Cut out of their lives

You have great insight Nanban. Any person who has had a taste of being separated from their beloved children will weigh up whether they should endure misery so they can be close to their kids. It's such a terrible choice, but things can and do change. It's just getting the timing right and being sure of your ground so it doesn't all blow up in your face, which happened with my son when he ended his marriage after years of abuse. With hindsight, he says he would have endured a few more years and stayed out of her way as much as possible so he could stay with his son, but that was because ex-DIL is a vindictive woman. Thankfully, most parents don't go to those lengths. He's your son and has grown up with your values, so I would guess he is in turmoil about this separation, like you

Wise and loving words - I can think of no better place to bring a sore heart than to Gransnet and the understanding people there - long may it continue x

I opened a Facebook page - complete mystery to me how that thing really works - but it is aimed at our grandson and a sort of diary, thinking that he would be able to find us through it somehow. But, I've just heard that children can't access Facebook at all until they are 13 and another 9 years seems such a long time to wait.

Hi Nanban. Children aren't supposed to open Facebook pages till 13, but many do with the permission and oversight of their parents for the first few weeks, then they forget about it.

My grandson still has a Facebook page but he doesn't go on there till I remind him I have left him a private message or shared a photo with him. He has 6 friends on there - cousins and schoolfriends, then me and his dad.

His mother told him not to use it last year, then promptly forgot all about it. We do see him now, and he can use it when he wants to, but his dad keeps a check on it. If he was to allow any friends we do not know, it would be withdrawn until he is older.

It's worth keeping things archived on there for the future. Facebook will probably go through more changes like the recent timeline, but it's a good place to store memories.

We have no idea where they are or how to make contact so I was rather hoping he would look for us - having not the least clue how that will work but can't think of anything else. It would be completely marvellous if I could invent a Grannies/Grandchildren Reunite Thing so that we who are 'missing' can post our names and be found. Firstly, of course, I would need to know how to!

Nanban - one thing that might happen in due course is that he might start to open up a Facebook account and find his name already there. To have greetings, memories and photos to show him would be testament to your efforts to find him. You have control of the account so it can't be closed down if anyone else finds it and doesn't want it there

My oldest daughter did this to us several times during her childrens upbringing..nothing we ever did was good enough....She has 5 children ranging from25 to 6 the two elder boys are now men and one of them has a really bad relationship with her I have to keep trying to get him to see her as I feel she needs to see more of him....I feel bad too as he gets me flowers on my birthday and mothers day but will not send them to his mum...She thinks I have taken him from her but not so I want them all to have a relationship with her as she is a depressive character who needs help...I also have a good relationship with their 19 yr old sister who although talks to mum regularly feels that I do more for her than her mum....I do not see the two young ones...I buy birthday presents and drop them around and Christmas gifts and they know that if they want I will always help....No I do not want to take them away from her I have had my family..and any mum of 3 will tell you that is enough bringing up for anyone, but I cannot ignore them and cannot refuse to help when they need it...
I think it is a crime to use your children as a form of blackmail as my feelings are children get different things from different people and the more people around who love them the better it is not a competition but a necessary part of bringing up rounded people...I have survived the tears and loss but it does leave a big puddle of tears that you can shed anytime you think about it...

I hope it helps others to realise that they are not alone this situation is very common lets hope it does not become the norm...Peckers up people and congratulate yourselves for caring and they will know when older that was the case really really they will...memories stay with them....

If you are missing family you can always find them on 192...you have to pay a little but you can get voters list addresses...It may make some of you feel better if you actually knew where they were..also many schools have web sites..I often find my other daughters little ones are pictured doing something exciting..I have always known where they were and it is a comfort..

Some good ideas there pollytunnel. I had forgotten about the school photos on their website. I printed some off last year when my grandson has a school trip in the Lakes.

Nanban. Excellent that you have gone on to facebook. I had thought about mentioning it here. I went on to it not so long ago and you get the hang of it it time and gather a few friends on the way. Really I think it could be the way forward for us "cut out grannies" to get out there as the younger generation do use these social media sites and you never know who might contact you in time. Kids get curious as they get older and there is just a chance that someone may stumble across you and make contact. I just use it to make a diary if you like of my doings just in case someone out there is interested. Actually a couple of mutual friends have made contact and that was very helpful to me.

