My son is treated like an outsider by his own siblings and it's breaking my heart

[Marielouisee]

I honestly don't even know why I'm writing this. Maybe because I've kept it inside for so many years and I just need to let it out somewhere. I'm a mother of four kids. My oldest son is 20, my second son is 19, my daughter is 17 and my youngest son is 15. I love all four of them equally. There has never been a favorite. They all grew up in the same home with the same parents. My husband and I have always tried to give them love, support and everything we could. We weren't perfect parents but we genuinely tried our best. That's why this hurts so much because no matter what we've done over the years, nothing has changed.

My second son has had some health problems since he was little. He has never been seriously disabled or anything like that. He can take care of himself, he goes out on his own, he has hobbies, he has friends and he doesn't need someone looking after him all the time. He's just different from the other three. He's not as sharp, fast or energetic as they are and he has always had a weaker immune system. He would get sick more often and sometimes he needed more attention from us than the others did. As parents we couldn't just ignore that. If one of your children needs you more at certain times you naturally give them that extra care. We never loved him more than the others. We simply responded to what each child needed.

Because of his health there were times we had to cancel family vacations or trips at the last minute. We never felt right leaving one child behind while taking the other three. Looking back now I know those moments affected the others more than we realized. They missed out on some things because of it. But it wasn't like their childhood was full of disappointment. They still had birthday parties, holidays, sleepovers, school trips, sports, time with friends and special moments with us. We always tried to make sure every child had attention and opportunities. It just wasn't always possible to make everything perfect.

As they got older though, especially around sixteen or seventeen, something changed. The frustration they had toward us slowly became resentment toward their brother. Instead of blaming the situation they started blaming him. It was like in their minds he became the reason they had missed out on certain memories as kids. From that point things just kept getting worse. They stopped inviting him to things. If they planned to go somewhere together they left him out. If they were hanging out at home they acted like he wasn't there. They have a lot of the same friends because they're close in age but they rarely include him. Even their friends have started treating him like he's invisible because they follow the example my other kids set.

The hardest part for me isn't even the exclusion. It's hearing the words they say to him. More than once I've overheard them telling him they wish he had never been part of the family or that they don't want him around. Every time I hear something like that it feels like someone is ripping my heart apart. I look at my son and he never screams back or starts a fight. He just goes quiet. He smiles less than he used to. Sometimes he'll simply walk back to his room like he's already expecting it. Watching your own child slowly believe he doesn't belong in his own family is something I wouldn't wish on anyone.

Last week was another example that completely broke me. The other three bought tickets to a music concert together. My second son was excited because he likes the artist too. He asked if he could come with them. They had already bought tickets for themselves and never even considered buying one for him. They told him no and left without him. He didn't throw a tantrum or beg. He just said okay and went back to his room. I don't even think he expects to be included anymore. That acceptance hurts more than if he had cried.

The thing that makes this even harder is that he's genuinely such a sweet kid. He's gentle, kind and thoughtful. He has never been the child causing problems or getting into trouble. He's incredibly talented in his own way. He paints beautifully. Honestly some of his artwork amazes me. He has found a small group of friends through art classes and local galleries. He goes to exhibitions, talks to other artists and that's where I actually see him smile. Those people appreciate him for who he is. Sometimes I wonder if complete strangers understand my son better than his own siblings do.

My husband and I have spent years trying to fix this. We've had countless conversations with all of them. We've explained how hurtful their behavior is. We've asked them to imagine how they would feel if the roles were reversed. We've tried family time, one-on-one talks, setting rules and encouraging them to spend time together. We've cried in front of them.

I'm just so tired. I feel like I've failed all of my children somehow. I feel guilty toward my second son because he deserves siblings who love him and accept him. I also feel guilty toward my other three because maybe somewhere along the way they carried resentment that we didn't recognize soon enough. I keep replaying every parenting decision in my head wondering where we went wrong. Maybe we made mistakes. I'm sure we did. Every parent does. But I never imagined it would end with one of my children feeling like an outsider in the only family he's ever known.

I don't even know what I'm hoping to get from posting this. Maybe someone has been through something similar. Maybe someone has advice. Or maybe I just needed to tell someone because I've carried this pain for years and it feels unbearably lonely. I honestly pray no child ever has to wonder why their own brothers and sister don't want them around and I pray no mother ever has to stand there watching it happen while feeling completely powerless to stop it.

