To want to end relationship with my brother because I cba?

[MissChatterbox1]

Hello and thanks for reading.

Im going to sound awful for this post I know but I need to vent it and get impartial advice. I’m prepared for vipers.

Background: I have 5 half siblings. I grew up in the same house with 4 of them. We are all adults now with our own families and get on well but not close.
The fifth sibling was my dads son who is 15 years older than me and I did not grow up with and did not know or meet until after my dad died.

Met this sibling when I was 19 and they were 34. They have no other siblings.
He’s a nice man but due to the age gap and not being raised together we have 0 in common.
However due to him having no siblings he has tried really hard over the years to force a relationship.
He’s gone out of his way to make this happen. Travelling across the country to things like my graduation and the birth of my child. Sending presents and cards on birthdays and at Christmas. Always trying to ring me and arrange meet ups.
He has a wife and kids and they are also super enthusiastic to have a relationship.

Now this is where I feel an awful person. I do not reciprocate the feelings at all and find it smothering and a bit weird if I’m honest.
We have nothing in common other than sharing a dad neither of us really knew.
He makes more effort than me and my siblings do for eachother and is really over familiar. When he and his family come they insist on staying in my house when my own siblings get a hotel. I have a house with spare rooms so can’t really say no but it’s awkward.
They try and arrange joint family holidays which I make excuses not to do and send me drawings their kids have done in the post.

Because we weren’t raised together and there is a huge age gap it’s essentially a stranger trying to exert themselves into your life at every opportunity.
My other siblings I have little in common with but we have a shared history and familiarity so have our own banter and jokes and understand each others quirks and ways so I can spend a weekend with them and tell them to go away or whatever. When they’re being annoying. My nieces and nephews feel like ‘mine’ and it feels like family and not a weird chore i’m doing.

Since having my child my brother and his family have stepped it up a notch and constantly want to meet and be in contact as he’s an ‘uncle’ now.
Their kids ranging from 2 - 19 year old (massive age gaps) call me auntie and my DP uncle and it feels awkward as they are literal strangers.
My DB and his wife will try and give parenting tips on visits which comes across as rude as critical because there is no foundation of a relationship like our own siblings so it feels like a stranger/acquaintance saying it.

I have tried to distance myself over the years but they don’t get the hint. I don’t respond to calls and take days to reply to texts but they still persist. They will go through their calendar for that year until they find a date we are free for a visit even if it’s 6 months away. They send expensive and thoughtful presents for all our birthdays which makes me feel indebted to them to continue the relationship.
They've even tried to ‘book on’ to our family holidays when we’ve told them we’re going somewhere (saying they might come too and looking up tickets on their phone there and then, I’m not joking!).
They keep pestering to spend Christmas together which I’ve managed to bat off! We have loads of other very close family and now our own kids to be contending with, we don’t want to host strangers on top on Christmas Day and it’s weird they even want to spend such a day together.

I know it sounds selfish but I have loads of siblings already as does DP. Infact DP has 4 full siblings who also have families so between us we have loads of siblings, nieces and nephews which is difficult enough to keep up with. However my DB and his family demand more attention than all our siblings put together! Because they only have me as ‘family’ they put all their attention onto us.

I personally would be happy with just sending an annual Christmas card and seeing their updates via social media at most. I don’t have the time or interest.
But I don’t want to hurt them either. They are nice people. I understand they want extended family as they don’t have it, but I can’t provide it.

What do I do?

I’ve tried every kind of ‘drifting away’ method possible. I feel like the only way out is to have some kind of huge fall out and go no contact because they will go to such great lengths to maintain this relationship that there is no other way. Even if I up and moved to Australia I have 0 doubt they’d use their annual leave to visit annually. That’s how full on they are.

Would you be interested in having a connection with him if he wasn’t so suffocating or do you prefer no connection at all?

I wish my brothers would make this effort

Well, you don’t owe him anything so of course you can cut him off.

