Fractious Families - And so it continues........ THREE

We had a wonderful weekend away, a staycation of course but we loved every second of it. The day after we got back, although we still had a few more days off work, my brother replied. I read the beginning, realised it was a very very very long message and skipped to the end to read the last paragraph. Hubby read it that morning and said that he could tell I'd clearly hit a nerve. But I didn't have the strength to read it until 48 hours later as I just couldn't do it. I knew it would be him on the defensive saying it was all me, he had nothing to explain and nothing was his fault. I was right, this was his reply:

(this, obviously, is an anonymous blog so I've changed names he used to titles as I have done for previous exchanges but I hope it doesn't deflect from reading it)

I haven’t replied to this just purely because I haven’t had the time, nothing more. So on the HUBBY thing, my view was never anything more than how everyone acted like nothing happened and that was all, you’re a grown woman so you make your own decisions and live by them.
 
The only other thing for me was protecting the kids from being confused which I’m not going into again as I’ve made my point on that many times.
 
MY NAME if we’re going to be honest then let’s be just that. We don’t get on, we haven’t for a long time and that’s Ok, people don’t get on in life. We have hugely different views on life, on the way things should be dealt with in general and all sorts of other things which then add to the pot.
 
In terms of my ‘family stance’ as you put it is neither one side or another, that is not something that enters our heads. It took ages to get them to reply to mums letter and then after that it just wasn’t something we could find time for them to be interested in again. SIL'S PARENTS never sent letters.
 
MY NAME it wasn’t two weeks, you asked about presents for the kids 10 days before ELDEST NEPHEW’s birthday, 10 days before NIECE’s birthday and about a week before YOUNGEST NEPHEW’s birthday. By then grandparents have asked about a month or more before their birthday and we then send ideas.
 
It shouldn’t be and never has been up to us to initiate that sort of thing. It’s not a surprise that it’s their birthday each year. Asking that late means there’s not a lot of anything else needed.
 
Even when you do ask and then send suggestions they are so wide of the mark that I have to then think of things to send you to get. For me this is the most frustrating because it just highlights the shear lack of understanding of what they like or are into at each moment.
 
Family events aren’t dominated by us at all, the only thing we take into consideration is the kids, the same as with everything we do in life. We put our suggestions forward and say what we we’re planning and if that’s not suitable then we look for another plan. We don’t dictate, we just consider the kids.
 
Now calling me a ‘bully’, that’s low and something I’m as far removed from as can be. Sure I’m grumpy and speak my mind but bullying?! Come on MY NAME. I’ll take that comment with a pinch of salt as I’m sure your messages were written with emotion running high, if not you’re understanding of ‘bullying’ is twisted.
 
As for the things you said about MY WIFE, again get a grip. There is no hatred, no distain, far from it. You two just don’t get on because of the same reasons we don’t due to our very different outlook on things. We’ve spoke to you about this years ago in our old house, we shouldn’t have to repeat ourselves.
 
If you meant that message in the family group from her then that has come from the way you dealt with ELDEST NEPHEW’s birthday which I felt was quite restrained. I myself could have said a lot worse, believe me, but thought it best to keep my mouth shut.
 
So, you force yourself to come to our house? If you don’t want to then don’t. You say you want to be involved in their lives and yet nothing has changed since we spoke in our old house. It did for a while but then since getting back with HUBBY it’s gone backwards.
 
If you want to be part of their lives then pay some interest in their lives. The odd voice message every now and again is great but I can count how many times you’ve asked to do something with them on one hand since getting back with HUBBY.
 
You don’t ask ‘frequently’ at all, you sometimes ask if we’re busy but that’s not the same. Again I could go back through your messages and count, you asking to do stuff is as far removed from ‘frequently’ as you could probably get.
 
We have never told you no about doing stuff, we’re not evil. We say we’re busy or have other plans or similar, we hardly have any spare time with three kids, a house, work, etc and any small spare time we have sometimes it’s just nice to do nothing.
 
I know it’s difficult for you cos if your current situation, I’m not blind, but you can’t expect to know them or do what your asking if you only see them on special occasions.
 
There are no barriers in the way, these are in your mind. The only difficulty is that we don’t get on but are civil when we see you, this is what you take as friction. There’s no friction on our part or towards you.
 
Yes you’re right, we don’t want you having the kids on your own because you don’t know them enough which stems from my previous points. I don’t mean in general, I mean about if one of them was to have a strop, if one of them became unwell, what they like, what they don’t like, all sorts of things to take into consideration.
 
We don’t ask anyone to join us on days out because we like going out just us. If we’ve asked grandparents it’s because we want them to spend as much time with them as possible doing things before they get too old.
 
Nine times out of ten the grandparents ask to do things with us and not the other way around. There’s no rule book.
 
