April 1, 2024 • 27 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 on It’s OK, 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.
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?
- 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
We're re-releasing some of our favorite episodes from the first 3 seasons. This episode was originally recorded in 2022.
Looking for a creative exploration of grief? Check out the best selling Writing Your Grief course here.
About our guest:
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 @dr.alexandra.solomon, or from her podcast, Reimagining Love. Find her at dralexandrasolomon.com
About Megan:
Psychotherapist Megan Devine is one of today’s leading experts on grief, from life-altering losses to the everyday grief that we don’t call grief. Get the best-selling book on grief in over a decade, It’s Ok that You’re Not OK, wherever you get books. Find Megan @refugeingrief
Additional Resources:
Want to train with Dr. Solomon? Check out her current training courses at dralexandrasolomon.com
Want to talk with Megan directly? Join our patreon community for live monthly Q&A grief clinics: your questions, answered. Want to speak to her privately? Apply for a 1:1 grief consultation here.
Check out Megan’s best-selling books - It’s OK That You're Not OK and How to Carry What Can’t Be Fixed
Books and resources may contain affiliate links.
Follow our show on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and TikTok @refugeingrief and @itsokpod on TikTok.
For more information, including clinical training and consulting and to share your thoughts, visit us at refugeingrief.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is It's okay that You're not okay, and I'm
your host, Megan Divine. This week it is all about boundaries,
how to make them, how to keep them, and sometimes
how to break them, with special guest doctor Alexander Solomon,
host of the podcast Reimagining Love. Stay tuned. Everybody will
be right back after this first break before we get started.
(00:28):
Two quick notes. One, this episode is an encore performance.
I am on break working on a giant new project,
so we're releasing a mix of our favorite episodes from
the first three seasons of the show. This episode is
from season one, in which I answered listener questions, sometimes
on my own, sometimes for the guest. So if you
want more of these Q and A style episodes, you
(00:50):
can find the entire collection from season one wherever you
get your podcasts. Second note, while we cover a lot
of emotional relational territory in our time here together, this
show is not a substitute for skilled support for the
license mental health provider, or for professional supervision related to
your work. I really want you to take what you
learn here, take your thoughts and your reflections out into
(01:11):
your own world and talk about it all. 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
(01:31):
this person to do what I want them to do
and they don't want to do it. 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
(01:52):
take between people is normal. But it does get tricky
when you've got conflicting needs and interests that result 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 barrier somebody
else has put up when we'd really like to be
(02:13):
let back in. Now, I've actually put off a show
on interpersonal boundaries for a bit, waiting for just the
right guest to dive into the tricky territory boundaries and
relationships are really messy. So you know who I turned
to when relationships get complicated, Doctor Alexandra Solomon. Doctor Solomon
(02:35):
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 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. Doctor Solomon
(02:58):
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 am so
glad to be together with you again, one of my
favorite people in the world.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
I like where this relationship is heading. I'm here for it.
I love this.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
We're a 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 you wrote something really interesting. You said, our
best and bravest work is to practice relational self awareness.
(03:34):
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. So can you tell me a little bit
about how you see that relational self awareness as like,
(03:56):
I don't know the gateway to navigating differences with curiosity
rather than criticism. What do you mean by that?
Speaker 2 (04:04):
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 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.
(04:27):
It's so easy in relationship to get caught up in
these cycles of blame and shame. 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 come back to curiosity and
(04:49):
care and mindfulness when we piece apart. Okay, So what
am I bringing into this dynamic? And what are you
bringing to this dynamic? And how is that creating the
heatree dish? You know of interplay where I'm 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.
(05:10):
Those are the conversations where we don't fall into easy answers.
We sit in the complexity. Yeah, and I love that.
Speaker 1 (05:19):
What did you call it? The golden equation of relationships?
Speaker 2 (05:21):
The golden equation of love?
