The science behind Renouer
Every claim is sourced.
Here are the sources.
And, in all honesty, what they do not allow: no controlled trial exists on reconciliation — so nobody can claim a « success rate ». Anyone who does is misleading you.
The Cornell national survey and the Reconciliation Project
The first representative national survey (more than 1,300 people): 27% of adults are experiencing family estrangement, about 10% from a parent or child; half for four years or more. The reconciliation strand — interviews with around a hundred people who reconnected — underpins the strategies in modules 2, 3 and 6.
Prevalence in representative longitudinal data
26% of young adults report estrangement from their father, 6% from their mother. The study also documents estrangements that are repaired, and the risk factors — parental divorce above all.
The clinical practice of reconciliation and the letter of amends
Forty years of clinical practice and a study of 1,600 parents underpin the letter of amends: the kernel of truth, an opening without demands, including the spouse, respecting boundaries. The foundation of modules 4 and 5.
Ambiguous loss
The framework explaining why this pain does not « go away »: your child is alive but absent, which prevents the usual grieving process. The basis of module 1.
The distancing process and its cycles
Estrangement is almost never an event but a gradual process, with steps forward and back. Re-establishing contact follows the same cycles — hence the methodical patience of module 5.
The generational gap in concepts
Notions of trauma and abuse have broadened within a generation: two sincere accounts of the same story can coexist. The key to reading module 3.