Reconciliation after estrangement?

[Albinoni]

I have NC'd for this but have posted in the past about my relationship with DD1 and was grateful for the advice and support which I received. The posts have since been deleted, at my request, but some of you may remember 'Lobster Boy', and my concerns that DD was in a controlling relationship and that I risked losing her.

Unfortunately, my fears were justified as DD seemed to become more and more withdrawn from the family, saying that her BF was her family now. She ghosted all of the family entirely for six months - apparently she just blocked us all - then there were occasional calls and she did send birthday cards etc. She moved house without providing an address and we didn't see her for two and a half years. I cannot begin to describe how painful that period was for me and DH and her sisters, but those of you who have been through this process of living bereavement will understand.

Anyway, the good news is that there has been a reconciliation following a lunch on neutral ground, in a restaurant, earlier this year (she lives hundreds of miles away from us). Prior to that, she had provided her address, so that we could send some books to her which are relevant to a course which she is intending to take next year. At the lunch, she said that they had married the previous year, and we said how pleased we were, and contact continued to improve.

The following month they asked if they could borrow some money to put towards buying a property and we agreed. Shortly after that, DD told me she was expecting a baby (due any day now), which I was overjoyed about. Then, a few weeks after that - and this is the part I am really struggling with - we received a letter from DD and SIL enclosing photos of the 14 month old which they already had. The accompanying letter was quite upsetting as it said they hadn't told us about DGC because they didn't want her to experience broken relationships and they hadn't been sure whether or not they wanted us involved at all, but they felt guilty at taking our money and not telling us about DGC.

DD and I subsequently had an emotional conversation and, since then, DD has been in contact with me virtually every day with messages and photos and is behaving almost as though nothing has happened. She says I can't think about the past or what I have missed and clearly wants to move forward. I know that she is right in that we cannot change the past and she assures me that she definitely does want us to be involved.

But I am in such turmoil over this. Obviously I am thrilled and excited about the reconciliation and the DGC, but I feel so desperately hurt and upset that she didn't tell any of us about all of these things, especially as I believed that we were close before. I am really struggling, to be honest, although it's early days and there is a lot to come to terms with.

We haven't met DGC1 yet as I think we both felt that it would be better to wait for the baby to be born and then meet them both together, when the emotions have died down a bit. The last thing I want to do is cause her any stress at this time and I sense that they are anxious at our meeting her PILs for the first time. I am also anxious about it, although they sound like lovely people and have been very supportive to DD. But goodness knows what they must think of us. I am also worried about becoming attached to the DGC in case they are taken away from me. I just couldn't put myself through all that again.

So I was wondering if anyone could give me advice if you have been in a similar situation. How easy was it to reconcile? Did the whole family reconcile or was it a piecemeal process? Did you involve any professional help, such as a counsellor or family mediator? Has it worked out? Are things the same and can the relationship ever really recover or is it just different? I really don't want to mess this up, as I have realised how fragile relationships can be, but I am feeling a bit overwhelmed.

Glad to hear your update. It's going to be a tough journey for you all so glad positive communication is improving with DD1

So very pleased for you all that the news is positive.

I hope the treatment speeds by, and it is soon all behind you.

That is truly wonderful news. I hope this journey you're about to start is as smooth and affective as possible.

I have seen those who care for cancer patients. Please OP. Take care of yourself. He is the love of your life but you're also his. You need to look after yourself as well.

You really are a wonderful person.

So happy to hear your positive update OP
Wishing your husband ALL of the luck in the world with treatment and please god, beating this x

Relieved to hear that you've had some positive news. DD1 will do what she wants to do, your dd2 is right and very wise, so when you're disappointed she doesn't visit despite the news, remember what dd2 said

Hi OP. I haven’t yet commented on your thread. I just want to say how happy I am to hear the cancer hasn’t spread. It’s a tough journey ahead. I think you need to take a breath and rethink any financial assistance you have promised to your DD1. You may need that money if things go bad and cancer is unpredictable. Please don’t give them any money. Your priority now needs to be potentially protecting your future. What happens if the cancer can’t be controlled by chemo and you need funds to send him for treatment in another country? Keep all of your resources. A friend of mine had cervical cancer. Initially chemo got rid of it. It came back somewhere else and chemo wasn’t working. We all raised £60 thousand to send her overseas for the type of therapy they don’t do here on NHS. Please keep your precious resources in case you need them. His life is more important.