I think siblings are a uniquely complicated dynamic. A therapist said to my once, if all comes down to who mummy loves the most (I assume that includes daddy too). I think if I’ve I’d met my sister outside of our family dynamic we’d have gotten on fine. But inside it, our relationship is very complicated and I feel sort of shut down when it comes to her on some level. And it’s been such a source of negativity in my life, I’m just over dealing with it.
And maybe on some level I am still a toddler fighting with her over mummy in the sandpit. It feels a lot more complicated than that but a lot of it relates to our parents, who did what and what was said.

Has one sibling drawn them in, or have they naturally banded together through the shared experience of being the siblings not favored? Providing one another with the emotional support they were not given by their parents?

They may have been provided for materially, but there are emotional wounds here that even OP acknowledges.

How, though? They'll be adults; they're not going to do anything because their mum told them to. They don't do it now, and she's been "challenging" them all their lives by the sound of it. Once they're no longer under her roof or in any way financially dependent, she'll have even less power. All she'll get is three kids who avoid visiting because all she does is whine at them about their brother and they're sick of hearing it.

Some people don't have relationships with their siblings in adulthood. A pretty high proportion of them have at least one parent nagging them to fix things. Most of them ignore it. If OP wanted the kind of kids who wouldn't dare to disobey her in adulthood, she should have started when they were tiny; it's way too late now. That sort of psychological control has to be established when they're small, completely dependent and easily terrified (and the parent has to be an unrepentant abuser, obviously). There's nothing she can do.

But they missed out of things they WOULD have done if it wasn't for the sibling.

These aren’t little kids anymore

But they aren’t little kids anymore.

Edited as wrong thread!

I am not sure the only solution would be to have kids who wouldn't dare to disobey her

That's not really how you build a close family, unless you all push them to join forces against you, and what parent does that?

You can't go back about not having your golden child, but recognising that the parents caused the issue and try to rebuild a relationship between your kids. Trying to shame or bully them into being forced to include a sibling will have the opposite effect.

So the siblings have said they wish the brother dead, and/or that he wasn’t part of the family - okay, so what’s the context? Two extreme statements in how many years? Prompted by what?

That’s how it can be in all schools. I’m not sure why you think it’s unique to private schools and not a common feature of the state sector. OP hasn’t said he was bullied at school, either.

You’re looking to blame the school because it’s an easy target if you’ve already got ideological issues with private schools, but OP makes it very apparent that the issues were born from and exacerbated by the home environment. This is something the parents need to take responsibility for, not deflect onto the school.

Arguably they have learned her values. They have felt emotionally rejected by their parents in favor of their brother, and so they’ve rejected their brother and favor one another in turn.

But what has changed? They saw their parents favor their brother then, and they see them favor their brother now.

They are now adults and adolescents shaped by the experiences, and wounds, not just of their childhood, but of their present reality.

So bloody what! I can understand a 7 year old having the opinion that this is all my brothers fault and I wish he’d never been born but a 19 year old saying that out loud!!
Nasty little bastards, I’d be disgusted if I had children that carried on like this.

Maybe the parents didn't cause the issue though? Maybe the siblings just aren't very nice people? We can't know. If they aren't, she can't change their personalities.

Your update is far more than strained relationships though. All 3 saying repeatedly they wish he wasn’t or nor part of the family is very extreme. Have they articulated it’s because of how you have pandered to him or could it be something much more sinister you aren’t aware of he’s done something reprehensible. I can understand siblings not getting on but for all 3 inc a 15 yr old to be effectively saying I wish you were dead is very extreme. I think you urgently need therapy to navigate this.

Some times we need to look at things from the bleakest realistic possibility to start to grasp what's going on.

You can find it distasteful. But it's making a point that many do experience. They just don't necessarily say it out loud. It remains the thought process though

Unless it's spelt out bluntly it never hits home that it's not necessarily the kids excluding. It's that they feel shut out from having the right to having feelings about the family dynamics.

There is clearly a huge amount of locked up anger and resentment in there.

It's not coming from nowhere and I just don't believe it's because three kids are ALL that entitled and evil when it comes to their brother.

To move forward it has to be fully confronted and that's not going to be pretty regardless of anyone's desire to be nice.

I just read what the OP wrote, it wasn't there. But everyone and everything had to be put on hold because of the golden child.

Don't get me wrong, I completely understand why a mum would feel more protective towards a child who nearly died at birth, but it's still unfair to revolve the entire family around ONE child, who is not even disabled or seriously ill or anything? It's a very bizarre way to behave

If you have planned a movie night with your kids, and one has a stomach bug, wouldn't one adult take the kids to the movie, and the other adult stay with the sick one? Who would cancel for everyone like the OP? And tell the other "it's not fair if your brother misses out". That's not normal.

