Estranging all family

Imaround
I admire that you have the strength and kindness to reconnect with your mother, because I know that whatever the circumstances there is no going back for me,
There has been no direct contact between us for more than twenty years, she is nothing to me.

I was estranged from my mom. Then she got sick and my dad died this spring. I am helping take care of her. I made that decision. She is in no condition to be abusive any longer honestly and I am now strong enough to not allow it. I know I have mentioned in the past that I spent time trying to understand why she is the way she is. It doesn't make it better, but it helps.

I have no contact with my MIL but I am not no contact with her if that makes sense. We live in different states. My husband talks to her. Her choice, she has only seen our kids twice in 18 years. She just can't be bothered. When we used to visit she would make other plans and leave us to do other things. We stopped visiting. It broke my husband's heart and I dislike her for that.

SeaNan, I know you are not asking for advice, but here goes, you have said you love your mom, but maybe at 81 you might not have long to reconnect, by doing so you will be helping your daughter also you can control your visits, if she shouts just say, well I'm off now, I will be back soon, this shouting makes my head aches, she will eventually get the message, you are in control. You're not a door mat, she treats you properly or not at all. You need to open that door for you slammed. Believe me, there's few things worse than losing your mom.

Amber, I haven't any time for the very vocal Woke brigade I'm afraid. I treat everyone as equal, whatever race or gender, it's the person I see and that matters. I don't feel the need to make it a cause because most people are accepting of differences, it was just that it took time, remember not so long ago homosexuality was a criminal act, we are far from that now, my grandchildren don't see barriers, that's not just because of how I have passed my views on, they made their isn't mind up with there peers, they are the ones that set the pace, it doesn't have to be marches and demos. I don't judge people that hold different views as long as they dont preach to me, I'm old enough to know what I think. Everyone has a right to know their own mind and thoughts and the louder you shout the less you are heard.

Allsorts Honestly, I have no idea! These days the youngsters would call him woke, but basically he’s just a a socialist who firmly believes in equality and the importance of diversity and inclusion. I think he was probably a bit of an outsider in his family which is why he’s such a strong LGBTQ+ ally - he often jokes about coming out as a Guardian reader!

I too have stopped contact with my mum. She's 81 now. The thing is though I never thought of the impact tit would have on my daughter, who has to travel 3 hours to see her if she needs anything. I really wished I'd have just turned the other cheek and put on a second, very thick skin. Ten years on now... Fact is I don't hate her. I've a lot of resoectforher bringing me up and love her as my mum. But the yelling and name calling, even though I might have deserved it, just got too much over time....

Sorry, I am struggling to see how that is just Allsorts

She didn't care that I suffered, it was deliberate. So how does that impact the abuser negatively?

Yes Violet I do think coercive or violent people suffer, not always them directly but their children will.
Nexus your sister beating up her own mother, no wonder you don’t have anything to do with her, I wouldn’t be surprised if your mother could forgive her though, if she knew she was truly sorry.
Smileless, one day your son will really see his wife, your dil, he will not like what he sees. She has a history of estrangement, she doesn’t care if her children don’t have their grandparents as long as she has her own way, isn’t that tge behaviour if a Narcissist?
Amber, it’s a wonder your father has turned out different to the whole of his whole family. I suppose any family can have a good sheep as well as a bad one.

That sort of thing is a deal breaker for me too Amber. Thankfully it's just the one uncle and the deceased grandparents like that on my Dads side.

I think they could be loving and giving in other ways but I really couldn't accept bigotry around me or my children. Too damaging and harmful.

Although I don't know if you can be bigoted and loving and giving because it would mean causing some sort of issue by immediately placing a shadow over future generations ability to love and live as they wish.

I wouldn’t say I was estranged, but I’m not in any contact with my father’s side of the family - so uncles, aunts, cousins. He and I are very close, but the rest I don’t have anything in common with and we’re so at odds politically that otherwise it would just be constant arguments. It’s hard for him because I’m very close with my mother’s side, but that’s because we’re similar people with similar interests and I know that I can spend time with them without anyone making racist/homophobic/transphobic etc comments. If both sides were the same then I probably wouldn’t speak to them either.

You can say that again .

Oh no, you definitely wouldn’t have seen that coming.

He didn't tell me anything I didn't already know Sara. I was good friends with his m.i.l. before he met their D, in fact it was because of our friendship that they were introduced by her parents .

You couldn't make it up could you; no wonder we still can't believe it.

