Support for all who are living with estrangement (2)

OOooooh nooooo. I posted my situation on a thread I set up and was hung, drawn and quartered. Very judgemental, angry people

serenitysarif you want to talk about estrangement on this thread, you wont be "hung, drawn and quartered" here I can assure you.

The regular posters here are kind, considerate and understanding. I'm sorry that you've had a negative response previously.

Yes crazy that was me, who saw our ES walking past our house with the GC we're not allowed any contact with. Using children as weapons is unbelievably cruel to them, and those they are being used against.

Jammy thanks for updating us. I'm sorry that you've found that nothing has changed with your mum but if this helps you to have closure at least that's something. It seems from your previous posts that you've done all that you can.

It was the nastiness from our ES that eventually enabled me to find the closure I so desperately needed. There's only so much one can take whether the abuse comes from a parent or an AC.

Our ES isn't a narcissist but his wife clearly is. Her influence on him is such that there is no way for us to get through to him and I read some time ago about narcissists that the only way to win the game is to stop playing.

Smileless2012 your post about your sons wife being a narcissist made me stop and think what has happened with our son, I believe his wife is one too, and until our son wakes up and realises exactly what she is I feel there is no way he is going to start communication with his family again. Until he met her a couple of years ago he was a completely different person, when I think back on some of the things that have happened I wonder why I was so stupid not to see it, all she ever wanted was him to herself and her children, we were never intended to be in her life long term, and sadly she now has got her way. I miss my son terribly but I am learning to live with it, but it’s hard some days.

Bopeepour son was completely different too. It's frightening how much someone can change because of another's influence.

We still, nearly 6 years later berate ourselves for not seeing what was happening right under our noses. The thing is, you love them so much and have such a wonderful relationship with them that you simply can't envisage that ever changing.

All days are hard aren't they, but some as you say are harder than others. Strange isn't it how these women cut out the people who brought their husband's into being, loved and raised them to be the very men they fell in love with and wanted to father their own children, then turn them into someone so far removed from the person they used to be, that their parents barely recognise them any more.

Bopeep
"all she ever wanted......"
same as my d.i.l. ...in my case, I will add .....herself, children and her parents. When she married my son, she had a 5 year plan...to get me out of their lives. It has worked.

The reality is that many EAC don't WANT to be chased or contacted. They view this as *harassment*.

This constant and perpetual accusation of harassment of absent AC, by their bereft families, really, really angers me. How easy it is for an outsider to sit in judgement, without knowing the details of what has gone on within a family, that has led to the estrangement.

If adults ask not to be contacted, that's their right. No one has the right to continue with unwanted contact. The law calls that harassment.

Family does not get a free ride. Yes, I get that estrangement is painful. We are estranged from my sister. But you do not have the right to constantly hound people via phone, in person, or by mail if they have asked not to be contacted.

This is assuming that they have asked not to be contacted. If there has been no such request I think it's reasonable to attempt a contact just to ask if everything is okay. But that's once or twice, not 15 times and getting a private investigator or showing up at a child's school or an adult's job.

I think it's reasonable for an EP to send their EAC a birthday card and a card at Christmas and the occasional loving message, if that's what they want to do. That is not IMO constantly hounding them. It's a way of reinforcing the fact that despite what they've done, you love them.

Not for me, almost 6 years now. Our ES doesn't want us in his life so we're not. We do send birthday and Christmas cards to our GC because for us, he doesn't have the right to deny his children their loving GP's, GGP's and large and loving extended family.

I agree agnurse that turning up at a GC's school or an EAC's place of work is unacceptable. If the GC knows their GP's and would recognise them, this could cause them a great deal of upset and confusion but if the GC has never met their GP and wouldn't know who that person standing near the schoool gate, hoping to catch a glimpse of their GC is, no harm is being done to the child.

You say you "get that estrangement is painful (you) are estranged from (your) sister". All estrangement is painful but I don't believe that the pain of estrangement from a sibling is the same as the pain of having your own child telling you they want nothing more to do with you and that you'll never be allowed to see your GC.

Harassment is against the law and now emotional abuse is also a criminal offence. There are many EAC guilty of the latter.

But you do not have the right to constantly hound people via phone, in person, or by mail
if they have asked not to be contacted.

Agnurse, you assume that you know too much. You know nothing.

I repeat my earlier post for you How easy it is for an outsider to sit in judgement, without knowing the details of what has gone on. You've proven my point precisely.

I think a simple Birthday/Christmas card or the odd message is absolutely fine. If the AC is in (maybe) an abusive relationship, it keeps the door open and there's a line of communication if they need it.