But half your OP is telling us that you’ve had years of him staying with you, attending your graduation, phoning you every week etc… and half of your OP is you telling us he’s a stranger to you. It’s not both 🤷🏻‍♀️

He’s not a stranger - he’s just not someone you like enough to be bothered with.

I hope he finds some friends or a long lost cousin who’d welcome him, as you're not worth the effort at all.

This.

OP, I can see both sides — his desperate longing to be involved, you finding it way too much, and without his obvious desire for a sibling, when you already have several.

I was also struck by you saying several times that you have ‘nothing in common — what is it you mean by this? Do you dislike him as a personality?

Hi OP,

Firstly, sorry about the people who are calling you horrible. I don’t think you are horrible, FWIW, just another human being who is responding to both the past and the present in the best way they know how.

Secondly, to me, my analysis of the situation is:

A) You grew up as 1 of 5 siblings, being the only one (I assume) in the household who had a different father. Being part of a large family of siblings holds its own challenges and resentments in terms of feeling as though your parents are meeting your emotional needs, but also being the only “other” sibling, also adds to these feelings, which I feel has made you have a relatively cool to cold relationship with your siblings, as a self-protection mechanism.

Most people want to spend time with their siblings because they love them and trust that they have your best interests at heart and the associated closeness that comes with that, but that seems absent, which is what is colouring your impression of the “other brother.” It is a learned response from how you had to relate to your siblings in order to protect your emotions when growing up.

B) Other brother enters the scene when you are 19 and seems to want all of the love and closeness and mentorship that was absent in your relationships with your other siblings, but you are unable to emotionally respond because of how you have been “programmed” to receive sibling relationships. The difference here is that you do not have the shared history to tie you to this brother, and you are unable to form the emotional closeness that he wants because of the vulnerability that would require of you, so your needs are unable to align.

I also wonder if “other brother” reminds you of the pain of having not known your father, and in keeping other brother at arm’s length, you are again responding to how you emotionally coped with being estranged from your bio dad whilst growing up in a family where you were the “other sibling” ie didn’t share the same parents as the other 4 siblings. This feeling of wanting to reject other brother’s love in order to protect your heart could very well be subconscious.

Solution:
The only solution is to sit down with yourself and practice radical honesty about why you don’t want this relationship with other brother.

You then need to speak to other brother and explain to him that for a number of years you have felt as though he is trying to create emotional bonds, connections and love that you feel unable to receive or respond to, which creates a cycle of blame/shame within yourself which only pushes you from him further.

Explain to him that you would like a break from the relationship and that you will be in touch when/if you feel differently.

It is critical to both your emotional health and to his that you are honest.

Thanks for all your responses I am really taking them all on board and thinking from those perspectives.

The reason I say ‘stranger’ is because I don’t feel closer to him than I would an acquaintance.

Imagine being a 19 year old girl in her first year of uni and meeting a 34 year old man with an ex wife and kids. A man who you have 0 in common with. No simile interests, no same sense of humour, completely different life stages. Imagine that man then deciding to travel all the way up to your uni halls every other term when your at uni after the first meeting and checking into a hotel so you can ‘hang out’ for the weekend. It was so awkward but he was nice enough and I am a people pleaser so felt I couldn’t say no. This luckily only lasted until my second year when I was then sent away for placements.
However this for me was odd behaviour back then and even now but I understand he was desperate for connection to forced myself through these awkward visits.

But why would a man with an established life and kids want to travel up to uni halls regularly to hang out with a 19 year old he has little in common with just because we share the same father?

As time has gone on this has continued. The deeper I’ve gotten in the more I feel I can’t say no.

I managed to not see him for 2 years whilst I was travelling and he’d still constantly try and call me more than my other siblings ever would. When I got back I met his now wife for the first time who was nice but again, nothing in common and not someone I would ever socialise with. The second time I met her she asked me to be her bridesmaid! It meant so much to them I said yes as I was on the spot and only 23 and they were both around 40 and took me to dinner.