Now I have great sympathy for you on the child front, of course I do. No matter what it’s a horrible thing for someone to go through. Like I said before I do things for mum and dad because I want them to have as much time with them and the kids experiences with their grandparents before it’s too late.
 
Don’t act like I’ve never had any sympathy for your situation or said as such because that’s just not true.
 
What ‘crass’ comments have I ever made?! I’m not a horrible person that you make me out to be, you’re acting like I’m some kind of monster!!
 
You feel the world is geared towards families because it’s something you desperately want. If you wanted something else as much your attention would be drawn to those type of things.
 
Yes I have a wife, children, a house, a dog but it’s by no means easy at all. I had a fucking breakdown after YOUNGEST NEPHEW was born because I found out just how hard it is. To this day it is just as hard but I know now it’s not all like the movies and it’s tough.
 
All our money goes on them, all our time goes to them, all our energy, our effort, our thoughts are all geared around them. Everything we consider, every choice we make is around them. I can’t remember the last time MY WIFE and I went out to do something for ourselves or buy ourselves something as a treat.
 
Between work and homelife there isn’t a second of the day that’s not taken up. It’s stressful and exhausting and it’s everyday. Don’t think just because we have it that everything is rosey.
 
Yes I’m sure you’d give everything to be in our type of situation but, and don’t take this the wrong way because you probably will, you don’t know what it’s like just as you say I don’t.
 
I don’t text you cos we don’t get on. Would you text someone you don’t get on with? Holding a conversation with you is difficult because of this.
 
Me and mum have always got on well, don’t act like it’s some kind of popularity contest. Our conversations have never ‘flowed’ because we’re such different people, ever since we were teenagers it never has. Let’s not act like it’s something that it’s not.
 
To say I ‘have no interest’ in your life and your ‘plans are worthless’ is just ridiculous and again I’ll just put those stupid comments down to your emotions running high when you wrote this.
 
I do nothing on purpose to make you or anyone else for that matter feel on edge or in a state. If you feel like that then that’s down to you not me, likewise you are the only one that has said I make them feel that way so it’s down to you feeling this way not me.
 
To end this I have nothing to apologise for so I’m not going to. I have nothing to take responsibility for, I haven’t treated you any differently to any other person I know.
 
We are still angry about how ELDEST NEPHEW’s birthday was handled because that just personified everything that’s happened. We chose to still have his birthday because the kids had been through enough, one last thing for them to make them feel special while going through all this shit.
 
You deciding against that when we had consulted those that it effected just showed lack of priority. And for HUBBY to even text me to say that MY idea for MY sons birthday wasn’t a good idea fucking infuriated me. You think I hadn’t considered everything for everyone and most notably ELDEST NEPHEW. Telling me what to do for MY son, I’m angry now just thinking back to it!!

I’ll end this here before I say something I regret. We don’t get on, this isn’t a surprise to anyone, we have completely different views on everything. But if you want things to get any better YOU need to change your ways towards the children.

As much as you say they mean the world to you it doesn’t look like that. Birthdays highlight it with your complete lack of understanding of them. There’s a difference between loving them and actually knowing who they are as children.

MY WIFE feels the same way about what I’ve said about the kids and doesn’t really say much because believe it or not she doesn’t want to upset you, me or mum and dad. She’ll be polite and say hello, etc though doesn’t do small talk because it makes her feel uncomfortable.

I’m not expecting a reply to this, in fact I don’t want one, enough has been said. Just think it’s not just as simple as thinking I’m the bad guy, maybe there’s a reason I may come across that way.

Pleasant reading, isn't it? I'd clearly rattled him. The swearing in it! I didn't swear once in my message to him. Not just that though, the number of times he used my name - how aggressive yet condescending! Check your text messages to your friends and family, how many times do you use their actual forename in the text you're sending?

And did you count how many times he completely missed the point I was trying to make? The one that got to me the most though was saying I was only seeing family stuff everywhere because that's what I desperately wanted. Erm, excuse me?!? That's like saying someone who is lactose intolerant is bound to just see ice cream and milkshake adverts everywhere. For heaven's sake. Infertility is not a choice, it's an aspiration denied that most have without thinking about it.

Then there was that last paragraph - "I don't want a reply". A perfectly good example of his controlling behaviour. It was only after a conversation with a friend that I realised it though, I had said to her that he made it clear he didn't want a reply. To which her response was "Again, control. He gets the final word? Only if that suits you" and it made me realise that I'd fallen for it again. I wasn't going to leave it at that just because he'd told me he didn't want a reply, I had things to say. So I decided to enjoy the rest of my time off work with hubby but that I was going to reply to him when it suited me.

And so it continued. Which is why, dear reader, I'm afraid that this is going to go to a fourth post despite me saying I'd do it in three as I just can't get it all in here. Bear with me.......

