Do you bother to keep in touch with your cousins?

[Allthenameshavegone1972]

Just that really. I really miss the old days of the 70's when we user to have big family parties at my grandparents houses. I have 5 cousins & a few second cousins. We keep in touch on Facebook & that's about it. All of our grandparents are dead, most of the parents are dead too.
I try to initiate a meet up once a year and these always seem to go well. However, none of them ever initiate back. It makes me question whether or not they really want to meet and I think why bother. It seems it's the grandparents are the link that keeps everyone together. Once that link is gone then it all falls apart.

I see my two cousins on dad's side every few months, we grew up on other sides of the country and visits were rare but as adults we have become closer as we have similar interests etc and there is only the three of us (and I am their only cousin), we live in different cities but try to organise a meet up once a year.

Weirdly, I grew up much closer to mum's side of the family, and although my cousins are much older than me we still saw each sporadically when I was a child / teenager but these days I only see two of them (one of whom use to babysit me), and that is at Christmas / NY break or family celebrations. I still enjoy their company but we live very different lives. Family factions and living overseas has meant I havent seen the others in years.

However, none of them ever initiate back. It makes me question whether or not they really want to meet and I think why bother.

I could never really understand this line of thinking. I am sure when your grandparents were alive, they were the ones organizing getting together. Does it mean you weren't that bothered? Of course not. You were happy with this pattern until you became the adult responsible for organizing.
I am the eldest of my cousins. I fully expect to pick up the organisation baton when our parents are no longer around.

I know exactly what you mean, OP. I have over 20 cousins, and have a real nostalgia for the days when we were all much closer geographically and emotionally. I practically grew up with three of mine like siblings, and with one we went to school together and were really close. We all went on holiday together, as we also did with another group of aunties, uncles and cousins. We had a blast, were forever in and out of each other's houses and I honestly adored my aunts and uncles (only three now still alive and two of them overseas).
I wouldn't say I'm close to any of them now that our grandparents and parents have gone and we are scattered across continents, but we are still in touch and love seeing each other when we do.

I keep in touch with 2 cousins I grew up with. They're the brothers I never had, we're all in our 60s now

Also close to the son of 1 of the cousins, and meet regularly for lunch with his wife and children.

I have 22 cousins on my mums side and none on my dad’s! My mums siblings are all still living (aged 65-80) and very close, and so we do still see a lot of some of my cousins, even the cluster who live abroad, and even those I don’t see often, I wouldn’t feel awkward with any of them. Thank god for Facebook I even know all their kids’ names. We have had large family holidays since our generation was first born, which were started by our grandparents; they passed away 15-20 years ago but we have continued it, especially while the bulk of our children were young- holidays with 20 ish kids age 0-15 running about entertaining themselves while we spent quality time together have just been fab. However I’m not sure what will happen once my mum’s generation start to pass away too, and our children grow up and don’t want these kind of holidays any more (especially if they’re expected to pay for themselves!). already the eldest of my cousins kids are 15-25 and not that interested, though still polite when we do see them :)
I do consider myself so lucky to have had such an extended family. So many of my core childhood memories involve my cousins.

Yes.

I speak to 3 close cousins almost every day and another 3 regularly. We will visit each other for big life events, if their kids or they are unwell, if they are having a rough time. I love them all dearly. I live an hour away.

I’m not close with any of my cousins, but that’s not through not bothering. Our family dynamics, both sides unfortunately, are horrible and somewhat traumatic and we, as kids, were caught in the middle. It’s sad but when you’ve been pushed apart as kids, it’s difficult to bridge that gap and rebuild a relationship as adults.

I hope my son stays close to his cousins, they all absolutely adore each other, it’s so sad to think it may not be forever. He’s got four my side and three on his dads side.

My husband is far better, happily. He regularly speaks to all of his eight cousins, some from each side of his family, and we see them semi-regularly. Of course some he’s closer to than others, due to circumstance, age and location, but I think that’s normal.

My best friends are my brother, sister in law and some of my cousins.
I have a weekend away with one of my cousins every year. I speak to the others most days. My brother and sister in law come for long stays and we do family holidays together.

We have quite a lot of shared family trauma, I suppose, and we’ve all supported each other to escape and have pretty successful careers and happy lives.

Although I do have friends I see often and have nights out/ weekends away with, no one “gets me” like them.

I have 45 first cousins , 30 on 1 side . I don't keep in contact with most . I'm close with a couple of ones who I would meet now and again . I have a lot of other extended family also , the main time we meet is either weddings or funerals.

