diff --git a/lib/src/relationship_generator.dart b/lib/src/relationship_generator.dart
index 65efd6b3..d6c612c1 100644
--- a/lib/src/relationship_generator.dart
+++ b/lib/src/relationship_generator.dart
@@ -28,8 +28,12 @@ List<Relationship>? relationshipsFor(
   // Since mixins do not support inheritance, we only care about
   // methods that exist on classes
   if (node is MethodDeclaration && node.parent is ClassDeclaration) {
-    final parentNode = node.parent as ClassDeclaration;
-    final parentElement = parentNode.declaredElement as ClassElement;
+    final parentNode = node.parent as ClassDeclaration?;
+    final parentElement = parentNode?.declaredElement;
+
+    // this shouldn't happen, but if the parent element happens to be
+    // null, just fail fast
+    if (parentElement == null) return null;
 
     // retrieve all of the methods and accessors of every parent type that
     // has the same name of [node]. These are the elements that this [node]
diff --git a/pubspec.lock b/pubspec.lock
index 240dd79e..58e9be38 100644
--- a/pubspec.lock
+++ b/pubspec.lock
@@ -437,10 +437,10 @@ packages:
     dependency: "direct dev"
     description:
       name: workiva_analysis_options
-      sha256: "428e75a330786b519c87409530c52a1f366731af2cf94fe6da85582889d583bc"
+      sha256: d7b1b88c2e4c5f795c56f40940583fa2de40510a23ef494a29db32699af52a3d
       url: "https://pub.dev"
     source: hosted
-    version: "1.3.0"
+    version: "1.4.1"
   yaml:
     dependency: transitive
     description:
diff --git a/pubspec.yaml b/pubspec.yaml
index 00fc5a88..2744f312 100644
--- a/pubspec.yaml
+++ b/pubspec.yaml
@@ -21,4 +21,4 @@ dev_dependencies:
   dart_dev: ^4.0.2
   dependency_validator: ^3.2.3
   glob: ^2.1.1
-  workiva_analysis_options: ^1.0.0
\ No newline at end of file
+  workiva_analysis_options: ^1.4.1
\ No newline at end of file