Fall out with family members

[GrumpyGregry]

I actually understand why your brother doesn't feel the need to visit a grave. My parents both died in the early 90's. I miss them both greatly and think about them every day, but have never felt the need to go visit their rose bushes in the garden of remembrance. (I did once when I attended another funeral at the same crematorium). I prefer to remember my parents as they were, not as a patch of earth, a stone or a rose tree. Those things mean nothing to me.
You shouldn't berate him for that or hold it against him. We all grieve and think of missed love ones in different ways.

I fervently believe in an afterlife but never visit my Mother's grave. She isn't there, but she lives on, in me and mine, and elsewhere.

 

[subaqua]

yes ,

I didnt speak to my feckless younger brother for a long time. then he rang me out of the blue. for a favour. then crawled back under the rock he had been hiding after i did the favour for him . we always had a give and take relationship he would take and i would give . I go sick of bailing him out of problem after problem for no thanks. it was only 3 years ago or so that he rang me again asking for a favour and i told him no , not this time and why that he got his act together and sorted himself out. we now keep in touch and have a great relationship

 

[shouldbeinbed]

No great falling out, more an aggregation of little things, I'm sure on both sides, and me and my brother are just not on one another wavelength at all. No communication, no idea what each others phone numbers are, we see one another very rarely for my mums sake but its strained & I suspect when she is gone, we'll not even know whether the other is alive or dead.

 

[Silver Fox]

It was Christmas 2007, although she tried not to show it my mum was feeling very weak. She wanted a family Christmas and invited all the close family for dinner at her house. My uncle declined her invitation with some feeble excuse.

Four months later my mum was dying of cancer, her brother came to see her in her final days. He stood blubbering at my mums bedside as his sister lay dying. I looked at him and thought what a twat. My mum wanted her family around her but you just couldn't be bothered.

Two days later my much loved mum was dead. I've never forgiven my uncle for turning down her invitation to spend her last Christmas together as a family. I've not spoken to him since and want nothing more to do with him.

 

[TheDoctor]

Some of my rellies I regularly travel a few hundred miles to visit.
Others, I would travel a few hundred miles to avoid.

 

[summerdays]

I don't get on with one of my siblings but only to the extent that I don't make any effort to contact her, and meet up with just her. Even my mum confirmed that she was the prickly one in the family as a child. I would like it if we got on better but also another problem is just all of us being busy with our own families.

I worry about one of mine who I see as similar in the way they push around their siblings and take offence at small things and hope they will stay in touch with each other as adults.

 

[buggi]

Does your mother not have a say where she lives? Is she not able to look after herself? Are you able to look after her? Is there a reason you can't move her ? Cost I presume? Does he go and see her, is he good to her while she is there, or does he just leave her there to rot. Basically, is she happy? If she is, then no reason to fall out with him. Let him get on with it and pay/provide for her, saves you a few bob. If she's not, and you can provide an alternative, every reason to put up a fight. As long as she's happy with the alternative (my nan is NEVER happy).

 

[Berties]

I struggle with my parentssome times,I just want to do my own thing some times( like cycling)now my kids are getting older,my parents count how many times I go to see them,phone them and throw it back at me after I give them a present they feel they don't want,it gets that bad,I just put it down to age,and having to much time,I've told some of my cousins I'll see you next time at one of the funerals,aren't family's great ,the best family members I have are not blood they were adopted by my uncle they are cool!

 

[roadrash]

I have seen my dad once in the last 30 years , the last time i saw him was about ten years after leaving school, i was at a school reunion sat at a table with about a dozen others when a man walks over to a girl that used to be in my class, has a short chat with her then walks away.
how do you know him i asked her , she replied simply by asking me if i knew him, i said yeah its my dad , her reply was ...........well i guess that makes us brother and sister........you needed a really big knife to cut the atmosphere after that.

 

[Pale Rider]

I am one of several one here who have had a low key, but irretrievable, falling out with a brother.

Being middle class, we maintain a veneer of civility at the very occasional family gatherings at which we meet.

But one can only hold one's breath for so long and after a while we always end up falling out.

Brother tells other members of the family he would like to get on with me, but makes no effort to do so.

