To cut contact with DS and DIL

[LaurentheLemur]

Today is the first birthday I have had since my husband of 40 years died. My birthday is flagged up on FB. Today my DIL has sent me a link to click on a website to help her get a referral bonus. She has not wished me a happy birthday.

Apart from a brief message of condolence via FB at the time, and both of them missing the funeral because they "couldn't afford time off work", I have had no real contact with her or DS for years.

Background - DS was brought up by his father, my ExH, and his darling stepmother told him I was dead. ExH moved abroad for a while and we lost contact (deliberately on his part). I managed to track down DS just before his 40th birthday, but of course he hardly remembered me. Initially I tried to rebuild a relationship but it fizzled out after a while. I think DIL wears the pants in their relationship. DS never contacts me and I don't even have his phone number since he changed it a couple of years ago. I know it takes 2 to have a relationship but honestly I am wondering why I should even try when they have made it clear they aren't interested.

I'm hurt and upset that they don't seem to have any understanding of how much a simple message would mean to me. But is cutting them off completely an overreaction at a time when I'm still grieving for my DH?

@VickyEadieofThigh the expression is 'the blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb'

And there are a hundred steps she could have taken to stop that.

Holy incomplete back stories, Batman!

I'm sure there is a huge backstory but why hadn't you been in contact for 40 years? Normally mothers are primary carers.

Anyway I think you are missing the point, you are focusing on yourself and not your DS. You have missed alot of his life and you are worried about your birthday?

You sound like my oldest child’s father who hasn’t been seen for 30 years, his loss. If he came back into my adult child’s life pretty sure they would not be worried about wishing him a happy birthday. You are not a mum to your son just some random he shares DNA with.

Sorry for your loss.

Tbh it doesn't seem like you need to cut them off. It's clear that for whatever reason they have little to no interest in having a relationship with you. You could just step back and fade away with no drama. Hopefully that leaves the door open if they ever decide to reconcile.

It must hurt a lot. Perhaps you could compile a file of all the things you did over the years to try to get your son back/be in his life. Court papers etc etc so that he can see that you did everything you could.

exactly, why OP didn't you fought to see your child in 40 years??

This is all ME, ME, ME. Listen to the PP who have told you why your DS is like this. You cannot call yourself a mother: giving birth to someone does not a mother make.

Oh yes.

I mean, is anyone surprised the OP abandoned this thread....

I can’t work out if this is pure bollocks, a reverse, or if the OP is someone with very disordered thinking.

Anyway I’m blatantly placemarking in case she comes back.

I read a lot of threads where the DIL is blamed for the DS’s lack of effort/contact. Maybe it’s easier to think this is mostly the DILs fault but the truth is your son is an adult who is capable of making his own decisions and is responsible for maintaining his relationship with you.

Their actions are clearly really hurtful to you but it sounds like it won’t make much difference whether you cut contact or not, since there’s not much of a relationship either way. I’m sorry that sounds harsh.

It’s ALWAYS on gone parent to try for contact and to fix a broken relationship, NEVER on the child. If you abandon him again now he will never forgive you, you owe it to him to keep frying. He thinks you’re an asshole, prove him wrong.

Interesting how the DIL is getting just as much and then more of your ire as your son.

DIL: “AIBU to not know the birthday of my husband’s biological mother with whom my husband has virtually no contact, and to not go to her second husband’s funeral?”

It’s really sad that your XH appears to have come between you and your son, but your snarky comments about his wife seem unwarranted.

Clearly there is a huge, dripping back story at play here as to why the DS was raised without any maternal input from OP. But I have a feeling OP won't be back to elaborate.

I was going to mention the irony, yes 😂😂

You’ve had no real contact for years, said in your op. You don’t have a mother son relationship. That may or may it be your fault but you can’t expect him to act and feel like a son that you’ve raised.

Either accept it for what it is and have real empathy for his feelings as the innocent one in this mess, or get the huff with him and cut him out of your life yet again. Which one is kinder?

This thread is becoming unnecessarily cruel.

None of us know what the back story is.

You need to stop focusing on your DiL for starters. Your relationship with her and the dynamic between her and your DS is the least important thing here.
If you want a relationship with your DS then you need to try to build one, from scratch really, as its clear he doesn't see you in the traditional maternal role.
Rather than hold on to specific expectations around events you feel he should mark as a son, and become upset when he doesn't, you need to manage your expectations. If you want him in your life you're going to have to reach out in an undemanding non confrontational way, step by step and see where it takes you.
Unfortunately your DS has managed without you as his mum his whole life, so is unlikely to have much appetite for expectations on him followed by your hurt feelings. Its just extra hassle from his point of view.

OP, I have nothing new to add that hasn’t already been said.

I'm hurt and upset that they don't seem to have any understanding of how much a simple message would mean to me

But I find this spectacularly self-absorbed. I have very little sympathy for a parent who allows 40 years to go by before contacting her child. Even now, you only seem concerned about your own feelings. How do you think your son felt when he found out you were around for 40 years but didn’t get in touch with him?

I truly feel for him, and if you are still this concerned about your own feelings rather than his, maybe it’d be for the best if you “cut him off”.

You are not a mum to your son just some random he shares DNA with.

Were that in any way remotely true there would a lot fewer deeply wounded children (or former children) walking this world.

Alienated parents are not always “perfect victims”. Some helped create the context in which there was motivation and capacity to alienate them. Some tend to focus very much on their own wounds but are more shortsighted when it comes to how they wounded. Some find it hard to envision the multi-person pile up through any lens other than their own.

It doesn’t mean they aren’t an alienated parent. It doesn’t provide some kind of “well they weren’t a good mum/dad” protective layer around their children so the act domestic abuse via alienation leaves them unharmed.

I don’t think bopping her over the head with her assumed lack of importance to her son is necessarily going to help her kid any.

Yet another unbelievable OP designed to rile up MN where they never return...

You're upset that you didn't have a birthday message?

Your son would've gone through more hurt / pain / upset by having an absent mother.