To not want contact?

[SilverStripeyTabby]

So NC for this one and bear with me cos this sounds like the plot of a crap novel....

My mum has three children from a previous marriage - he was a highly respected professional man but massive issues with DV, raped her within their marriage, many, many dreadful things happened to her. She met my dad and they fell in love.
His parents (he was still living at home) loved her, but didn't want and didn't have the room for, three children who weren't their grandchildren in their little rented terrace with outside toiler. This being the suburban 1960s, what the neighbours thought was very much a thing. When the divorce came through mum and ex were offered 50/50 custody and mum considered it best and least disruptive for her children to leave them with their father in the family home full time.

So fast forward 60 years, and her first family would like to be be in contact with her. Mum is in her 80s, frail, early stages of dementia, and in sheltered accomodation, and she doesn't think she could cope with the emotional upheaval that it would cause her to resume contact - not to mention the possible disappointment for all parties after so long.

Seems they also want to have contact with me. Obviously we have the same mother but other than that we were brought up in different worlds, different backgrounds, different lifestyles. I'm not curious about them: I've grown up knowing about them but I don't feel that I'm missing a piece of my life. From what I hear of them we have nothing in common more than a shared biology. (That sounds snobby but that's not what I mean - let's say from what mum has been told they would not approve of my lifestyle.)

AIBU to want to leave sleeping dogs lie and to decline contact?

Would it be less of an upheavel for you to now just send them an email with pictures of her life and some tidbits? Doesn't have to take ages and maybe it gives them a little something that they might cherish.

@Isthisfinallyit

I doubt they want a cheery email
About their mother’s happy life without them! I more think they are seeking answers about why she abandoned them...

If your mother still has enough understanding is she afraid that another side to the story might come out, and are you worried that they are after her money?

Interesting that the mum, who has 'early dementia' (diagnosed, or inferred from being forgetful? Early dementia can cover a wide range of possibilities) has nevertheless been able to say she can't cope with seeing her elder children. Lots has been said here about how vulnerable she is but she seems to have enough capacity to protect herself from this. Conveniently.

Completly agree with this.

Those poor kids deserve closure! Who are you to judge them - this is not your story!

Inheritance or not, 60 whole years of no Demintia - she owes her kids to face up to them - they have done no wrong!

The most saddest post I’ve read on here 😢

@GreytExpectations

Interesting that the mum, who has 'early dementia' (diagnosed, or inferred from being forgetful? Early dementia can cover a wide range of possibilities) has nevertheless been able to say she can't cope with seeing her elder children. Lots has been said here about how vulnerable she is but she seems to have enough capacity to protect herself from this. Conveniently.

Completly agree with this.

Me too, so it's too upsetting now for the 'd'M. It was too upsetting 60 years ago when she abandoned them, but the time in between? Too much fun pretending they didn't exist?

Wow, there's a lot of people who want to play happy families here. Well guess what? It's not a fucking soap opera. Look, if you want nothing to do with them, that's fine. Same for your mum, it's okay, whatever you do or don't do.

Something similar happened to a friend when she was 50, just after her father's death.

She was contacted by what turned out to be her mum's first daughter, whom she had had before her marriage and who had been adopted. She had waited until her mum's husband had died, in case he didn't know about her (it turned out that he did), and approached my friend to ask if she would mediate as her mum had refused to see her.

Her mum refused to meet the adopted daughter or to talk about it at all. The woman asked if she could meet my friend instead, and she agonised over it but finally decided she couldn't. I can't imagine what the adopted daughter felt like.

It destroyed what had been a really close relationship between mum and daughter. She had always only had a tiny family - just her, her mum, dad and brother. It was really noticable at her wedding, when one side of the church was full of the groom's family and her side had just her nuclear family and lots of friends. It turned out that she actually had aunts and cousins and had had grandparents, none of whom she had ever known about because her parents had distanced from them in case they told the children about the adopted daughter.

