Going 'no contact' with your family can feel like 'an impossible choice.' These women say it helped them leave toxic relationships behind.

Maya Rufino works as a therapist in California, but before she could begin helping others, she had to first help herself. Rufino went “no contact” with three of her family members — her parents and a sibling — over 10 years ago. “My decision to go no contact was complicated, as I think it often is,” she tells Yahoo Life. “It wasn’t any one thing; it was many issues over the course of years.”

The term “no contact” usually refers to adult children severing ties with parents or other family members. It's a step most often taken to end psychological, physical or emotional abuse or suffering, but many still see it as a drastic response. “We’re socialized to maintain relationships with those who share our DNA, no matter how they treat us,” says Rufino. “I don’t believe in this.”

As therapy philosophies change and more first-person accounts of people documenting their own no-contact journeys surface on social media, that stigma may be slowly shifting. While detractors argue that the repercussions of going no contact outweigh the benefits, those in favor of the practice say such estrangements can end toxic dynamics and hold family members to the same standards as we do friends. "The simplest way to explain the importance of familial 'no contact' boundaries is through the lens of forgiveness,” explains one psychotherapist, Renée Zavislak, who went no contact with her mother and extended family seven years ago. “Forgiveness requires safety. This safety depends on two critical variables: accountability and boundaries.”

What compels people to go no contact, and why do they see it as unavoidable? Ahead, people who have done it share their side of the story — and what happens next.

Why people go no contact

It was abuse that made Melissa Gallagher cut ties with her family in 2022, she tells Yahoo Life. “My father’s physical abuse and my mother’s failure to protect me and my siblings were the main reasons for my decision,” she says. “I didn’t want to keep trying to fix people who refused to change, and I realized I was in a toxic environment that was suffocating me.”

Like everyone else interviewed for this article, Gallagher emphasizes that going no contact was a decision she made only when everything else had failed. “I was scared, exhausted and confused,” she says. “It felt like an impossible choice, but I knew the situation had become too unhealthy and dangerous to stay.”

Zavislak's estrangement from her mother and other relatives was a long time coming. “For as long as I can remember, my mother was cruel, critical, invalidating and dishonest. She regularly reminded me that she had not wanted to have children,” she says. "Several incidents" prompted Zavislak to cut ties, she adds. "While the specifics are long and complicated, the prohibitive factors were my mother’s persistent denials and her ongoing, go-for-the-jugular insults.”

Bunny Hedaya often shares details of her no-contact experience online. “It started with my mom not showing up when she made plans with my son, then eventually I was fed up with her disappointing him, and I cut off contact completely,” Hedaya says. “Becoming a mom made me really realize that who I have around my child needs to be people I want influencing him on life.”

Katie McGreal went no contact with her entire family in 2022, and she says her choice was based on a lifetime of affronts and abuse. “I didn’t make a conscious decision that I would end my relationship with them until the frustration was so deep that I couldn’t not listen to it,” says McGreal. “I couldn't keep up a relationship with someone who wouldn't take accountability for their bad behavior and who wouldn't stick to [their] word, or who was lying all the time.”

Other people helped Rufino realize what she was missing within her own family. “Healthy relationships in my life, like friends and my long-term partner, showed me that relationships don’t have to be draining and challenging,” she says. “While my dad was not showing up, not keeping in contact and not supportive, my friends were always there.”

The decision-making process

Zavislak says there are three criteria that make a relationship a good one for trying no contact: "All attempts at repair have been exhausted, because the violating relative cannot assume accountability or respect boundaries; the person considering the boundary is continuing to be abused or violated; and the relationship is preventing the boundary setter from healing.”

Zavislak recalls her own efforts to set boundaries with her mother. “My first attempt was to move across the country; the geographic boundary minimized my contact with her," she says. "Still, each visit or call left me emotionally eviscerated. My next boundary attempt was to ask her not to address certain topics with me: my appearance, my son’s appearance, my relationships, etc. She was unable to abide by that one, and the insults continued, often prefaced with, ‘I know I’m not supposed to say this, but…’”

In her work as a therapist, Rufino often speaks with patients navigating their own questions about whether or not to go no contact. “I do not advise people one way or another, because this is a very personal decision based on a person’s own values and needs, as well as costs and benefits of the relationship to their life,” she says. “Some people may decide that the relationship is not even worth trying moderate boundaries, and some may decide that they’re willing to try to infinity."

Rufino's own feelings about her process were complicated. “I had so many feelings leading up to the decision to end these relationships: fear, anxiety, anger, hurt, relief, joy, anticipatory grief,” she says. “But if I’m honest, I think the relief of knowing I had a choice was the strongest feeling for me, because the relationships had already been so draining, and at times traumatic, for so long.”

The aftermath

For those who initiated the break, moving through grief is often a large part of the process. “I have grieved the loss, and that process has allowed me to move on,” says Zavislak. “I should add that my sadness is not only for me. I feel for my mom and for her family, for the fact that their own unhealed pain is so alive and destructive.”

There is also the realization that what occurred in one’s childhood is not the responsibility of the child, but of the adult. “It's not the child’s responsibility to have a healthy relationship with you [the parent],” says Hedaya. “You’re not entitled to have control of your children once they are adults. I hope I create a home that my son always feels welcome and wants to be in, and I know that if he ever does not feel that way, it’s my fault."

McGreal also acknowledges the blame game that can come with a no-contact relationship. "So often, abuse victims are the ones left feeling bad, when it is the abuser that has done wrong,” she says. “I am sick of this dynamic. I didn't do anything wrong, so I refused to think that I had anymore.”

There are also different outcomes to a no-contact situation. Some families reconcile, others never do. For Gallagher, there's been no looking back. “I’ve built a beautiful life for myself, one filled with love, peace and the freedom to be who I am without fear," she says. "I will never have to live like that again, and I’m proud that I was able to break the generational cycle of abuse. I feel at peace with my decision. Without it, I wouldn’t be here.”

Rufino's decision to go no contact sparked change within her mother. “After I ended my relationship with my mom, she went to therapy and worked on the issues I was having with her," she shares. "Slowly, we built a much healthier relationship. Going no contact prompted her to put forth the effort I was asking for, and I’m not sure she would have done it otherwise.”

McGreal, who wrote a book about her experience, is skeptical of that ever happening for her. "I can't see myself having a relationship with them again unless something drastic changes or happens, but I can't even think what that could be. I don't wish them ill; I just wish them away from me.”