You Can't Choose Your Family, But You Can Choose Your Boundaries

You Can't Choose Your Family, But You Can Choose Your Boundaries

Setting boundaries with family is some of the hardest relational work there is. In my over 13 years of experience working with clients of varied backgrounds, this comes up more consistently than almost anything else. Not because people don't know what they need, but because the stakes feel so much higher when it's family. The cultural weight of "blood is thicker than water," the sense that these are supposed to be your closest, most loving, most unbreakable bonds, makes it harder to say: this isn't working for me, and something needs to change.

Why family relationships feel uniquely hard

Most of us grow up with the assumption that our families know us best, love us best, and treat us best. And for some people, that's true. But as we expand our relationships outside of our families and experience love, care, and belonging in other groups and with other people, it can start to shift our perspective on how healthy our family dynamics actually are.

Family systems include so many variables. The relationships between siblings, between parents and children, between certain family members and not others. The way emotions are expressed or not expressed. The stress levels in a home. The degree to which people feel seen and supported. All of those things shape our experience of family, and those experiences are formative. They influence the way we understand the world and ourselves in it.

In an ideal situation, our families are our first experience of unconditional love, acceptance, and belonging. A group of people where, no matter how we show up, we know we belong. But that isn't everyone's experience. And as we grow and learn more about ourselves and what feels good in relationships, it can become important to get clearer about how we need to be treated, including by the family we were born into.

Why family boundaries feel so much harder to set

One of the most common things I hear from clients is that setting a boundary with a family member feels terrifying in a way that setting one with a friend or colleague simply doesn't. For some people it can feel like life or death, even when there's no actual conflict present. It's the anticipation of disrupting something that has always existed in a particular way.

Part of what makes this so hard is that families operate like systems. Like a machine with parts that have learned to work together in a specific way. When you set a boundary, what you're really doing is indicating to the system that you're changing the role you occupy within it. If you've always been a particular cog in that machine and you're now asking to be treated differently, that's going to disrupt the functioning of the system for a while. It doesn't mean the system is broken. It just means it needs time to adapt and figure out how to work in this new form.

The most common mistake people make when setting a boundary with family is assuming they can explain themselves once and have it respected from that point forward. That's rarely how it works. Families, like all close relationships, need time to adjust. The boundary will likely need to be reinforced, sometimes more than once, before the new expectation becomes the norm. In The Exhausting Work of Boundary Setting When You're a People Pleaser, we look at why that repetition is so draining and what tends to get in the way of holding a boundary over time.

What it actually looks like when a client gets this right

I've been working with someone for a number of years who for a long time described her relationships with many of her family members, including her primary parent, as quite enmeshed and codependent. After her primary parent passed away unexpectedly, she was really disappointed by how some of her extended family members showed up. What became clear over time was that there was a kind of dysfunction in that extended family that wasn't working for her. It was creating significant stress, and that stress was pushing her toward some unhealthy coping mechanisms, including alcohol and substance use.

Eventually she made the decision that she couldn't maintain regular contact with that part of her family. As she took a step back, she was able to see more clearly how toxic that dynamic had become and how much it was affecting her. She had to reinforce that boundary more than once, making clear that she wouldn't be going to that family home, and that in order to maintain the relationships that did still feel rewarding, those would need to happen in a different setting.

What surprised her most was the grief that came with it. Setting a boundary in a relationship that had once felt really important and valuable, but had since become something harmful, brought up a kind of loss she hadn't anticipated. That grief is real and it makes sense and it doesn't mean the boundary was wrong.

What she also noticed over time was that her drive to drink was lower. That her stress was lower. Because she was no longer spending energy managing all of those unhealthy dynamics. That's what a well-placed boundary can do. It doesn't just change the relationship. It changes how you feel in your own life.

If you recognize something of yourself in this, our individual counselling and relationship counselling work are both good places to explore what this looks like in practice. You're welcome to take our Match with a Therapist quiz to find the right fit, or email us at hello@opcounselling.com to book your first session.

The myth that gets in the way

A belief that comes up often, and that I think is worth naming directly, is this: if you really loved your family, boundaries wouldn't be necessary. This is really unhelpful to buy into. It assumes that all families are healthy, well-functioning, and respectful of one another. And that simply isn't the case for many people. It comes from the same place as "blood is thicker than water," this idea that loyalty to family should override everything else. But what that costs people, ultimately, is the experience of being loved in a way that actually resonates with them. That really makes them feel cared for. And it can keep people in dynamics that feel harmful or even abusive, because leaving or creating distance feels like a betrayal of something they were taught to hold sacred.

Boundaries are not a rejection of family. They are a way of communicating what you need and what you deserve, so that the people in your life who are capable of showing up for you can actually do so in a way that is meaningful to you.

Most importantly, I want you to walk away from this understanding that boundaries are a loving thing you do for yourself and for the people in your life that you care about. They make it possible for others to care for you more meaningfully. And that is something every family relationship, healthy or not, can benefit from.

About the Author

Orli Paling, RCC is a Registered Clinical Counsellor with the BC Association of Clinical Counsellors, with an MA in Counselling Psychology and over 13 years of experience working with adults navigating addiction, ADHD, trauma, and emotional regulation. She practices at OP Counselling in Vancouver, BC.