Great news! Brilliant ❤️

So delighted for you Albinoni and family.
Hopefully DD1 will cop herself on and leave the coercive control of LBoy.

In a strange way I think this will start making DD1 question some of her choices, the distance the no contact.
Hopefully enough to see sense but only time will tell.
So relieved it hasn't spread OP.

What a huge relief, I am so relieved too! Hope the treatment isn't too brutal and your DH isn't diminished too severely by it.
Good news about DD1 and the wake up call for you also that nothing is more important that the health of your family. This has well and truly broken you out of the cycle of brooding about that situation and wondering how things might have been different.
Will await further updates as you feel ready to post x

Wishing you all the best for the treatment, do you have a timescale? will you still be able to go to South Africa?

Sorry not to have replied for a couple of days, as still feeling a bit dazed. I do really appreciate all your posts though, and I will post again in the next day or two, when I have had time to process everything. X

@Albinoni I hope you’re ok and have good support from your family and friends while you deal with everything you have going on at the moment.

Thanks Monday and to all of you for your kind comments.

I feel a bit numb, to be honest. After the euphoria of learning that the cancer hasn't spread, which gives hope, I have crashed down to earth and it still all feels unreal. It is going to be a hard road ahead and I hate the thought of seeing DH suffer, of all the uncertainties. He was meant to have another scan last week, but the hospital couldn't fit him in, so hopefully it will be this week and then we can get the full picture and move forward. It just all seems to be a waiting game. I wish I could wind the clock forward 6 months.

I am not sleeping. I lie awake at night imagining worst case scenarios, which I know is really stupid, as I need to think positive thoughts, and sometimes I succeed. I spend too much time dwelling on past events - big events such as our wedding and the births of our DDs - but also myriad random small events, in all of which DH has been present. The thought of losing him is unbearable.

We have an appointment with a solicitor today to change our wills - DD1's share will be divided equally between her and her DC, on trust until they are 25. The wills will actually state that each of our DDs will share equally with any of their DC, so it is fair, but the reality is that I don't want LB near anything of mine, so far as I can help it. God forbid, if anything were to happen to both of us, he would be like a ferret down a hole, 'taking charge' and 'protecting' DD, before we were even cold, and upsetting DDs 2 and 3.

Sorry, that sounds really morbid, doesn't it? I believe DH can survive the treatment and live for many years - I have to believe it, but I will feel easier in my mind when the wills are done. It's one less thing to worry about.

In the meantime, we are carrying on as we were, and we are spending the next weekend away with some good friends. I haven't told them yet, but we have agreed that we will, so that we have a 'get out of gaol free' card, if he is tired or doesn't feel up to doing as much as they might want to do.

DH is till keen to visit DD1 and meet the DGDs. I wonder if, at the back of his mind, he thinks this might be the only time, although he is speaking positively about treatment and the future. I have to respect his feelings on this, although I remain, at best, ambivalent. In my sorry for myself moments, I feel that everything I love is taken away from me, so I am very wary of forming any attachment to the DGDs. Even though DD1 might genuinely want some sort of reconciliation or ongoing relationship, she has shown that she will cut us out of her life at the drop of a hat if LB tells her she should.

DH also wants to provide the rent for a year but not pay anything else and, again, I have to respect his decision.

I was chatting to a friend who is a school teacher the other day. She thinks that it will be extremely difficult for them to uproot the family, relocate to the other end of the country, and do the PGCE and first year qualification year between them at the same time. Apparently, there is a lot of work to be done after class finishes. Also, how will they manage with one car - they won't so what's the betting that will be on their list of things required to 'support' them? Anyway, we shall see.

