Struggling with DP's decision to cut contact with his family - please help if you can.

[foothesnoo]

I would really like some advice.

My DP has always had a difficult relationship with his parents. When I met him he was in sporadic contact with them. As our relationship progressed he built bridges with them and they have been quite involved in our lives, visiting their grandchildren regularly and even going on holiday with us on occasion. I have had a good relationship with them, especially his mother who does treat me like a daughter, but they are not easy to be with. His father is a controlling bully who has been violent to his mother. His mother is a victim but also quite manipulative (I hope that doesn?t sound too harsh).

Last year DP had a breakdown and we have come through a really hard 12 months and out the other side. DP has come to the realisation that his relationship with his parents has never been healthy and in fact is destructive to his own mental health. He has cut contact with them for the last 12 months and feels that this is a good thing for him. He has also more or less cut contact with his siblings who he sees as not supporting him. This means that our children have lost contact with their grandparents and also their cousins on that side of the family.

I am struggling with it all. I want to support DP and I think he has both the right and the justification to cut his parents out of his life. But I feel really sad about it ? I know it will be hard for his mum particularly not to see our kids. And I feel for his siblings , one of whom has not been in a place where she can be supportive, even if she had wanted to.

How can I balance loyalty to DP, the needs of my kids and DP?s need not to have his family in his life anymore? How can I step back and think this is not my issue to solve, it?s DP?s choice? I have been mediating their relationship for years.

Thanks slim and surrounded. It's really useful to explore things a bit on here. Sad to see so many people who have this sort of situation - obviously more common than I thought.

I agree with most of slim's response but would say this is not grudge holding as much as protecting your own sanity from people who keep on emotionally hurting you and continually letting you down through their behaviours. Your partner now needs to concentrate primarily on himself and his own family unit of you and your children.

Just because they're his parents does not give them carte blanche to act in such a manner. People would not put up with this type of toxic behaviour from friends so why should parents be any different?. Blood is not always thicker than water.

Building bridges can work only if his parents are willing and or able to accept some responsibility and accountability. Otherwise its all built on sand. If your partner's parents' cannot or will not accept their part in the events leading up to your DP cutting contact then they likely never will.

totally agree Atilla.
However, I'd still try and keep a door open, even only for the purely opportunistic purpose of a guiltless future iykwim?

DP has not really talked much to his parents about what it is about their behaviour he finds difficult (although he has talked to his father about the way he treated him as a child and how that made him feel).

I don't think DP is in a place where he can have those conversations yet. I am not sure whether he thinks that cutting contact is a way of never having to have those conversations. And I am not sure whether that would be a positive or a negative thing.

DP has not really talked much to his parents about what it is about their behaviour he finds difficult (although he has talked to his father about the way he treated him as a child and how that made him feel).

I don't think DP is in a place where he can have those conversations yet. I am not sure whether he thinks that cutting contact is a way of never having to have those conversations. And I am not sure whether that would be a positive or a negative thing.

I don't think it is necessary to talk.

What is necessary is for your DH to move on. He must understand that his happiness now is HIS doing. Too easy to cling on to ghosts.

Not sure having a drawn out conversation is always cathartic. Often it actually creates more pain stirring up the s**t!

Time is a healer. So is distance.

If it is important to you that kids maintain a relationship with grand parents then insist on that only. A sunday lunch once in a while will not damage your kids!

Your DC do not need toxic pople in there lives grandparents or not!

My own grandparents espically my gran were and are very toxic on many levels, when my mum had contact with them it affected her greatly and in turn affected me, the person i became and all other things that happened in my life.

There affect on me and my life directly or indirectly (through mum) meant that the moment i reconised that they were having the same affect/infolence on my DS i cut all contact.

Within a week we were both happyier, more contented and my DS speach development came on leps and bounds.

There are times when im sad and times when i'm angery or hurt. Mostly i think i 'greive' for what could have been if they were different type of people.

Most importally though my DS and myself are a lot happyier (im happy because hes happy - hes happy because im happy and so on)

Your DP has cut contact for a reson i think you need to respect that he knows his parents better than most and wouldnt have done this light heartlly. Are you sure hes tell you all of his reasons for cutting contact?

Although my granparents were only toxic emotanally there are some things that happened that i want to keep in a locked closet somewhere and would never dream of telling others, the thought that they may do these things to my DS along with the things they were already doing was enough to make me walk away.

your dp could be me

i am much much happier having cut ties with them all even the ones i thought supportive

toxic is the right word
toxicity spreads through a family
yes my children have lost 'family' but they have gained healthy parents

a future free from issue created by these people

i feel free

i hope your partner does

this counts for a lot

I dont think you can validate your husbands experience, especially the abuse he suffered when he was a child, when you also expressively say that they are good grandparents and you want his children to be under their influence. What you want is a child to be with them, know them and love them. He possibly sees himself as a child, with them, as you want HIS children with them. Do you see what I am getting at?

I think you should leave it. You are not showing understanding and acceptance for HIS situation by letting your children be with them. Effectually it is like saying, their behaviour wasnt so bad, look, I let me own children be with them. You are playing devils advocate WITH your own children here. They will never realize their behaviour has pushed their son away when YOU still want to see them, and want your children to stay in contact. It could in fact prevent him from moving on.

Just as a matter of interest, are your DCs of an age where they can express an opinion as to whether or not they want to continue having any kind of relationship with their GPs? Can you explain to them why they can't see their GPs any more, if that is the route you choose? And will it hurt them if they can't see them?
Because, much though I agree that your DP needs your full support, your DCs shouldn't suffer because of it - GPs are often not around that long in children's lives and I would hate for your kids to think that you had deprived them of knowing their GPs.

ButterflyMcQueen - this is me!!

After my mother said sme incredibly nasty and destructive things on the phone I decided enough was enough. I know I was right - at my Gran's funeral a year ago, she looked right through me, as if I wasn't there.

I am not going to let my children experience the loss, pain and hurt that a person like this can give. They are worth more than that. I can't imagine the hurt I would feel if my dh decided to give my mother (flip! I use the term in relation to the person who gave birth to me, not who mothered me - and yes I am saying this knowing that she is probably - once again - stalking me on MN) access to my children. As she is my mother then it is up to me, (but both of us in a cohesive relationship - which we have - and mother refused to acknowledge dh at Gran's funeral either)

I don't want my kids having any dealings with this level of toxicity. Its nasty, complicated, brutish and incredibly deliberate. After Gran died, mother returned all the pictures I had sent, including ones from after our estrangement of my dcs. She clearly wants either no contact, or a version of contact which will harm my DCs - funny enough, I am not up for that!!!

These stories are so

They are

But for many of us (and I speak for myself and I think for others here) the only alternative is so bad as to be not worth it.

I would like to see my maternal parent. I would like to let my children have a relationship with her.

But, given the circs we are in , it is neither desireable not profitable to do so. She is toooo toxic.

agree weegie

mothering was not something i experenced