Estrangement / Cut off Mum

The first thing to remember is that you are more than good enough person to be a grandmother. I suspect by saying this your SiL was hoping you would beg and weep and ask to please be allowed to see DGS. That way he would have had you under his control as well as your daughter.

By accepting his edict, however, grief-stricken, you have protected yourself and your daughter. Yes, your acceptance may be used as proof you do not care, but your daughter will know deep down that you do, but your distress and pleas cannot be used as a far more powerful way of manipulating her.

How do you cope? I do not know. I will leave that to the respondents who speak from the place you are in.

All I would say is that, hopefully, one day, your DD will break the spell, and return to you with her child and you will be able to welcome her and help her. Strong with the knowledge that having not compromised yourself by leaving yourself open to this man's manipulation you will better be able to help her

I'm so sorry to read about your estrangement b0dhiTree, my heart goes out to you. We have been estranged from our son for over 4 years now. Haven't seen our eldest GC since the age of 8 months, now aged 5, and have never seen our youngest of 14 months.

Sadly, there are many parents in this situation; there's another thread on this forum specifically about this about living with estrangement and moving forward, you may like to take a look.

We too were extremely close to our son and his wife's manipulation has resulted in the same sad result. As Starlady has said, you are not alone and although it's upsetting to know that others suffer as you do there can be some comfort in the knowledge that others too find themselves estranged, through no fault of their own.

You ask how you can cope, not easy to answer because we are all different and so all have different coping mechanisms but for me the first step was not even taking one day at a time, but a couple of hours at a time.

I spent the first year in tears and hardly going out. I'd stay up late listening to sad songs and sobbing and get up late every morning because there seemed little point in getting out of bed. My dear husband Mr. S. cried a lot too but bless him, managed to drag himself up and out every day to go to work.

Now, when I look back at that first year I have absolutely no idea how we came through it with our sanity in tact. It takes time b0dhiTree, you need time to grieve for the daughter you've lost and for the GC you've never known.

As for recovery, I don't know if any of us ever will really recover but what we can do is make the most of what we have, focus on the people we love who love is in return. We hope for the day that we can remember our AC before they left us with a smile, and not just our tears and the terrible pain that living without them brings.

Hi Starlady. It wasn't just the cards we had a 'proper' relationship. we used to visit each other about 3 or 4 times a year. She lives 5 hours away from me. We exchanged gifts and always saw each other over the Christmas period. I am 99% sure sil is abusing her financially. She has developed OCD since she has been with him. I have come to realise I will have to wait. She was a gutsy lady and I hope she finds some of that strength again. I cannot see her leaving him until her son is much older. I have no doubt this man would get his son one way or another. x

You seem to think your new sil is controlling dd in some way and causing all this. Is it possible that dd is being emotionally or physically abused by him? Then you might just have to wait till she gets the courage to leave and be there for her and gs when she does.

You only mention Mother's Day cards as a sign of your former "good relationship" with dd. Were there no Christmas or birthday cards/gifts? No visiting back and forth or going to lunch together, etc? If your relationship was down to MDay cards, perhaps it was deteriorating before she met sil? This is something to think about, also.

Or did something happen just before or after that last MDay card? Maybe a "last straw" thing or whatever?

What sil said was very cruel, but perhaps he's just standing by dd and not vice versa? If you figure out what went wrong, maybe you can begin to resolve it...

OMG, b0dhiTree, I'm so sorry! What a total 180 your dd has done! That must be so painful!

And not to see gs on top of it! One hurt on top of another!

"I cry a lot and feel very lonely and isolated."

You did right to come here. You're NOT isolated. There are many grands here in similar situations. There's a whole thread dedicated to their support, as you'll see if you look around. Keep talking to us.

Counseling might also help. And focusing on other parts of your life - friends, hobbies, work, etc. (((Hugs)))

What a sad situation to be in, b0dhi. Have you entirely given up hope that there will be communication between you and your daughter and grandson in the future (I notice that you're not asking for advice on how to remedy the situation, just to cope with it)?

Personally when I'm coping with difficult situations I ask myself whether I've done all I possibly can to make matters better. If the answer's yes then I mentally file it away under Regrettable Things That Happened. If it's
no I make an effort to put things right. This effort doesn't always result in success, but at least I'm then in a place where I know I did all I could.