Cutting off my parents after family abuse

[Mum2Girls90]

Hi mumsnet,
I really need some advice. Some may remember a year ago I posted that my daughter (9 at the time) had disclosed she was being sexually abused by my older brother.
Fast forward a year and he has just been found guilty and convicted of 3 counts of sexual assault with a child under 13.

This has been both a relief and rising conflict as it’s my family.
My parents never threw him out, nor did he receive any punishment from them whatsoever. He continued his daily life living with my parents, whilst me, my partner & 2 daughters have been blamed, removed and punished for taking legal action.

With the run up to court, I could no longer continue watching my mum side with him. She attended court hearings & everyday in the 5 day trial with him. Some days I attended alone if my DP couldn’t get time off work.
We had to support our daughter on our own without my family.
Ever since then, family members have crawled out of the wood work with their opinions of how wrong I am for stopping contact with my parents, as well as refusing them contact with my children.
I have tried to explain my reasoning, all abuse happened at their home, their lack of support, the fact they are harbouring a convicted paedophile. In my eyes, they can’t have the best of both worlds by seeing my children too. My mum has always been overbearing, always step on my toes. I always put it down to her own parenting guilt from not supporting me through hard times at a younger age. However, it has all become too much. People throwing guilt and blame at me left right and centre.

Today, my dad text and again tried to pass the blame that I’m the reason he hasn’t so much as even sent a text! I’m furious.
He told me I’m breaking my mums heart and how dare I stop her from seeing her grandchildren.

This isn’t a decision I’ve made lightly, I just can’t look at my mum or have a relationship with her after the way she has hugely let us down. She was a very big part of our life which hurts more the way she’s behaved.

Am I wrong to cut contact?
I worry my children will hate me for cutting out their grandparents after this huge battle in our family.
But I don’t know how I’m supposed to continue this life with her in it when she still has him living at home before his sentencing while as a family we are trying to pick up broken pieces and rebuild our lives.

Someone please help ☹️

Mum I am so sorry. Meeting your mother must have been a dagger in your heart. I went out recently to a fancy meal, one where I spent the whole day applying fake tan, doing my nails really dolling myself up (I never bother with that shit) only for my mother to end up seated at the table beside me. I was gutted. I didn’t let it ruin the evening but it was so difficult. It took all of my resolve. It is just so hard.

I have learned is that it is okay to be gutted that this cannot be fixed. I found myself in the early days having to justify and replay why I cut off my parents over and over to myself to make my peace with it but the real grief was for the fact I had found myself in a situation I did not want to be in. I wanted a relationship with my parents, I wanted them to do the right thing. Grieving over that, rather than trying to convince myself constantly I had done the right thing was instrumental in me moving on. I generally don’t do as much of the blame or guilt anymore just profound sadness that I (and my children) have lost a relationship that was so so important to me and my children. That grief is like a death, it will never leave but it definitely gets much easier to deal with. I am so sorry you are going through this.

Your parents are in denial and are angry that you aren’t playing your part in their denial. Until they are ready to face what’s happened, there’s really no point in contact.

They’ve probably made excuses for your brother his entire life and unfortunately this is no different. They also don’t want to face their part in the situation and have chosen to pressure you to maintain their innocence.

Stay strong, unfortunately this situation has exposed some really unpleasant and deep rooted dysfunctional dynamics within your family.