what is the craziest reasons your family members have become estranged?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This doesn’t happen in healthy families. I am estranged from my three siblings who are also estranged from each other who are also estranged from cousins aunts uncles etc. There were estrangements in the generation before us as well, or at very least distant very cool relationships, so we come by it honestly.

I participate in support groups for adult children of alcoholics and for adult children of narcissists. In my own experience and from observation of others, most true estrangements don’t happen for crazy reasons. They happen because people reach a breaking point with sick family dynamics and to preserve/improve their mental health they have to remove themselves from further exposure to a toxic family atmosphere, from ongoing emotional abuse.

+1,000,000

Often there is a lot of untreated mental illness-especially personality disorders, but also alcoholism, drug abuse, depression and anxiety. There may be a small or big event where afterwards a cut-off happens, but it had been brewing for years, even decades.

[Anonymous]

My uncle refused to drive my mother to the airport because he was tired, he just got home from his shift at the hospital. He called her a taxi. She didn't talk to him for FIFTEEN YEARS after that. FIFTEEN.

[Anonymous]

My grandfather's uncle cut him off when he married my grandmother, a Catholic (they were Lutheran). This was all in North Dakota. His name was Knut Knutson.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everyone in my family is estranged from each other, ha. LOTS of drama. Here’s how it happened:

- My dad is a marital counselor and offered to help his nephew with counseling. Nephew and his parents were expecting my dad to side with him and tell the wife she was in the wrong and needed to just do what her husband said. When dad refused (and actually encouraged her to leave this abusive dynamic), dad’s entire family cut us all off.

- When I left my NPD husband, my mom and siblings all sided with him against me. He’s very charming and persuasive. They gave him a ton of info to use against me to gain custody (which didn’t work, judges don’t care I took SSRIs as a teen) and xH convinced them to sabotage my job and any relationship I tried to have after him. Things like contacting clients to tell them I don’t know what I’m doing and harassing a man I was dating by calling repeatedly, calling his job, etc. So I don’t talk to mom and siblings anymore.

- Mom’s sister hooked up with her husband, so my stepdad. They obviously don’t talk anymore.

- Mom has 4 sisters (5 girls total) who were all very close their whole lives. Then 2 of the sisters left their husbands after the kids were grown. Mom went crazy on them for divorcing - thought it was the wrong thing for them to do - everyone else was pressured into picking sides and eventually just stopped talking to each other because of all the drama.

- Mom and stepdad are still married but basically estranged/separated. She got tired of his crap and bought him a house in another state so she wouldn’t have to deal with him.

So the only people I talk to are my dad (who is awesome), and one aunt who calls me about once a year when drunk, rambles on, then hangs up without saying bye.

First off, your dad could have lost his license. You do NOT do counseling with family members. Totally unethical.

First off? Was there supposed to be more?

It’s legal to counsel family as long as you remain objective. You don’t lose a license over it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think the "crazy reason" is just the straw that broke the camel's back and not the full picture. There is usually a long period of erosion without repair and then that final incident breaks things.

+1

Like the wedding dress ornaments -- in a normal family, the aunt would have asked her sisters first, and they might have had a discussion about the dress, etc. So the fact that the aunt did it unilaterally indicates that there was already a problem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think the "crazy reason" is just the straw that broke the camel's back and not the full picture. There is usually a long period of erosion without repair and then that final incident breaks things.

+1 Exactly

[Anonymous]

People generally don't just become estranged for stupid reasons. There's typically a bigger, more deep-seated reason to break ties with family members. Could be they've always been dysfunctional and hurtful their entire lives, could be there's some mental illness going on, could be there's a low level resentment that comes up stronger when something big happens (like in a lot of family the siblings become estranged when a parent dies and siblings fight over elder care issues and/or inheritance/financial issues). But I think in all cases I know of of family estrangement, there was some problem, maybe kept under the surface for many years, that existed well before the estrangement and then it doesn't take much to make it lead to a falling out/fight.
In OP's case, the reason the sisters aren't talking is probably not solely about ill-conceived and unappreciated wedding dress ornaments. There's probably more to it than that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Me! I got offended at something my sister said about my weight, I de-friended her on Facebook, now we haven’t spoken in 10 years. I apologized soon afterward for de-friending her and I have sent birthday texts and gifts throughout the years, but no response. She will, however, talk to my husband.

