ready to dive into
the first one with me? I'm okay, let's do it.
(08:47):
So this listener wrote, I have two adult step daughters
that have cut me out of their lives since my
husband passed away from sudden cardiac arrest late last year.
I feel like I want to reach out to them,
but I have so many concerns about how to do
the We haven't had any context since about a month
after he died. My husband's birthday is coming up and
I would really like to reach out to his daughter's
(09:08):
But should I, if I do, what do I say?
I doubt myself in everything these days? So where do
we go with us? Mm hmm. There's a lot of
layers here that that I'm really I'm grateful that she
sent this question to you, because I think there's this
this is going to land. I think different parts of
it will land, you know, for different listeners. You know,
(09:30):
I was so touched in this last sentence of I
doubt myself and everything these days. And I know you
have so much to say about grief and self doubt. Right.
This is while she probably was a she was a
stepmom for some length of time, and it was very
likely the first time in her life she ever had
been a stepmom, which, by the way, I think is
probably one of, if not the most difficult role in
(09:50):
the family system. And so that was her first time
being a stepmom. And then she lost her husband, and
so it is her first time being a widow, and
so self doubt makes so much sense. It's so understandable
because these are spaces she has not been in before, right,
And her emotions are big and I'm sure threatened to
(10:10):
overwhelm her at times, and now she's approaching the first
birthday without her husband. There are so many different moving
parts to this. I love that you said this is
the first time she's had to do these roles or
sort of act in these roles, and that is something
that we don't want to underestimate the power of or
the pressure of, to be honest, like, I don't want
(10:32):
to screw this up. I need to do this correctly.
And I really hear that in this listener's question, like,
tell me exactly what I'm supposed to do here, because
this relationship is really important to me and I don't
want to screw it up. We're talking a bit more
of these days about cutoffs, and my understanding of the
research around cutoffs, is this the way this one is
playing out. It's it's pretty typical that most often it
(10:53):
is the adult child generation that cuts off the parent
generation cut off to go in that direction more often
than a parent generation cutting off a kid and then
um families. You know, blended families are more at risk
of cut offs than not blended family So in some
ways they've got a couple of risk factors here for
(11:15):
this to happen. And this you know, the man, this
man was kind of the fulcrum of the system. Right.
He was the tie for the daughters, and he was
the tie for this wife. And so these two women,
the stepdaughters and this step mom, they don't have a
tie a blood tie, right, If and as they were
to continue their relationship, it would be really based on
(11:36):
choice someone of history. We don't know how much history,
but it really would be a relationship truly of choice,
not duty, not blood, and you know all that factors in.
That's a really good point that you brought up there,
that we don't know the backstory here. We don't know
what kind of relationship this listener had with the stepdaughters
before her husband's death. Was it a tense relationship, was
(11:57):
a good relationship. We don't have a lot of back
store there. But I think that we can make some
guesses here that the relationship right now feels broken or
tenuous and tender. I love what you said they're about.
If they're going to move forward with a relationship, it's
a relationship of choice, right, It's not a relationship of
(12:18):
obligation or duty or you know, even something that really
has a good road map to it. No, Yeah, that's right.
There's not these would be three women choosing a kind
of relationship that certainly has got his memory as part
of it, like as sort of the connective tissue. But
it would be a relationship that they would choose, and
to see each other, I imagine highlights perhaps the pain
(12:42):
of his loss. Right when she's looking in those women's eyes,
maybe they look like if they look like him, right,
So she has face to face with all the ways
that he lives on in them, and they when they
look at her, they see the marriage, whatever that marriage
meant to them. So I imagine there's potentially pain that
maybe these daughters are protecting themselves from, but also then
(13:05):
a really important gateway to reminiscence and memory. And yeah,
I think there can be a real longing. And I
hear that in this listener. This this real longing for
a continued relationship. Right. It sounds like not only her
husband died, but she also lost a relationship that mattered
to her, whatever that relationship looked like. Right, So she's
(13:26):
in a way grieving three losses. And that's something that
we want to bring into the room here too. So
there's there's just really that longing and it's not like
being connected is going to solve anything for anybody. You
brought up how much pain there is involved in all
of this. You know, we don't know if these adult children,
one or both of them, if it's too painful for them,
(13:47):
Like we don't know what's going on for them. We
don't really know what's going on for any of them
until we sort of get to the point where we
can have that conversation. Well, that's one of the things
that I was thinking about, Like this question, is the
step mom story, is that the daughters have cut me off?
You know, we were saying before, like the way in
which these these sort of like chapter five may look
(14:08):
like the girls cut her off. But I wonder if
the girl's story is in chapter one she didn't follow
up after the funeral, or she didn't do this, or
when we asked for this she didn't know respond there.
There may have been things in which the daughter's story
might be she really pulled away from us. And that
is not I am not saying that at all in
any way to blame or put responsibility on this question writer.
