Whereas I can talk about enstrangements with AC - my much older brother was absent from my life for eleven years. He had always carried large chips on his shoulders mainly to do with out Dad, and shortly after our Mother died, he stole (not for the first time) some money from our Dad and disappeared.
Eleven years later, long after our Dad had died, he rang me out of the blue. It appeared that his partner (he had deserted his wife and three children much earlier), had died after a long illness, which he had nursed her through, and he was now turned 70 years old, and feeling lonely.
He came back into my life, treating me as if he had always been around, indeed, rarely got through a day without a 'phone call from him. He treated my own AC as if they were his own, and their children as if they were his loved g.children. (Totally ignoring the fact that he had several g.children he had never seen).
I tried, very hard to get a reconciliation between him and his eldest daughter and son, but they told me that so much had happened in the past, and so many 'reconciliations' that had failed, that they were not willing to put themselves through it again.
For the next five years, he became like an extra AC -(Which I really did not need). When he became ill in hospital, it was my eldest daughter who accompanied him down to Theatre for his op. from which he never recovered.
My eldest son and eldest daughter were the ones who helped me make all the appropriate arrangements.
I informed his two eldest children of his death (his youngest, he had never seen and had been adopted by his ex-wife's second husband). They told me they would not attend his cremation, but I was so delighted that they both did come - although they told me it was for my sake, not his!!!
Whereas, I am glad that I had those last few years to have some good memories of him, I cannot forgive, either his treatment of his own family, nor his treatment of my Dad.
Many, many years go, I had a falling out with my parents, just after the birth of my third child - expecting them to drop everything to help me out. I was wrong - and the estrangement lasted just three months - over that Christmas. My lovely Mum made the first move, and I was so very, very happy she did. From then on we had a wonderful relationship again, but even now - nearly fifty years later - I have dreadful guilt feelings about that missing Christmas with them.