Her mum had also been really judgemental about sex before marriage and illegitimate children, and always taken the moral high ground, which my friend then found unbearable.

From seeing her every day, her mum cut her off, and when she died, left everything to her son ( who kept it, which is another story).

Very sad all round.

Fuck me ... just text back
"We are cold fish with no interest..save yourselves now!"
Best these poor people never meet you

Ok. Firstly, I find that when people say “don’t judge” and “there’s more to the story” (while somehow never elaborating on what the “more” is), it’s usually because they don’t want certain unpleasant truths caked out for what they are.

Secondly - OP, your mother traumatised those children. And with emotional trauma, often there’s a part of a person that never grows beyond it. So while these are fully-grown people, the frightened, abandoned children they were are inwardly still there.

You and your mother are so cold towards these people, it makes me shudder. Yes, your mother may now be too ill and frail to give them the closure they need, but it sounds like you could. You are focused on what’s best for you (the apple didn’t fall far from the tree there) and normally I’d applaud that, but in this situation... no. I really think that putting aside your own comfort for the sake of three abandoned children (which they still are, emotionally at least) would be the decent thing to do.

Finally, you have decided that these people won’t approve of you, based on information your mum’s friend found on social media. Are you kidding me? I mean, wow, you really did some in-depth research there, didn’t you? Would you be happy for people to judge your entire character based on something so flimsy?

Maybe, just maybe, you’re just the teensiest bit smug and, as a PP said, contemptuous of your siblings because you’re the one she loved enough to keep.

Ok, I know I’ve been harsh. I’ve worked with many abandoned kids over the years and the damage it does is off the scale, so this post has riled me more than most.

YANBU
In her 80s, frail with dementia, she should be left in peace

Don't pressure her

With dementia and sheltered accommodation...
even if she'd committed a serious crime 60 years ago, she'd never be brought to trial,
so leave her in peace after something so long ago that was wrong, but not criminal.

I would imagine, given the ages of all involved, they want some answers and closure before she dies. To be abandoned by your mother, regardless of her reasons, is an event that some children may never ever recover from and as adults they may still be very damaged by it
You don't have to love them, or even like them, but civility and human kindness are not bad things to extend in this situation. You need never see them again, but to know a little about your roots and to ask the questions they want answered would not take too much from you

This.

I'm shocked that the OP is so cold. Maybe her mother was the same way. Times were different but to want nothing to do with them at all even now is heartbreaking. A letter to try and fill some gaps would not take much and might go some way towards answering questions that have been in their minds for sixty years.

Any responsibility for contacting them, providing them with closure or otherwise meeting their expectations lies their parents, not you. I can see why that might be more than your mother can handle and even if it wasn't and she was just being selfish, it still isn't your responsibility to step in and make up for her lack. Just as her "first family" children are blameless in this, so are you.

You aren't obliged to put yourself in a situation you will find uncomfortable or unpleasant just because their father was a vile rapist and the court system and culture at the time made it impossible for your mother to see her children without putting herself at risk.

@FourLittleDucklings

Those poor kids deserve closure! Who are you to judge them - this is not your story!

Inheritance or not, 60 whole years of no Demintia - she owes her kids to face up to them - they have done no wrong!

The most saddest post I’ve read on here 😢

The OP wasn't asking what her mother should do.

Did you actually know of the existence of these children before now?

TBH, if I found out that my mother had three children she cared so little about that she walked away from them and left them with an abusive rapist I would get in contact with them and I would never speak to her again.

And I very much doubt her ex was an abusive rapist, more likely she was the abuser and he threw her out. Any father who cut contact with his children is the lowest of the low, I take the same view of a mother who does so.

yes technically you can decide not to have contact with them, but you need to ask yourself how much of an influence your mum has had on your decision. if you knew about them all along then you have probably been fed a line about how hard a life she had before, how much of a victim she was and how she had no choice but to not only leave her children with their father but to actually walk away from them and deny their existence for the next x number of years.

