I keep seeing the same thing in dementia care that doesn’t sit right with me. There’s a quiet push for spouses to emotionally detach from their partner — not because the relationship is gone, but because the system is more comfortable when it is.

It’s rarely described that way. It’s framed as preparation. As self-protection. As “acceptance.”

It’s rarely said outright.

It shows up as:

“Prepare yourself.”

“They’re not really your spouse anymore.”

“You need to start letting go.”

Sometimes that guidance is appropriate.

Often, it’s premature—and delivered while the relationship is still very much alive.

I’ve worked with couples where memory is impaired, but emotional attunement is intact. Where the marriage hasn’t ended—it’s just changing. Where comfort, attachment, and shared meaning still exist—even as roles change. And yet the default advice is detachment, as if preserving the relationship is denial rather than care. It actively reshapes the relationship before it has truly ended.

Safety matters. Burnout matters. Boundaries matter.

But so does not erasing a partnership prematurely. I wonder if we’ve made emotional withdrawal the default because it’s simpler for systems—when what families actually need is more nuance.

We need to stop treating early emotional withdrawal as a moral virtue. And we need to ask harder questions about who early abandonment actually serves.

-Jessica Kowal RN, BSN