how much did it hurt to lose an estranged member of the family?

[mattysmum09]

Just wondering as I have no experience of this but I'm thinking of say a close relative but you are not actualy close to them haven't spoken for maybe two three years.... Don't particularly like each other but one day that person dies in a tragic way.... Do u stil feel as much guilt and grief as u would if u were close?

Only really heard much from close family member when they were v ill. So hadn't seen them much at all over the years. Don't miss them but regret not encouraging more meet ups when they were alive, but they were the one leading the busy exciting life abroad and not much interested in us.

My stepdaughter has been estranged from us for 6 years now. We have no idea why and she will not respond to letters or emails. We get no acknowledgement of gifts for her ds. My dh will be 77 soon and I have come to hate SD for the hurt she has caused him. He says he is "heart sore". I hope she is devastated when he dies but her devastation would in no way compensate for what she is doing to him now.

My dad died last yr. I hadnt seen him for 13 yrs. I didnt feel anything at all. I know my sister felt the same. I had however already grieved for our lack of relationship so i think that had something to do with it. Everyone is different though

My dad died 2 years ago, hadn't spoken to him for years. . Long story.
Turns out he had cancer, knew he was dying but didn't want to tell me.

Left feeling very angry & very guilty that I didn't see him before he died. Put a letter in his coffin with photos of my DS (who he never met) & of my wedding day (which he wasn't at), was therapeutic at the time but the anger, guilt & sadness remain.

Wish I could turn the clock back to just be able to say goodbye.

I have been having these thoughts about my Mother recently, I haven't spoken to her in a couple of years and I doubt I will again, but I have no clue what I will do if she gets ill or dies. My brother will want me there but I would feel like a fraud because, to be honest, I can't see me being sad, she was an utter cow to me while portraying herself as the perfect Mother to everyone else.

My Dad is probably dead already, I haven't seen him since I was little, my Mother burned all his letters he wrote and his pictures and refused to even give me his proper name or DOB to trace him from. I feel a sort of numbness about that because I will never know, if I did find out for sure then I would be pretty gutted I lost my chance to ever have a Dad even for a short while.

I will tell you. It is very frightening. They use all sorts of threats and emotional blackmail to get you back in line (to stop challenging their sense of being perfect), and because they once had power of life or death over you once, you do battle with the terror of obliteration.

This is when I learned: courage means doing the right thing even though you are completely terrified.
It is also when the sayings of Jesus 'I have come to give you life/you are reborn through repentence/[my way of living the truth] will put you against your mother and your father - made complete sense. It is living the full life he talks about, as opposed to a half life pandering to others.

But, you know? The need to live authentically is what you strive for. You know instinctively that this is what will save you and give you life, instead of crushing yourself to appease someone else.

thegreylady: can I please earnestly advise you not to get involved in this. They had a relationship way before you came along. Do not blindly take his side, the obliviousness of men means he has no intention of seeing her side and she probably gave up. Why enable his pity party? HE did this.

You know, if there was knocking in the engine, what would your poor sad husband do? He would stop the car, open the bonnet and look at the engine. In other words, he would look at the problem. Has your poor husband asked the two magic questions: 'what is wrong? What do you need from me to make things better?' and then LISTENED to the answer? I bet you he hasn't...

Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. What goes around comes back round again. Your H did something/failed to do something/hurt her mother way in the past, and this is HIS problem, not yours.

Sorry I am cynical but children have to be desperate to divorce their parents. Parents hurt children, they do. They should remember this time your H is at:

they won't always be in a position of power, and who will be choosing their retirement plans.

abit wobbly now you dont know anything about thegreyladys situation so where did all that come from?! major projection going on there and what the heck does "obliviousness of men" mean?!

I think wobbly actually has a point.

He certainly knows what happened six years ago even if thegreylady has no clue as to why. People generally do not cut off parents without an awful lot of soul searching beforehand. Going no contact is incredibly difficult.

I have nothing to do with most of my father's family. For good reason.

In that time, a couple of them have died. Probably more, but I only heard about a couple.

I didn't and don't give a shit. Don't care either way. No weeping and wailing or oh, if only I had... I was as sorry for those who loved them as I would be for any stranger, in an 'oh, sorry for your loss' way, but no more than that.

There are lots of them. I wouldn't be able to pick them out of a line up. Haven't had anything to do with them for over 20 years. Why would I be broken up about it? They're strangers to me.

I don't wish them dead, but I don't grieve for them. I don't hate them any more. I don't have any feelings for any of them. And I don't go to their funerals.

I do know Jack, that children have to be REALLY pushed and finally give up all hope before they cut contact. Do you think she (the SD) is doing this for fun???? Have you READ any 'dysfunction' posts? Do not automatically assume emotional health in families.

The second clue is Greylady's complete 100% adherence to Poor Hubby's pity party and putting all blame on the child. However distressing it is to see his pain, not once does she show any curiousity or empathy for how this might have happened. No casting her mind back to what event triggered the no contact. No willingness to consider that PH might have a part to play.

Thirdly, if men do not tend to resist introspection, that this is an hysterical Wobbly anti-man thing, what explanation can you put forward to the literally hundreds of pages in the relationships thread, which are overwhelmingly women trying to manage difficult relationships with men who resist them, when all they want is something so reasonable - raising complaints so that they can be heard and worked on, for a mutually beneficial outcome?

I say hard things (I fuggin hate bad parenting I admit it is a red mist thing for me). But it doesn't make them any less real.

I lost my mother many years ago. She is still alive but was dead to me for most of my adult life, most of my childhood too, but it is a long story.

She now has Alzheimer's. And the person who was my mother is indeed dead. What is left bears no resemblance to the woman she was.

I have arranged her care and visit often. I have seen her more in the last six months than I have in 20 years. It is very bittersweet. I do it out of duty and because I believe it is the right thing to do. I know that when she does finally pass away I will have done everything I can, but I know there will still be regrets. For all the years that were lost and for the things I cannot change.

I spent a long time in therapy to learn that you can only change what you are in control of (yourself) and that you cannot change other people.

I do worry about how I will feel when it happens. There is so much left unsaid, and it is too late to get answers from her but I think that the fact that we do have contact now and knowing that it makes her happy means that I will have a clear conscience in the end, and that, I hope, will make it easier.

"children have to be REALLY pushed and finally give up all hope before they cut contact"

No they don't. There are all kinds of reasons why someone may not wish to have anything to do with their family. In one example in my own family the person concerned was an alcoholic, blamed everyone else for her own failings, and had isolated herself from society in general... not just her parents and siblings

To answer the original question.... there have been quite a few other examples of estrangement in my extended family. In almost all cases, the imminent death of the person involved led to some kind of contact being restored, mostly constructively.

that may be your opinion abitwobblynow but your post came across like youre the authority on thegreyladys husbands situation. i dont think you should assume what you dont know about.

I think that was Wobbly's point, JumpingJack - that the grey lady has just assumed that the fault lies with the SD rather than her husband.