I tell other members of the family I have no desire to get on with him, so I also make no effort, which means there's no helping us.

An observer might reasonably think we both need our heads banging together and should start acting our age, not our shoe size.

Any such rational suggestion would, of course, be rejected by both of us.

 

[MarkF]

My sister and I were born within a year, but we never bonded, I never liked her and she never liked me, we are chalk and cheese. When our children were young I used to dread birthdays and Xmas, because I'd have to talk to her, she probably felt the same. If we meet, rarely, the tension is palpable. Just prior to my fathers death my sister and mother had a spectacular fall out and haven't spoken since, that's 5 years ago now, my preference would be for them to talk again, it would make my mother happier, but as I have only one sibling and considering my mother is loaded, I am not unduly concerned. I suppose my Mothers funeral will be the next and last time we meet.

 

[Accy cyclist]

Does your mother not have a say where she lives? Is she not able to look after herself? Are you able to look after her? Is there a reason you can't move her ? Cost I presume? Does he go and see her, is he good to her while she is there, or does he just leave her there to rot. Basically, is she happy? If she is, then no reason to fall out with him. Let him get on with it and pay/provide for her, saves you a few bob. If she's not, and you can provide an alternative, every reason to put up a fight. As long as she's happy with the alternative (my nan is NEVER happy).

She doesn't have a say in where she lives or other matters as she's been classed as having dementia. My brother somehow was granted Power of Attorney without my knowledge,so he holds all the cards. I suggested to him that she'd be better off back in her own town where folk who know her could visit her,but he brushed the idea off saying "she wouldn't recognise them and they wouldn't visit her anyway". She's been in that home for going on two years,yes he visited her nearly every day but my mum and the staff there say he visits occasionally now. She was happy there till her friend moved to another home,now all she talks about is coming home,but my brother will have that covered by blaming it on the dementia.

 

[tyred]

I am much younger (~9 yrs) than my brother and sister and I've always got along fine with my sister but with hindsight, my brother destroyed my life with endless mental and physical bullying which has taken years of counselling to overcome. He also always took everything of mine - birthday present money, tapes, CDs, books etc. In more recent years, I forced myself to tolerate him to please my parents and because of a deep down desire to belong to a "normal" loving family but I just couldn't.

The final straw came early this year, I had lost a wheeltrim from my car and there were 4 x 13" Peugeot wheeltrims sitting under the bench in the garage at home where they had sat gathering dust for about 20 years. They belonged to a car my Dad used own which he later gave to my brother. I asked Dad and he said to take them. My brother seen them on my my car and went ballistic and said there were his and he was going to report me for theft and have me arrested if I didn't give him €150 for them which is their value apparently (they might fetch a tenner at a car boot sale imo). I told him to grow up. He kept coming and complaining about the wheeltrims and I ignored his rantings and then when I went away for a few days cycling with the car sitting at home, he took the wheeltrims while I was away leaving a ranting note under the windscreen wiper.

I just couldn't believe the pettishness of it and the fact that he didn't have the nerve to take them while I was around but waited until I went away. I suddenly saw him for what her really is - a childish bully who has no life, hobbies or friends and works perhaps 14 hours a day 6 days a week and spends Sunday washing and polishing the car he rarely uses as he has nowhere else to go apart from work. I used to be angry at him for the way he treated me but now actually feel sorry for him. He'll die a wealthy but very lonely man.

 

[EltonFrog]

These post are some of the saddest things I have ever read, anywhere. I thought my life was tough when I was young, but pale into total insignificance compared to the story's here.

 

[Ganymede]

These post are some of the saddest things I have every read, anywhere. I thought my life was tough when I was young, but pale into total insignificance compared to the story's here.

Agreed. I've had quite big differences with my older sister but it's all worked out in the end. Families are no bed of roses. I'm sorry to hear of everyone's troubles.

@Accy cyclist - power of attorney can be held by more than one person. My sister and I hold it for our parents and it's much better to have two or more people in case one isn't available when a big decision needs to be made. However I suppose it was unlikely that your bro was going to suggest that. Sorry for your situation - dementia is appalling, as you may have seen from some of my posts, my Dad is on that path.