The whole experience was a nightmare and gave me anxiety as I was expected to act like close family and attend wedding photo shoots and all sorts with a bunch of much older strangers I had nothing in common with just to appease them.

This has escalated over the years in this way.

My other siblings are not related to him. They find the whole thing hilarious and strange. It’s like my DB has an imagine of how families should be and is trying to recreate that. For example, when I bought my first house, my other siblings got me bottles of Prosecco and champagne, congratulated me, that was that. My DB however bought me a load of brand new house appliances costing a small fortune and then he and his wife invited themselves over to see it and were a bit critical of my other siblings for not putting in so much effort. But for me my siblings reactions were normal and they were the ones being OTT.

Also I don’t think genetic link seems to be enough for a relationship without history or common interests. We don’t watch the same shows, like the same music or even have the same sense of humour. I’m very sarcastic and self deprecating and my DB and his wife would take these comments literally or not understand why I find something funny causing awkward silences.
They are all vegans whereas we are meat eaters so we don’t even have food in common.

My other siblings I also don’t have much in common with, but we have the same sense of humour so can laugh for hours and understand each others weird ways from growing up and can happily tell each other to piss off without causing offence. If we go on a weekend away together we can play our childhood board games and catch up on gossip about childhood friends and family.
If me and my siblings didn’t grow up together then we wouldn’t have this foundation so probably wouldn’t ever hang out or even cross paths.

In regards to my father being the reason I feel this way, maybe so? My bio dad I only ever met a couple of times in my life. However I had a stepdad who was like my dad and I’ve never really been bothered about my bio dad not bothering. I never sought him out. My needs were met from a paternal perspective so I felt neutral about it.

As someone who has a brother who has actively avoided me for the past few years and who my dc don't even know exist due to his absolute lack of interest or effort, yabu!

What a wise and thoughtful post. I don’t mean to sound patronising. It’s just increasingly rare to see things discussed in such a way.

Well at least he'll die before you so you won't have to deal with him anymore

Also in an ideal world what I would have wanted is to have met for the first time to satisfy each other’s curiosity. Then when realising that we have little in common to have maintained contact through the odd Christmas/birthday card and maybe go for a meal every couple of years if in each others area.

That would be ideal in all honesty. None of this forced intense closeness.

I get it, there's nothing between you and he's trying way to hard to be a very close family member. I'd want to push away too.

I'd bring up that you're still struggling with the revelation of him and that you understand he's not had siblings until now but that he needs to give the relationship space to grow, rather than overwatering it (if he likes a gardening analogy)

I wouldn’t consider a person I speak to regularly on the phone for 1h, whose children I have met and who have stayed at my house a “random” or a “stranger”. How have you not get to know him in all this time?

You can have a relationship with him (if you want) while not seeing him as family.

It’s up to you to set boundaries in the relationship, which it doesn’t sound like you have done (I wouldn’t have anyone staying at my house, no matter how much they insisted).

To answer the question of DPs views, he’s not bothered either way.
He’s very laid back. However he did put his foot down and say ‘what on earth?!!’ When they tried to invite themselves to stay at our home on our first Christmas with our baby and when they tried to turn up as a ‘surprise’ on our first family holiday abroad. Luckily neither happened but he found that very strange and said no to both.
He has many siblings and they are all very close. So he understands close sibling relationships and even he thought it was strange behaviour.

He said he’d never dream of randomly rocking up with me and the kids to a hotel resort in Majorca to gate crash his brothers holiday. Especially as he and my brother also have 0 in common so it’s not like we’d all be having a laugh and drinking cocktails.

Other then that he thinks my brother is nice enough and wouldn’t mind if I did want a close relationship and would go along with it to a degree.

He has totally overstepped boundaries. You need to be firm with him and tell him his behaviour is overpowering. Makes no difference that he is family.

