The background is that my parents were neglectful and abusive. Both were alcoholic drug addicts and were a nightmare together.
Some of my earliest memories are of being asked to pick my favourite Christmas present and my father chucking it on the fire, my brother regularly being burned by an iron as a punishment and the constant hunger (which often was matched with watching my father eat).
I was the youngest of four siblings, and I was the youngest by 9 years. They were all close in age and I was the late mistake. The addictions started when I was about 2ish and when I was 7 our grandparents took us after I included my brother being burned by the iron in my ‘what I did at the weekend’ in school. It was so common place I didn’t realise it wasn’t normal.
When I was 12 my Grandad died. My Nana realised that none of my siblings nor my aunt would take me in if she also died. So she sold a lot, cashed in all policies she had, raided her savings and used the payout from my Grandad’s work to pay my Aunt, my uncle and my siblings their share of her and grandads estate so that I could be left the flat we moved to (a 2 bed flat in a rough area). This was agreed, in fact encouraged, by everyone and they pretty much all used the money for house deposits or, in my aunts case, paying off a chunk of mortgage.
When my nana died and everything was sold and balanced it worked out that I got was worth about £300 more than my siblings and £1200 more than my Aunt and Uncle. My uncle basically said that their houses had increased in value way more than that so to forget it. I paid my aunt and one of my siblings the difference as they insisted on it.
The whole thing caused such bad feeling I’m only in contact with my uncle.
At a family funeral on Friday my cousin, my aunt’s son, made several digs about me being Nana’s favourite as I was the only one left anything in the will. After the third dig I pointed out to him that my siblings and I split my father’s share (he was completely disowned by them) and the only reason cousin didn’t get anything is because my Aunt is alive.
He was super confused and asked what I meant. I explained what had happened and it turned out that all these years my three cousins were totally unaware that their Mum got her share, just several years before Nana died. Also that it was absolutely evened up when she did die.
Its caused WWIII in that branch because my cousins have had ill feeling toward Nana (and me) all this time and it was totally unnecessary. They are now furious at their mother.
A few relatives have suggested I owe my aunt an apology for causing the row, but I didn’t bloody cause it! Her lies did.
Hopefully it’ll be many years before the next funeral so I don’t have to see any of these people thankfully, but I don’t feel remotely bad and don’t see why I should?