Would you blame the parent with multiple children NC?

What shared characteristic do you think the older generation must hold that they will always be the ones at fault?

They share the characteristic that they were the adults during the period of their children's life that the children were entirely dependent on them. It was up to them to decide how they wanted to treat their children. Their children had no choice but to put up with it.

I once knew a family where the kids had been hugely encouraged by the dad to reject their mum. He was an awful abusive and manipulative person. One of the kids recognised this and ended up going NC with the dad but the other totally stayed on his side and cut contact with both the mum and sibling. It was a very sad situation.

If you asked the adult children they wouldn’t go into detail just say she didn’t respect boundaries, was manipulative, turned nasty when she didn’t get her own way and son would say she wasn’t nice to his wife. The other children would say they aren’t getting involved. So that’s is how much information anyone would get from this.

I'd say that's quite a bit of information. But depending on who you are and what your relationship to all the parties is, it's not really anything to do with you. As a PP said, you can only take people for how they are to you.

I wouldn’t judge her. On one hand she might be an abusive cow. On the other hand, the DCs could have been alienated by her exH and he might be the horrible one.

We have no idea what goes on behind closed doors.

Not to be unkind- but I assume this is the version of the story as told to you by her.

I have a dear widowed friend whose 2 adult DC have gone NC because the Bank of Mum closed . She has DGC she longs to see but not allowed .

Hmmmm. My own mother is/was a toxic emotional abuser. My brother is no contact,I am light contact and my sister keeps her at arm's length. She was an awful, damaging parent and her past behaviour is affecting me more as I get older.

However lots of her friends think she's great. She shows them her carefully curated best side.

People are NC with family for a reason. It’s usually a crap childhood. I’m NC LC with nearly everyone. It’s heartbreaking.

But that doesnt mean your friend is not a good friend. The nc children dont affect you or your friendship.

Myself and my mum are in contact but have a difficult relationship from my point of view. But she had lovely friendships, I’m glad she does as everyone deserves thst. But it’s hard thst she doesn’t want that with me. For example in the past if I went to stay, doesn’t happen anymore, she’d still go out to one of her friendship groups whilst I was there rather than doing something with me. I’m a few hundred miles away so I might only be there 2 days of that year.

just enjoy her friendship.

No I don’t believe that multiple adult children will go to the lengths of never, ever speaking to their parents again for no reason.

No contact means your own children never meeting them. Having birthday parties, weddings, events, christenings, graduations and not telling them. Not reaching out when they’re in hospital, on birthdays, at Christmas.

Going through some of the hardest and also the best times of your life and by default wanting to embrace your parents but not being able to.

I think going no contact is incredibly hard and I imagine most of us find our parents quite tiresome and tedious sometimes but I don’t think we’d go to the lengths of above for no reason, no. I absolutely believe some people move out and get their own lives and can’t be arsed due to what you’ve listed. But not no contact.

The same way I imagine a parent going no contact with their own child must be absolutely excruciating but parents still do it to save themselves from pain. No contact isn’t something that only a child inflicts to a parent. Why are you assuming only younger generations do this?

I would also reserve judgement. I know several people from very different walks of life who went NC with a parent through coercive control from a partner who was abusing them. I think there are a lot of people who have found themselves alienated from family because of a new partner who wants to isolate them and it can take years, even after leaving the abuser, before they realise they were manipulated.

You think that no adult child ever has no further use for a parent once they have their own life filled with new people? That no one ever finds their parents dull, tiresome and inconvenient? That no one of their generation could possibly be over sensitive, argumentative, selfish, looking for an excuse for drama, to play victim or not be bothered?
What shared characteristic do you think the older generation must hold that they will always be the ones at fault? And what unique qualities do younger generations have that make you think they will never be in the wrong?

2 nc and the rest low contact. she is the common denominator.

i'd leave well alone, she's only reaching out because she is ill and wants company. it comes across as manipulative already

I would assume blame on both sides but most likely the Mum. The onus should be on the parent to try and pursue the relationship. However as PP say difficult people or cold people are often victims of their own traumas and don't know how to be loving and supportive. Also MH issues can be genetic so where one person may need to cut off a parent to protect their own MH, another person with stronger MH may be supportive and realise the parent is struggling mentally. It's often complex. I think there would be an serious issue with the mother but it'a debatable as to whether that makes her a bad person.

Without knowing the children's reasons for being NC, it's impossible to answer if the mother is "to blame" or if the children are BU. And it could be neither: both may have perfectly valid reasons for their choices, behaviour etc.

Not everything that happens in families is someone's fault. It's not uncommon for someone not to get on with a parent or child. Families can be very fraught and divided, sometimes.

There will always be exceptions but generally speaking, children will always crave/pursue a good relationship with their parents - to feel loved/accepted/seen etc. So, to decide to go no contact is an incredibly hard decision and heartbreaking for the child on some level. People struggle to understand this from the outside when there’s no terrible event or story that makes NC make sense (eg physical or sexual abuse in childhood). But something like emotional neglect, for example, is death by a thousand cuts - no obvious traumatic event to point to but years of trauma that builds and builds. So when I hear about people going no contact, I tend to believe that they suffered enough for it to be ‘justified’. I don’t necessarily believe it is the solution to the trauma they have experience but I can understand it as a strategy. Especially as most people who go no contact try to create healthy boundaries and work on the relationship for a while before cutting off contact.

YES I would. One going NC could maybe be their kid's issue, all of them- nope.

In my experience, parents who are baffled that their children dont want to talk to them usually do not, or will not, see their abusive, manipulative behaviour as they think there is nothing wrong with it.

It doesn't sound like she nurtured much of a bond with her children tbh. Her ill health now doesn't really have anything to do with it. If an adult child feels that their life is easier and happier without their mum in it, then that speaks volumes really.

I wouldn’t ostracise her or avoid her, but I’d certainly bank it as something to be aware of, and I’d be extra vigilant for manipulative and dysfunctional behaviour.

Agreed.

One of DHs brothers went NC with his parents, and in fact the rest of the family many, many years ago, after his wife fell out with them.

DH and his other sibling continued to have a good relationship with them and I personally feel I couldn't have had better PILs. Always kind and supportive but never interfering or intrusive.

The NC DIL was a very volatile woman who was prone to fly in to a rage if something upset her. I was there once when she blew her stack and was actually quite shocked. No doubt she would have her own version of events and reasons but hard for the rest of us to understand

No friends wouldn't raise eyebrows for me. There's a lot of reasons that can happen that don't mean there's anything wrong with the person.

If multiple children have given the same reason though, it seems more likely there is an actual issue at play though.

To give a little bit more context woman doesn’t really have any friends

Then it's clearly her fault. Two children NC and no friends? There's a pattern here.

She has a few people who check on her due to illness but no deep meaningful friendships. She is very lonely due to this.

Too bad. She sounds difficult.
Having an illness doesn't mean she's entitled to friendship or good family relationships.

She also sounds very good at blaming other people for her own shortcomings.

Why does everyone in the town think that she is a wonderful mother? I assume that the mum is telling them how much she has done for them and how ungrateful they are and they are taking her at her word.

One child, maybe, but two...?

Unfortunately, yes, I know this is the case.

Can be due to external pressure, misunderstanding, mental disorder on the part of the child, many things.