Morning Albinoni
Your emotions are bound to be all over the place. Such a horrible situation for you all. Once you have a treatment plan fixed in place you will hopefully feel a little less uncertain. Try not to think too far in to the future, I know that hard but it can seem too overwhelming if you do . One step at a time .

Everyone ‘s cancer treatment is different but I honestly didn’t find mine as bad as I was imagining . Not saying it was nice because obviously it wasn’t but not as horrendous as I thought it would be. Yes there were bad days but also good days and the worst bit for me was ,as you describe, the fear and uncertainty.

I know you will want to be strong for DH and your DDs but please don’t put too much pressure on yourself to feel positive all the time . That’s a really hard thing to do and adds to the strain .

Good plan regarding the wills .

I’m a teacher and I agree with your friend I think what Dd1 and LB have planned for next year is highly unlikely to succeed but thankfully that is not your problem . It’s a decision they have made independently.

Hope you manage to enjoy your weekend with friends , I think it’s good to tell as many people as you feel comfortable with. They’ll want to support you .

Take care
💐 💐 💔

It does show what an unnatural situation she is in, that she hasn’t been straight over to you on a train.
You have so much to deal with and yet also have all the stress and worry of wondering what will next be demanded of you.
Would her sisters tell her a few home truths , or go and see her ?
When are you supposed to be visiting, in March ?

Good luck with the scan. At least when you get a treatment plan and start treatment then you will feel like you are dealing with this - at the moment you are in limbo and it must be all surreal for you.

There are so many different types of chemo. I had two different sorts, the first wasn't half bad, apart from a few days after the treatment it was pretty much business as usual, to my surprise. The second was a bit grim but in reality it was only 3 months, a beginning and an end. I was on my own with mine and that made things a lot harder, DH has you and the girls. Makes all the difference. I've been amazed to hear a relative is cooking and gadding about in the car, going away for the weekend etc during his treatment. DH may not even have chemo.

I personally absolutely refuse to get into a state in the middle of the night if I can't sleep - once all that stuff starts I get out the laptop sharpish, headphones on, and get lost in something lovely and diverting. I usually drop off to sleep quite quickly. Just my way of going about things Albino. I've been through a lot in life and I've got quite good at circumventing psychological torture! 💐❤️

Albino I not Albino! Stupid autocorrect 🙄

Re dd1, it may be the psycho nutjob LB goes too far. My ex went too far when we were faced with an awful family tragedy. He was deeply inappropriate and it badly jarred with me. It set up a questioning in me.. It could be dd1 is shocked at LB's kneejerk response, as I was with my exh.

Listen to your gut Albinoni - it’s doing a great job for you right now from what I can tell from your last post.

You are getting your priorities right and putting in boundaries.

It is a huge risk to get in too deep with the DGDs right now - you know that LB will continue to goad and emotionally blackmail you with them - regardless of your DHs health. He has a significant PD and will still be looking to continue to financially exploit and emotionally abuse you both.

He doesn’t have the emotional capacity to feel remorse, love, empathy. His brain will be clanking away a mile a minute working out how to manoeuvre and exploit this latest turn of events.

You can’t afford this focus / risk - so keep emotionally detached. Save your finite energy for your DH.

Well done on the wills - that’s a great decision. Don’t worry about what else will come up around more money needed because you have already made that decision - the answer is “No - that’s not possible.” Full sentence. No further explanation needed. Might be worth stating that right up front when you agree to pay the rent (do you have a cap / figure on this? Will you pay the deposit, the fees, moving costs, etc). Because the next tranche of begging / financial explanation will be around the DGDs - shoes, clothes, some sort of expensive alternative therapy, piano / riding / ballet / mandarin lessons etc etc.

I hope that this week brings clarity and a way forward for your DH and that you can still get back to that elation from last week and enjoy that with your DDs.

Argh!!!

Hi @Albinoni I know you’re feeling a bit all over the place at the moment but this is a really good update, I hope the solicitor went well it’s absolutely the right way to do it then the maximum Lb can get anywhere near to is a sixth of the estate.

