16-year-old son with no contact - devastated

[SeasideK]

Me and my wife separated 2.5 years ago. It was an amicable separation, instigated by me but no drama (no affair or anything). I moved out into a flat near the family home and my ex-wife and son (let’s call him Sam) continued to live there. Sam stayed overnight with me twice a week, both midweek and at weekends and we would all attend events with our mutual friends and see one another with no issues. Sam and I had season tickets for the football, would go to the cinema, out for food, for walks, catch up with friends and he would come to band practice with me and happily sit and sing along with us. Sam and I had a nice holiday to Scotland to visit my friends and me and Sam had a day at the Edinburgh fringe on our own which was great.

Fast forward a few months to Sam turning 16. He celebrated his birthday and then suddenly with no incidents, he told me he didn't want to stay with me nor see me anymore. I did go round to the house to speak to him, but he was non-responsive and didn’t give me any reasons why he didn’t want to see me.
After a while, Sam blocked me on his phone / WhatsApp etc and refused to engage in any communication at all. He also blocked all of my family members (my parents, siblings etc).

I am understandably, devastated. Eventually my ex-wife told me some reasons why Sam no longer wanted to see me. The reasons given were that he didn't like the way he was spoken to by me sometimes, was upset about an argument he witnessed between me and my dad, that I didn't show an interest in the things Sam was into. I admit the argument wasn't good, but I did apologise to Sam at the time. Sam had never mentioned the other issues to me, so I wasn't aware. I do know I can be brusque and direct in conversation in general. I addressed the issues raised by Sam in a letter to him which my ex says he read but didn't respond to.

I contacted a mediator, but Sam has refused to meet with the mediator even though my ex-wife originally said he was open to speaking to the mediator.
It has now been six months, and I do not know what to do next. My ex-wife is not particularly helpful at all. I have always had a good relationship with Sam and at the minute I can’t see a way of moving this to an outcome I’d be happy with.

I would desperately like any advice from anyone with real-life experiences and any ideas for how to move forwards.

Thank you so much
K

My guess from reading what you’ve written is that there is some longstanding pain from your relationship that he is dealing with and possibly something going on to do with your family (either things they have said to him or things one of them has done), which was maybe brought to the surface by the argument he witnessed. Sometimes we can do lots of nice things and provide lots of nice stuff, but it doesn’t fix the pain from the damage that has been done.

Speaking as someone who has no relationship with a parent, there is always a reason that someone goes no contact. It doesn’t just happen out of the blue for no reason. If the reason isn’t glaringly obvious to you, then it’s either something you aren’t aware of (could he have been abused by someone and feels you aren’t protecting him because of your relationship with them?), or it’s something you are in denial about. I don’t mean that in an accusatory way, but sometimes it’s very hard to admit we’ve made big mistakes as a parent.

I cannot recommend enough using this time to do some work yourself. Not with a mediator, but with a therapist. Actually talk honestly about your flaws and what you can improve. You can consider family therapy with your son down the road if he wants to do it, but I would start with yourself and your own accountability. It’s the one thing I really needed from my parent and that would have made a difference in healing our relationship.

Thanks for this. Definitely given me some things to think about. It definitely could be linked into my parents as they do argue a lot and can say things without thinking so that could have had an impact on my son.

bump.