Support for family members cut out of loved ones lives 4

Morning Girls
No predict-a-text or spell check on my new laptop , that I can find, must be one surely
I agree with you Smileless you have not burged in Greenockgran it's good to have your input, also agree re; not being worried who sees my posts, as it's all the truth and would do them good to see the damage they have done to the people that loved them and their children the most; their mothers and fathers, so sorry you got upset Smileless I too cannot take confrontation of any sort and yes we are damaged souls!

Thank you Wendysue love the typo When this first happened with nasty s.i.l I had panic buttons installed in all rooms and above my bed, as I was getting terrible threats, even about my little dog being killed! This is because Gypsies don't like 'outsiders', the wife yes, but not her family! A strange thing happened to me yesterday; I had just paid for my petrol, no shopping [so no heavy bags to carry] came out, walking a normal pace back to my car, when a car reversed back and then forward very fast into me! I jumped out of the way, if I'd have had a small child or my little dog with me on my right, they would have been killed! I went up to the 'lady' driver and said 'you nearly run me over!', the verbal abuse was unbelievable, her son got out of the car and was the same, the little girl in the back was sort of waving me away [maybe for my good], but I did think they were gypsies and wondered if they were part of my estD husbands family, as it was in their territory, but just 5mins from where I live, so I pass there all the time.
Must dash, work calls...

Hi All- Up early,too early again, and can't sleep. My friend who is a nurse yelled at me to get on some meds because I'm going to give myself a heart attack. I had told her of the anxiety I am having in the middle of the night. Do you think our estranged children are also? Probably not I'm guessing.
How come some people are able to speak their mind to their children and the children still respect them and love them? It puzzles me.
My ESS posted on FB some Buddhist sayings about his calm heart and he has learned to listen to the suffering of others and through understanding that compassion is born. What the heck!! He is so **NOT **compassionate or else he would have not expected us to babysit every week for two years while taking care of his grandparents who were in their 90's. And he wouldn't have made us done all the work picking up and dropping off their son. We never said anything because we wanted to see our grandchild. Add to that my moms three times hospitalization and care all rolled up made for a few years from hell for us. And they are mad because WE only saw the kids eight times in seven months the third year and stopped babysitting as we couldn't handle the eight hour days and having both in laws dying. Yet all those eight times were initiated by us. They both had ten weeks off in the summer and never came by here once. We can only imagine this is why they are mad as we aren't sure. EDIL said her kids deserved a better grandfather. How utterly cruel to be in the family five years and say that. So I wrote her an email back with my husbands help saying how much we did for our parents and how we made sure to bring our children over to their grandparents homes. That it wasn't only one sided. They said they didn't have money for a sitter to go to my MIL's funeral as it was two hours away. I gave them money for that and the next week they posted pictures on FB of their hotel and the food they were eating at their weekend away. We were fools!
So this is what I mean. They can behave and say anything they want yet we could not defend ourselves. So where is this compassion my ESS is talking about?
Sorry for my rant. I am frustrated and angry about everything today and beating myself up thinking we should have not said anything to defend ourselves and there would still be peace. But at what point do we stop letting people walk all over us?

Rhinestone, your ESS and EDIL sound very entitled and demanding - not "compassionate" at all! I don't know exactly what you said when you defended yourselves, but I don't think that's what pushed them away by itself. It seems as if you were already in conflict cuz you wouldn't do everything they wanted. Lecturing them (in the letter) about how you did things years ago and how things should be probably didn't help, but it wasn't the root cause of the problem, IMO.

Do I understand that they used the money you gave them so they could attend MIL's funeral to go to a hotel and take a weekend vacation, instead? And posted about it? How spiteful!

I'm glad you were there for your GS as much as you were for those two years though. He probably has many fond memories of you two and may seek you our on his own, as he gets older, and form his own relationship with you, one much nicer than what you have with his parents. Please take some comfort in that thought. You and DH have had a lot on you plate, in the past, and now deserve to relax a little and enjoy the years to come. (((Hugs!)))

Morning Girls
Rhinestone My ND and I had to be careful what we said and did, and yet his mother & father & sister anything goes! His mother was going around cooing "Oh, our first grandchild, our first grandchild", when Jack was born, in front of my Laila, if we had said anything like that we would have got a rocket up the bum, and his sister posting a pic of Jack saying my lovely nephew, we couldn't have done that either, we would have had to have both children in the pic. Both C are my grandchildren, but Laila is only ours, not his C or his mother's grandchild, but we weren't allowed to mention this, strange!
Morning Wendysue How are you getting on with your situation? Can you refresh my memory please, as I can't remember your story.

