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Rachel Haack | LMFT

@rachelhaack

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Marriage & Family Therapist | Consultant | Wife | Mama to 5 | A hopeful approach to mental health and improving relationships. Instagram ≠ therapy.

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Hi friends, and a special welcome to all the new faces. 🤍

As this little corner of the internet continues to grow, I’d love to get to know you.

What brought you here?

Was it a video? A recommendation from a friend? An interest in family, relationships, psychology… or something else entirely?

I’d genuinely love to know. Tell me a little about yourself below.❤️⬇️ by @rachelhaack

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3 months ago

This season, I made something for parents whose holidays look different than they hoped. It’s called Still, Love: four Monday evenings together, a Thanksgiving morning gathering, and a companion to carry with you through the season.

It isn’t about forcing cheer. It’s about making honest room for what hurts, and for the love that’s still here.

It opens today. It’s $100 for the whole season: 5 live gatherings, a personal holiday companion guide, and all replays included. Comment STILL and I’ll send you the link. 🤍

#parentsofadultchildren #holidaygrief #familyestrangement #adultchildren #griefsupport by @rachelhaack

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4 days ago

It’s still September, but I’m starting this conversation now because for many parents, the dread begins long before the holidays do. Many are bracing to enter the hardest, most complicated time of the year. ⁣
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Grief isn’t only for death. It can come from a relationship that’s changed, a tradition that ended, or a family that looks different than the one you pictured. When we don’t recognize it as grief, we tend to be much harder on ourselves than we’d ever be with someone else going through a loss.⁣
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Over the next few weeks, I’ll be sharing ways to care for yourself through this season, including something practical you can use on your hardest days.⁣ **post edit: You can now comment HOLIDAY and I’ll send you my free one page Holiday Hard Day plan. ❤️
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What’s something you’ve been grieving that you’ve never called grief?⁣
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#parentsofadultchildren #holidaygrief #ambiguousloss #familyestrangement #adultchildren by @rachelhaack

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24 days ago

I’m signing off for the rest of 2025. My word for the year has been 𝘥𝘪𝘴𝘤𝘦𝘳𝘯𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵. I didn’t realize how 𝗴𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 it would be. ⁣
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Professionally, I’ve felt clearer about my values of courage, excellence, and care. Anchoring tightly into these has helped light the way. I’ve had the honor of working with truly incredible parents and adult children—of diving into the messy, painful, confusing, and beautiful walk of family life. ⁣
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Personally, life with my sweet Tyler and our girls continues to expand and deepen us. It is breathtakingly FUN and exhausting to be parents. Our world feels like a miracle to me. He and I frequently look at each other in surprise. It’s like we have no idea how we got here.😂

I’m also learning in real time that the family story only grows larger, more complex, and often more challenging in ways you can never anticipate. Family relationships stretch and refine your soul. I’m always wondering what I’m doing well and where I’m failing. I live in the tension of trying to balance self and others; work and family life; individual interests and the interests of my children. I’ve learned to be more gentle with myself and to understand that this tension is never going away. It’s a worthy one. ⁣
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Two last points of discernment: ⁣
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1. I haven’t sent Christmas cards this year. I had one designed and then failed to order it. Oh well! First world problem! ⁣
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2. I need time completely off social media to center my mind and heart in my home for the holiday. The passion I have for my work, paired with the fear of the algorithm dropping it into some black hole, can keep me returning more than I should. Resets like this always yield better insight and restore balance. ⁣
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So with that, I want to offer the most sincere THANK YOU for being part of this community. Your comments are meaningful, and we’ve made real shifts in the conversations about family this year. The work will continue in 2026! The fight for stronger, healthier families is the hill I’ll die on.❤️⁣
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Wishing you a very Merry Christmas and happy holidays. See you next year. ⁣
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Rachel ⁣ by @rachelhaack

