I’ve spent years surrounded by people I love—family, friends, people who have been woven into different chapters of my life—and lately I’ve been thinking about something that feels a little uncomfortable to admit.

How well do we actually know the people we say we know?

Not their favorite color. Not what they order at a restaurant. Not the stories they tell every Christmas because we’ve heard them 400 times and could probably recite them ourselves.

I mean know them.

The things they’re afraid to say out loud. The things they regret. Who they call when their world is falling apart. What they think about when they can’t sleep. The parts of their lives they keep private. The version of themselves that exists when nobody else is around.

Because the older I get, the more I realize that some of the people I’ve known the longest have somehow become strangers.

And maybe some of them always were.

That sounds incredibly sad—and honestly, sometimes it is.

I want to know people deeply. Especially the people I love.

I want to know my family beyond the role they play in my life. I want to know the people they are underneath mom, aunt, sister, daughter, friend.

And probably more than anything, I want to know my girls.

They’re adults now, which means their lives belong to them. There are friendships I’m not part of, conversations I’ll never hear, thoughts they might never tell me, experiences they will process without me and pieces of themselves they may choose to keep entirely their own.

That has been a strange part of motherhood for me.

When your children are little, you know almost everything.

You know what they ate. You know who made them cry. You know what happened at school. You know when they're sick. You know what they're afraid of. Hell, for years you can't even go to the bathroom without somebody giving you a full briefing through the door.

Then they grow up.

Suddenly, knowing them becomes something different.

I can ask questions. I can listen. I can make sure they know I'm here. I can try to create the kind of relationship where they want to tell me things.

But ultimately, I can only know what they allow me to know.

And I think that's one of the harder truths about loving another human being:

Access to someone's life isn't the same thing as access to who they are.

When People You Love Start Feeling Like Strangers

I've been thinking about this with my extended family, too, although for very different reasons.

There are people I'm related to who I barely speak to anymore.

Some of that distance came after conflict.

There was a situation in my family that made me deeply uncomfortable. An adult man was walking around naked in front of women and children in the family. I didn't believe it was appropriate, and I wasn't willing to pretend that I did just because speaking about it might make other people uncomfortable.

So I spoke up.

That didn't exactly earn me Family Member of the Month.

Over time, relationships changed.

And recently, while talking with my mom, I heard that some members of my family were still upset with me—not only because of that situation, but because of how they believe I've treated my mother.

And immediately I thought:

But what about how I've been treated?

That's the complicated part of family conflict.

Everyone remembers the chapter where they were hurt.

Sometimes nobody wants to read the chapters that came before it.

My relationship with my mom has its own history. There are things said to me when I was young that stayed with me for decades. Things that shaped how I saw myself, love and belonging.

That doesn't mean I've handled every situation perfectly.

I haven't.

I've hurt people. I've reacted emotionally. I've said things I wish I had handled differently. I've had to look at my own behavior and take responsibility for it.

But accountability can't only travel in one direction.

And maybe that's part of how families eventually become strangers.

One person remembers the argument.

Another remembers everything that led to it.

Someone else remembers an entirely different version.

Years pass.

Nobody talks.

And eventually the people who once knew nearly everything about each other's lives don't even know the basics anymore.

Maybe Family Estrangement Doesn't Always Have a Beginning

When we hear the term family estrangement, it sounds so official.

Like there should have been a meeting.

Congratulations. Effective immediately, we are now estranged. Please turn in your family membership card on the way out.

But I don't think it always happens like that.

Sometimes there isn't one dramatic goodbye.

Sometimes people just stop calling.

Invitations disappear.

Birthdays become quieter.

You stop knowing what's happening in their lives.

They stop knowing what's happening in yours.

Months turn into years, and eventually you realize the person standing in your childhood memories is someone you wouldn't know how to have a conversation with today.

That's a strange kind of grief.

Because they're still here.

They're just no longer here.

And that can leave you grieving a relationship without having an actual ending to grieve.

We Only Know the Versions People Give Us

The more I thought about this, though, the more I realized it isn't only about estranged families.

It's everyone.