Another thing.. going on a rant now.. but he pretends he knows me better than he does which does my heading. So at the wedding there was a lot of ‘oh your DB said you’re a big drinker and love your wine!’ And ‘your DB said you’re a massive fan of xyz’. Neither are accurate reflections of me. At uni I loved a good drink and party when I was a fresher as did most first year teenage students. But i hadn’t been a student and gone out partying in years at that point and neither was I a ‘massive fan’ of xyz. I’d watched one episode once when he rang me.

He does sound a little over-enthusiastic but they sound like nice people.

You keep talking about how he is so much older than you and how you didn't grow up together, but surely you are now an adult, and not all relationships need to start in childhood in order to be close.

You are obviously free to do what you like. If you don't want a close relationship, make your excuses and keep it to a minimum.

I am totally with you OP, I would absolutely hate this and tbh I think his behaviour goes beyond “nice” and into “weirdly obsessive”. The uni halls thing is definitely odd.

I don’t see why you are obliged to spend weekends or long phone calls with someone you don’t especially get on with and have no shared history with, just because you share some DNA.

I do agree there is no easy way out of this though. I think the best you can do is quietly stop responding and message only once every 6 months or so with “sorry been so busy! Hope all well.” Or similar. He will be hurt by this - but not as hurt as by a full on open conversation saying you just don’t want that sort of relationship - IMO. Also stop telling him where you are going on holiday!

You keep thing on about having nothing in common with him, but have you tried to establish a rapport and fund something in common?

My sympathy is with you OP, and I am surprised how many posters suggest you should feel obligated to this stranger and his family. I would suggest that you actually ignore all attempts to contact you, not replying to texts at all for example. And use your child as a reason not to cooperate eg DC is ill/very demanding/ going through a difficult behaviour phase. Say you are too exhausted to socialise. Try to minimise social media contact by adjusting settings to they cannot see much, if you post on social media.

‘DB bought me a load of brand new house appliances costing a small fortune
They send expensive and thoughtful presents for all our birthdays’

what cunts they are, eh?

I feel so sorry for them. They are probably being more clingy because they sense how you feel. Maybe if you acted more enthusiastic for a bit they’d relax .

Please don’t cut them off. You don’t know how hard it is to not have much family, and your kids may love that connection when they’re older.

You need to communicate with him. Grow up and use your words. Tell him that it’s too intense and you need him to calm down. There must be a happy medium you can find.

Have you even tried to find anything in common with him? You base it on shared history but that's not all it has to be.
You're both adults now and can find many things to have in common, but you really don't give him a chance and to keep referring to him as a stranger when you've spent plenty of time together is quite strange!
They sound lovely and they're making real effort to keep in touch, despite your clear lack of interest, because you're their family and family is important to them.
It doesn't sound like they've given any real reason for you to not want to stay in contact, other than you not having shared history with that brother. You do sound pretty awful, I have to be honest.
Maybe you should grow up a bit and realise family is a thing to be cherished! No matter how that family came into your life..
Give the man and his family a chance! If you let that barrier down, you could come to build really strong relationships with them and come to really enjoy their company, if only you'd really try...
They really don't deserve to be hurt just because you can't be bothered, and it doesn't seem like they've done anything wrong so in all honesty I think they deserve a chance. It's you that needs to adjust your view on this really...

Sounds like a very difficult situation and tricky to negotiate without one of you being upset.

It might be worth seeing a therapist a couple of times to figure out the best way forward because this isn’t going to be a problem that goes away and needs careful thought. Your DB has clearly got a polar opposite view of what your relationship looks like and must think you feel similarly.

It would be sad to crush him emotionally by being too heavy handed but equally you need to have some boundaries to protect yourself. Maybe try writing a few versions of a letter setting out your position?

Good luck. They sound like nice people but involved in a fantasy world where you are all super close.