Smileless big hugs, sadly damaged is unfortunately what we are, in our case we have damaged our marriage somewhat too we need to rebuild ourselves so very difficult. I couldn't even talk about Tor to Steve without crying.

We are very dubious about our sons partner sadly it seems talk is cheap.

I know Steve loves us and that's main thing butmwemhave grave doubts about her sincerity and both feel she is using Steve to provide roof over head and care for her boys. I pray we are wrong.

My son has kept in touch throughout the entire Christmas period with calls and texts, which has helped a lot. I still don't know why all this is happening, and am even wondering if my daughter-in-law could be suffering from PND. She has never been the warmest person, but this complete cut off is bewildering.

I have told my son that if I have said or done something to offend her, then I am truly sorry. I will leave it now, because I can sense how much pressure he is under, and I don't want to add to it. All the time though my little beauty is growing and I am missing it, and I will never be able to get this time back will I?

Rhinestone - I have to say my dd is the same way in that she expects to be able to say whatever she pleases about everyone else, but gets utterly offended if anything is pointed out to her about her behaviour. It's frustrating as it's so ridiculous. She says horrible things about others, but will not hear anything that remotely resembles criticism of her. If that happens, that person is literally cut out.

While she is sort of talking to me again, all it will likely take is any whiff of not agreeing with her and she will disappear from view again. I do think as someone else mentioned previously that she is jealous of her brothers and the time they take in my life. But she is 29 and they are 9 and 6. Of course they're going to take up more of my time. All those years being the only child and now she is upset. It's odd really, as I have always been willing to make time for her. Always. Her boyfriend is very demanding, however, and expects everyone else to bow down to his superiority, and unfortunately for them, I'm not willing to deal with some of his nonsense.

We'll see how it goes.

Hi Wendy
I can't understand AC/CIL and at times I read SIL as is that sister in law as opposed to son in law and then I have to read the whole thing again and work it out like the Guardian crossword.
So I have decided to spell my relationships out. You are so supportive and kind but you never seem to mention your own relationships. I hope you are OK. X

Imvennoticed that wendysue but think you mentioned you were fortunate in your relationships.

What a horrid lot some of the people are on this forum on alone for Xmas thread,seems like they have such boring lives they have to troll online.

Well I could not understand that. Could you write it again in the morning?

Good morning.

I made mistake of putting our bad experience of Xmas on another thread greenockgran.

Sadly there are some extremely nasty posters on here who get some sort thrill out out of rude posts they are called trolls.

Is that clearer?

Some people love to upset others as they are anonymous.

Celebgran means the "Alone for Christmas" thread. She wasn't alone - she visited her son and his partner. The partner did not come up to her high standards of hospitality. I posted suggesting that she laughed off the trendy coffee-jar mugs, excused the girl her imperfections and let her son decide how much housework he did when his partner was working full time.

No trolling, no insults, no being cruel to her. No boring friendless life that makes me want to be nasty.

I do hope that all of you on this thread enjoyed your Christmas, whether it was filled with busy company or spent quietly at home among your cards and memories.

No anonymity either - if any of you are ever in Edinburgh, send me a PM and we can meet for a coffee - I have never been anonymous on Gransnet, quite a lot of people have met me and seem to want to meet again.

WendySue I meant that we gave ESS and wife money to come to the funeral as it was two hours away. They didn't stay overnight then but the next weekend they went to a hotel overnight and bragged and posted on FB. No I'm sure the email was not the problem but I should know better than to have a conversation over the Internet. I should have done it in person but we were both mad when she told us her boys deserved a better grandfather . The night prior to emailgate we were with my ESS and his family and he ignored his dad all night. So you are correct that there was something already in the works.
Husband walked in the house last night with red eyes. He had been crying. Said he called son and left a voicemail to get together and talk but no response yet. This is his last try. We have called out lawyer and are prepared to change wills and such. Enough is enough. We can only hope the children grow up and get a heart and soul. Honestly how could anyone live with one and be so cruel and mean.
Daughter called with husband problems again. How much more can we take? Enough is enough.
SmilelessI hope you are still enjoying fun in the sun with family. I meant to ask you what your son is going to do about his teaching job now? Wow in the states we have a shortage and states are scrambling for teachers.
HeavenknowsIt sounds like your daughter has had you to herself all these years and now is feeling jealous 9 years later. As far as her boyfriend is concerned playing stupid and cheerful about him is what will help you deal with him. There is a psychiatrist on the radio here that tells everyone to pretend to be stupid about things and cheerful as if you have no clue about what the person is talking about. Makes one look innocent and keeps them out of trouble.

Apologies elegran I guess am feeling very down at moment
And didn't appreciate being called she.

