Interesting watch

'We've been estranged 10 years already and as you've said DiamomdLily, hopefully neither of us will find out any time soon, but can you imagine at a time of grief, when you're at your most vulnerable, seeing the person who estranged you and hasn't been in your life for years?

I wouldn't want anyone to feel they'd need to tell him not to attend my funeral, and I wouldn't tell him I didn't want him at his dad's. I hope that if there's no compassion or understanding, common sense would prevail and he'd stay away"

Smileless - no, I wouldn't want them there, and they'd not be travelling with me, but I wouldn't feel I could try and bar them.

Hopefully, they wouldn't try to attend, but I don't know. I've known too many "estranged" ACs become the weeping, adoring children when the Will is due to be read....🙄

Guess who's in for a shock? 😉

I know it's difficult to imagine but it has come up on this forum and previously estranged children have and still are caring for parents. I don't doubt it happens in reverse too.

So I don't think everyone feels that way

Of course it's always possible, unless as you say you're unable to make decisions for yourself but then there maybe other family members who would know that being cared for by someone who wanted nothing to do with you for years, would not be something you'd want.

I don't know of anyone who would ever want their children to have to care for them. I certainly wouldn't our DS to have too and there's no way I'd accept help from our ES.

I can't imagine anyone would want to have to rely on receiving care from the person who they no longer have a relationship with, because that person estranged them.

I don't know that that is always possible Smileless, I don't know how it works. Would you have to somehow emancipate yourself from your living relatives? What happens if you are unable to make a decision for yourself?

I don't know how it all works. Personally myself I don't ever want my children to be in a position where they have to care for me but I don't know how in a position I will be to make those decisions

That should have read 'how they managed not to revisit their own childhood's onto their children'.

Well no, of course it doesn't give you all the answers VS. As I posted, a starting point would be to ask those who've broken the cycle of abuse, how the managed to revisit their own childhood's onto their children.

An EP would have to want their EAC in their life when frail and alone. I wouldn't want mine if we hadn't already reconciled.

I don't have any problems with my children but I do not feel that gives me all the answers. The answers I do have are based on how people wish to be treated and spoken too and how some personalities are I suppose, too strong in whatever way that they are unwilling to change or admit any fault

While I have moved on from the possibility of a relationship with my mother and do not have hope, I don't feel its impossible for that situation to change.

For instance a circumstance where she is frail and alone, I doubt I would be able to turn my back on her. I would care for her the best I could. The distance and the healing I've achieved we be quite difficult to undo at this point. I'm a stranger to her now. But if she were changed I'm sure that closeness could be achieved again in some fashion.

I do believe that it is never too late to change and heal. I'm a different person than I was 6 months ago and will be different again in 6 months.

Some of that change is natural and some of that change is choice.

If my mother was alone for the first time, with no one to hide her misdeeds from, no one left to lie too, and no one left to impress or seek simpathy and attention from, maybe she could finally face the truth of herself

No you don't Sara. Everyone's situation and experiences are different. Your mum lost her relationship with you but you ensured that she didn't lose her GC too.

We only have two and because of our estrangement don't, and in all likelihood will never know them. We have an email from ES when he said they needed some space, assuring us that they'd never stop us from seeing our GC because they knew how much we loved him. A few months later we were totally cut off.

Funerals are a hard one. I don't want our ES at mine because yes, it would be hypocritical and I feel the same about his dad. I also think it would be very hard on which ever one of us is left behind.

We've been estranged 10 years already and as you've said DiamomdLily, hopefully neither of us will find out any time soon, but can you imagine at a time of grief, when you're at your most vulnerable, seeing the person who estranged you and hasn't been in your life for years?

I wouldn't want anyone to feel they'd need to tell him not to attend my funeral, and I wouldn't tell him I didn't want him at his dad's. I hope that if there's no compassion or understanding, common sense would prevail and he'd stay away.

now I have to go through the whole bereavement, anger and sorrow again that's awful swampy, especially as you'd finally moved on. I do know a couple of people who've reconciled, one after several years of estrangement and I admire their courage for doing so.

I'm pretty certain I wouldn't have the courage or the strength to live with the fear of it happening all over again.

Prevention can only happen if the estrangement hasn't taken place and barriers to reconciliation are many and varied, and very much dependant on individual circumstances.

The biggest barrier for me is fear and a close second is the destruction of trust and I have absolutely no idea how or if those could ever be overcome.

Not all parents who were abused, neglected, controlled and/or shut down revisit that on their children so I suppose a starting point would be to ask those that managed to break the cycle.

Maybe I have too much desire to "fix" things. I know that's a personality trait that kept me in that relationship for far too long

But my mother had an awful childhood she revisited on me. There must be ways to heal that or those of ustranged from abusive, neglectful, controlling or shut down and unloving mothers, would not have found our own better ways

Maybe as mentioned, societies focus on mental health, could prevent some future estrangements.

Blood is not always thicker than water, we aren’t obliged to like our relatives.
I try and feel something for my mother, I try to drag up a bit of compassion, but there’s nothing there.