I don't keep in touch with cousins on my mothers side. My DM and most of her family are not nice. On my DF side, (2 cousins there) my aunt (DF's SIL) kept all the family together communication wise, and the occasional visit. Since she's passed nearly a year ago there's been no contact.

This thread though has spurred me on to message my cousin today.

We have a WhatsApp group and twice a year we meet up for lunch, we all very much enjoy this. They are much nicer people than their parents were.

I know and am in pretty regular contact with my cousins (English Irish US and (not so much) France. DH has only seen one cousin since we married 25 years ago. I like keeping in contact. FB helps too.

Not really.

I've got some I'm friends with on fb because they live abroad, we have caught up with them for a meal when they've been in the country on holiday. The others live in the next town and if I bumped into them we would say hello/have a brief chat but I don't even have their phone numbers.

I do have fond memories of being all together as kids at the grandparents house but as adults we don't really have anything in common.

We try but we are spread out over the country. One of my cousins has a daughter the same age as mine so we meet up a few times a year. When I go down to visit them, I usually see her brother as well.

My other ones live even further away so I hardly ever see them. We did used to do an annual meet up but it just got too hard to coordinate and fell away after Covid. I do try and keep touch via Facebook and stuff but we are not as close through not spending much time together.

I have 14 cousins ranging in age 41 - 17. I’m on the older end! I’m in contact regularly with 5 of them at the younger end, we see each other regularly and they are close with my kids. The others I’ve not seen or spoken to in years! Some have their own children as well but I’ve not met them.

No. Most of them shat on me from a great height. It’s too outing to go into it but think exclusion from family events, prevention from saying goodbye to a dying grandparent and ignoring health issues

I wouldn’t recognise them if they passed me in the street. Mine grew up in the NE, us in Yorkshire, my mum and her sister whilst remaining close lived 100 miles away from each other since their teens, money in those days wasn’t there for regular visits that distance. As my parents (late 80s and passed now) got more money and could visit the NE we kids were too old to be interested or bothered visiting adults we didn’t know.

No. I have a lot of cousins, big age range so there’s 20 years between me and some of them and all of them lived at least 100 miles from me growing up, some much further abroad. Didn’t really ever see the cousins on one parents side, only every few years, but saw more of them on the other side but even the ones we saw most it was only a few times a year, I did get on with some of those closest in age to me and have some of those as Facebook friends but don’t have any contact with the younger ones or the ones on the other side. I have seen a few of them at funerals in recent years but even then not all attended, I wasn’t invited to any of their weddings, and nor did I expect to be.

I love seeing my cousins! We are living in different countries so not everyone has been at every meet up this year. But everone is home for Christmas and we are having a big meet up in December and I'm so excited.

DH sees his cousins less as they live even further away, but again we do see then when we can

We had all drifted apart but started seeing each other at funerals and we realised that if we didn’t make an effort the family would be no more. So yes, I see them regularly. I am sad that DC have virtually no relationship with cousins on either side.

Not really. After my DGM died and the appalling way two of them behaved I'm not interested. They both also think they are better than me because they think they are wealthier than I am. I don't discuss my finances with anyone and I live quite modestly. And no they are not.

I keep in touch with a couple on Facebook.

No, as I barely know them. My kids are close to their cousins and can’t imagine them ever losing touch. Eldest son (adult) see’s his cousins every week, and actually manages his cousin who is 15 months younger. My DD is close to her cousins too (different cousins as different dad to my eldest), especially one’s around same age. 20yr old DS and his 20yr old cousin no longer close, they are very different but will always see each other at family occasions and get on, just don’t stay in touch via message / video call like DD.

I have 30 first cousins (28 one dads side, 2 on my mums) they range in age from 48 to 9, yes I still talk to them all (except one that I was never close to) but to be honest if and when she is around(she lives in Australia) I would still talk to her. We are mostly still in Ireland where we grew up but some live in Australia and America and over the years others have lived abroad too but come home. One of my cousins is my neighbour which is nice and another lives about 5mins away and her dc are school with my dc. We have a WhatsApp group that we all chat through. We meet up a good bit throughout the year at various occasions. I love my cousins.

On one side of the family all the cousins, aunties and uncles are on a group family chat except two cousins - one with a learning disability and one whose partner cut them out of the family.

We're ranging from 60 to 40 years old. We meet at different occasions and it's great to see them. We all have similar personalities and humour. The second cousins are slowly being added to the group as they come of age.