to feel bad for my kids that we have no family

[BeachDrifting]

We have no close extended family. No family get together. Weddings. Family at my kids birthdays. It’s just the 4 of us all the time. On our own. I see other people’s social media and their celebrations every weekend. My best mate has 20 family members over to her house every weekend. Where did I go wrong? We don’t even have anything close to that and no possibility of it. I feel like I’m living life wrong. How do I get what they’ve got? How do I get that big extended family thing for my kids? It makes me feel incredibly depressed. Every weekend I feel lonely. Can I ask how others with no extended family cope. What do you do to fill the gap?

OP if you feel like your family are toxic and everything then you don't need them. It may seem like everyone else has something you haven't got but all your children ever need is you! You can make your house loud with fun, brightness, board games, card games, jokes, family movies, stories, chats, music. That beats a meet up where you're afraid your children will listen to racist or homophobic crap!!!

You can't magic up a family where they don't exist, or hang out with a toxic family just because you want your social media to look like other people's.

We don't go to big family gatherings. I don't have any siblings, my partner has who lives a long way away. They don't have kids, so my son won't have any cousins. We are close to our parents, but that's it. We have lots of friends, perhaps cultivating friendships would fill the gap you're wanting?

We’re the same. I think it’s a lot more common than people think. In our situation Dh is no contact with his whole family and my only relative died in 2019. Being honest the only thing that bothers me is that we don’t have anyone to have the children in an emergency- and I have disabilities. It’s difficult from that point of view but there are lots of positives too! No worrying about trying to please everyone at Christmas / no trying to visit loads of people all the time / spending whatever we like just on ourselves and not having to budget for presents and stuff for extended family etc. You only have to skim the threads on here to see how much stress people have with their families!

I get it op. I feel like my social media has been full of other peoples extended family gatherings and holidays all summer. My DH is an only child and I have a sibling who we only see 2 or 3 times a year due to distance. It does bother me sometimes.

We have a very small family. DS has 3 grandparents and DH has a sister so one Auntie. No cousins and we only see DH sister once a year or so.
We have lots of friends and they have children, I guess we’ve made our own family.

I understand OP. I was brought up by my DM - my father left home when I was 2, and I’ve never had any contact with his family. I believe he, his mother and 2 brothers are alive but I’ve not seen them since I was a toddler.

My DM is an only child, so I have no cousins, aunts or uncles. Her parents died before I was born, so no grandparents either. And I’m also an only child, so no siblings.

I now I have a lovely DH, and 2 DC (7 and 4). DH is one of four siblings, but they’re a very distant family and never talk. FIL is dead, we haven’t MIL seen for three years even though she only lives an hour away. She is not interested in spending any time with us - we have next to no contact (I got sick of her lack of interest and excuses, so stopped inviting her to things). My own DM is a doting and dedicated grandmother who loves our DC and we see her regularly (despite her living 2 hours away).

Thankfully, we are a very happy and self-contained little unit. We do everything together and the house always feels nicely full. On the plus side, my DC have a huge amount more family than I did but I do feel a bit sad that they don’t have cousins/aunts and uncles in their lives like their friends do, and they only have one grandparent that they see.

We kind of grew up like this. My mum was an only child and my dad's brother and his family (my cousins) lived abroad. I've never met my cousins. My dad and uncle aren't close. My parents moved away from where they grew up when we were kids so we only saw grandparents once a year etc. I never felt like I was missing out TBH.

I was one of four siblings though. So is my DH. We have stayed local to our families. So now my kids do have that, they're close to (some of) their cousins etc. But even I find a lot of my family exhausting TBH and I am reducing how much time I spend with them since covid.

"The thinner the string, the tighter the knot" my grandmother said.

My entire family - three generations - consists of six people and that includes in-laws. You just need to be tighter. Establish traditions for holidays and birthdays. And encourage your children to marry into large families when they grow up, so they will have what you want for them.