(14:31):
I am just inviting the possibility that she has put
together the data in a particular way that may not
be the way this story lives inside of one or
both of the daughters. And that's really what you said
when we when we first started chatting here, is like
we want to widen out the scope of the story
(14:51):
and wonder about the other characters and what's their perspective
and what what is their reasoning, what does their story
look like, and how do those stories compare. I think
sometimes we can be like, oh, the step mom clearly
did something terrible and that's why these people don't want
to talk to her anymore, right, Like, I don't know,
maybe we we certainly don't have enough information on that.
(15:12):
But one of the things that you really said so
clearly is that nobody is to blame in any of
these directions, Right, We really just need to be curious
about sort of the full breadth of the story in
order to build this relationship of choice. Do you think that,
in terms of like applying just a really strict grief lens,
(15:33):
do you think it's possible that the step daughter is
like in an effort to almost like bind the enormity
of the grief, it's sort of like easier to somehow
blame like the yeah, if she if she hadn't blah,
blah blah, then Dad would still be here, I think,
especially with a sudden death. Certainly certainly happens in other
kinds of losses as well, but in a sudden death
that really sort of messes with your understanding of the
(15:57):
safety and predictability of the world. There is a big
temptation to point a finger, and I think for a
lot of people, anger is a much easier emotion than
intense sadness. It's easier to sort of be hot and angry.
And if you hadn't done this, this wouldn't be happening
like that as a normal human impulse. So we really
(16:18):
don't know the full story here, and honestly, in a
lot of ways, I don't think we need to know
the full story in order to talk about where does
this listener go from here? So you said something on
your Instagram recently that kind of speaks to where where
do we go from here? You wrote the difference between
walking on eggshells and quote handling with care is whether
(16:39):
you can talk together about how tender the dynamic feels.
Handling with caution is a kindness we can offer each other,
building trust without compromising authenticity. So one yet another awesome
thing that you write on your Instagram, everybody should follow you.
But what are what are some ways that this listen
(17:00):
or might handle this tender dynamic with caution. I really
do love the idea of her reaching out. If she
can do it with zero attachment to the outcome, right,
and of course she's going to have preferences of how
it goes or doesn't go. But if she can, if
this conversation helps her feel really grounded in curiosity and
(17:23):
care and love, then I imagine whatever words she chooses
to reach out with will convey that, and then that
way she can just allow their reaction to be what
it is, right, and it can be sort of almost
like a data gathering like that. She's you know, she's
doing her work to ensure that she doesn't have an
(17:44):
angle or an axe to grind. She is reaching out
with curiosity and care and love and then just releasing
the outcome, which is so darn hard to then whatever
happens next, then she gets to go from there, right,
She's got to. There's this beautiful Martin Luther King quote
about how hard it is to take the first step
(18:04):
when you can't see the full staircase. That's what I
would invite her to do if it feels like she's
you know, well resourced and she can do this without
feeling like then the outcome will devastate her, you know,
or be too much for her, then I would like
her to kind of take it that first step, even
though she can't see the full staircase. I love that idea,
(18:25):
idea and air quotes here the idea of letting go
of outcome. This is sort of like the whole like,
don't care about the outcome? No, like that. Okay, so
that's not really gonna happen. However, I think we can
have sort of as a practice or an operating principle
that I will reach out, I will take this action
with as much skill and self awareness and reflection as
(18:49):
I am able to access, and I can't control their
reaction to that. Love it. That's I think that's just
slightly different, a different approach than like, I don't care
what happens whatever the outcome is, like no, no, no,
like that. Let's let's be realistic here. But I do
think that it can take some of the pressure off
to feel like it's all on you to do this perfectly,
(19:11):
and if you don't do it perfectly the future relationship
is screwed, right. I think that is that is undo
pressure agreed to me. This is really about taking the
time to really ask yourself what am I hoping for here?
What would be the best possible outcome in the situation,
and what is it that I really want to convey
(19:32):
to these people that I very clearly care about, right,
and spending some time in that self reflection, that relational
self awareness that you talk about, spending some time in
that so that you can show up with skill to
a very tender dynamic. I think that's a really important
distinction that you're making, and that she will right. There
(19:55):
are particular outcomes that she has a preference for and
particular outcomes that she fear or dreads, and if it
goes in a way that it is one of the
feared or dreaded outcomes, I would I would wish her
sadness but not shame, right, I would wish that she
could kind of stay with sadness and notice if there's
an urge to kind of turn it against herself, right,
(20:16):
that that any sort of like sense that she did
it wrong or this happened because of some aspect of
her character which is why I think it's so important
how you're focusing her on the kind of skill and
gentleness going in that will help her hopefully sit with
whatever next step happens on there, and that she has
absolutely no control, absolutely no control. Yeah, and having just
(20:40):
come off of the loss of her partner over which
she also had no control. Lack of control is really challenging.