Speaker 1 (05:22):
The golden equation of love. I love. I love love equations,
the only kind of math I really like. What I
really really like about what you just said is, you know,
this tendency we have because we are human is to
think that either everything is all about us, or everything
is all about the other person, right, they're doing this
terrible thing to me, or I'm not getting what I
(05:42):
want in this relationship because I'm doing something horrible. I mean,
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.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
That's right exactly. And I think sometimes we miss it
because by the time we start analyzing what's going on,
we've become so polarized, right, our positions have 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 it looks like you
(06:19):
are behaving like a complete a hole. But in chapter one,
you know, I 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,
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 service of going forward, right,
(06:42):
we don't look in the rear y 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 the big explosion,
the big cut off, the big drama. Yeah. So a
(07:05):
lot of us this sort of like relational detective work.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
Yeah, And I love 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
really doing this as a way of looking at what's
(07:30):
actually happening here, and how do we treat what's happening
with kindness and tenderness.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Yeah, I mean I feel like I'm sure you feel
like this too, Like as a therapist, like I have
infinite compacts. 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. In this moment
must have been so painful for you, right that it's
it's not hard to hold. I mean, sometimes the things
(07:55):
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 felt so devalued,
I felt so afraid of losing you. Right, those kind
(08:16):
of core tender pieces just pull you know so much
compassion forward.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
Yeah, I mean, these are the complex interpersonal and personal
relationship issues that you deal with with such I don't
know the word I 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
(08:45):
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 got two 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. You ready to
(09:10):
dive into the first.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
One with me? I'm so ready. Let's do it.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
Okay, let's do it. 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 this. We haven't had any contact
since about a month after he died. My husband's birthday
is coming up, and I would really like to reach
(09:34):
out to his daughters. But should I, If I do,
what do I say? I doubt myself in everything these days?
So where do we go with this?
Speaker 2 (09:46):
There's a lot of layers here that I'm really I'm
grateful that she sent this question to you, because I
think this is going to land. I think different parts
of it will land, you know, for different listeners. You know,
I was so touched in this last sentence of I
doubt myself self and everything these days, And I know
you have so much to say about grief and self doubt. Right.
This is while she probably she was a stepmom for
(10:07):
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 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
(10:31):
she has not been in before, right, and her emotions
are big and I'm sure threatened to overwhelm her at times,
and now she's approaching the first birthday without her husband.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
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 to 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
(11:05):
supposed to do here, because this relationship is really important
to me and I don't want to screw it up.
Speaker 2 (11:11):
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's playing out. It's it's pretty typical
that most often it is the adult child generation that
cuts off the parent generation. Cut offs go in that
direction more often than a parent generation cutting off a kid.
(11:31):
And then families, you know, blended families are more at
risk of cutoffs than not blended families. So in some
ways they've got a couple of risk factors here for
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,
(11:54):
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 choice,
some a lot 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.
Speaker 1 (12:13):
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
it a good relationship. We don't have a lot of
backstory there, but I think that we can make some
guesses here that the relationship right now feels broken or
(12:35):
tenuous and tender. I love what you said there about
if they're going to move forward with a relationship. It's
a relationship of choice, right, It's not a relationship of
obligation or duty or you know, even something that really
has a good roadmap to it.
Speaker 2 (12:51):
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 of his loss. Right when she's
looking in those women's eyes, maybe they look like if
(13:14):
they look like him, right, So she is 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 a really important gateway to reminiscence and memory.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
And yeah, I think there can be a real longing
and I hear that in this listener, 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 in a way grieving three losses, and that's something
(13:57):
that we want to bring into the room here too.
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 won
or both of them if it's too painful for them, Like,
we don't know what's going on for them. We don't
(14:17):
really know what's going on for any of them until
we sort of get to the point where we can
have that conversation.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
Well, that's one of the things that I was thinking
about with this question, is the stepmom's 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 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 ask for this,
(14:46):
she didn't you know, respond, 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. I am just invit
the possibility that she has put together the data in
a particular way that may not be the way this
(15:07):
story lives inside of one or both of the daughters.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
Yeah, and that's really what you said when when we
first started chatting here, is like, we want to widen
out the scope of the story and wonder about the
other characters and what's their perspective and 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 stepmom clearly did something terrible and that's why these
(15:33):
people don't want to talk to her anymore, right, Like,
I don't know, maybe we certainly don't have enough information
on that. But one of the things that you really
said so clearly is that nobody is one hundred percent
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
(15:54):
of choice.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
Do you think that in terms of like applying just
a really strict grief lens, do you think it's possible
that the stepdaughter is like in an effort to almost
like bind the enormity of the grief. It's sort of
like easier to somehow blame, like maybe they don't Yeah,
if she hadn't blah blah blah, then Dad would still
be here.
