Daughter won't communicate with me at all

Smileless I simply asked a question

Diamondlily I am not the only one who shares their own situations on threads but all my replies to the OP have been about her sad situation which I hope improves

So there shouldn't be any problem really

So you lot are hijacking a thread ..... again....

Coping is all you can do until the light bulb moment comes for her and she regrets being so unkind to her own mother. This moment will come, something will happen in her life, nothing stays the same. Accept that SHE has a problem right now (may be a mental health crisis for all you know) and feel sympathy for her, this will help divert your own feelings of hopelessness at the situation. Send her a card, some flowers to say you're still here for her and be patient. Also be kind to yourself and never feel you are to blame, but think about what triggers her or has done in the past. Understand her like a friend would as this will help you to feel more objective. Warm wishes to you.

Freshair

Coping is all you can do until the light bulb moment comes for her and she regrets being so unkind to her own mother. This moment will come, something will happen in her life, nothing stays the same. Accept that SHE has a problem right now (may be a mental health crisis for all you know) and feel sympathy for her, this will help divert your own feelings of hopelessness at the situation. Send her a card, some flowers to say you're still here for her and be patient. Also be kind to yourself and never feel you are to blame, but think about what triggers her or has done in the past. Understand her like a friend would as this will help you to feel more objective. Warm wishes to you.

This is the sort of comment that often occurs in these situations when we post into an echo chamber. “She’ll
Regret it” “the grandkids will come looking
And be mad they were deprived grandparents “ “clearly they’re the ones with problems “. They make us feel better but they also aren’t always factual. My in laws passed estranged and my dear husband and I’m ever regretted it. He never had a moment and felt bad for how” he’d treated “, instead he felt freed. Very few grandchildren come looking and sometimes we need to try to see where we may have gone wrong.

Op here
Says her daughter
Believes she suffers from mental illness. Examine that. Why do you think
She feels this way? Etc.

Something similar happened to a friend of mine. It turned out, as far as I understand, that the daughter’s husband had persuaded her to cut off all contact with her mother because he thought their relationship was ‘toxic’. With hindsight, he may have been trying to cut any family support his wife might have had as he was planning to leave her. Everything came right in the end, but cutting contact with a parent in this way is very unkind, and if she’s making a point, she should say what it is.

It feels as if any effort you make to reach out is being flung in your face, I’d honestly save myself the heartache and stop trying. She’s withdrawn, so it’s up to her to get back in contact, or to tell you what’s wrong so you can put it right!

EleanorRose has posted that her D's insinuation that she ER, having a mental illness has no basis in reality Grams2five, and some EAC fabricating reasons for cutting contact with their parent(s) has been discussed here.

I don't see this thread as an echo chamber, there have been a variety of opinions and suggestions posted here. Maybe it would be more beneficial if rather than accusing like minded posters of being in an echo chamber, you just accepted that not everyone's points of view are going to be the same as yours.

Your friend's experience is sadly not uncommon PamQS. We firmly believe that this is what resulted in us being estranged from our youngest son and only GC.

Third party influence can be very destructive and result in families being torn apart. It's good that everything came right in the end for your friend and her daughter.

PamQS

Something similar happened to a friend of mine. It turned out, as far as I understand, that the daughter’s husband had persuaded her to cut off all contact with her mother because he thought their relationship was ‘toxic’. With hindsight, he may have been trying to cut any family support his wife might have had as he was planning to leave her. Everything came right in the end, but cutting contact with a parent in this way is very unkind, and if she’s making a point, she should say what it is.

It feels as if any effort you make to reach out is being flung in your face, I’d honestly save myself the heartache and stop trying. She’s withdrawn, so it’s up to her to get back in contact, or to tell you what’s wrong so you can put it right!

I agree with you. Some in-laws can be manipulative and coercive. We read it every day, in various formats, and many of us know people like that. It can destroy families.

The OP would be best to stand back, and lob the ball back into her daughter’s court.

Meanwhile, if the OP just wants support, and nothing else, then the “support thread” will probably be more useful to her.🙂

What evidence do people really have of estranged children "fabricating reasons"?

