Minh Tran
Growing up, I thought family was supposed to be a source of unconditional love and support. But when every conversation feels like walking through a minefield and every interaction leaves you drained, you start questioning what “family” really means.
For years, I convinced myself that if I just tried harder—if I was more patient, more understanding, more forgiving—things would get better. They didn’t.
The breaking point wasn’t a dramatic explosion. It was a series of small realizations, each one chipping away at the illusion that things would ever change. Eventually, I did something I never imagined: I walked away.
Cutting ties with my parents while they were still alive felt unnatural, like grieving a loss no one else could see. Society teaches us that mourning is for the dead, but no one prepares you for the grief of losing people who are still breathing.
What followed was an emotional unraveling I wasn’t ready for—guilt, doubt, even moments of longing for a version of them that never really existed.
But through it all, I learned something surprising about grief: it doesn’t just signal an ending. It also makes space for something new.
How I processed the grief of losing them
At first, I tried to ignore it. I told myself I should feel relieved, that cutting ties was the right decision. And it was—but that didn’t stop the waves of grief from hitting me when I least expected them.
I had to let myself feel it. The sadness, the anger, the emptiness—it all needed space. Instead of pushing it down, I sat with it. Journaling became my outlet, a place where I could untangle emotions that felt too heavy to carry in my head.
Meditation helped, too. Not in a magical, instant-healing way, but in small moments of clarity. Observing my thoughts without judgment made me realize something: I wasn’t just mourning my parents. I was mourning the version of my life I had spent years hoping for.
Reframing my grief made all the difference. Instead of seeing it as proof that I had made the wrong choice, I started to see it as part of the process—proof that I was finally breaking free from a cycle that had hurt me for too long.
But what surprised me most was how different this grief was from what people assumed it should be.
In the next section, I’ll share what most people get wrong about walking away from family—and why my experience has led me to see things differently.
Why people misunderstand what it really means to go no-contact
People assume that cutting ties means you’ve moved on, and that once you walk away, the pain disappears.
But that’s not how it works.
Going no-contact isn’t a clean break. It’s not like flipping a switch and suddenly feeling free. The emotional ties don’t just vanish because you decided to stop answering the phone. If anything, the grief lingers longer because there’s no closure—just an open space where family should have been.
I used to think distance would erase the hurt, but instead, it brought everything to the surface. The guilt of leaving. The doubt about whether I made the right choice. The loneliness of knowing that, no matter how much I craved love from my parents, it would never come in the way I needed.
That’s what people don’t understand: walking away isn’t about escaping pain. It’s about choosing not to let it control you anymore.
But knowing that didn’t make the emotions disappear. I had to find a way to process them, to move forward without feeling trapped in the past.
In the next section, I’ll share the one thing that helped me truly heal from this loss.
The one thing that helped me truly heal
I had spent so much time focusing on what I lost that I hadn’t considered what I could gain. The turning point came when I shifted my focus from grief to self-rebuilding.
Instead of waiting for the pain to disappear, I actively created the peace I had been missing. That meant setting new boundaries—not just with my parents, but with how much space I allowed their absence to take up in my mind.
I also stopped looking for validation. For years, I wanted someone to tell me I did the right thing, and that I wasn’t a bad person for walking away. But the truth is, no one else could give me that answer. I had to trust my own experience and remind myself why I made this choice in the first place.
Most importantly, I redefined family. I poured energy into relationships that felt safe and supportive—friends who became like siblings, mentors who offered genuine guidance, and even moments of solitude where I gave myself the love I had always wanted from them.
Healing didn’t mean forgetting or pretending it didn’t hurt. It meant accepting what was lost and making room for something better.
And through this process, I realized something even deeper about self-worth and emotional freedom—something that changed how I see not just my past, but my future.
Taking back your power and moving forward
For a long time, I felt like a victim of my circumstances. I hadn’t chosen my parents, I hadn’t chosen their behavior, and I certainly hadn’t chosen the pain that came with walking away.
But at some point, I realized that while I couldn’t control the past, I could control what came next. That shift—from feeling powerless to taking responsibility for my own healing—changed everything.
It forced me to start thinking for myself. So much of what I believed about family, loyalty, and obligation wasn’t actually mine—it had been handed to me by society, by culture, by the people who told me that “family is everything” even when it was the very thing breaking me down.
Letting go of that conditioning allowed me to redefine what truly mattered in my life. And from there, everything became clearer:
- You don’t have to hold onto relationships just because they’re labeled “family.”
- Taking responsibility for your healing—even when the situation wasn’t your fault—is the key to reclaiming your power.
- Thinking for yourself means questioning what you’ve been taught and deciding what actually aligns with your true nature.
- Real freedom comes from building a life based on your values, not outdated expectations placed on you by others.
This experience taught me that healing isn’t just about moving on from one painful chapter—it’s about reshaping how you approach life entirely. Once you recognize that you’re not trapped by other people’s definitions of love, duty, or success, you start making choices that align with who you truly are.
And when you do that, you don’t just heal—you become stronger than you ever thought possible.