Fractious Families - And so it continues........ TWO

(helps if you've read this before you continue, no biggie if not though!)

So. We had the fun and games of eldest nephews birthday and this time, for once, I was not going to kowtow to him. I had had enough. I just carried on with my life, I wasn't going to him cap in hand to say how sorry I was for our behaviour - which is what I normally have to do for us to continue to have any vague level of civility. It's always the same, no matter what has happened I'm wrong and he's right and I have to bow down to him before we're able to be treated normally again. Or whatever that means to him, I don't think we've ever been treated 'normally' but there you go. 

So I left things. Two weeks before the October half term holiday I texted him about possibly meeting up, we offered to pay, and I suggested a load of places we could possibly go and be outside to minimise risk (this was prior to where we live being upgraded in the English 'tier' system for Covid so we could meet up). The conversation unfolded as follows:

HIM
Are you seriously just going to act as if everything is alright and like NEPHEW's birthday didn't happen?! I have had no message from you about it since with you knowing how annoyed I was at it all. And you think you can just message me something like this and I'll open to the idea?!

ME
I knew how annoyed you were which is exactly why I haven't messaged you. I'm never going to win this argument, I know that, I just always end up in tears and I can't do that anymore. We'd just like to see the kids over half term

HIM
So you're happy to break the rule of 6 now but you weren't for NEPHEW's birthday?!

ME
These are not the same circumstances. Then can we just take the kids out for the day please?

HIM
How are they not?! It's still the same thing, more than 6 people being together

ME
One three year old is not the same as five adults. In that situation we were more than happy to risk it for an hour but then plans changed and we felt uneasy

HIM
I'm afraid it's not going to be as simple as this. We were left really angry with the way it was dealt with by you both and it's a culmination of a lot of other things too which we spoke to you about years ago but it only changed for a few months. The very fact you text me acting as if nothing has happened and everything's alright has just added to it all.

And that was it - I snapped. I was done, I didn't care anymore, he'd broken me, I wasn't going to let him get away with it any longer. This last message had tipped me over the edge. I spent the next day writing an email, adding and editing throughout as the day went on, as a reply to that text. I copied and pasted each paragraph into its own text message and sent the replies to him that evening. I genuinely had no idea how he'd react to it or how/when/what he'd reply, all I did know was that we could not carry on like that, *I* could not carry on like that. 

I'd sent the email to hubby just before I left work (i.e. before I sent it to my brother) and I've since sent it to my best friend. Both had the same reaction, that it was hard hitting but measured and they were both so so proud of me for writing it. They'd both seen how the relationship with my brother had deteriorated and how it had affected my mental health and were so pleased I'd sent what I'd sent. As hubby put it - I gave him both barrels, reloaded, gave him both again and then threw in a grenade for good measure. This is what I sent:

Ok. It’s time to be brutally honest with you because pussy footing around to try and fit your agenda clearly isn’t working anymore. You’re angry with the way this was dealt with?? I’ve been angry FOR YEARS about the way you and YOUR WIFE treat me and, more recently, HUBBY. I know you have never forgiven him for the hurt he caused me and you’ve never forgiven me for taking him back but we’re together now and stronger than ever so you’re just going to have to deal with it.
 
Your hypocritical stance on family stinks. You’re both very good at equality between the parents but there is no equivalent of me, of us, and so we’re frequently forgotten or an afterthought at best. Prime example, the letters I sent over lockdown earlier this year. I know mum got responses to her letters because she told me she had, I’d put a large amount of money on the fact SIL'S PARENTS got replies to anything they sent too. You told me we didn’t get a reply as they had so many letters from friends not everyone got a response. But the grandparents did, so are we friends or are we family?! The way we’re treated over presents also makes us angry. I don’t think asking two weeks before a birthday is ‘short notice’. I know there is a list and I know it gets shared with the grandparents, they clearly do ask earlier than we do but why, when it gets to only a few things left on the lists, do you not think ‘oh, we need to save something for ME and HUBBY to get’? Are we that forgotten about? It’s not as if we’re NOT going to buy presents is it??!? We’re always going to get presents and since everything we always suggest is not met with your approval we need the list and yet we’re never thought of as the list gets bought up. These are just two recent examples but there have been many many over the years showing how we’ve been treated differently.
 