She sounds petty and mean.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the "crazy reason" is just the straw that broke the camel's back and not the full picture. There is usually a long period of erosion without repair and then that final incident breaks things.

+1 Exactly

[phone]

OP, i am so glad you seem to have no idea that two weeks of not speaking is not estrangement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everyone in my family is estranged from each other, ha. LOTS of drama. Here’s how it happened:

- My dad is a marital counselor and offered to help his nephew with counseling. Nephew and his parents were expecting my dad to side with him and tell the wife she was in the wrong and needed to just do what her husband said. When dad refused (and actually encouraged her to leave this abusive dynamic), dad’s entire family cut us all off.

- When I left my NPD husband, my mom and siblings all sided with him against me. He’s very charming and persuasive. They gave him a ton of info to use against me to gain custody (which didn’t work, judges don’t care I took SSRIs as a teen) and xH convinced them to sabotage my job and any relationship I tried to have after him. Things like contacting clients to tell them I don’t know what I’m doing and harassing a man I was dating by calling repeatedly, calling his job, etc. So I don’t talk to mom and siblings anymore.

- Mom’s sister hooked up with her husband, so my stepdad. They obviously don’t talk anymore.

- Mom has 4 sisters (5 girls total) who were all very close their whole lives. Then 2 of the sisters left their husbands after the kids were grown. Mom went crazy on them for divorcing - thought it was the wrong thing for them to do - everyone else was pressured into picking sides and eventually just stopped talking to each other because of all the drama.

- Mom and stepdad are still married but basically estranged/separated. She got tired of his crap and bought him a house in another state so she wouldn’t have to deal with him.

So the only people I talk to are my dad (who is awesome), and one aunt who calls me about once a year when drunk, rambles on, then hangs up without saying bye.

First off, your dad could have lost his license. You do NOT do counseling with family members. Totally unethical.

First off? Was there supposed to be more?

It’s legal to counsel family as long as you remain objective. You don’t lose a license over it.

It's a dual relationship and yes you can be sanctioned by your license board. Legal and ethical are one in the same. Perhaps it's legal, but it considered an ethics code violation.

[Anonymous]

Sorry-legal and ethical are not one in the same. No idea if legal, but definitely violates ethics code.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sorry-legal and ethical are not one in the same. No idea if legal, but definitely violates ethics code.

It seems like if you’re so sure of the ethics, you’d have an idea about the legality. It makes me wonder if you’re confusing ethics with your feelings, and in “it feels to me like it would be unethical to treat anyone you’re remotely related to.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That’s sad. It sounds like she was trying to do something nice.

No. You don’t take it upon yourself to do something like that without consulting anyone first. What if the daughters wanted to keep it someday after mom was gone, or wear it in their own weddings for sentimental value, which is not uncommon?

[Anonymous]

My half sister started to badmouth my mother and tell stories that I got some “inheritance” from my dad who passed. While there were no inheritance reallt, they spent everything on his cancer treatments while he was sick.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My dad posted some joke on Facebook that involved a reference to OCD. My cousin, who is like over 50 and was diagnosed with OCD before the pandemic, commented that it was hurtful and offensive. My dad apologized in a response comment, and then apologized to him privately. My cousin replied if my dad was really sorry then he'd delete the joke. My dad decided not to do that. So now my cousin spends a lot of energy pointedly not talking to my dad when they're both at family events.

Sounds from your last sentence like you think cousin is in the wrong, but your dad is 100 percent in the wrong here.