Option 1: Staying in touch, on new terms

Not every daughter wants to pull back, or can. You might share a home, care for her, run a family business with her, or simply not be ready. Staying in touch is a real option, and it isn't the same as doing nothing. What changes is you: what you share, what you expect, and what you'll put up with.

What it means

Danu Morrigan, author of You're Not Crazy – It's Your Mother, describes the first option this way:

She describes trying "not to take her narcissistic games personally," and keeping conversation so bland she calls it "a weather-topic relationship." Karyl McBride, Ph.D., a licensed marriage and family therapist, describes something similar and calls it a civil connection:

What it can look like

• Safe topics only. The weather, the garden, her news. Not your marriage, your money, your health or your wins.
• Less shared. Annie Wright, LMFT, suggests pairing low-key replies with "an information diet": you stop volunteering details that could be used later.
• Boring on purpose. Sometimes called gray rock. Wright describes it as "You become boring on purpose. Not cold, not cruel, just flat and factual."
• Limits with consequences. "If you criticize my partner again, I'll end the call." Then you end the call. Morrigan's rule of thumb is that the consequence "must always be something that is in your control to enact."
• No expectations. McBride says this kind of connection works when "the superficial relationship" can be OK "without expectations."

What it costs, in Morrigan's words

She also says, of her own years doing this, "there was no authenticity in it, and no connection." For many daughters that's the trade: the relationship stays, and the hope of real closeness goes. McBride ties the civil connection to having done the grieving first, so that "it is possible to be ‘a part of and apart from’ at the same time."

When it may fit, and when it may not

It may fit if her behavior is hurtful but not dangerous, if staying in touch protects other relationships you care about, or if you're simply not ready to decide anything bigger. It's a harder fit if every limit gets run over, or if contact leaves you unable to function for days afterward. If that's happening, low contact or a pause may be worth a look. If there's any threat to your safety, start with our resources page.

Guides in Staying in Touch, on New Terms