Support and friendship for those whose lives have been affected by estrangement.

Yogin thank you. The little birds using my fat ball feeder are sparrows, wren, a starling, a couple of blackbirds (when they can get a look in) blue tits and others. They move so fast and form a sort of queue on nearby branches, taking their turn, one by one.

Whiff yes seeing the positive is a gift I think. This year I had some winter interest shrubs and small trees planted, a Rowan Copper Kettle, a witchhazel Jalena, a mahonia and a weigela.

Seeing the consultant for pre op the week after next.

Sparkly your birds sound nice. I do get a few sparrows, blackbird and robin, not every day though, did get a big flock of starlings the other day, they stayed in the trees, just as well, too many.

Babs hope Mr.B is better now xx

Whiff enjoy all your clubs and activities.

It's now 12 years since I posted my first thread on Gransnet. At the time I'd been estranged from my three daughters and felt I was the only wicked mother in the world. Unfortunately there were a couple of very unsupportive responses here and for weeks I didn't venture back. Now I'm glad I did.

Reading this estrangement thread has at times given me the the support just to carry on and over the years the 'girls' and myself have gradually blended back together, but the cause of the bust up is still a mystery to me, it's the elephant in the room and not talked about.

Something deep has since happened between us and though we now keep in touch fairly regularly, I'm very wary of hurting like that ever again, so in my head I hold a little something back from being totally immersed as a mum and still feel a little bit like the wicked witch.

It's still the deepest pain I've ever felt and it never goes away.

Am going to find this time of year harder this year. Not just because of DH’s ongoing health problems, but because I do actually know now without any shadow of a doubt that if one of us falls desperately ill our eldest daughter will not give a damn. Before this I assumed as much but now we both know it. And what makes this worse is my DH has so many holes in his memory is like Swiss cheese, he sometimes thinks we are still in contact with her.
Tbh would love to fast forward to January and just get on with the move to our bungalow, but of course our other DDs and GCs deserve a good Christmas after the year we have all had.
Members of the family who took my eldest daughters side are now clamouring to change camps. Too late I’m afraid. The damage is done and I will only put my trust in those who have stayed close to us.
Hope everyone is ok and has weathered storm Claudia.
Xxxx

boheminan

It's now 12 years since I posted my first thread on Gransnet. At the time I'd been estranged from my three daughters and felt I was the only wicked mother in the world. Unfortunately there were a couple of very unsupportive responses here and for weeks I didn't venture back. Now I'm glad I did.

Reading this estrangement thread has at times given me the the support just to carry on and over the years the 'girls' and myself have gradually blended back together, but the cause of the bust up is still a mystery to me, it's the elephant in the room and not talked about.

Something deep has since happened between us and though we now keep in touch fairly regularly, I'm very wary of hurting like that ever again, so in my head I hold a little something back from being totally immersed as a mum and still feel a little bit like the wicked witch.

It's still the deepest pain I've ever felt and it never goes away.

Best to let that elephant in the room make a quiet exit from your lives and concentrate on the here and now. When parents say they don’t know what caused such an estrangement others doubt this and think they must be lying to cover up something awful they did. After 12 years we no longer feel the need to justify ourselves, we did our very best as parents who muddled through at times but always put our children first.
You must have done something right for your girls to be back with you, and maybe the reason they are not discussing what caused the bust up is because they are not entirely sure either.
Pain like that never does go away but we accommodate it and move round it to live our lives the best we can.
Holding back a bit is normal, a dog once kicked will automatically recoil from a person’s foot expecting the worst. And nothing wrong with being cautious. But I can assure you that you are not a wicked witch.
Take care
🌹🙏🏾

Please bear with me as I have to say this as I just got myself upset. I know my daughter in law has Instagram and every few months and I knows it nuts I find it and can see any pictures she posts before it comes up to see more sign in to Instagram so then I close it . Just looked and there was a photo of her and my son. What's upset me not just seeing my son but he has grown a beard he has black hair like his dad and with his beard he looks like my husband when he was that age . He's lost weight as well which makes he look exactly like his dad was at 38.

It's not the fact that I am missing my son but him looking like his dad making miss my husband all the more . I am in tears writing his dad was only 9 years older than him when he died .

Oh Whiff that is so upsetting for you.
Unfortunately your son might look like your dear husband but I doubt very much he has inherited his principles or backbone even in the face of a terrible illness.
Or your qualities that have made you the kind of person who cares so much about others and believes in having a duty to care for ageing members of the family despite any differences.
Sending hugs 🤗

Whiff I am so sorry, dint cry, what a shock, do you think you might be better not watching on Instagram, You have a lovely daughter and grandsons that think the world of you. He is the loser, his father would be ashamed of him. I don't know anything my d is doing, I think she is just like her father...Like Babs, I know she doesn't care, never will, be pleased when I no longe live. That is a very bitter person. Luckily Babs you have other daughters that do love and care but it must be so upsetting when your husband doesn't realise at times shes not there.. Mothers are like a shepherd with his flock, always on the look out for that lost sheep.

Nice to read your post boheminan and good to read you reunited with your 3 daughters. How long were you estranged for? may I ask.

Whiff best not to look, I don't xxx

That quote was spot-on [unfortunately for us on here] Allsorts

Babs looking forward to catching up with you over a coffee xx

Yoginimeisje

That quote was spot-on [unfortunately for us on here] Allsorts

Babs looking forward to catching up with you over a coffee xx

Looking forward to it too. ❤️

Morning all, just been reading through all of your posts after a busy week last week. We stayed at our flat and begun sorting out our shop.

