To find this nauseatingly twee

[auserna]

A relative of mine has started signing all their cards something along the lines of, "All our love, now and always. We are so grateful that you are ours."

We are not an overly sentimental family. I don't recall either of my parents ever saying "I love you" to me, my siblings or each other.

AIBU to want to vomit a little at the turn of phrase or am I the most misanthropic curmudgeon out there?

To echo what others have said, I wonder if your relative has had an experience lately where they’ve reassessed life and want to tell the people they love what they mean to them. I mean, it’s not an awful sentiment to receive but I can understand it feeling strange when it’s completely new and you aren’t used to expressing those types of feelings.

Well maybe - we're not especially close - but I'd be surprised if any actual event had happened recently to trigger this and I didn't know anything about it.

And I thought “Many Happy Returns” was bad. 😆

I think it’s less an event and maybe that they’ve had therapy which has involved talking about the lack of warmth and affection in their childhood and now maybe they are trying to change that/lead by example in being more demonstrative, but because they haven’t been shown a model growing up it’s coming across as false

Just be grateful that this person bothered to send a card. A really thoughtful gesture from them .

Meh, wouldn’t have the time personally but if it works for them, let em crack on

it is twee but honestly I think its better to err on the side of expressing love more rather than less.

I found it hard in my marriage when there was little vocal expression of love and I didnt receive cards really of any form

Yes, I think it's cringy. Perhaps sweet and well-meant, depending on your actual relationship, but still... eww.

Also I disagree with all the people saying that it's sad your parents never said, "I love you." Actions speak louder than words, and this can be a really generational/class/other background thing.

My dad never told us he loved us. But he definitely did, very much, and I never doubted it. After he died (unexpectedly and fairly young), I remember a counsellor expecting me to be sad that we'd never said that to each other. But it didn't bother me at all. It's not the saying it that matters.

On the other hand, my mum then went through a phase of saying, "I love you" to me after my dad's death, which she'd never done before. I assume a counsellor or someone had told her to do it. Of course I said it back, because anything else would have been hurtful. But actually I've never been close to my mum and I don't really have warm feelings towards her. I'm not sure she likes me very much either. So there we were, saying "I love you" to each other, but I can't say it really made our relationship any better. Whereas I had a great relationship with my dad and we never said it at all.

I haven't read all of this but I'm picking up it's unusual for parents not to tell kids "I love you ". My parents have never said those words, their actions show they do. But is it really unusual to have never been told it?

Mine have never said it either.
It used to make me sad sometimes but not anymore, they both had very hard upbringings and wouldn’t be the best at expressing themselves.
For me, I just make sure I say ‘love you’ to my children nightly.

I would find that really cringeworthy. I can’t stand overblown sentimentality. I would never say anything though and I wouldn’t match it with similar phrases.

Also, like pp’s, my parents never told me they loved me. We didn’t do hugs either. If they had hugged me, I would have assumed I was at death’s door or something🤣 But they were very loving in how they treated me. Considerate and caring and empathetic. I was never in any doubt that they loved me.

That's a reach! I'd be astonished if that's the case, although I guess it's not absolutely impossible.

I grew up in the 60s/70s and mine didn't. I don't know if it was a thing then as OH's never did either.

It’s not uncommon in older generations. It doesn’t mean parents didn’t show love.

In that case, it’s just a variation of the kind of things they write anyway.

A relation of mine does this- half the card taken up with it. Combined with medical professional's handwriting, I quite often give up before the end.

A lot of people have therapy and don’t tell their families!

Yes I would say it’s quite unusual to not be told I love you by your parents. But I think it depends on how old you are. Parents have generally become more demonstrative and aware of what children need emotionally as time has gone on.

My parents never said ‘I love you’ to us, nor each other. They would write it in cards, but never say it. Sad, but that was typical of their generation. When our children came along and would fling their arms around their necks and say ‘I love you!’ to them, they had to reciprocate but it didn’t come easy.

Our young adults kids never sign off from a phone call to us without saying ‘I love you’ and vice versa. My girlfriends and I say it often too. I’m so glad our generations are not as stilted.

You are not wrong, OP. Also, the implication of ownership ("you are ours") is just creepy.
However, bizarrely, some people like sentimental claptrap..... I guess we're all different?!

My parents never did but we knew we were loved. I don’t think it was that common back in the 60s/70s. I said it to my kids all the time though.

Everyone just gets a ‘lots of love’ from me on cards. I’ve never been very sentimental or slushy though.

I'm wondering whether posters who say it's weird/creepy/whatever would be willing to confirm that they have never told and would never, ever, tell their children that they love them. If that's the case, why?

Your relative likely read it elsewhere and liked it so much that they decided to use it themselves. I admit to using something similarly…There is a character called Janet in US comedy The Good Place who said “Hi there” and I use it sometimes in messages to people eg on Vinted. Don’t care if it’s twee either, as I like it!

Might they be on mumsnet?

As someone with a highly dysfunctional/abusive family I think you are being VVU. OK it's twee... but they love you. You are very, very lucky.