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I apparently have been in a conflict with my oldest son. His actions so remind me of my exA. He has shown me not much respect. I have detached...but have left a few messages, because I want to see my Gkids. No response....It has been over a month. This is not fair to the kids..we spent so much time together...the parents are punishing me.... I feel so lost..and sad--do I just let it go? I will not show up at their door. any other grandparent gone thru this.?
meagan,I have not seen my grandson,Tiger,my nic for him in at least seven years.
I changed his first diaper and held him so mom could rest.I packed him around in a front pack.We were best buds.We rode around in my huge cool jeep.
Then the gal who had him, an A,got another b friend. All of a sudden things got weird.She and i would make a day I would take him,but her mother refused to allow me to pick him up.
Next thing i know I call him,he answers,he tells me his mom told him that I do not love him anymore.stick in the knife and turn it over and over for years.My AH went crazy so there went grampa,so lets throw away gramaDebi.
Sooooo until a year or so ago, I was able to let it go to hp. Does not bring me to my knees anymore missing him.I hope and pray when he is a teen he will find his way back to me. She also cut my son out of his life.We cannot find where they live.
It is horribly selfish.Makes me so sad to know how you feel. If you can, maybe they would allow the kids to get presents from you.When my mother moved away,she sent my kids tapes of her reading and talking to them.I wish I still had those tapes. Hopefully they will give them to the kids.
What if you called and asked to talk to one of the kids?
Sadly this is one of those to put in HP's hands. Right now my daughters behavior has been absolutely horrible. So there goes my other grandson.I wish I had never met him to have him torn from me too.
Can only change me so I do my best not to think of them anymore. makes me want to drug it a way,but I don't do that.sigh, never have.gotta feel ever pain in every nerve.
have accepted I will not have my dear grandboys in my life. I am one to my eight year old neighbor Lori,hp sent her to me.
It is horribly hard when those who are in control put a wall up we cannot get thru.
Maybe send a letter asking if they will give you visitation??There are g parent rights in some states....
hugs,hugs,hugs,and dang it, I think of all the LOVE we have to give them. I was so HAPPY when others loved my kids. Their gma was another parent for them and they loved to see her.think of all the kids and parents who would want a nice person to love their kids.NOT to mention your grandkids who are missing out from not knowing you.
Yes. It's the most tragic hurt I've ever felt. So much like a death, I mourned the love we shared but knew they would come find me once old enough. Like you, we had shared so much time, happiness, love it is cruel beyond reason. What they couldn't take away from me were my happy memories and hopes that one day they would seek me out. I stopped calling, stopped begging and handed it over to my higher power GOD in prayer. I had to get busy with other things to keep my mind from totally doing a melt down. Yes, you are correct...the people it is intended to hurt goes far beyond their game, it includes the kids too. Sad.
I am so sorry you are going thru this. I am not a grandma so maybe I shouldn't respond but I have "grandma issues". I have 3 kids and my mom was a huge part of their lives. I am positive she feels like a victim because I have limited the kids contact with her. And I feel so conflicted about that decision. She was there when my 2 younger ones were born, she took care of them all when I was so obsessed with my ex that I fell into a serious post partum depression. She came and stayed with me when I was scared of him and his rage. She did alot for me and she loves my kids. No question there. She loves them. The problem is I have grown and changed (within this program) and she has become sicker. The healthier I get the less I can be around her. She is a very dysfunctional person, she is abusive. I do not want my kids to have that in their lives and have to figure out how to fix the scars the verbal abuse leaves on their soul. She doesn't know any better, and I can't fix her. So, I had to step away from her and protect the kids.
Now, I doubt that is the same with your issue as you are the one here, working this program. Maybe it is reversed. You are getting healthier and your son doesn't know how to relate to that, it scares him and so he is doing all that he knows how to do by pulling away. That which is different is scarey. I don't know.
I will tell you this, it was NOT an easy decision in my case. Not at all. I saw the pain my kids went thru in "losing" grandma and not understanding why. It put ALOT more onto MY shoulders as I no longer went to her for help with the kids. I hated doing it, but I feel it is the right thing to do and only time will tell if I am right. It does hurt my heart to have this seperation. I guess no matter what the circumstances are, it is painful for all parties involved.