Our initial relief at the condition it had been left in was short lived as on closer inspection very little if any basic cleaning had been done for 12.5 years. We should have expected it TBH because it was her D who made such a terrible mess of our flat above, that we had to gut it when she left.

Mr. S. has already worked wonders which involves an awful lot of hole filling and copious amounts of white emulsion. I couldn't do as much as I'd intended because having only recently recovered from tonsillitis, Mr. S. caught a cold and passed it on to me .

Oh Whiff that must have been very upsetting, seeing your ES now looking just like your DH used too. Such a shame that he didn't also inherit his kind and loving nature. I hope you're OK today .

Those cakes looked too good to eat. I hope they tasted as good as they looked, I bet they did.

The glass light shades look much better for a wash. You're doing the right thing getting a cleaner. It's frustrating when you can't do things as well and as often as you'd like, so why not pay someone to do them for you.

Warming up properly before singing is essential and was something that used to irritate me about the choir I was a member of; E never warmed us up properly .

You have been busy; 9.5lb's of tomato chutney, how long did that take?

You're right of course Allsorts, we wont ever forget I just wish that we could. It's hard to believe isn't it that the child you nurtured, loved and cared for doesn't care if we live or die .

It's good to know that you've sorted things with your GP and troublesome relative Sparkly and that things are underway regarding your long standing health problems. My cats used to enjoy watching the birds through the windows and would make funny little noises the closer the birds came.

It's the undeniable realisation that hurts so much Babs , when your worse fears are confirmed which is what's happened for you with Mr. B. being so unwell. Nothing could have prepared you for confirmation that your ED doesn't care.

This has clearly had an affect on those family members who'd 'taken her side' now that there's irrefutable evidence of her treatment of her parents who did nothing to deserve it.

November 16th Yogin. The anniversary of your estrangement, now 13 years . Mr. S.'s birthday (he was 72 yesterday ) and the birthday of our youngest GS who we've never met.

So occasionally, very occasionally there is good news; thank you for sharing yours with us here boheminan. Hopefully as time passes you'll be less aware of 'the elephant in the room' but I suspect you'll never be able to ignore it completely.

I wonder if it's possible for a parent whose been estranged to ever put away that fear of being estranged again especially when as it is for you, you still don't know why it happened in the first place.

You're not a wicked witch. If you were, you wouldn't be able to have any kind of relationship with the D's who gave you the greatest pain you have ever felt, that never goes away.

May your relationship with them go from strength to strength; the very best of luck x.

Sorry to hear about some of your individual dreadful pain about being estranged, I want to send everyone on this thread a warm healing virtual ((( hug ))).

Smileless when cats do the strange eck eck sound, I’ve heard they are imitating some of the birds sounds, to try and tempt the birds nearer. Doesn’t work through glass thank goodness.

I’m sorry those people did that to your shop, dirty things.

It's good to know that you've sorted things with your GP and troublesome relative Sparkly and that things are underway regarding your long standing health problems. - thank you Smileless for saying that.

Christmas is a dark time for us being estranged. I find I get through it by being kind to myself, eating what I want, watching what I want.

But the pain is always there.

Have a peaceful week, estranged friends….

Ps photo of Cally. She’s usually shy. 3 years 2 months old.

Whiff that was hard for you and so painful. I understand that temptation to take a look ...but resist if you can; it's not worth the upset it causes you. 💐

I wish i had a magic wand to whisk away the hurt from us estranged parents , particularly this time of year.
Whiff im so sorry for your hurt , sending big hugs🤗
So much unnecessary sorrow, take care all x

yoginimeisje My daughters and I were estranged for around 12 years.

@Smileless, sounds like lots of hard work last week, am sure the sterling efforts of Mr S with a paint brush saved the day, hope you managed to rest a bit though sounds like you have had a beast of a virus.
Thanks for kind words. ❤️
@Sparkly, love Cally, hope you are managing your health issues well, keep us updated. And you and Bridie22 are right about estrangement being hard at this time of year when family ties are top of the bill and emotions run close to the surface. Would love to hibernate until spring.
Am presently decluttering and packing ready for the move, plenty of time yet but with DH unable to help much is mostly down to me and DDs and SiLs but they work and have small children so is hard going.
They say moving house is one of the most stressful things people can go through, but after the kind of year with we have had I would argue otherwise.
Take care everyone.
🙏🏾🌹

I wish I could too Bridie. I've got a Prof. Dumbledore wand I bought a few years ago in Florida but it doesn't work .

So I've been thinking about how much this thread has helped me; how we have and continue to help one another and how many we've helped over the years on this thread and others where people open up about their estrangements and in the absence of that magic wand, I think we do pretty well.

You're amazing Babs x

Thanks for that Smileless 🌹
And a big thanks to Yogi for treating me to coffee and cake and to Joey for just being super cute 😁

but of course our other DDs and GCs deserve a good Christmas after the year we have all had

You deserve a break, a rest, some nice food and so on too.

We all do, we are all of value.

Thanks Stripey 🌹

Morning all, cold one today!

Happy birthday to Mr.S & your youngest GS; bittersweet!
I came back from Africa to buy a property here in UK, we had an agency manging it, who assured us they would vet the renters. On our return, years later, we found out they had rented it out to 3 young guys that worked in the local Pizza hut, they showered in a way that almost brought the ceiling underneath in the kitchen down! . You're giving Whiff a run for her money with your long posts S .

}}}Hugs{{{ back to you Sparkly Your cat has a look on her face to say; don't mess with me!

Thanks for reply Boheminan Long time estranged then. xx