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Divorce/separation

do you have contact with nieces and nephews (by marriage) after divorce?

2 replies

ooby · 21/12/2012 19:23

my sil and DB are going through a bitter divorce.

I have supported them both equally for years and have been as impartial as possible during past separations.

A year ago my sil decided that i was on my db's side. i found it so hard to keep listening to her vitriol and defended him on a couple of issues about 18 months ago.

she hasnt wanted to speak to me since.


soon after this, she started boycotting my dds' birthdays and stopped sending cards etc. this is hardtbh, as she has known them since birth, and they are now aged 10 and 8.

i still send cards and gifts to her and my nieces at her address, not just my db's, as a gesture of reconciliation/ goodwill, i suppose.

now, obviously their dc are the main casualties in all this, but i think it's terribly sad that my sil is happy to cut all ties with her nieces (my dds), whom i thought she had been very fond of.

is it usual for nephews/ nieces by marriage to be dropped in this way? am i being naive to think that she 'should' still have affection for her nieces and be prepared to send a birthday card even if she finds face to face contact difficult?

do you have experience of this, anyone?

my dds want to know if x is still their aunty and i don't know how to respond. it is very hurtful, tbh.

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ooby · 21/12/2012 19:41

anyone?

OP posts:
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Collaborate · 22/12/2012 06:18

Sort of related. I still send a Christmas card to my ex BIL. He's the father of my niece and nephew. My sister remarried a great guy. Thought everything was fine.
Until my sister has now completely cut me off. Won't acknowledge my existence (eg blanked me at a recent family gathering) just because I send him a Christmas card and won't promise not to in the future.
I believe it's also because I won't join in with the vitriolic ex-bashing that also now Hmm seems to infect my parents. Sister seems to think I've taken sides against her. Well, if refusing to allow myself to be drawn into a festering pit of bile and nastiness is to take sides against her, then so be it.
What I'm trying to say is that there is a mindset in some people who think that when a marriage breaks down sides should be taken and people on the other side ignored. I say that if those people want to do that, whilst its sad, at least you don't have to interact with them in the future, as they've perhaps revealed themselves to have a capacity for nasty pettiness that hitherto you thought them incapable of.

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