Speaker 1 (16:14):
I think, especially with a sudden death. Certainly happens in
other kinds of losses as well, but in a sudden
death that really sort of messes with your understanding of
the 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
(16:37):
and angry. And if you hadn't done this, this wouldn't
be happening like that as a normal human impulse. So
we really 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
(16:59):
where where do we go from here? You wrote, the
difference between walking on eggshells and quote handling with care
is whether 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
(17:19):
yet another awesome thing that you write on your Instagram.
Everybody should follow you. But what are some ways that
this listener might handle this tender dynamic with caution?
Speaker 2 (17:31):
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 it doesn't go. But if
she can, if this conversation helps her feel really grounded
in curiosity and care and love, then I imagine whatever
(17:54):
words she chooses to reach out with will convey that,
and then that way she can and 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 angle or an axe to grind.
She is reaching out with curiosity and care and love,
(18:17):
and then just releasing the outcome, which is so darn
hard to do, so possible. 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 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,
(18:39):
and she can do this without feeling like 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.
Speaker 1 (18:51):
I love that idea. Idea in air quotes here, the
idea of letting go of outcome. This is sort of
like the whole draya, 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
(19:12):
will take this action with as much skill and self
awareness and reflection as I am able to access, and
I can't control their reaction to that, Ah, I 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 is like no, no, no, like that. Let's be
realistic here. But I do think that it can take
(19:33):
some of the pressure off to feel like it's all
on you to do this perfectly, and if you don't
do it perfectly, the future relationship is screwed. Right, I
think that is undue 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
(19:54):
possible outcome in this situation? And what is it that
I really want to convey 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 and that so that you can
show up with skill to a very tender dynamic.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
I think that's a really important distinction that you're making,
and that she will right, there are particular outcomes that
she has a preference for and particular outcomes that she
fears or dreads, and if it goes in a way
that it is one of the feared or dreaded outcomes.
I would wish her sadness but not shame, right, I
(20:37):
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, 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
(21:00):
hopefully sit with whatever next step happens on there. And
that she has absolutely no.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
Control, absolutely no control. Yeah, and having just 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
(21:25):
don't want to really like dump all of that information
onto somebody after no contact, you know, like here's a
text that's seventeen thousand words long. No, Yeah, 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
(21:47):
have wanted to really respect your privacy and your timing.
His birthday is coming up, and I just want to
let you know that I would love to continue a
relationship with you, whatever that might look like.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
Feel like my whole chest opens as you provide that
keep going nice.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
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 I give
you or when Alexander 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
(22:25):
wanted to respect your space and your timing, and I
want to extend an invitation and let you know that
I would love to 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.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
There's a complete and total absence of should or obligation
or duty or good people xys that you know, there
is just permission and some vulnerable. Right, there's a bit
of vulnerability on her part. I would love to continue.
So she's stating what she would like, and that's vulnerable.
It's vulnerable to state what you would like. Yeah, but
(23:04):
in that language, you're inviting her to say, I would
love to continue a relationship with you. However that would
look to you.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
I mean, it sends a very strong message, doesn't it.
I think that the subtle or maybe not so subtle
message is like I am aware and skilled enough to
do a really skillful, elegant request of you into this
really awkward territory. Like I think we're always we're always
we're always demonstrating our skill set to other people, right,
(23:32):
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 would really want
us to keep in touch, like oh red black City. Right,
if I am the adult child, I'm like delete, not
talking to you. So we really do want to be
mindful of like no matter how high the emotion is,
(23:53):
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 send the other person running away.
And certainly any kind of should language or your dead
dad would want us xyz like oof. That sort of
omniscient stuff doesn't work in any kind of support. But
(24:13):
especially when you're in this sort of tender navigation of love,
you want to be mindful of the message that you're sending.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Megan, why did you start by saying that you think
that she should send a text to each of them individually.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
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
you think about it, like we always have different relationships
(24:46):
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
have different fears, annoyances, desires as it relates to their
(25:11):
grief and any ongoing relationship with their stepmom. 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 be
like boiled down to this is a boundary issue. We
had so much good information to discuss and dissect around
(25:34):
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 going to
find your questions to carry with you. Don't miss that
next week, friends. You know how most people are going
(26:01):
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,
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(26:23):
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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
(26:46):
cliches or platitudes or simplistic think positive posters is an
important skill for everyone. Find trainings, workshops, books and resources
for every human trying to make their way in the
world after something goes hoholeably wrong at Megandivine dot Co.
