When I was growing up my parents never told me or my siblings when someone in the wider family, usually grandparents or aunts and uncles were seriously ill or dying.
We would only find out maybe a few days before they died, or not at all. Even when we were adults, I remember my mother not telling me my grandmother had died until she actually died though I suspect my mother knew for sometime before that the inevitable was coming (I was 25 at the time, my oldest sibling was 33)
My mother always said she wouldn’t worry any of us with bad news until it was absolutely vital we knew because what was the point. Even if we found out some bad news she would down play it, to the point that the week before she died I visited her and asked if anything was wrong as she looked awful, she said ‘oh just a bit of tummy trouble’ ( yes I did get her straight to hospital but sadly she was too far gone and passed a week later)
Conversely in my DH family, everyone knows everything about everyone.
My mother’s attitude has instilled the same thing in me.I.e. Don’t tell anyone that doesn’t need to know until they need to know. Whereas DH tells his kids everything I.e. he was recently recalled after the poop test (for bowel cancer detection) for a colonoscopy. Yes we worried but he insisted on telling all his siblings and children despite the fact he hadn’t yet had the colonoscopy (it came back all clear by the way)
I’m not saying either of us is right, we do what we do. Just wondering how others deal with serious/sensitive situations with the wider family.
I’ve just finished a jacket for my grandson
