When you don’t talk to your own family anymore

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Going through a family estrangement unfortunately. Due to my family’s interference when my ex and I making decisions on my children visiting him and his family which leads to emotional abuse and verbal abuse. One family member for a second time has been round to my house and shouted at me and my partner in front of the children. I tried all last year to patch it up but the shouting at me in front of the children has happened again. I haven’t spoken to my family for three weeks now and I want to keep them at a distance and focus on my household.

How can you allow children to have a maintain a relationship with family members you no longer want to talk to yet protect them from their opinions talk which is damaging to my household? Or if I have to stop their contact how do you explain a fall out and support the children without hurting them emotionally? Only one of my three children wants to see the adults but all of them would like to be able to see their cousins.

"How can you allow children to have a maintain a relationship with family members you no longer want to talk to yet protect them from their opinions talk which is damaging to my household?"

You don't. If the relatives are too difficult/batshit/abusive for YOU to deal with its the SAME deal for the children as well. They as well as you need to be protected from the sort of person who has again turned up at your house to verbally abuse you and your partner in front of your kids.

"Or if I have to stop their contact how do you explain a fall out and support the children without hurting them emotionally? Only one of my three children wants to see the adults but all of them would like to be able to see their cousins"

How old are your children?. Give them the age appropriate truth; if they are older you can explain a bit more. Explain this is your decision to make. When was the last time they saw their cousins anyway?. It may be they do not have much of a relationship with them anyway due to physical distance and they attending schools their cousins are not in.

Personally, my children have no relationship with my family. If they are too fucked up for it to be healthy for me, they are definitely too fucked up to have anything to do with my children.

It’s hard to gauge what the relationships currently are like, but my children haven’t seen my family in 3 years. One of the doesn’t even remember them and the older one does but truly has only asked about them a handful of times. We explained in an age appropriate way the reasons why we couldn’t see them anymore, and she just said she couldn’t understand how they could think they were being kind in how they treated us, shrugged, and has never mentioned them again.

If you really do want dc to see cousins, could you offer to collect them to take them to the park or over to yours without their parents?

Thanks for your replies. Good to know I’m not alone with not having a supportive family and cutting them off.
I am recovering from cancer treatment and surgery too - had an oesophagectomy in September. I just don’t want any stress.

I was thinking to suggest meeting up with the children and cousins at trampolining or the park. My sibling has only checked in with the other family members and sides with them. They’ve never asked how I am and have been avoiding me. We had a birthday party for my youngest and none of their household came to see my daughter. One adult and child were sick but the other adult and child weren’t. They text my children saying ridiculously grown up things like, “our door is open”. Like a 10 year old can drive round to theirs. They began a conversation with “I want you to know that * loves you. You don’t have to believe what your mum says to you just because you feel sorry for her” My dc are 12, 10 and 8 and their cousins are 4 and 2. They live about a 10 minute drive away. I see them once a week when my youngest and their eldest do karate together.

Why would you want to encourage a relationship between her children and your own?. Guilt?. Guilt here is a useless emotion.

I would not do this due to the age gap between her children and yours. They really have nothing in common with each other and I would think they are in separate groupings in karate. Also your sibling is not siding with you nor does she want to hear your side of things.

Do you think it would be healthy for your children to continue these relationships? If so, why, when it's not healthy for you?

Do you let your children do other things you think are unhealthy for them? If not, how do you explain it to them? I'm sure you find ways of telling them that it's not good for them to eat chocolate or pizza for every meal, or that they need to get off their xbox and play outside for a bit.

You're in charge of their welfare. Take charge. Walking away from people who don't know how to have respectful relationships is a good lesson. Don't hide it from them.

My children don’t even know those people exist.

There's an awful lot of long married over 55s who really don't much like each other. So many reasons though why they don't split. It's complicated but money is often a big factor, as is a fear of being on their own.