We Aren't Family: How To Sever Ties With Toxic Family Members

Living in a toxic family is hard, as they would constantly emotionally and mentally abuse you. Not only that, the constant beratement and gaslighting would contribute to and cause health deterioration. A home is where you should feel safe – not a place where you would feel threatened on a daily basis.

However, being in an Asian family – even a toxic one – would be a bit hard to navigate around, and it would be hard to sever ties. Leaving one’s family is frowned upon in any Asian community. But it’s totally okay to sever ties with them if it’s for the greater good of your mental health.

It’s never easy cutting ties with family, as it takes a big leap of faith and a lot of courage to do so. Not to mention, the aftermath of it. Factors that contribute to the difficulty of severing ties with toxic families are loyalty towards the family, which confirms the saying “blood is thicker than water”; and guilt over “abandoning” people who are biologically related to you. But psychologists confirm that it’s okay to cut off any toxic relations who do more harm than good for your life.

If you aren’t sure how to cut ties with toxic family members, here are some tips that might help you:

Decide when to cut ties

Decision-making is never easy in life – be it for good things or bad things. However, remaining in a toxic relationship with your family would negatively impact your mental wellbeing. The deciding factor to sever ties would be when you realise that a relationship is a lose/lose situation for yourself and there’s nothing left for you in being with your family member or members. You need to heal from all the pain caused – but how could you heal if you can’t remove yourself from the source of the pain?

How to deliver the news

There’s no ‘right’ way to deliver the news to your family that you are severing ties with them. But obstacles include extended relatives, i.e. aunts and uncles, whom you only see once in a while during big family reunions. However, you don’t have to abruptly stop answering calls or reply to messages. You can tell them that the relationship isn’t benefitting either of you right now and that you’ll be withdrawing yourself from them.

If they are not going to respect your decision on it, at this point, it’s totally okay to stop answering or replying to any messages or calls.

Handling emotional aftermath

Severing ties with family would either be a positive or negative event, as the emotional burden would be greater if your family tried reaching out to you by asking for forgiveness or reconciliation. However, intermittently reacting to someone’s attention can send ambiguous messages; and anticipating this behaviour and remaining firm so as not to reinforce it by not interacting is critical. You might feel regret, relief, guilt, or even a cesspool of emotions due to your decision.

An easier way for you to sort out conflicting feelings in the aftermath of severing ties would be to talk to a therapist, as this would provide you with some peace within yourself.

It may be a norm for Asian families to not talk about mental health issues, including toxicity. But always remember that when you are at your breaking point, talk it out with them first. If they are not going to respect your decision, severing ties might the solution.