Agree I am a perfectionist and expect other people to reciprocate but if you're unhappy been there you unwound understand we were very cold and miserable.. I realise am on thin ice and any criticism of sons partner will not go down wel.

I wish I could but I can't view his stepsons as our grandchildren I guess at 14 and 16 we find it difficult, known them 4 years and have really tried.

Omg get worse on iPad
I meant you needed to be there to understand,

Also it is not first visit lack effort always much same this time was worst,

I am toying with trying to speak to our son but be difficult

Poor husband got dreadful cold we were so cold while there,

It is not easy, Celebgran when you seem to have nothing in common with your son's choice. You can only assume that she must have good qualities that make him want to be with her, and be as nice as you can to her. You may see the good side of her after a while.

There is a thread where someone says they really don't like their daughter's boyfriend. The replies said that if her daughter saw him against her family, who were not criticising him, she would see the difference for herself once the first attraction had worn off. But if the mother were to set up a "her or me" situation, the daughter would fly to defend him.

It is a minefield. Tread carefully and you will reach the other side without getting blown up!

Sound advice Elegran on this thread and the Alone at Christmas thread.

You can't catch a cold from a cold house Celebgran, it's a virus. Don't use your DH's cold as another reason for criticising.

Hello everyone, it's 10pm here in Oz and there's a nice cool breeze. I can't believe how hot it's been here, I think it was on Monday that Western Aus. was the hottest place in the world; certainly felt like it, we thought we were going to melt.

You must be nearing your trip to Florida Rhinestone, I hope you have a wonderful time. Clearly you and your DH need a good rest and time away from your worries. I know you take them with you but it's surprising how much easier it is when there's a far greater geographical distance between you. Wish DS could live and teach is the USA; it's closer than Oz, well depending on where I suppose. I'm in the process of looking for a huge crate that I can put him in once I've rendered him unconscious so I can bring him home with me. Oh and then there's DDIL and their dogs who I've fallen in love with; oh dear that's going to have to be an enormous crate isn't it.

Good to see that you've posted again Greenockgran I hope you're getting used too the abbreviations we use, took me a while and sometimes I still get, not that it seems to take much these days.

So pleased your DS has kept in touch over Christmas Gaby, that's so important but of course we all understand how awful it is for you not to be able to see your GC.

Wendysue your posts are always so caring and supportive; you're like a breath of fresh air and it's so much appreciated.

Gosh Yogagirl, what an awful experience, of course it could have just been 'one of those things' but it does make you wonder; I hope it was nothing to with your ED's family.

Dear Celeb, maybe you should let sleeping dogs lie for now. I do understand how delicate you're feeling. It's been yet another difficult year for us all and you've had more than your share of health problems. I know how much you were looking forward to Christmas with DS and it's upsetting when things don't go the way we'd hoped.

Tomorrow is New Year's Eve which means that on Friday we can begin a New Year. In case I don't get on here until next year I want to drink a toastto my dear friends on this thread, to all who've contributed over the past year; to wish you all a 'Happy New Year'. I hope 2016 brings us all many good things but I know that whatever it brings, we'll be here for one another.

Katek dh been pharmacist for over 40. Years when your body become chilled immune system cannot resist germs the same. Likewise when under stress.

On brighter note great hear from smileless and some good news fromme nurse explained my knee X-rays and have referral date for 20th Jan not too long. Apparently left knee worst still and one with spur and fluid.
Sadly that day is Tor my estranged daughter birthday,

It is a mine field elegran I guess am not prepared to put up with any rubbish from my son just because our daughter has disowned us if that makes sense. However fine line to tread,

I did an email but have not explaining issues not sent as it has maybe helped get it out of my system.

We have decided no more Xmas visits and if can tactfully maybe stay In b and B but of course not if will cause offence.

I v cold and windy here in frinton enjoy warmth smileless

Yogagirl messaged you on fb hope you're u ok.

Happy new year to you all and I wish peace of mind and good health to us all.

Sorry Yogagirl just read about your scary experience with car,
That was awful,
Hope it wasn't anything sinister doubt it just a dreadful driver,
We just came back from doctor and right of way at rounds out car carried on dh honked and he kinda stopped impatiently waving us to hurry !

Happy New Year to all our sad Grans who are missing their DGC and DC. I truly hope things improve for you all in 2016. It must be so hard reading all the GN posts about family gatherings and pleasurable times with DGC . Be strong - you never know what's round the next corner.

Well Smileless whilst you are enjoying the nice cool breeze, in baking hot Oz we here in ole` Blighty are battening the hatches against storm 'Frank' I'm pleased you are having a good time. I wish you and all your family a very Happy New Year
I'll be back on to give everyone else NY message
Celebgan