Just tossing labels around is not helpful. She is narcissistic. He is selfish. They tell lies. None of that is helpful. All of these situations are highly individualistic. In other words, generalizations and non-specifics just don't apply in many cases. In some cases, it is entirely appropriate to distance one's self from parents who are unable to treat their adult child as an adult. You have to get beyond the label of "abusive," and consider if the parent is consistently disrespectful of the adult child. This can take the form of constant criticism, negative comments, disclosing confidences, emotional extortion, manipulation, lying, cheating, stealing, etc. And actual threats to physical safety are always unacceptable.

On the other hand, some adult children are just grown-up spoiled brats who haven't learned to work hard and accept responsibility for themselves. A parent's frustration with these shortcomings in their adult children can cause the parents to become overly critical or meddlesome in their children's lives. Adult children should never distance themselves from their parents for minor or non-recurrent "transgressions." It is an extremely serious matter to estrange one's self from parents, and should only be done in extreme cases. I recently estranged myself from my 80 year old mother and everyone in the family is upset at me for "being mean" to my 80 year old mother. The specific thing that I felt justified this action is that she has treated me as the "stepchild" all my life. I was always not invited or disinvited to family events and family members later shared constant negative comments she says about me. This past summer she invited everyone in the family, kids, nieces, nephews, uncles, aunts, friends, neighbors, etc., except for me and my children. That was the last straw for me. Until you know the specifics, you can't really assess whether the estrangement is a reasonable action or not.