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10 months ago

Hi! I’m Rachel Haack. Wife of 22 years, mother to 5 daughters (yes, five!), and eldest daughter of 8 siblings (!!) I’m a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist. I earned my undergraduate degree at CalSouthern University in Psychology and a graduate degree in Clinical Psychology (emphasis in Marriage and Family therapy) from Azusa Pacific University, California. I have additional training in working with couples and families, infidelity, sex therapy, first responders, estrangement, trauma and grief.⁣
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I treat a variety of mental health and relationship issues. I apply an integrative, developmental lens and tend to utilize strategies & interventions from Family Systems, Cognitive-Behavioral, Emotion-Focused, and Attachment-Based theories.⁣ ⁣
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I work in private practice, offer online consulting, and host workshops for small groups of incredible women (with a heavy emphasis on personal expansion, joy, and resilience!). ⁣I love my job. You can learn more at www.rachelhaack.com
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My therapeutic style has been described as “warm and real”. I’m a proud nerd, lover of deep thinking, and sometimes I say embarrassing things that make me lie awake all night cringing in horror. I love to laugh, appreciate sarcastic humor, and predict my children needing therapy someday thanks to having me for a mother. Which is to say: I’m in the trenches with you. No ivory tower to be found here!⁣
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My goal for this online space is to:
1) create conversations ⁣
2) advocate for better relationships within messy, beautiful, complicated families
3) help women navigate their second half of life with unapologetic zest. ⁣
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I love the creative and connective aspect of social media, and believe in the tangible power of encouragement and education online. I’m inspired by each contribution from this very thoughtful audience. YOU are amazing!⁣
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Please say hello 👋 or share requests for topics you’d like covered in the comments below. ⁣I’m all ears!
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Thanks for being here❤️⁣ by @rachelhaack

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2 years ago

I’m away visiting my oldest daughter, who is studying overseas. She had a break, so we decided to make a special mother-daughters trip of it to our favorite place.⁣
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I have a special affinity for British history, landscape, literature, culture, humor… you name it.⁣
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I inherited this from my Grandmother.⁣
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She was an avid reader, a skilled writer, and had the most hilarious way of using alliteration to deliver a criticism. Her books were the ones I consumed during my awkward adolescent years, and she happily supplied me with more recommendations when she discovered I found 🇬🇧 history as intriguing as she did. I’ll never forget her voice, or the way she could narrate a segment of Tudor history with the perfect blend of education and intrigue.⁣
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As I walked the grounds of Blenheim today, I couldn’t hold back the tears.⁣
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Oh, Grandma, you would have loved this.⁣
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She never got to immerse herself in the place she intently studied and so loved.⁣
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She became a mother at 15. She went on to have 8 children. She enrolled herself in nursing school and graduated at the top of her class. She spent her whole life raising a family, working, and tending to the needs of new mothers and babies.⁣
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Responsibility like that, beginning at 15, produces just the kind of complicated and awe inspiring family storylines you might imagine.⁣
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My Grandma was no stranger to trauma or suffering, and so much of it she carried alone.⁣
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I fear she never felt the honor she so rightfully deserved over the course of her all-too-short life. It’s hard to fully face how much of it broke her heart.⁣
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She was vivacious and warm, loving and emotionally unpredictable. Skilled and brilliant, complicated and deep.⁣
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I was once told that a good way to live out your regrets about loved ones who have passed is to offer up your efforts in the present as a living, breathing apology.⁣
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I never thought I would work with so many hurting women and complicated families. And somehow, it all fits.⁣
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So as I make my way through the parts of England she never got to see, with her great-granddaughters in tow, I’ll mark our stops as an altar in my heart. Along with my work.⁣
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This is for you, Gigi. by @rachelhaack

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5 hours ago

Attachment research describes this shift in three steps. First they stop seeking you out as much. Then you stop being the one they turn to when things go wrong. Last, and slowest, the person who gives them the courage to take a risk changes; the one represents the foundation of their inner world.
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That can happen in a very healthy partnership and still feel like a real loss. It’s even harder when you’re worried about who they chose, or when that person shows no interest in keeping you in the family.⁣
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You don’t have to compete for the top spot, and you don’t have to pretend you’re totally fine. Stay warm and steady and easy to come back to. Many parents find a new seat in their kid’s life, and it’s different from the old one.⁣
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If you’re in the middle of this, it’s a real loss. You’re not crazy. Even healthy, necessary losses suck!! They hurt!!! Especially for the parents who connected so well. It’s often a harder transition on the inside. ⁣
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Save this for the next time it stings, and send it to a parent who’s living it.❤️ by @rachelhaack