So really, briefly, if we want to talk about some
scripting maybe for this person, So I would suggest something like,
you know, after you've done your reflection, after you've really
looked at what's my goal here? What would I really like?
You don't want to really like dump all of that
information onto somebody after no contact, you know, like here's
(21:03):
a text that's seventeen thousand words long. No, maybe something
more like, don't send a text to both of the
adult children at the same time. So individual contact is
important here, And to say something like, I know we
haven't been in touch since your dad died, and I
have wanted to really respect your privacy and your timing.
His birthday is coming up, and I just want to
(21:24):
let you know that I would love to continue a
relationship with you, whatever that might look like. I feel
like my whole chest open as you as you provide
that scripting, keep going nice. I love that. I love
a visceral reaction. It's it's really what we're going for.
Here is some elegance in the difficulty. And of course
you know, when when I give you or when Alexander
(21:45):
gives you suggestions for scripting, you want to make things
sound like you and not like us, right, because you
want to be able to maintain it without having to like,
you know, go back and listen to us. But I
think the message here is I've wanted to respect your
space and your timing, and I want to extend an
invitation and let you know that I would love to
(22:06):
see what kind of relationship we might grow together, if
there is one, and what that would look like like.
There's a real permission giving in there that I really appreciate.
There's a complete and total absence of should or obligation
or duty or good people x ys that you know,
there is just permission and some vulnerable Right, there's a
(22:28):
bit of vulnerability on her part. I would love to continue.
So she's she is stating what she would like, and
that's vulnerable. It's vulnerable to state what you would like,
But in that language, you're inviting her to say, I
would love to continue a relationship with you. However that
would look to you. I mean it sends a very
strong message, doesn't it. I think that the subtle or
(22:50):
maybe not so subtle messages like I am aware and
skilled enough to do a really skillful, elegant request of
you into this really awkward territory, or like I think
we're always We're always We're always demonstrating our skill set
to other people, right, We're always demonstrating what we're standing on.
I love that you came up with shame there, Like
if you instead you did a message like your dad
(23:12):
would really want us to keep in touch, like O
red Flag City. If I am the adult child, I'm
like delete not talking to you. So we we really
do want to be mindful of like, no matter how
high the emotion is, no matter how much we desperately
want to have that connection. For a multitude of reasons,
you want to watch for a language that will accidentally
(23:33):
send the other person running away, and certainly any kind
of should language or your dead dad would want us
x y Z Like, oh, that sort of omniscient stuff
doesn't work in any kind of support, but especially when
you're in this this sort of tender navigation of love,
you want to be mindful of the message that you're sending. Megan,
(23:53):
why did you start by saying that you think that
she should send a text to each of them individually.
Texting to each one of them individually recognizes them as
individuals rather than a unit. I think that's really important.
People like to be seen as who they are. We
also don't want to assume that both of these adult
step daughters have the same reasons for radio silence. If
(24:17):
you think about it, like we always have different relationships
with different family members, I'm sure that she didn't have
the same relationship with each one. Like they don't come
as a unit. I mean, maybe they present as a
unit sometimes because they're good friends. But these are individuals
that we're talking about. Each one of those stepdaughters had
an individual, unique relationship with their dad. They probably each
(24:37):
have different fears, annoyances, desires as it relates to their
grief and any ongoing relationship with their step mom. I
think there's a measure of respect in addressing them as
individuals because they are individuals, So we aren't kidding everybody.
When Alexandra and I say that almost every issue can
(24:59):
be like boiled down to this is a boundary issue.
We had so much good information to discuss and dissect
around boundaries and relationships that we split the show into
two parts so that you can do what we've been
talking about, which is some you know, self reflection and
some questioning into your own ideas about boundaries. So Part
two is coming next week, and that's also when you're
(25:20):
going to find your questions to carry with you. Don't
miss that next week, friends. You know how most people
are going to scan through their podcast app looking for
a new thing. They're going to see the show description
for Hereafter and think, I don't want to talk about
that stuff. Well, here's where you come in your reviews.
(25:43):
Let people know it really isn't all that bad. In here.
We talk about heavy stuff, but it's in the service
of making things better for everyone. So everyone needs to listen.
Spread the word in your workplace, in your social world
on social media and click through to leave a review.
Subscribe to the show, download episodes, and send in your questions.
(26:05):
Want more Hereafter? Grief education doesn't just belong to end
of life issues. Life is full of losses, from everyday
disappointments to events that clearly divide life into before and after.
Learning how to talk about all that without cliches or
platitudes or simplistic think positive posters is an important skill
for everyone. Find trainings, workshops, books and resources for every
(26:29):
human trying to make their way in the world after
something goes horribly wrong at Megan Divine dot c. O
Hereafter with Megan Divine is written and produced by me
Megan Divine. Executive producer is Amy Brown, co produced by
Kanya Jujas and Elizabeth Fossio, Edited by Houston Tilly, and
studio support by Chris Urin. Music provided by wave Crush
Host
Megan Devine
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