Sometimes estrangements need to happen for the peoples' peace of mind.
I have had the unfortunate experience of estrangement for years which was resolved temporarily because I was undergoing treatment for cancer. But I always felt uncomfortable around the family concerned because of the previous issues. Now it has happened again and I'm probably more devastated this time because I was needled into making a reaction that for years I had kept under control because the person concerned is a past master at passive aggression and control. I took the bait like a fool because this person will not let things lie and was understandably upset when I said things they didn't like and 'were unaware of'
Life was much easier before and now I have to go through the whole bereavement, anger and sorrow again when I had dealt with it before and reached a point in my mind where I was finally okay with it all.
Estrangement is not a happy state of affairs for anyone but in these days when people keep banging on about MH - it maybe all that keeps some people sane.

DiamondLily
I admire your dignity, and how you have managed to rise above it.
Hope your husband has many more years with you.

What thoughts do people have on how to prevent estrangement or what barriers exist to reconsiliation?

Is this something everyone posting here has considered?

Many people come to these threads looking for advice when newly estranged or when the relationship with a family member is struggling. How can we help them?

Sara1954

But if they wanted to attend the funeral, would you not feel that was the height of hypocrisy?

Probably, but they are still his sons, and funerals are very much about protocol.

And, when someone dies, people do often show hypocrisy.

I'm not sure what they would do - hopefully I won't find out anytime soon.🙂

But if they wanted to attend the funeral, would you not feel that was the height of hypocrisy?

Sara1954

DiamondLily
I feel for you and your husband enormously, but I wonder if people will be talking about me in this way one day, never again means never again, no last minute reconciliations, no going to her funeral (assuming I’ll outlive her, she’s going strong)
But when I see the heartbreak you and Smileless have gone through, I think I maybe deserve it.
It doesn’t change anything for me though.

No, I wouldn't bar them from the funeral. Funerals are about dignity, protocol and calm. If they wanted to reconcile, I wouldn't stand in their way.

But, I'm finished with them, when I no longer have to have them in my life. And, they will be left in no doubt as to why that is.

As I've said, every estrangement is different, and it depends on the background to it.😉

DiamondLily
I feel for you and your husband enormously, but I wonder if people will be talking about me in this way one day, never again means never again, no last minute reconciliations, no going to her funeral (assuming I’ll outlive her, she’s going strong)
But when I see the heartbreak you and Smileless have gone through, I think I maybe deserve it.
It doesn’t change anything for me though.

Anger can be a positive emotion DiamondLily, if it stirs you into action that helps you take back control of your life, it's worked for me.

Being angry at what they've done and how that's made us feel eventually gave me the determination to refuse to spend the rest of my life feeling sorry for myself, and allowing feelings of guilt and failure to drag me down.

Seeing someone you love in pain, physical or emotional is awful isn't it. To continue to behave so appallingly when the person's so ill that it's believed they're unlikely to survive is despicable. How do they sleep at night?

Smileless I sometimes think watching a person we live suffer, is worse than going through it ourselves. You feel so helpless.🙁

Jenny - It can help to write it down, I think. You can write exactly what you're thinking, and it needn't be shown to anyone.

I actually think that moving onto anger from sorrow can also be positive as well though.

I've never had any sort of counselling - but I have got a very trusted friend, to talk to, and we have supported each other over the years.

DH is moving it on at the moment - and it feels that it's helping for him, as he's stopped trying to find out where"he went wrong". He didn't go wrong - they did,

I'll never forgive them for what they've done to him - even, during his last hospital admission, when the hospital were telling me DH was unlikely to survive, they still did it.

One day, I will have my say with them - and they will know exactly` what I think.

When and how that is remains to be seen. I can wait.😗🤐

Putting it in a letter that you don't send is very cathartic Jennyluck and if you still have it, it can be quite upsetting to read it again.

I've done it too and found it really beneficial to see just how far I've come from the emotional wreck who could barely get out of bed, to someone who upped sticks, moved away and with a wonderful husband who was also in the depths of despair, made a new life.

The anger has lessened but still remains. I will I think always be angry because of what he did to us, but mainly because of what he did to his father.

I held that man in my arms as he wept. It broke my heart. We still cry but not as often as we used too.

I'm glad that writing it down helped you.

Smileless2012, I think I could have benefited from counselling. I just needed someone to listen to how it made me feel.
Instead I wrote it all down. I wrote a letter to my son, never sent it, just to say how it all made me feel.
Then last year had a clear out and found the book I wrote it in.
Well, I was shocked a how angry I was. But it helped to write it all down.

Estrangement is so complex with all parties having different
perceptions.

Yes grief counselling for the estranged has been recognised as beneficial for some time.

Men or women can be subject to spousal abuse. With men, they are usually emotionally abused, rather than physically, and with women, I would say it's more of a mix.

I agree.

One thing I will say on my part, my MIL heavily implied I was emotionally abusive and he was 'under the thumb', I was controlling, all that.

Never once mentioned that she started an argument the day I gave birth...then it all went downhill from there.

I'll never know what was going through her head at the time or if she had some sort of personality malfunction because it's a million miles away from the person she is now!

This is why a lot of professionals, if unable to help a person to reconsiliation, now recommend grief counselling