Every single family event is dominated by you and dictated by what YOU want to do. Father’s day, mother’s day, birthdays, Christmas…. We cannot put any other plans in place until we know what YOU are doing. You’re a bully and you’ve been gaslighting me for years, I cannot do this anymore. The mix of that and YOUR WIFE’s passive aggressiveness, not to mention the fact she just cannot hide her utter disdain for my very existence, has made being in your presence increasingly difficult. My mental health has suffered and yet I still force myself to spend time in your house as I love your children desperately and want to spend as much time with them as possible despite the constant barriers you put in our way. We want to be involved in their lives but it is draining to ask frequently for days out, or to come over, and to be told no. We know we can’t see them unless you are present and that further restricts the time we’re able to spend with them. Maybe we don’t ask much as we should but when you’ve been hitting your head against a brick wall for a long time it gets to the point where you need to stop doing it as it hurts too much. Why have you never asked us if we want to join you on days out?! Why does it always have to come from us?!
 
Over the past couple of months it has looked increasingly likely that we are never going to have children and it will just be the two of us for the foreseeable future. We’ve done a lot of research into adoption and we feel that route is no longer open to us, we still cannot conceive naturally. We’ve been offered the money for another round of IVF but, as much as we are seriously considering it, the odds that it will work are still ridiculously low (5%). You have great empathy for mum and what she has to deal with daily with dad, I’ve seen the way you treat her and you take her for days out as a break and the kids do video calls and send messages. However for reasons I cannot fathom (altho, probably, it’s because if you’re brutally honest you don’t really like me either) you have absolutely no empathy for the situation we are in. This is proven by the many and frequent crass comments you make about children. You have no idea how it feels to be in our position, the world is geared towards those that have children and we are surrounded by constant reminders every day of what we desperately would like but cannot have. Adverts on the tube and on TV (pregnancy vitamins, days out for kids, toys), baby on board badges and buggies on the commute, articles in newspapers about what to do for child-friendly holidays, it never ends. You have managed to tick every single box in life that you are meant to and expected to tick – job, house, wife, kids, dog. And whilst I have no doubt whatsoever that you have worked incredibly hard to get there and it has not been easy for you, at the same time you have not been denied any of those things through no fault of your own. Just imagine for one minute how that feels. To want something, that pretty much everyone else has, so desperately but there is absolutely nothing you can do to fill that void. The pain and emptiness that we carry around with us EVERY SINGLE DAY is palpable and you have no idea. Nor do you seem to care or if you do care, it’s only a bit and there is certainly no empathy there.
 
All of this goes both ways. When have you ever texted me to ask how I am? How we are? How things are going? You did for a bit when HUBBY and I were splitting up but, generally, I just get ear-splitting silence from you. You take no interest in us or our lives. I know you text mum frequently and have conversations with her, but you don’t with us. I have tried to start conversations on numerous occasions but when I do eventually get a reply from you (and I know you’re busy with work, I don’t expect instant replies genuinely I don’t) the conversation doesn’t really flow naturally and peters out after a few texts. Yet you have frequent conversations with mum. Again, I can only assume it’s because you don’t really like me and don’t really have any interest in my life or care what I’m up to. We have no children therefore our plans are worthless and there’s no reason for you to keep in touch with me.
 
It is perfectly possible to love someone desperately yet dislike them. You are my brother and for that reason I love you to the moon and back and would throw myself in front of a bus for you, but as a person being around you just makes me feel on edge the whole time.
 
Now, your reaction to this will be that I’m being over sensitive. That’s always your reaction when I tell you how I’m feeling, you dismiss my very real feelings but you can’t see what you do to me and how you make me feel. Whilst I admit that I can be more sensitive than most (especially towards you, my own flesh and blood, for a long time now you’ve been the only one able to really push my buttons) BUT - you are the ONLY person in my life that I speak to that makes me feel like this. Every conversation I have with you makes my insides contract, my breathing tenses and nine times out of ten I end up crying and in a very messed up state. HUBBY has had to pick up the pieces every single time and he too is sick of seeing me like that. You are the only person that makes me feel like that and puts me in that state so yes, whilst I admit I do have over sensitive tendencies the only conclusion I can get to is that the issue is with you and not with me. I don’t react like this with anyone else. It is how you treat me and view me that leads me to feel like this and whatever level of oversensitivity I may have just makes things worse.
 
For my part, I am sorry I haven’t said any of this sooner. Really I am. It’s an incredibly heavy weight to carry and I have found the burden extremely draining for a long time, but you have a very domineering personality and it’s difficult to stand up to you, I know mum struggles. I have found it difficult in the past to find the strength to say these things but it has got to the point now that we cannot carry on like this anymore. You have said yourself that we’re not as close as either of us would like to be but until you start to take some responsibility for how things have turned out between us we will not be able to move forward. I desperately want a different relationship with both you and YOUR WIFE but the longer this goes on the more I realise that just isn’t going to happen. But maybe some new, middle ground/third way can be forged. One day it will just be the two of us and I want you in my life more and not less, but I also no longer want to be scared of you or how I feel when I’m around you. And I certainly don’t want every interaction we have to end with me in floods of tears convulsing.

It took him over ten days to reply.