Unfortunately there are people who do things that are verging on harassment, i've never witnessed this just read about it.

My MIL did go abit OTT at the start which was a real eye opener. She put so much effort into slating us, airing on social media, getting relatives to message us...
If she had put the same amount of effort into seeing her grandchildren and being an actual grandparent and mother it wouldn't of got to this.

I have just emailed my very recently ES....told him I loved him, told him I'd like to see the kids and told him if he still doesn't want contact, that's fine. I apologised for any thing I said or did that might have caused the rift. Can't do any more.
I will concentrate now on doing things for myself, and for the other grandchildren who are in my life.
Feel better for having sent that email....I should have said but forgot to, that if he has nothing nice to say then I didn't want a reply .

People are indeed so quick to judge.
Sending a birthday card/Christmas card is not harassment, it is very possible that the grandchildren are waiting and looking for cards from their grandparents. This is all about the children and their right to a loving, caring relationship with grandparents, unless there is a PROVEN reason why not.

I have and am trying very hard not to harass my son. However the comment was made by them (he and his wife) that because I hadn't asked to see my my GC "I couldn't have been that bothered". You can't win no matter what you do. The decision has been made to cut you out, end of story. Like Smileless we have recently moved away from the situation as it was heartbreaking. That's what it is, heartbreaking and soul destroying to not be wanted by your own child. For him not to want you in his child's life. I am so sorry to read the posts on here of those who are in similar situations. Certainly I would never have encouraged my husband to do such a thing to his parents. We didn't always agree with them but we respected them. As Smileless states we brought these men into the world, I don't expect that to count for anything but it does seem ironic.

*People are indeed so quick to judge.
Sending a birthday card/Christmas card is not harassment*

Yes it is if you have been asks to cease contact.

Its a fact not an opinion. If you are told to stop contacting an adult and you keep contacting them, that qualifies as harassment.

And having been told that your post/contact is not enjoyed by the recipient, then sending it on special occasions is particularly unkind and selfish.

Sending a card to an EAC on special occasions isn't IMO "particularly unkind and selfish". An envelope doesn't have to be opened, it can be put straight into the bin as I''m sure our cards to our GC are.

What is unkind and selfish is the cutting out of kind, loving and decent parents which means they are also cut out of their GC's lives.

So basically notanan2, our grandchildren are to think we don't care, if as far as they can see, we make no effort to remember their birthdays or at xmas! We, in the main are intelligent enough to know that harassment won't help. It's not acceptable to harass people, agreed. But is it acceptable to be cut of entirely from the people we love, I don't think so.

I was replying to posts about cards to ACs who asked for no contact.

If you have been told that they dont want to hear from you, and you continue to send post to their homes, you are deliberately doing something that you have been told they dislike on their birthdays & Christmas of all days to do something to a person which they say they don't like!

Not only IS that harassment (its pretty straight forward)
It is also nasty. Bad enough to keep doing it, but to do it on special occasions is deliberately causing upset/distress on special occasions.

If someone asks you not to contact them and you still do you are harassing them.

If you don't want to hear from someone day to day, then you especially won't want to hear from them on special ocassions!

Why are you deliberately casting a dark cloud on your ACs special ocassions?

cba

Well, I found out today that the dm I went nc with has done something unforgivable a while back, secretly, that has only just come to my attention now. That has utterly done it for me. Bridges totally burnt. I'm never looking back now and I don't want to/expect to hear about her death and I won't be going to the funeral. I'm finished with my birth family. I don't ever want to hear about them again.

I'm here on this estranged support thread to receive and give support, nothing else. I hope in some small way I can make people feel a tiny bit better, or at least that they are not alone. I know the support and understanding I have received on here, in such an unexpected and sad situation, has really helped.

Jammytoast,
You may find that you get more support elsewhere.
Despite the thread title, this group does not support ALL going through estrangement, especially not adult children who have had to become estranged from a birth parent. It is a group for parents of adult children who apparently had no role whatsoever in their adult children having to come to the heartbreaking realisation that no family is sometimes better than a family that makes you feel like sh*t.

Think of it like a divorce support thread... except only for people who weren't the ones who made the final decision to end it. With the latter being considered responsible for the whole relationship breakdown by the default of being the ones who ultimately called it a day.

Hope you get the support you need. Try the main boards x

Feel better now notanan2?

I will do if Jammytoast finds somewhere more supportive to post Chewbacca. (Which is pretty much anywhere else for someone going through estrangement as an AC)