family breakdown
Domestic unit fracturing
Family breakdown is the disintegration of a family unit, typically through divorce, separation, or estrangement.
The term often carries moral or political weight, invoked in discussions of social problems: Critics blamed family breakdown for rising crime rates.
It emphasizes rupture rather than transition—a family that has broken down has failed, not simply changed form.
- divorceLegal end of matrimony
- separationState of being apart
- custodyProtective care or control
- child custodyLegal parental responsibility allocation
- shared custodyBoth parents raise child
estrangement · parental alienation · conflict · dysfunction · growing apart · split · rupture · fragmentation · falling apart · abandonment · neglect · turmoil · heartbreak · lawyers · courts · visitation · alienation · tension
- societal decaydecline, decay, degradation, degeneration, deterioration
- divorcedivorce court, divorce decree, divorce papers, divorce filing, divorce lawyer
- Addiction Harmsaddiction, overdose, dependence, dependency, withdrawal
- Alcoholismalcoholism, alcoholic, alcohol abuse, alcohol addiction, alcohol dependence
- family lossorphan, motherless, fatherless, parentless, abandonment
- marital problemsinfidelity, adultery, cheating, affair, divorce
family breakdownfamily unity
Cohesion among relatives
family stability · domestic harmony · nuclear family · happy family · family bonding
family breakdownfamily reunification
Rejoining separated relatives
reconciliation · marriage · family bonding · starting a family · family reunion
family, breakdown, families, familial, familiar, familiarity, familiarize, familiarization, unfamiliar