Smileless
Maybe one day he’ll be in touch, realising that he’s made a terrible error of judgment

But it’s not easy to backtrack, especially if his partner is against you

Perhaps he feels he confided more than he should have done regarding the other grandparents, and feels foolish now that he has allowed them into his childrens lives.

As you know Allsorts, our ES's wife has a history of an on/of relationship with her own parents which is why only myself and Mr. S. were at their wedding, and they married abroad.

Her childhood was not a positive one, which is an understatement and yet, as far as we know they remain a part of their lives and are the only GP's our GC know.

I remember our ES, before they married saying if they had children he wouldn't want them to have anything to do with the children. I told him he was wrong, that they would be GP's and if his wife wanted them to see any children they might have, he couldn't disallow it but could insist the child(ren) weren't left alone with them.

Oh the irony. Me listening, understanding and trying to help him find a way forward if needed and I knew why he was worried, and had every reason to be so and we were the ones who were cut out in the end!!

That's awful nexus I'm so sorry. Don't know what else to say .

Like Sara1954 I've disengaged totally and only think of her when a thread about it comes up on GN. Would I care for her in her hour of need? Wouldn't even cross my mind.

i have not seen my sister in 22 years, she beat up our mother and was never charged, until that time we all had a close bond and saw each other all the time, she has 4 children and they all blamed there grandmother for the family break up, since then she has married and some of the children have had children of there own, i can never forgive her but i think my mother could and that is fine, i have another 3 siblings and she cut all them off, since this happened we lost members of the family and although she new about them she never came to any of the funerals. my mother is in her 80s and when she dies i will not even bother to tell her, there would be no point.

Violetsky
You are a better person than me, I couldn’t do it, just couldn’t.

Do you really think abusive people eventually suffer * Allsorts*?

I haven't seen any evidence so far...

The only thing I wonder is, if my mother will eventually end up old and alone with no one to look after her because in that situation, I think I would have to step in and help.

Sorry, off topic

The original post was falling out with all family, both sides husbands and wife’s. Not just your mother. From what I gather a lot of estranged adult children estrange because they just don’t like their parents, some estrange because of emotional or physical cruelty, totally understandable. Yet there are countless people who forgive their parents everything, they say well she’s my mom, I love her but don’t like her, also people with no thought but for themselves, yet not everyone can be wrong, just them right. I think it more likely you don’t like the way they live and want to be different, either they are too posh or to rough, I don’t know, you want to distance from the way they live, before certain people start shouting about their abuse I am not on about that, I have said many times abuse is wrong, no excuses. I also know for a fact that it comes back on them, but that’s no consolation because as parents we don’t want that for them whatever they have done to us.
I have made friends on here with some lovely people, now living without any contact from their beloved child and gc, and I am so pleased for them making really fulfilling and happy lives without their offspring. They really deserve it, one day their children will realise just what they have lost.

I know Smileless but so many different situations here

"You are no longer a part of mine and ....... lives and are to stay away" if you can put that in a hand written note and force it through your parents letter box on Christmas Eve, together with the gift your parents bought for their GC's first Christmas, how can that by anything other than cruel?

I'm not saying that in all cases cruelty is intentional but I can't see any other explanation in ours.

No Chewbacca, Smileless didn't inspire my thoughts, we are just having a conversation (I hope). I am just interested in why anyone doesn't give reasons for ending a relationship and whether that is intentional cruelty.

As I have already said, that could be that they don't feel their reasons will be heard and it seems to be established that is a hard thing to hear for any parent.

Or another thought is, when I gave reasons with hope that the relationship could be fixed, they simply didn't want to attempt to fix it, they just don't have a connection to the other person and that can be simple opinions, lifestyle choices etc.

Or maybe, it could be that they have decided they don't want the relationship and they feel giving reasons would in itself be cruel when no chance will be given to rectify those reasons.... and maybe that would hurt just as much for the recipient knowing the problems with no chance of fixing them.

So I just think there are other possibilities than it being intentional cruelty.

For some reconciliation is off the table but for those where it isn't, that might be something to be open minded about...

That's all

Are you saying that Smileless2012 is responsible, or in some way to blame for her situation VioletSky?

Well I can only talk about that from the perspective of my own relationships with my boys. Of course it isn't always easy to listen, for parents or their children especially depending on what's being discussed, but we did and still do with our DS.

But there has to be something to listen too doesn't there, and for 27 years there was never a communication issue with our son, especially between him and me.

We are talking about adult children, not petulant school children or stroppy teenagers; adults who as we all must do, need to learn how to negotiate relationships in their adult lives both personally and professionally.