Most people say they don't know the reasons

What you actually have is 2 perspectives on a relationship... Instead of denying the other their feelings and alienating them, why not meet them in the middle?

She also insinuates that I am mentally ill.

In my very limited experience of any of this sort of thing, maybe she is quietly saying to you that she thinks or knows, that she herself is mentally ill, currently.

If your EAC has fabricated reasons as our ES has done VS, you don't know the reasons do you, and where is the evidence that EP fabricate?

No one whose been estranged or has estranged has evidence they can present on this forum, they can only talk of what they have themselves experienced.

As I posted earlier, if someone is lying and you call them out on their lies, you are not denying their feelings. How can they have feelings about an incident that never happened?

As for alienation in the aforementioned circumstances it's the EP whose alienated by their EAC and you can only meet someone in the middle if they're prepared to meet you there. You can't do it alone.

I have never thought an EP to be fabricating anything, let alone said it Smileless

Why does it have to be such an either or opposition all the time?

But as you know, I said on this very thread that I kept a diary of things that were happening to save my own sanity from abuse and replies to that were that diaries may be fabricated..

So I think it is clear how I would treat another versus the treatment of myself as an estranged child

Even though we have an OP with a daughter who won't communicate and people here who are well placed to advise how to encourage communication and people who have sadly not found that solution...

So again, this is an open forum and my wish to help others doesn't deserve some of the responses I get

Smileless2012

EleanorRose has posted that her D's insinuation that she ER, having a mental illness has no basis in reality Grams2five, and some EAC fabricating reasons for cutting contact with their parent(s) has been discussed here.

I don't see this thread as an echo chamber, there have been a variety of opinions and suggestions posted here. Maybe it would be more beneficial if rather than accusing like minded posters of being in an echo chamber, you just accepted that not everyone's points of view are going to be the same as yours.

Your friend's experience is sadly not uncommon PamQS. We firmly believe that this is what resulted in us being estranged from our youngest son and only GC.

Third party influence can be very destructive and result in families being torn apart. It's good that everything came right in the end for your friend and her daughter.

“She says it has no basis in realty. “

Great but t that doesn’t mean that spending
Some
Time reflecting on what makes
Her daughter feel that she does could point one in the right direction is I’d the hope is to underhand and potentially be able to reconcile. If she doesn’t suffer from mental Illness it
Doesn’t change
The fact that something has occurred that makes her daughter feel
She does -
And at point it’s less important if she really
Does than addressing what’s making her child feel that way and if it can be addressed

When a poster states that they don't know why they've been estranged, and are responded too by another poster saying they don't understand how they can't know, or perhaps they've been told but aren't listening etc., they are being made to feel that what they're saying isn't/can't be true; that they are fabricating.

I don't know why it has to be such an either or opposition all the time but I do know that it doesn't help when a poster is asked if it's only the advice and support from EP's that's valid. It isn't helped when EP's who are responding are told that they're in an echo chamber, simply because their own experiences align with the one whose posting.

Both of these comments have been made on this thread and they were made by posters who have themselves, or whose partner has estranged their parents. Perhaps that is the answer to your question VS.

No one has suggested that the OP doesn't spend time reflecting Grams2five. As I posted earlier, I've yet to come across an EP who hasn't done so. That doesn't mean that all do and it doesn't mean that the OP hasn't done so and concluded that her D's suggestion of mental illness has no basis in reality.

We don't know if something has occurred that makes (the OP's D) feel this is the case. You say the fact that something has occurred that makes her daughter feel as she does, but you have no way of knowing if this is a fact, if her D's estrangement has anything at all to do with the OP's behaviour, nor does anyone else here.

The OP has told us that her D's insinuation regarding her's, the OP's mental health has no basis in reality. So here's a radical idea, why don't we respond to what we have been told has happened by EleanorRose instead of what we think may have happened.

You can't address what may or may not be behind your AC's estrangement of you if they refuse to talk about it with you.

Not sure what any of that has to do with me

If there is an issue with other posters take it up with them

I am not some sort of EAC representative to be ranted at, I am an individual

I'm not ranting at you VS, you asked a question and I suggested an answer and it was you who asked a poster if the only advice/support that was valid came from EP's.