With the rent that’s a good solution but do try and set a budget for them based on the average price of a low end 2 bedroom place.

Wishing you all the best especially for DH over the next few weeks.

Grohnjant - thanks for your positive post. DH now has an appointment for the PET scan tomorrow morning, which is good. Apparently the cancer team review cases on Mondays, so hopefully we will have a consultation next week to decide on treatment.

We are going out to lunch to our favourite Mexican restaurant, with DD2 and DD3 today, before DD3 heads off back to London, which will be lovely. We put some records on the gramophone last night and managed to be quite happy, whereas Sunday afternoon was a low spot. We are all just trying to be as normal as possible, but it feels like the calm before the storm.

I think you are right that it will be extremely difficult for DD1 and LB to cope with everything with the move and the course etc, but I am not going to get involved. Otherwise, they will just try to find some way of blaming me if it all goes pear shaped. I hope that they succeed, but I don't have the energy to care very much at present. I know that sounds heartless.

Monday - you are right that it's the being in limbo which is the worst - I know that PET scans are more detailed than CT scans so I am worried that it will show up things that the CT scan didn't.

springy - I hope that DH is as well as your relative, but we will see. I anticipate that it will be a gruelling couple of months but just pray that there will be a good outcome. You are totally right about just putting on headphones at night instead of endlessly brooding. DD3 has also recommended CBD oil, which I have tried a couple times and does seem to be quite effective at calming and inducing more peaceful sleep. I don't know what LB's response to the news is - I can't imagine that he has a shred of sympathy for DH, me or DDs 2 and 3, but he presumably has some feelings for DD1 and its effect on her.

Gutterton - DH's diagnosis has obviously hit us all very hard, but I am also struggling not to feel bitter towards DD1 at present. I am generally not a bitter person, as bitterness just corrodes the person who feels it and taints other aspects of life. But I think what if DH doesn't make it - he could have had so much joy during his last couple years with the wedding and the birth of DGD1, and she and LB deprived him of that. We could have rejoiced as a family. Instead, DD1 and LB have brought a lot of misery and, although I might forgive for myself, I will find it hard to forgive for DH if he has limited time available. But I can't say that, because he wants this meeting to go ahead and he is entirely forgiving. And of course I have to believe that all will be well and that he will be with us for a long time.

I was thinking back to that vile response DD1 sent me a couple of weeks ago, just a few days before DH's diagnosis. How she referred to things being on an 'upward trajectory' and my message 'not being conducive to the relationship you want' - also, referring to how they had decided to open up their family to us and let us visit their home. The whole attitude was that we are doing you a great favour. There was no sense that they wanted a relationship or that they even regard us as part of 'their' family. I also struggle with the assumption that you can measure the relationship as improving because DD1 now communicates with us. I have come to the realisation that DDs 2 and 3 reached a long time ago that, whereas I still love DD1, I have been striving for something which probably just doesn't exist. I now think that, although I will maintain communication, the relationship with DD1 suffered a terrible, if not fatal, blow on 5 September 2019, when we received the photographs of the grandchild she had not told us about.

I would like to get the money sorted and pay an agreed sum, but I can't think of that right now. At least we are sorting the wills out.

billy - DD1 would share her third of the estate with her DC under the new will so, as things stand, she would inherit just over 10% and each of the DGDs would inherit the same.

All cancer treatments are different. PET scan is very detailed and I hope nothing else is found. They may decide to operate or simply go straight for chemo and radio as a first line treatment. The treatment is very targeted around the cancer and side effects are very different for all. The main thing is to understand that a cancer diagnosis is like a bomb blowing up in your life and you feel like you are walking around in a daze. Your DD1 is likely very upset but I am surprised she hasn't rushed to see her father. However she is the least of to worries as your DH will need a lot of support in the coming months

Yes they do act as though they're doing us a favour. The clear subtext is 'behave, or you will be punished'. I don't know what gets into them 🙄