Think about your closest friend.

You probably know their stories, their habits, their terrible dating decisions and exactly what face they're making when they say, "I'm fine," even though they are absolutely not fucking fine.

But do you know everything?

Of course not.

They have thoughts they haven't told you.

Memories you've never heard.

Private fears.

Conversations that happened before you entered their life.

Entire versions of themselves that belonged to another time.

And you have those things too.

We walk around believing we know people because we've accumulated information about them.

But knowing facts about someone isn't necessarily the same as knowing their inner world.

Even the people closest to us remain, in some ways, mysteries.

I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing.

I'm starting to think it's simply part of being human.

Maybe Knowing Someone Is Something We Keep Choosing

This realization could make relationships feel incredibly lonely.

Instead, I'm trying to look at it differently.

Maybe we're never finished knowing someone.

Maybe that's the point.

Instead of assuming, I've known her for twenty years, I know her, maybe we should continue being curious.

Ask different questions.

Listen when the answer isn't what we expected.

Allow people to change without constantly comparing them to who they used to be.

Tell the people we love things about ourselves that go beyond "I'm good" and "nothing's wrong."

And when our children become adults, maybe loving them means accepting that we aren't automatically entitled to every corner of their lives.

We can create safety.

We can stay interested.

We can listen without immediately trying to fix everything.

We can keep the door open.

But they decide how far they walk through it.

That's something I'm still learning.

If Someone You Love Feels Like a Stranger

If you're reading this because someone you once knew intimately now feels like a stranger, I don't have a five-step solution for getting them back.

I don't think one exists.

Sometimes reconciliation is possible.

Sometimes distance is healthier.

Sometimes two people love each other and still can't figure out how to exist in each other's lives.

And sometimes the relationship isn't gone at all—it has simply changed.

What we can do is stop assuming history guarantees closeness.

Relationships need curiosity.

They need conversations.

They need accountability from more than one person.

They need boundaries that can be respected without automatically being interpreted as rejection.

And they need room for people to become someone different from the person we remember.

Most importantly, we can ask ourselves something uncomfortable:

Do I actually want to know this person as they are—or do I want them to remain the version of them I already understand?

I'm asking myself that question too.

Because I want to know my girls as the women they're becoming, not only as the little girls I raised.

I want to know my friends beyond the pieces of their lives I happen to see.

And yes, part of me still wants to know the family members who have become strangers.

I don't know whether I ever will.

There are relationships in my life I may never completely understand or repair.

But I'm realizing something else as I get older:

Maybe loving someone isn't being able to say, I know everything about you.

Maybe it's being able to say:

I know I never will.

But if you want to show me who you are, I'm still interested in knowing you.

FAQ: When Someone You Love Feels Like a Stranger

Is it normal for family members to become strangers?

Yes. Family relationships can become distant because of conflict, boundaries, major life changes, unresolved hurt or simply years of limited communication. Sharing a family history doesn't automatically guarantee emotional closeness throughout adulthood.

Can you grieve someone who is still alive?

Absolutely. People can experience grief when an important relationship changes or ends even though the other person is still alive. You may be grieving the relationship you once had, the person you remember or even the future you imagined having together.

Does family estrangement always mean completely cutting contact?

No. Family estrangement and family distance can exist on a spectrum. Some people have no contact, while others communicate occasionally but no longer have an emotionally close relationship.

Should I reconnect with an estranged family member?

There isn't one answer that works for every relationship. Reconnection depends on what caused the distance, whether both people are willing to communicate honestly, whether boundaries can be respected and whether rebuilding the relationship feels emotionally safe and healthy.

How do you stay close to adult children without invading their privacy?

Sometimes closeness means shifting from knowing everything to creating an environment where your adult children want to share. Stay curious about their lives, listen without judgment, respect their boundaries and remind them through your actions that they can come to you when they're ready.

The Part I'm Taking With Me

The people closest to us aren't books we've already finished reading.

They're still being written.

So am I.

Maybe that's why knowing another person isn't something we accomplish once.

It's something we keep choosing.

~Tj🩷