@BeachDrifting

Our family members are hours away in different directions. Mine are toxic, racist and homophobic. DH has a broken family background and there is no cohesive unit just separate individuals who don’t like each other.

Your children are probably better off not seeing them then. You made the right choice

@BeachDrifting

It is really hard. My kids have never had a family birthday celebration where cousins visit and family hang around for the day. I feel ashamed. Like I’ve massively let them down. It’s utterly shit.

I’ve got cousins, but they didn’t live close enough to join in birthday celebrations when I was a kid. I still had birthday parties with friends from school. It was fine.

We do have family on both sides so not the same. But my youngest just turned 18 and, like his DSis a couple of years earlier, his Sunday afternoon “family” party in the pub garden was filled with friends of my DH and me, and their families, who have known him all his life. Very much a case of “friends are the family you choose for yourself”.

Nothing special about having a bunch of people foisted on you that you don't like; choose your own friends.

The same here OP, all deceased unfortunately :(
It doesn't help that a lot of things in the UK is structured around the expectation that you have supportive family.
I found moving to a bigger city can help, there's a greater spread of types of people and lots of foreigners, who won't be near their family either. I find neighbourly support and socialisation actually much better than i expected which came as a surprise

We don't have much family around us. My parents live abroad. Most of the DC's dad's family live in another country and his mum who lives close by is not that bothered. The DC see her and their great uncle on 27th December and their grandma the odd other time. I have a brother, sis-in-law and nephew and we meet up when we can but we are 3 hours away from each other so not so often. It's a shame as I also remember meet ups with lots of cousins being great fun!

We are in the same situation but only because we are expats. We have friends who are our family. We do Christmas, Easter, and other celebrations together.

I grew up without any extended family. Just the 4 of us. I had no idea I was missing anything. I loved my family and we were really close. Just thought a different perspective would help. Kids are very accepting and you can make things wonderful for just the four of you.

We don’t live near family and love our local church every week as it’s friendly and we know people of all ages there. They always seem to care about us and vice versa and the children too enjoy the friendly chatting at the end of the service.
I also have such a special family we are close to whose families aren’t near either and we have become like family to each other. Her teenager will confide in me and I feel so honoured she’s like another Dd when she’s otherwise very shy and anxious.

I grew up knowing lots of cousins and having family gatherings. It was more common before social media and mobile phones to keep in touch. My kids don't have it.. either because of fractured families, spread out family or people just not being as bothered.. but they don't know any different and are happy so that's enough for me!

We didn't have much family and once the grandparents had gone, nobody really apart from one or two cousins of mine who are very nice but whom we only see occasionally. I only have one child!

He has loads of friends, some are really close, and it has never bothered him. It doesn't bother me either, there isn't anything I can do about it anyway.

Comparison is the thief of joy.

Those happy families might be arguing, might have money disputes, might have endless problems. Forget about the family you don’t have.

We are the same. It cuts deep. O can't say it gets any easier, even after 8 years of parenthood and distant/disinterested families. I wish my children had doting grandparents and fun aunties but they don't and never will..I try to give them all the love/fun/support they need and hopefully we'll be closer for that. It won't ever change so it's all you can do.

Tell me about it ! I'm exactly the same. Just me and my dd and her dad who doesn't live with us but is part of her life. I worry so much that it's just us and the guilt is overwhelming. We had a large family but have lost close family members over the years so now we are tiny. I long for huge family christmases again. I see facebooks posts of friends with their large extended family's and feel a pang of jealousy.

I get you too op. Lots of my side of the family have passed away incl my parents and after getting divorced my exes family want nothing to do with me and my dcs. We are lucky to have my lovely cousins.

We are/were the same op, i totally get it. Now they have girlfriends with big extended families and we dont. Its shite.

The xmas adverts are the worst. Big families round the table, plenty food, lots of chat. Its just been us 4 for years. Feel so bad.