Hereafter with Megan Divine is written produced by me Meghan Divine,
(27:08):
Executive producer is Amy Brown and Elizabeth Fozzio, Edited by
Houston Tilley. Music provided by Wave Crush
This is It's okay that You're not okay, and I'm
your host, Megan Divine. This week it is all about boundaries,
how to make them, how to keep them, and sometimes
how to break them, with special guest doctor Alexander Solomon,
host of the podcast Reimagining Love. Stay tuned. Everybody will
be right back after this first break before we get started.
(00:28):
Two quick notes. One, this episode is an encore performance.
I am on break working on a giant new project,
so we're releasing a mix of our favorite episodes from
the first three seasons of the show. This episode is
from season one, in which I answered listener questions, sometimes
on my own, sometimes for the guest. So if you
want more of these Q and A style episodes, you
(00:50):
can find the entire collection from season one wherever you
get your podcasts. Second note, while we cover a lot
of emotional relational territory in our time here together, this
show is not a substitute for skilled support for the
license mental health provider, or for professional supervision related to
your work. I really want you to take what you
learn here, take your thoughts and your reflections out into
(01:11):
your own world and talk about it all. 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
(01:31):
this person to do what I want them to do
and they don't want to do it. 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
(01:52):
take between people is normal. But it does get tricky
when you've got conflicting needs and interests that result 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 barrier somebody
else has put up when we'd really like to be
(02:13):
let back in. Now, I've actually put off a show
on interpersonal boundaries for a bit, waiting for just the
right guest to dive into the tricky territory boundaries and
relationships are really messy. So you know who I turned
to when relationships get complicated, Doctor Alexandra Solomon. Doctor Solomon
(02:35):
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 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. Doctor Solomon
(02:58):
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 am so
glad to be together with you again, one of my
favorite people in the world.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
I like where this relationship is heading. I'm here for it.
I love this.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
We're a 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 you wrote something really interesting. You said, our
best and bravest work is to practice relational self awareness.
(03:34):
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. So can you tell me a little bit
about how you see that relational self awareness as like,
(03:56):
I don't know the gateway to navigating differences with curiosity
rather than criticism. What do you mean by that?
Speaker 2 (04:04):
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 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.
(04:27):
It's so easy in relationship to get caught up in
these cycles of blame and shame. 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 come back to curiosity and
(04:49):
care and mindfulness when we piece apart. Okay, So what
am I bringing into this dynamic? And what are you
bringing to this dynamic? And how is that creating the
heatree dish? You know of interplay where I'm 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.
(05:10):
Those are the conversations where we don't fall into easy answers.
We sit in the complexity. Yeah, and I love that.
Speaker 1 (05:19):
What did you call it? The golden equation of relationships?
Speaker 2 (05:21):
The golden equation of love?
Speaker 1 (05:22):
The golden equation of love. I love. I love love equations,
the only kind of math I really like. What I
really really like about what you just said is, you know,
this tendency we have because we are human is to
think that either everything is all about us, or everything
is all about the other person, right, they're doing this
terrible thing to me, or I'm not getting what I
(05:42):
want in this relationship because I'm doing something horrible. I mean,
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.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
That's right exactly. And I think sometimes we miss it
because by the time we start analyzing what's going on,
we've become so polarized, right, our positions have 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 it looks like you
(06:19):
are behaving like a complete a hole. But in chapter one,
you know, I 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,
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 service of going forward, right,
(06:42):
we don't look in the rear y 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 the big explosion,
the big cut off, the big drama. Yeah. So a
(07:05):
lot of us this sort of like relational detective work.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
Yeah, And I love 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
really doing this as a way of looking at what's
(07:30):
actually happening here, and how do we treat what's happening
with kindness and tenderness.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Yeah, I mean I feel like I'm sure you feel
like this too, Like as a therapist, like I have
infinite compacts. 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. In this moment
must have been so painful for you, right that it's
it's not hard to hold. I mean, sometimes the things
(07:55):
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 felt so devalued,
I felt so afraid of losing you. Right, those kind
(08:16):
of core tender pieces just pull you know so much
compassion forward.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
Yeah, I mean, these are the complex interpersonal and personal
relationship issues that you deal with with such I don't
know the word I 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
(08:45):
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 got two 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. You ready to
(09:10):
dive into the first.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
One with me? I'm so ready. Let's do it.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
Okay, let's do it. 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 this. We haven't had any contact
since about a month after he died. My husband's birthday
is coming up, and I would really like to reach
(09:34):
out to his daughters. But should I, If I do,
what do I say? I doubt myself in everything these days?
