Would you blame the parent with multiple children NC?

[TheBushySquirrel]

Situation: Women with multiple children. Divorced from their Dad almost 20 years ago. Two of her children are NC, both of them at different times due to different reasons and nothing to do with each other as siblings are not close. One of these is her only daughter.

Both still remain close to their Dad. Her other are children still in contact but not particularly close to her and don’t go to visit often. Woman isn’t elderly but frail and in ill health, quite often in and out of hospital- has been going on for years.

In this situation would you think that she is to blame for multiple children being NC or would you think the children are being too harsh particularly given to her ill health?

What is NC?

No contact.

I’d try to reserve/avoid judgement. These things are often highly complex. Even if she played a role, it doesn’t mean she doesn’t deserve friendship. Sometimes there are circumstances people deeply regret but can’t go back and change. I would take her as I find her. I wouldn’t judge the adult children either. Healing can sometimes mean we aren’t able to stay in contact.

Im assuming it means no contact?

To be honest its hard to judge as we will only get one side of a story here, and not enough detail in the original post…..

Her health has nothing to do with it. Whether the children are right or wrong about their upbringing, the truth is their own. It is so hard to deal with the baggage and guilt that comes with estrangement without the flying monkieys.

All of my siblings are NC with our parents apart from me, and I'm not keen on our parents either. Come on, objectively, it has got to be on the parents hasn't it? To paraphrase Oscar Wilde, once is a misfortune but more than once looks like carelessness.

I believe there is always a reason that children go NC with their parents, regardless of what their parents say. People don’t cut off their parents for no reason.

I think two adult children going NC highlights there is something in the parents behaviour that has caused this.

yes

I think going no contact with your mum is a huge decision and unlikely one that was made lightly by either of her children.

Given that they did it separately when not close to each other and for different reasons also goes to show that this wasn’t some one off argument that spiralled or something like that.

I wonder what efforts the mum has made to take accountability for the way her children feel, address concerns, make changes and try and reignite a relationship. My guess is zero and she blames them.

Yes

Yes, I would assume something went on in their childhood that caused this. Especially as it’s multiple children.

This, and the “ah but her health” is such an appalling guilt trip.

I think there’s two sides to every story.

I’m not sure ‘blame’ is the right word, but I’d probably assume that it had been an unhappy home, and parents have a responsibility for changing that.

Ill health isn’t relevant, the children shouldn’t be guilt tripped into looking after her.

Agree with this. Every single one of my DHs siblings are no contact with MIL. If it’s only one child then I would think ‘two sides of every story’ but when it is every child there’s a clear pattern.

TBH- I'd probably reserve judgement, but also look at how frequently the person also falls out with friends to see if there is a pattern. Mind you, the only person i know who has (all) of their children NC is someone who cannot keep a friendship either due to her - challenging- behaviour. She makes friends easily as she is charming, yet she can't keep it up.

Quite possibly. But knowing a few families where this happened it’s not always as straightforward as mum being only perpetrator. Of course in some cases it might be.

In one case I know the mum was married very young, there was horrific abuse in the marriage. The kids had a terrible childhood and are NC. They are right to do this as that is what they need. But the mum is also someone who deeply regrets staying and at the time felt she had no choice. I am friends with the mum decades on. I don’t minimise the pain for the children. It’s awful. But I don’t need to somehow ‘make her pay’ by ostracising her for decisions she made 30 years ago that she already knows were entirely the wrong ones.

Another person I know was abused as a child. She is now in her 80s and recognises she was cold and distant with her kids and still struggles to show emotion openly. She loves her kids but she failed them, and she was failed by her parents. She has never ever told her kids about the abuse and even now she has only told me little bits (all of which are horrifying). I have compassion for everyone involved honestly. They probably feel their mum never loved them because she never showed love the way they deserved. It’s just horribly sad and past repairing.

I’m not trying to minimise, just explain why I take a more nuanced view.

I mean, you’d think, but manipulative people are very good at spinning a sob story to explain why nothing is ever their fault.

I am NC with my mum and stepdad. Stepdad’s 2 children are NC with them as well. Between them, they have 3 adult children and 5 grandchildren they have no relationship with. So they literally have no family, that’s all of us.

Some people have been like, wtf?! I always knew something was up and I don’t believe a word they say about what’s happened. The story according to them is that we all 3 separately tried to blackmail them for money and cut them off when we couldn’t get it. The real story is stepdad is a paedo who continues to abuse children under my mum’s watch.

They have lots of friends though, and sometimes those friends contact me to tell me how horrible I am for what I did to them trying to take all their money. 🤷🏻‍♀️ But the friends they do have are 90% new ones who they seem to rotate in when older ones disappear. I suspect people do get a bit suspicious and question if the stories they tell are true and then maybe get fed up with their drama. But at least some people for a time must believe the narrative that they were just so unlucky and ended up with such awful children and none of this is their fault.

There are always reasons for no contact. Sometimes both parties are "difficult" rather than just the parent but its often telling where two kids have separately gone no contact with the same parent, especially if they've maintained contact with the other parent.

I know someone who is one of six siblings and she and one other sibling (the two eldest) were NC with their mum but not their dad. I was baffled as the siblings were all so close and gave off really happy family vibes. When I got to know her better I found out that the mum had been shockingly neglectful during their childhood and the two eldest had pretty much brought up the younger ones and shielded them from it. I kept thinking why have 6 kids if you don't care about looking after them but stuff like this does happen. You just dont know and can't judge. The illness stuff is a red herring.

I would assume the children had a difficult childhood especially as the siblings also don't talk to each other. But give the mum grace and assume that maybe she didn't have the best childhood/mental health either. All sounds very sad.

Yep.

Id be inclined to reserve judgement but if i was judging anyone it would be the sweet old lady before the kids tbh..

I’m so sorry. I absolutely acknowledge there are totally clear cut cases.

But I don’t think anyone’s suggesting otherwise? Many awful parents were not parented at all themselves, forming an intergenerational chain of trauma and unhappiness, often unaware of the damage they’re passing on. I’m in contact with my parents, because I choose to, but they were dreadful parents, to the point of not intervening when I suffered CSA aged eight and told them. They sent me back to the same setting, never reported, minimised. My point is that they were both dragged up in dysfunctional, impoverished environments, and are completely unaware of how far short they fell. In terms of a pattern, they have six children. All but one are childfree by choice.

If I didn't know any more information than this, I'd try not to judge anyone involved. As other posters have said, these things can be very complicated.

There's an older woman in my home town. Her dd doesn't speak to her. Everyone in town thinks she's a wonderful mother and her dd clearly had problems. But the son also hardly speaks to his mother, does the absolute bare minimum for her. Everyone seems to forget this fact.

So yes, I do think that if all of your kids don't really speak to you then they clearly didn't have the greatest upbringing and you are partly responsible.