My mother still calls and sees the kids. Much less than she ever has and that hurts me. She could see them whenever but it has to be at my house. I live 45 minutes from her which she sees as No problem for me to drive it but across the world for her to drive (no she's not old, wants to drive across the US when she retires, it's a control thing on her part, saftey issue on mine). She doesn't want to put forth the effort and that hurts too. But after getting out of my insanely abusive marriage, I am unwilling to be abused by anyone ever again, not even for the sake of the kids having a grandmother.
My ex MIL dumped my kids (who LOVED her) when the ex and I split. She has 7 kids of her own and she really didn't have time for my kids who were going thru some awful hard times. She also is crazy (nicest term I can think of at the moment). When she did try to have contact with them, it was only with my oldest 2 and she just went on and on about how much fun she was having with their cousins. That hurt my kids. So, I had to tell her to not contact my kids unless it was thru me and that seems like too much so she just doesn't. Just like her son (my ex).
This disease ruins families. It just smashes them apart. I would say, if you want to see your grandkids, just keep trying. Jump thru the hoops even though you know in your heart you shouldn't have to. Kids think they know what is best, better than their parents and you add the family disease of alcoholism and it really messes us up. Don't let go, don't give up. Fight, do anything and everythng you can to stay in touch with those kids, to make sure they know you love them. That is what I wish the grandmas in my kids lives had done. Like I said, I am doing what I am doing for the sake of protecting my kids, I do not know if it will trun out alright or not. But I, personally am a fighter. I will fight for my kids till the last breath in my body and I will do so when I am a grandma.
Grandma-x8 and Great Grandma-x1 here and I rarely see any of my grandchildren and it is not for a lack of trying to see them. My Great Grandson will be two years old soon and I have seen him twice when he was very small.
It hurts deeply not to be a part of their lives but I know that at one point in their lives I was important to them and they all know where I am at and how to contact me. I blamed myself for quite sometime but soon realized that I had been an important part of their lives when their mom's and dad's allowed me to be. The problem here isn't me it's the war of words and control between my sons and their x-wives. The x's use the children as a weapon and they will never know how much it hurts until they are forced out of the lives of their grandchildren. I have also observed that when a grandchild is at odds with their parents they automatically pull away from the grandparents as well.
I contact them as much as I can even though I seldom get a response back or any sort of acknowledgement of a birthday or christmas gift. My gut tells me just give it up your wasting your time but my heart tells me that someday they will remember who was there for them when they needed a hug.
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Everything I have ever let go of has claw marks all over it.
I have 5 daughters & 7 grandchildren - it's been over 2 months (this time) since I've seen our oldest daughter, cause she's been in jail.
Her 3 children I see few & far between. There are all 3 with different people. The oldest I saw at Christmas time, sometime last fall I saw the middle daughter, and the baby is the one I've seen the most, just a couple of weeks ago.
It breaks my heart - but because of recovery it's not about me - it's about this horrible disease and what it does to families. I try to do what I can for those grandchildren and still maintain healthy boundaries. It's hard and it hurts.
I also pray for God's best for those precious grandchildren and for our daughter.
Cause that's all I know to do.
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No matter what me and my God are going to be ok, even better than OK -
This will be the first time I have posted, but this line really struck me. I am also an Adult Child & am married to an alcholic in recovery for 8 years now. In working my Alanon program, at this time I have found most of my issues, resentments and so on revolve around my mother, the non alcholic of my childhood. I also have limited, very limited contact with her, nor let her have much with my kids. She has let me know in words that I do not measure up to what she wanted from me, so I do not worry about it. I so badly want a relationship with her and can say I have honestly tried, you can only take being hurt so many times. My kids use to ask why Grandma would do stuff with all the other grandkids and not them, when she was driving by with 5 minutes of our home. She knows nothing about my children, they no longer have any interest in going to see her. I do question at times if this is because of my feelings. My Mom only lives at 20 minutes from me, so distance is not really an issue. My f2f Alanon group has been great in helping me to work thru this in our Step meeting. I honestly hope that one day, I along with my kids can have a relationship with her, but I just do not know. She use to goto Alanon, but no longer goes. My father and ex-step father are alcholic/drug addicts. My current step father is just starting recovery. I have brought up Alanon to my Mom, she told me "I have been thru that and all of it. I do not need it." Ok, I will leave it alone, not my business. Reading these post tonite, maybe she is just to sick and this is part of why I cannot be around her. My kids have more "Choosen Grandparents" through the fellowship we have with AA & Alanon. They are loved and these people take an interest in their lives. I am sorry this is so long, don't know if this was all mixed up, but I typed it as I thinking it.