I think it would be unfortunate if the Op wrote 3/4 kids off as just “not nice people.” That s the type of response that might lead to a post in 15 years “I don’t know why DD doesn’t have me over to see that baby more.”

None of us are perfect, I yell at my kids, I say the wrong thing, they spend a lot of time in childcare etc

I hope that they are grateful for what we strive to give them, but I chose to have them and to a point it’s my job to do my best my them.

And if my kids raise something with me as young adults I will have to deal with it e.g. I hated spending so much time in childcare, my response shouldn’t be “did you not like your house and all the things I paid for for you?!”

As parents we need to listen and engage with our children. Really engage.

We also need to set boundaries about what it’s acceptable, but not only boundaries.

And we also need to take a look at ourselves as to why we do certain things. Like talking about a birth story regularly decades later, or bringing it up in a fight.

They show favour because they pull them up when they say nasty things, that she gets upset that whilst they leave him out they’re cruel in the response to him if he asks to be involved. Wow, the fact that 20yo is allowed to live under their roof whilst being a nasty bully (despite why they maybe) is showing favour to them. They must realise it was never their brothers fault. They have had a life that maybe was seemed lacking by their peers but maybe the parents should have put them in state school and given them a dose of reality. Where being upset over a few cancelled holidays whilst still having holidays would have been met with the contempt it deserves.

I think it is extremely unlikely that all three are awful nasty callous bastards or whatever they've been called by Mumsnet's bastions of inclusion and kindness.

I went to private school (not in Uk), the people who bullied me were the poorest kids in the year. The richest kid was very nice. Not everything comes down to privilege.

It isn't about a "bastion of kindness and inclusion". It's about recognising that in situations like this, there is always more than one side to the story.

All we've had is the mums side of the story and it's very clear she favours her 19 year old whether this is conscious or unconsciously. I see it in the way she writes and speaks about him. We don't the point of view of the siblings, how they viewed their childhood, what they felt they missed out on, how they experienced things. Are comments being said all the time or are they being said in the heat of the moment?

I think that's fair. Something in the way in which this family has been handled had produced this. A trio of rotters doesn't suddenly spring up in a family like dandelions.

No, that’s not how she’s shown favor, as I suspect you already know if you’ve bothered to read OP’s posts. Even she acknowledges they have reason to feel resentment. I highly doubt it’s ‘only’ because of a few cancelled holidays either. This is one of those threads where I really would be interested in hearing what the siblings have to say, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it was very different to OP’s account.

Dismissing their feelings as contemptible doesn’t magically change how they feel, or do anything at all to fix the situation or the broken relationships. Actually, that’s the attitude that’s almost certainly guaranteed to worsen both.

And lol, they should have been sent to state school as a form of punishment? To be bullied? I thought state schools were supposed to produce kind and inclusive individuals? Yeah, you’re really selling it as superior to private schools.

I find a huge number of posters are only interested in the symptoms not the cause. They don’t deal with what’s been said about what might be cause, they just say “so the behaviour is ok?!”

Obviously the behaviour is not ok, but only punishing the behaviour will just further entrench the behaviour IMO based on what’s already happened.

And people are making it about class - private school brats, pity about them having holdiays cancelled in their privileged life, wouldn’t be tolerated in my house etc. That also won’t solve anything.

Do you have any close family friends Op that you trust to be honest.
The vibe I’m getting as a stranger reading your posts is ds 19 can do no wrong and has been treated as a delicate flower.
Your posts aren’t consistent. If he’s independent with friends and now in reasonable health why is he sadly retreating to his room. He’ll have his own plans.
My dd is working at an American summer camp. The parents send info about the kids - she had twins. She spoke to me after last summer about how could parents so blatantly favour one twin over another and how they could be so blind to the real situation. Parent had pretty much written twin A is awful, twin B is an angel who can do no wrong. In reality and my dd was with them 24/7 for 2.5 months twin B was a nasty manipulative piece of work. But mum was oblivious.

That wasn’t the point. Their peer group was predominantly privileged so they compare their experiences to that. These kids did have plans cancelled but as reiterated by The OP they still experienced many holidays, trips, all birthdays where celebrated, they tried to compensate. They were disappointed but had their peer group been less fortunate their moaning would have fell on deaf ears as their peer group would have been more mixed. You’re also missing the point that visiting friends of these kids are also treating him with contempt, on who’s behest is that from? These kids aren’t 10 yo who know no better. They’re on precipice of adulthood and shouldn’t be behaving this way.