My advice is absolutely based on finding better ways to communicate and making suggestions about potential reasons or issues (not statement of fact)

And as another poster pointed out, it just ruins every thread when people can simply give their individual advice and move on

Granted mine tends to be on the empathic, peace and love, listen and communicate, understand people's feelings side... But who are you to tell me that's not what an OP wants to hear anyway?

And if it isn't what they want to hear by OPs own words, I always leave the thread anyway

Smileless2012

I'm not ranting at you VS, you asked a question and I suggested an answer and it was you who asked a poster if the only advice/support that was valid came from EP's.

I asked them a question yes

I'm not telling you what an OP does or doesn't want to hear VS so please don't accuse me of something I haven't done; it benefits no one.

I am really not sure what the issue is with my comments and things aren't getting any clearer

So I am going off to bed

Smileless2012

When a poster states that they don't know why they've been estranged, and are responded too by another poster saying they don't understand how they can't know, or perhaps they've been told but aren't listening etc., they are being made to feel that what they're saying isn't/can't be true; that they are fabricating.

I don't know why it has to be such an either or opposition all the time but I do know that it doesn't help when a poster is asked if it's only the advice and support from EP's that's valid. It isn't helped when EP's who are responding are told that they're in an echo chamber, simply because their own experiences align with the one whose posting.

Both of these comments have been made on this thread and they were made by posters who have themselves, or whose partner has estranged their parents. Perhaps that is the answer to your question VS.

No one has suggested that the OP doesn't spend time reflecting Grams2five. As I posted earlier, I've yet to come across an EP who hasn't done so. That doesn't mean that all do and it doesn't mean that the OP hasn't done so and concluded that her D's suggestion of mental illness has no basis in reality.

We don't know if something has occurred that makes (the OP's D) feel this is the case. You say the fact that something has occurred that makes her daughter feel as she does, but you have no way of knowing if this is a fact, if her D's estrangement has anything at all to do with the OP's behaviour, nor does anyone else here.

The OP has told us that her D's insinuation regarding her's, the OP's mental health has no basis in reality. So here's a radical idea, why don't we respond to what we have been told has happened by EleanorRose instead of what we think may have happened.

You can't address what may or may not be behind your AC's estrangement of you if they refuse to talk about it with you.

You are still missing the point. What’s occurred is that her daughter feels she is mentally ill. If as er says she is not , has no basis in realty etc that doesn’t change that her daughter thinks she is. The think is what’s occurred. So rather than suggest ER dismiss this as she says ts categoriclaly untrue, one should seek to understand WHY her daughter thinks it. Whether she suffers from mental illness at all isn’t the issue. It’s that her daughter thinks she does. Any hope of reconciliation on ERs part should start there. What has led her to these thoughts. Her thoughts are what’s happened. The feelings exist. So instead of brushing it off as categorically untrue , start there if one is truly looking for answers. Op said she doesn’t know why she’s been cut off , but then says her daughter says she’s mentally ill. Sounds like that’s the reason at least in part why . But rather , than pursue what her daughter is feeling she’s dismissing it as “not true”. The thing with feelings is they aren’t true or untrue.

A large part of treating like it is a situation of sides is that, people come here who don't want to be on one.

There are estranged parents here who, have decided that's how they are comfortable now. They don't feel they are wrong in the situation, they aren't willing to change anything and that is that. That's absolutely fine and a valid choice

Same with estranged children, they want to be estranged

But I don't treat situations like either/or because they aren't. Many people come here wanting to resolve or understand their situation... So that's what I want to help with

First step, other people's feelings ARE real, figure out why they are having them

There’s also the possibility that the daughter could be suffering from a mental illness herself, thereby altering her perceptions of what is what. It happens.

I would imagine the husband of the OP and her other children are the ones best placed to know the answers.

No one on here does, 🤷‍♀️

I would imagine the husband of the OP and her other children are the best ones placed to know the answers and the facts DL.

Not everyone thinks that way

No they don't, but we're not here to tell people what they should or shouldn't think are we.