Anonymous wrote:Op here: I appreciate all these replies
- I have no plans to involve my parents in finding out why he's cut me off, though I'm sure they know. They see each other almost daily and are very close.
- while he needs time to process this I think these 2 things are worth mentioning : it didn't effect him directly AND I've made peace with my parents. The cutting me off seems disproportionate to his experience with any of this.
- de friending him on Facebook : he cut me off and has made clear by his silence thru major holidays, my kids' birthdays and no response to my texts he's done with me.

While your particularly incident may not have involved your brother you really do not know what his experience may have been. His cutting you off could be

1. Things occurred with him that you are not aware of and he has dealt with that by "forgetting" about it, you bringing up your incident and by default spending time with you has triggered unpleasant memories and rather than deal with reality he cuts you off in order to keep "pretending" and not be reminded.

2. He may not believe you and sees your continued relationship with your parents as being evidence of your lying.

3. Perhaps he disagrees with your definition of "inapropriatness" and views your devcsion to confront/clear the air with your parents as selfishness and entitlement.

I would not have defriended him. I would leave him a message, telling him that you love and miss your relationship, and you'd love to talk about everything when he's ready.

Op here: and for the record, while I've made peace with my parents I'm not sure it will ever be as close as it once was. But all 3 of us are ok, we've moved on and it's like okay this may be the new normal but we're okay with that, life's too short (they are 80 but in fabulous health) let's get on with things.

I don't blame you OP, you brother sounds like he is being completely unreasonable. It might not be a bad idea to talk to your parents about it; why in the world would he cut you off and still be fine with them, especially if you are fine with them too? And he's done it without a word to you? That's completely hostile.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
So, you recently talked about a childhood incident implicating one of your parents. Your parents and yourself have moved on, and your brother, since being made aware of this incident, has not communicated with you, even though he has communicated normally with your parents.

I have no idea what's going on with him, but certainly I would be pissed. I would ask my parents to find out what's going on, and relay the fact that it took a lot from me to express my feelings on the subject, so being cut of like this feels extra hurtful.

This is called "triangulating" and is very destructive to the family relationship. Don't ever pull other family members into your conflicts with another family member.

I disagree. The parents can totally ask the brother why he's not communicating with his sister, for God's sake. It's not secret CIA stuff, for crying out loud.
Or would you rather the siblings never speak to each other ever again, just because one should never ever triangulate? That's so dumb.

Op here: I appreciate all these replies
- I have no plans to involve my parents in finding out why he's cut me off, though I'm sure they know. They see each other almost daily and are very close.
- while he needs time to process this I think these 2 things are worth mentioning : it didn't effect him directly AND I've made peace with my parents. The cutting me off seems disproportionate to his experience with any of this.
- de friending him on Facebook : he cut me off and has made clear by his silence thru major holidays, my kids' birthdays and no response to my texts he's done with me.

Your brother's reaction is really odd. Almost as if he thinks you lied or something.

Also, since he has a great relationship with your parents (one of whom was inappropriate), he might be the type of sibling that likes to look the other way even when they know of an inappropriate situation within the family because they don't want anyone to rock the boat.

Anonymous wrote:
So, you recently talked about a childhood incident implicating one of your parents. Your parents and yourself have moved on, and your brother, since being made aware of this incident, has not communicated with you, even though he has communicated normally with your parents.

I have no idea what's going on with him, but certainly I would be pissed. I would ask my parents to find out what's going on, and relay the fact that it took a lot from me to express my feelings on the subject, so being cut of like this feels extra hurtful.

This is called "triangulating" and is very destructive to the family relationship. Don't ever pull other family members into your conflicts with another family member.

So, you recently talked about a childhood incident implicating one of your parents. Your parents and yourself have moved on, and your brother, since being made aware of this incident, has not communicated with you, even though he has communicated normally with your parents.

I have no idea what's going on with him, but certainly I would be pissed. I would ask my parents to find out what's going on, and relay the fact that it took a lot from me to express my feelings on the subject, so being cut of like this feels extra hurtful.

Anonymous wrote:Op here: I guess I hoped that he'd at least reply to texts saying anything from "go away forever" to "I need time". I'd certainly honor that. The complete cutoff just feels really
hostile.

In turn, you "defriending" him was "hostile" and likely escalated the problem. You have had a lifetime to process what happened. This was just dropped on him like a bomb. Just as you needed time to come to terms with things to the point you could discuss it openly. Likely so does he. While this distance and "rejection" is painful to you, you are likely expecting too much of him at the moment.

Op here: yes, he continues to have great, very close relationship with them.

Op here: I guess I hoped that he'd at least reply to texts saying anything from "go away forever" to "I need time". I'd certainly honor that. The complete cutoff just feels really
hostile.

Remember that he may also just be processing that the picture of his family and childhood that he has always held in his head (and maybe even proudly bragged about) has just been altered. He may be going through an entire grieving process, which can take a long time. Is he communicating with your parents?

OP, you have to allow your brother to deal with his feelings in his way. Obviously, the incident is not so minor league to him and there may even be issues from his perspective that you're not aware of.

Let him return and deal with you when he's ready and accept that it may never happen.

Sorry you are going through this.

Don't be so sure nothing happened to your brother, even if he swears up and down that it didn't. It is hard for anyone to discuss painful incidents from their pasts, and many adults choose to bury childhood secrets this is especially true for men.

You are in my thoughts and I hope someday the relationship between you and your brother can be mended.

Hugs.

So in July I told my parents and my brother about something that happened, isolated incident, when I was growing up between me and one of my parents. Let's put it under the heading of minor league inappropruateness. Very minor and yet suddenly bothered me in context of my kids and I finally, yes at age 45, had to get it off my chest in order to have a functioning relationship and feel safe re my kids etc.
it was awful to tell we didn't talk for a few weeks. And then we did and my parents and I had a very good, healthy conversation and we were able to move on. My older brother hasn't talked to me since July We used to text all the time. Nothing happened to him btw, I know that for sure, and he's very close with my parents. I've tried to reach out a few times- nothing. He has completely cut off contact, not even telling me off if that's how he feels. It just feels awful. Anyway, no contact on thanksgiving and now I've had it. Be mad at me but cut me off? I took him off my Facebook, I mean if you cut me off fine. But deep down it just hurts. I guess this is just a vent from a middle aged lady. Thx for listening