So where do we go with this?
Speaker 2 (09:46):
There's a lot of layers here that I'm really I'm
grateful that she sent this question to you, because I
think this is going to land. I think different parts
of it will land, you know, for different listeners. You know,
I was so touched in this last sentence of I
doubt myself self and everything these days, And I know
you have so much to say about grief and self doubt. Right.
This is while she probably she was a stepmom for
(10:07):
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 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
(10:31):
she has not been in before, right, and her emotions
are big and I'm sure threatened to overwhelm her at times,
and now she's approaching the first birthday without her husband.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
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 to 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
(11:05):
supposed to do here, because this relationship is really important
to me and I don't want to screw it up.
Speaker 2 (11:11):
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's playing out. It's it's pretty typical
that most often it is the adult child generation that
cuts off the parent generation. Cut offs go in that
direction more often than a parent generation cutting off a kid.
(11:31):
And then families, you know, blended families are more at
risk of cutoffs than not blended families. So in some
ways they've got a couple of risk factors here for
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,
(11:54):
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 choice,
some a lot 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.
Speaker 1 (12:13):
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
it a good relationship. We don't have a lot of
backstory there, but I think that we can make some
guesses here that the relationship right now feels broken or
(12:35):
tenuous and tender. I love what you said there about
if they're going to move forward with a relationship. It's
a relationship of choice, right, It's not a relationship of
obligation or duty or you know, even something that really
has a good roadmap to it.
Speaker 2 (12:51):
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 of his loss. Right when she's
looking in those women's eyes, maybe they look like if
(13:14):
they look like him, right, So she is 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 a really important gateway to reminiscence and memory.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
And yeah, I think there can be a real longing
and I hear that in this listener, 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 in a way grieving three losses, and that's something
(13:57):
that we want to bring into the room here too.
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 won
or both of them if it's too painful for them, Like,
we don't know what's going on for them. We don't
(14:17):
really know what's going on for any of them until
we sort of get to the point where we can
have that conversation.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
Well, that's one of the things that I was thinking
about with this question, is the stepmom's 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 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 ask for this,
(14:46):
she didn't you know, respond, 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. I am just invit
the possibility that she has put together the data in
a particular way that may not be the way this
(15:07):
story lives inside of one or both of the daughters.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
Yeah, and that's really what you said when when we
first started chatting here, is like, we want to widen
out the scope of the story and wonder about the
other characters and what's their perspective and 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 stepmom clearly did something terrible and that's why these
(15:33):
people don't want to talk to her anymore, right, Like,
I don't know, maybe we certainly don't have enough information
on that. But one of the things that you really
said so clearly is that nobody is one hundred percent
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
(15:54):
of choice.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
Do you think that in terms of like applying just
a really strict grief lens, do you think it's possible
that the stepdaughter is like in an effort to almost
like bind the enormity of the grief. It's sort of
like easier to somehow blame, like maybe they don't Yeah,
if she hadn't blah blah blah, then Dad would still
be here.
Speaker 1 (16:14):
I think, especially with a sudden death. Certainly happens in
other kinds of losses as well, but in a sudden
death that really sort of messes with your understanding of
the 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
(16:37):
and angry. And if you hadn't done this, this wouldn't
be happening like that as a normal human impulse. So
we really 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
(16:59):
where where do we go from here? You wrote, the
difference between walking on eggshells and quote handling with care
is whether 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
(17:19):
yet another awesome thing that you write on your Instagram.
Everybody should follow you. But what are some ways that
this listener might handle this tender dynamic with caution?
