There should be a word for it! Last in family

I'm sure there are a lot of us who have no remaining kin and who feel bereft. Friendships and other social relationships are a partial solution but rarely a complete answer for everyone.

henetha

It's strange for those of us who were adopted. My memories are
very mixed up.

Although divorced parents were alive for very many years, I was put in a children’s home at a very young age, later fostered and adopted. Both sets of parents have died.
As henetha says, very mixed up feelings.

The only person who knows my past is my sister and I dread anything happening to her.

kittylester

It's weird, isn't it, the different memories that family members have especially younger ones. My siblings see things so much differently from me.

I posted that in a hurry - I wasn't drunk, honest.

What I was trying to say was that my brothers have an entirely different perception of our parents. Added to which, my mother preferred her sons.

I have a lovely Aunt. She was married to my Mum's brother and they didn't get on. She is too discreet to dish the dirt.

You know I had to look that up in the hope that there was such a word but there isn't really. Sole kin or surviving kin or perhaps to turn the viewpoint around entirely and call yourself the deceased relative! However it sounds quite lonely put like that.
But now that I'm near the top of the tree so to speak along with siblings - it has encouraged me to look into Ancestry. I dip in every now and again and pay for a subscription when I know I'll sit for a while and look at newspaper cuttings and manifests as family were quite well travelled in their time. The winter days are great for this browsing but as @kittylester said other people have different takes on things.

Not sure that was English but hope you know what I mean.

It's weird, isn't it, the different memories that family members have especially younger ones. My siblings see things so much differently from me.

grandmattie - I feel desperately sad for you. I too came to this country about 50 years ago. I live in Wales and have always felt ‘at home’. You say ‘surviving children’, so I am presuming you have lost a child. No wonder you are so sad.

grandMattie I am so sorry that you still feel like a foreigner when you have lived here for 50 years.
Your in-laws must have been horrible people to tell your daughter that they wanted nothing more to do with your family.
I think you should record your memories somehow, including from where you were born.
Surely there is no need to hide them from your child/children. 💐

kittylester

Not quite the same but I am the eldest with 2 younger brothers and know about things and people they have no idea about.

It's an odd feeling.

Yes I'm the same.

The eldest sibling and the only one with any recall of our mother being in hospital and away for some months. It had an effect on me but not them. I had one elderly aunt who I did talk to about that time. She could put dates and a timescale to events. She did help me make sense of things. Now she's gone too and I miss her terribly.

I'm the eldest now it does fell odd.

My sister died before I was born and I was brought up as an only child. My parents had no brothers and sisters either though my father had 2 half brothers I discovered and found I had some very nice cousins both in the UK and in Australia. My DH has a brother and sister which is nice and I enjoy 'sharing' them. We are lucky enough to have 2 grown up children and am delighted to have a lot of grandchildren, so hopefully all will continue satisfactorily when I've gone

I am the sole survivor of my ancestral family apart from two distant second cousins and have no children. My mother died at 104. She mentioned various relatives who died before her and when she was 100 she mentioned one cousin who had just died at 103. By contrast my OH has an extensive family still living.

I am an "Army Brat", as a forces children were, and may be still called, an only child who travelled the world with my long deceased parents, and then once married, with my late husband. My memories are of a world partly forgotten, and there is no one who shares any memories, so I have written them all down, with appropriate photos. What my children do with this once I'm gone is up to them, but it was great fun writing it all down, and I even go back and fill in a few more details when some thing reminds me of happenings.

A country singer (I think Kathy Mattea) had a song 'I'm all that's left of this family of three, who's gonna know but me?' all about that feeling.

I am the eldest, my sister is sixteen years younger but we are very close despite being opposite sides of the M25. We have grown closer since our Mum died seven years ago.

I have two half siblings on my Father’s side, we are not close, I send Christmas and Birthday cards they do not, sure they know when my birthday is, as it’s never acknowledged.

I have a friend who I have know since I was sixteen, she is the only one left who I can share early memories with, and knew my family and my sister since she was born.

I tend not to dwell on being the matriarch but sometimes I still go to ring Mum or Dad when I think of something from years ago.

My mum died just before my sixtieth birthday, she has left a huge hole in my heart and our family.

I am estranged from my sibling, my parents are dead. I can't face returning to where I grew up.No cousins, no female relative.

It's strange for those of us who were adopted. My memories are
very mixed up.

I am the oldest of my family.
I admit I don't really think about it often.
I have 5 adult children, grandchildren and a (precious to me) husband.

My earlier memories are entirely my own.

My parents died over 20 years ago. My sister is still alive but is in a care home. If I visit her on a good day, she remembers much more than I do. It is odd to think that I am the only person who can confirm that what she says about the old days is true.

I have no parents and am estranged from my older sister. All aunts and uncles have died and only have a couple of cousins alive, both younger than me though only have contact with one of them. Thing is my parents died early and I only ever knew one grandparent for a very short time, the rest died before I was born, also we were not a close family anyway.
Do have close friends I grew up with in Lancashire with whom I have a shared history, we live down south now but we still visit each other and speak often.
Am quite happy to call them family. 👍

I dread the loss of the only close blood relation I have because when he dies there will be nobody to remember times gone by with especially our childhood. No siblings but cousin brought up in the same town and have always been close. I am glad to have children to pass on family history photographs etc. to . It must be horrible to think that strangers might dump all these memories .

My parents are dead, but brother and sister plus a paternal Uncle of 91 and an ‘adopted sister’ are still alive. My Uncle, fully with it, chats on the phone, but about what’s happening now and I rarely reminisce with the others, we talk about things that have happened very recently, or plans in the near future.

I am the youngest of nine - parents and siblings have all gone -I am the only one left.🥲

I’m like Farmor15 at the head of the chain now.
However, my friends are like siblings and two refer to me as the sister they never had.

It is what it is - no point in dwelling on the past (too often).

An only child I grew up geographically distant from cousins, the two I saw the most are much younger than me. My close friend of over 70 years has advanced dementia and now remembers nothing of the times we spent with my parents at home and on holiday, she always came with us. My mother died over 30 years ago, my father almost 20 years ago. There is no one who remembers my parents as younger people, how life was, what we did as a family, the struggles and celebrations. At times I find it very difficult indeed.