Take what she’s told you out of the equation because most of it is likely bullshit. If you’d found out about them without her input or after she’d died, what would you want to do then?

You need to make your decisions independent of anything she has said. You don’t owe them anything but equally they’re a part of your past whether you want to admit that or not. They’re still your siblings, you can pretend that they aren’t through not getting in contact, but that doesn’t change the facts.

As for the people saying this is harsh on an old lady with dementia, no it isn’t. Dementia doesn’t make someone a less despicable person than they already were. Sometimes bad things happen to bad people....

'And I very much doubt her ex was an abusive rapist, more likely she was the abuser and he threw her out'

The arrogance of strangers really dies know no bounds. Baffling.

*does

Thank god Alternativeperspective was here to explain the character of the OPs mother to her ... Wow

zombie

I am amazed the children have even bothered to ask op's permission to see their own mother, quite frankly if I had been abandoned all those years ago with no explanations or answers, and she left and started a new family without a word. I would not be sitting idly by and waiting for op's permission or their mother's for that matter.

After being abandoned as a child and all the pain they must have endured for the last sixty years, I would prioritise my own recovery from the loss and neglect, and speak to my mother myself in person, regardless of whether she was 'ready' or not for the conversation.

The fact they have so carefully approached you, shows great character and kindness. They sound like thoroughly decent people.

After all, dementia or not, these children are owed at the very least an explanation from your mother. Dementia does not shield you from the brutal truth. Simply being old does not remove your obligation as a human being to do the decent thing. She may not feel like facing up to the suffering she has caused, but as I say her feelings on the matter are entirely secondary to those poor children left behind all those years ago.

I am incredulous that you have been able to forgive your mother. I couldn't. It is a cruel and awful thing to do, and one that must have stained your family for decades.

I am amazed the children have even bothered to ask op's permission to see their own mother, quite frankly if I had been abandoned all those years ago with no explanations or answers, and she left and started a new family without a word. I would not be sitting idly by and waiting for op's permission

The OP hasn't said they asked her permission to see their mother.

@ Pollypocket89 no decent human being walks away from three children and never looks back while starting a new family with someone else.

Bearing in mind we’re not talking about a woman who e.g. felt she had no choice but to give her children up for adoption so they could have a better life. We’re talking about a woman who took care of her own needs while leaving her children with the alleged abuser she herself was escaping from. And never looked back, even to the point she doesn’t want any contact with them ever.

I hope they contest her will at least.

None of us have a clue about their actual lives though. That kind of projection on it is mental. It's a forum so crack on, there's nothing I can do to stop any of it but to read it, it's nuts

They may well want to contest her will, and who could blame them? No amount of money will ever compensate for the lifetime of psychological damage their mother did to them, though. Poor babies. This thread breaks my heart.

Massive amount of projection on this thread. It’s ridiculous and frankly weird. I’m not surprised the Op has stopped responding.

Perhaps these children were conceived as a result of rape, and the mother maybe feels it will do even more damage to them to know this.

In those days there was no such thing as being offered 50/50 contact. In those days it was called custody.

Whatever the reasons for the mother's decisions, that is a separate issue from what the op is asking about. She herself doesn't want to have contact with these siblings, and wants to know if people think that is reasonable.

I guess if your mother has dementia, then if you were to be in contact with her eldest three children, any questions they had would be directed at you instead. Perhaps you feel unable and disinclined to take on the mammoth task of explaining any of this stuff to them on her behalf. Especially as it's not your story to relate and you may not have been given the full picture by your mother.

It's sad for these three children but it's been left too late. One thing which is really odd though, is your mother stating that they would somehow disapprove of you. That sounds to me like some kind of attempt at manipulation of you, possibly to keep you well away from them. Because how on earth could she know?

Of course no one wants their boat rocked, and agreeing to help them would certainly be opening up to that.