Speaker 2 (17:31):
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 it doesn't go. But if
she can, if this conversation helps her feel really grounded
in curiosity and care and love, then I imagine whatever
(17:54):
words she chooses to reach out with will convey that,
and then that way she can and 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 angle or an axe to grind.
She is reaching out with curiosity and care and love,
(18:17):
and then just releasing the outcome, which is so darn
hard to do, so possible. 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 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,
(18:39):
and she can do this without feeling like 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.
Speaker 1 (18:51):
I love that idea. Idea in air quotes here, the
idea of letting go of outcome. This is sort of
like the whole draya, 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
(19:12):
will take this action with as much skill and self
awareness and reflection as I am able to access, and
I can't control their reaction to that, Ah, I 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 is like no, no, no, like that. Let's be
realistic here. But I do think that it can take
(19:33):
some of the pressure off to feel like it's all
on you to do this perfectly, and if you don't
do it perfectly, the future relationship is screwed. Right, I
think that is undue 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
(19:54):
possible outcome in this situation? And what is it that
I really want to convey 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 and that so that you can
show up with skill to a very tender dynamic.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
I think that's a really important distinction that you're making,
and that she will right, there are particular outcomes that
she has a preference for and particular outcomes that she
fears or dreads, and if it goes in a way
that it is one of the feared or dreaded outcomes.
I would wish her sadness but not shame, right, I
(20:37):
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, 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
(21:00):
hopefully sit with whatever next step happens on there. And
that she has absolutely no.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
Control, absolutely no control. Yeah, and having just 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
(21:25):
don't want to really like dump all of that information
onto somebody after no contact, you know, like here's a
text that's seventeen thousand words long. No, Yeah, 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
(21:47):
have wanted to really respect your privacy and your timing.
His birthday is coming up, and I just want to
let you know that I would love to continue a
relationship with you, whatever that might look like.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
Feel like my whole chest opens as you provide that
keep going nice.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
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 I give
you or when Alexander 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
(22:25):
wanted to respect your space and your timing, and I
want to extend an invitation and let you know that
I would love to 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.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
There's a complete and total absence of should or obligation
or duty or good people xys that you know, there
is just permission and some vulnerable. Right, there's a bit
of vulnerability on her part. I would love to continue.
So she's stating what she would like, and that's vulnerable.
It's vulnerable to state what you would like. Yeah, but
(23:04):
in that language, you're inviting her to say, I would
love to continue a relationship with you. However that would
look to you.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
I mean, it sends a very strong message, doesn't it.
I think that the subtle or maybe not so subtle
message is like I am aware and skilled enough to
do a really skillful, elegant request of you into this
really awkward territory. Like I think we're always we're always
we're always demonstrating our skill set to other people, right,
(23:32):
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 would really want
us to keep in touch, like oh red black City. Right,
if I am the adult child, I'm like delete, not
talking to you. So we really do want to be
mindful of like no matter how high the emotion is,
(23:53):
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 send the other person running away.
And certainly any kind of should language or your dead
dad would want us xyz like oof. That sort of
omniscient stuff doesn't work in any kind of support. But
(24:13):
especially when you're in this sort of tender navigation of love,
you want to be mindful of the message that you're sending.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Megan, why did you start by saying that you think
that she should send a text to each of them individually.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
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
you think about it, like we always have different relationships
(24:46):
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
have different fears, annoyances, desires as it relates to their
(25:11):
grief and any ongoing relationship with their stepmom. 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 be
like boiled down to this is a boundary issue. We
had so much good information to discuss and dissect around
(25:34):
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 going to
find your questions to carry with you. Don't miss that
next week, friends. You know how most people are going
(26:01):
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. 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
(26:23):
social media and click through to leave a review. Subscribe
to the show, download episodes, and send in your questions.
Want more Here After 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
(26:46):
cliches or platitudes or simplistic think positive posters is an
important skill for everyone. Find trainings, workshops, books and resources
for every human trying to make their way in the
world after something goes hoholeably wrong at Megandivine dot Co.
Hereafter with Megan Divine is written produced by me Meghan Divine,
(27:08):
Executive producer is Amy Brown and Elizabeth Fozzio, Edited by
Houston Tilley. Music provided by Wave Crush
Host
Megan Devine
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