Son disowned me

I am so sorry you are going through this. It is extremely difficult when your adult children turn their back on you. It is even harder when they use their children as a weapon. I have been there.
I have no perfect answers. I have put all in the Lord’s hands and trust Him to take care of the situation.
Please know that I can empathize with you. I am praying for you and your family.

Jools1825 - so sad. All that I can say is, be patient. I have also had relationship problems with my middle son. I was heartbroken at the time. Although I was allowed to see the children, it was hard. Some awful things were said. Like you, I am divorced and so it was harder still. Things are better now, but there are some nights, I think of all that happened. The nights are so long sometimes. But trust me, it will get better. Getting older has one advantage. Memories, good and bad fade and the hurt eases with time. Best wishes

It is so awful to be estranged. So heartbreaking.

May I ask. If your son did not want his wife to know that his dad had paid, How did his wife find out. Did you tell her and did he feel betrayed. I'm sorry if it hurts that I ask this, I'm trying to understand.
My heart aches for you.

Your son is terrified that you will drop him in it with his wife. If you can, have a discreet word and assure him that your lips are sealed - yes he is in the wrong but think about the end result you desire which I think will be to have more access to your grandchildren. When you do see your grandchildren be fun and light hearted and don’t let them see how sad you are. Things don’t stay the same and they may well ask to see more of you when they get older. Maybe buy some small family type presents or take a cake (if you can afford it) - even if they don’t let you in. Perhaps you could give them all a chocolate advent calendar - son and wife as well. I feel your pain - my son has split from his wife, lost his job and is now an alcoholic. I’m now on a four hour trip by public transport to take him a chocolate advent calendar anything to keep the lines of communication open I really hope your situation improves. People do soften up as years go by. My husband didn’t speak to his mother for over a year because of a minor (in my opinion) issue. I worked on him and he eventually came round. He bears a grudge (he’s not speaking to my son at the moment) whereas my philosophy is ‘least said soonest mended’. It’s particularly hard at this time of year when we’re surrounded by seemingly perfect, or at least ‘normal’ families. Kids eh? We never stop worrying about them and they never lose the capacity to hurt us.

I am so very sorry that you are experiencing this Jools. It's a terrible thing to be rejected by your own child and as a result have no, or very little contact with your GC.

Maybe as Coolgran has suggested, your son feels betrayed but he needs to take a good look at himself and see that this is in part because of his own lie.

He lied to his wife by telling her, or allowing her to believe he had purchased the car when in fact, due to be being in debt which he was keeping from his wife, the car was paid for by his father.

As crazy says, the passage of time does help to take the edge off the pain but it never goes away. Christmas Eve will mark the 10th anniversary of our estrangement from our youngest son and only GC, and for all of us who are estranged, Christmas is by far the hardest time of the year.

Even the very limited time you get to spend with your GC is an opportunity to make memories and remain an active part of their lives, which may well make it possible for you to see more of them when they're old enough to make decisions for themselves .

I ask myself how your son sees this, how he justifies his actions, who he can talk to about it. You don't say what your relationship with him was like before.
I can recommend 'Fault Lines' by Karl Pillemer but advice is difficult. What worked for me was keeping communications open, accepting the situation for what it is, and doing my bit, where I can, to make it ok for my grandchild. I wish you the strength to find a way through this. You will always be his mother, and he knows that.

I'm wondering how he justifies his actions. He lied to his wife by telling her or allowing her to believe he'd paid for the car and was also keeping her in ignorance of the fact that at the time he was in debt.

Yes, I wonder how he justifies those actions to himself. My guess would be that he feels guilty and wants to avoid facing up to the consequences. Just a guess, perhaps totally wrong.

It is a horrible situation to be in but there is some positives here but let's deal with the negatives first.
Your son is obviously a coward and lacks the confidence in his relationship to tell the truth to his wife. That is an unhappy place to be for him and I suspect one day that things will crumble. On the upside, your son may need you should that happen and you may be able to resolve differences then.
The positive is that you do still get to see your grandchildren albeit rarely. That gives you a chance to have a relationship with him which may grow as the children get older. Don't be tempted to tell them why you see them less often, just enjoy the time you do get. So many grans on here don't get any contact and that really is awful.
Not calling you Mum is upsetting but as long as you have some contact, there is hope.

Were you there when the money was lent?

Maybe things did not happen as you believe?

Either way, as much as I don't agree with lying, I would not ever think it my place to tell the truth to my sons wife, I would think it his.

A good response icanhandthemback and as you say there are some positives so don't lose hope Jools and enjoy the time that you do get to spend with your GC.

Thank you, Smileless2012.

Thank you all for your advice and comments.

I said he hadn’t paid for a car he bought from a family friend

It really wasn't a good idea to tell his wife about this. It seems that the whole alienation stems from that conversation , and even though some years have passed, his anger has remained. It is never a good thing to say negative things about your adult children to their partners .

As others have said, enjoy the time you have with the grandchildren . That is all you can do at the moment. Time may heal your son't anger - I hope so anyway.

I agree stella best to keep any negative things about your AC to yourself. TBH, if I were the OP's d.i.l. I'd be furious that my husband had lied to me; more angry with him than my m.i.l.