Exactly so - I write as if my grandson will read it one day and he will know he was thought of and wanted and loved.

Thank you for the 192 suggestion but we do know that our son has moved out of the country for at least 2 years with his job. We did ask a work colleague if they would send on a parcel for us to our grandchildren now and again but they wouldn't/couldn't help. People on the outside - and I too have been guilty of this - think no smoke without fire, six of one half a dozen the other and it will sort itself out, she/they must have done something. The wonderful thing about gransnet is that people understand and sadly know from their own experiences.

Anyone been watching the 'long lost family' programme? Now, why can't our families watch it too!

I love that programme - cry throughout! Families aren't living in a vacuum - surely they must come across our perspective on things every now and again and feel uncomfortable? Hope so!

I always watch it, too. If our families could just understand what it was like for some of us to be young and 'in trouble', they may see what a desperate struggle it was to try and keep an illegitimate baby in those days.

Just come across this. The words at the beginning are one of the saddest things I have read. I can really relate to it at the moment.

SJP, I hope that you're able to get a little bit of comfort and support from the posts on this thread. It may not solve issues for you, but it may just help to know you're not alone.

greenmossgiel I so agree - recently had to put my GD right after she had watched the program, and put on facebook

Long lost families is sad but it also makes me mad,women that turn their back on their own children make me sick!and if anybody tried to take xxxx off me even if i was like 17 id tell them where to go! I'd get by somehow,my daughter is my life and I couldn't live without her

I explained that young women did not have a choice unless the family helped. No family allowance, no right to keep your job, no right to housing, no help from the state etc. I had a supportive family and supportive partner but he could have denied paternity and walked away (we are still married 45 years later) if we had not my parents would have kept their GC but I would have had to work to help keep him in food, clothes etc.

She had not realised how hard it could be and apologised.

Pennysue - how lives have changed over the last decades. It is inconceivable now that there was a time not so long ago when there was absolutely no help available. What were young mothers to do when turned out by parents, no financial help from the state, no housing, no child care on the one hand, and good people in good positions lined up to adopt on the other. The hardest thing to grasp was the lack of support from parents then but the war generation parenting itself was very different - restrained, colder, hidebound by rules. It should be somehow made so much easier for 'missing people' to connect and find others, especially with the internet - I don't know of any site where names can be posted up to be found and I so wish I knew how to invent one.

*Nanban from me to you. I'm so sorry you are so unhappy. Gransnet is great just to express your feelings. It appears you have a number of fellow sufferers who understand these feelings and support you.

I am new to Gransnet but I am amazed at how this topic appears to have the most responses out of all of the topics on the forum. Losing contact with a son is obviously far more common than I thought. I have a fragile link with mine but it is hard going to keep my patience when emails, phone calls etc go unacknowledged. Birthday later on this month - I live in hope he may remember it.

SJP, I have a fragile link with my younger daughter, who estranged herself from me for 7 years. Somehow or other, probably due to the birth of her own grandchild, she softened towards me, and things got better. I'm always very fearful that she'll drop me again, and I honestly don't know how I'd cope with that. My elder daughter and my son tell me not to fuss round her, because that will put her off, but I think it's a case of I'm damned if I do and I'm damned if I don't. If I go to see her, conversation is sometimes difficult, and if I hold back from seeing her, I worry that she'll think I don't care.....oh dear!
I hope your son remembers your birthday, but if he doesn't, do try not to think that he doesn't care. Our families can be strange creatures...they don't seem to understand what matters so much to us. I think we're very good at not showing that they've hurt us. If we did show the hurt, it would hurt them, and we'd hate that, wouldn't we!

green you're so right - I often find myself holding back from saying something about my hurt feelings because they would be so upset to know they had hurt me, albeit unintentionally. Not that it happens that often, mind!

when

I think really that as parents all our attention is on our children - and that is true for our children when they in turn become parents - and their Mum and Dad take second place. As a parent you would die for your child but I am not sure that would be true of our children dying for their parent it doesn't make evolutionary sense. Sorry it seems a bit garbled but I hope you get my drift!!

Get your drift, whitewave, for sure!

SJP I hope you have the best of birthdays - your son's heart will remember even if his head may not!