(Author’s note: Dan and Laura are real people going through this situation right now; their names were changed to protect privacy.)

A frail, 85-year-old cancer survivor sits in his living room obsessively dialing a number on his landline phone. Day after day he waits to hear a voice despite knowing that his call will never go through because his number is blocked. He frantically redials. It’s a ritual Dan performs every day, hoping to hear his daughter’s voice if only for one last time.

In the bedroom his wife Laura lies motionless in bed staring at the ceiling. This is where she spends most of her time despite the fact that her doctor has doubled her antidepressants. The couple require daily nursing assistance, arranged for by a son who lives 15 minutes away but never visits. It’s a depressing scene.

If you spend any amount of time with them, they’ll tell you about their daughter, Tina. They had three boys but their fourth child was a girl they called their “miracle baby.” Ever since Laura was young, she wanted a little girl, but she knew that for medical reasons the fourth baby would be her last. Dan tells the story of how Laura cried tears of joy when their baby girl arrived, and even had all the nurses crying. But where is Tina now?

Tina and her brothers stare back at you from pictures hung around the house. They all married and had their own children: happy families mugging for the camera in group pictures – yet this elderly couple can’t remember the last time they’ve seen one of them.

It’s a problem happening in families nationwide. Some call it a silent epidemic of estrangement, others glibly refer to it as going “no contact” like it’s some prophylactic necessity. But the truth of the matter is Dan and Laura have been completely canceled — trimmed off and discarded like fat from a piece of meat.

Their cancellation began when their daughter Tina who, when she couldn’t get a definitive diagnosis for her........

© American Thinker