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a day ago

𝗧𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗽𝘆 𝗵𝗮𝘀 𝗮𝗻 𝗲𝘃𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗯𝗹𝗲𝗺 𝘄𝗵𝗲𝗻 𝗶𝘁 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲𝘀 𝘁𝗼 𝗳𝗮𝗺𝗶𝗹𝗶𝗲𝘀.⁣
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A lot of people are asking whether therapy is contributing to family estrangement. I think it can, but usually not because there’s some boogeyman therapist saying, “Ooh, you should cut off your family.”⁣
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It’s much more subtle.⁣
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Therapists are drawing conclusions about people they have never met.⁣
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Sometimes they’re teaching about them, creating frameworks around them, even writing entire books explaining the psychology of people they have never assessed, treated or spoken to.⁣ 🚩
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The evidence? A client’s self-report. A text from Mom. An email from Dad. A voicemail played in session. One person’s account of twenty years of family history.⁣
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We would never consider that an assessment of the other person. Yet somehow it becomes enough to explain entire categories of people.⁣
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I work disproportionately with parents trying to repair relationships with adult children. I can tell you a great deal about those parents’ experiences.⁣
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What I cannot tell you is 𝘄𝗵𝗼 their adult children are. I haven’t met them.⁣
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Yet in therapy, a client’s experience of another person can become the therapist’s explanation of that person. That explanation shapes how interactions are interpreted, which possibilities remain open, and eventually which choices seem reasonable.⁣
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Nobody ever had to say, “Cut off your mother.”⁣
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The narratives simply became more certain, recasting other people as less complex.⁣
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And then, when people question whether this might be influencing estrangement, the profession can be surprisingly resistant to examining its own role.⁣
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We ask families to examine their contribution to relational systems. Therapists should be willing to do the same.⁣
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So I’m curious: Is it reasonable for therapists to make claims about groups they’ve never actually worked with? by @rachelhaack

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5 days ago

I call it the split mind of the parent. It’s a big reason so many parents stop talking about what’s happening. You want advice and support, but you worry that if you tell the whole story, your friends and family will think less of your son or daughter. And since you’re hoping for repair, you keep the door closed.

Two things can help. 1) tell people what you need before you tell them what happened, and 2) find at least one person who can hold both feelings at once, often another parent who has been there.

You can be hurt by someone and love them fiercely at the same time. Having two minds about it means you’re in a real relationship with a real person.

What do you wish people understood when you tell them about your estrangement?

#estrangement #familyestrangement #estrangedadultchildren #parentingadultchildren #familytherapy by @rachelhaack

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7 days ago

Parents of estranged adult children get a LOT of instruction these days and not much understanding. Many of you have apologized, reread old messages, and gone over every argument looking for what you got wrong, and then found more of the same waiting online.

Real accountability matters, and so does being worn out by a conversation that treats every parent as the problem. Both can be true, and you don’t have to pick one.

Repair is usually slow, and it tends to start with how steady you can stay when things get hard, not with proving you’ve changed. That’s the work I do with parents and families.

I’m Rachel, a family therapist. If you want more of this, I post about families, adult life development, relationships, estrangement and repair most weeks, and you’re welcome to follow along.

What’s the advice you’ve gotten that you’re most tired of hearing? by @rachelhaack

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10 days ago

I’ve been working behind the scenes on something special.⁣
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The more I listen to parents this time of year, the clearer it becomes to me: the holidays call for more support, not less. They have a way of showing us what’s missing. But I’ve come to believe they hold far more than that, too, if we know where to look.⁣
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On October 15, I’m opening 𝗦𝘁𝗶𝗹𝗹, 𝗟𝗼𝘃𝗲, a holiday experience for parents whose holidays look different than they hoped: ⁣
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Four evenings together this season⁣
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A Thanksgiving morning gathering⁣
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and a companion to carry you through.⁣
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Everyone on my email list will hear about it first, on October 13. If you’d like to be one of them, comment PLAN and I’ll send you my free Hard-Day Plan, which puts you on the list. 🤍⁣
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#parentsofadultchildren #holidaygrief #familyestrangement #adultchildren #griefsupport by @rachelhaack

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11 days ago

You are not a diagnosis. It’s not an identity. LOVE YOU! #therapist #mentalhealth #relationships by @rachelhaack

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12 days ago