What to do about my brother not staying in touch...

theoretica

Some people keep in touch a lot, others don't. If he hasn't been told straight out that he is upsetting you and your parents he may be completely ignorant of this.

Does he answer the phone if you call him with number withheld? Do you know his partner well enough to ring her when you want to speak to him?

anrutpea

Because we all get the same. My parents give my fiance birthday money. My grandma sends our partners and us birthday and christmas money.

They have been together for 10 years but only visit 2 times a year max.

Bennifred

thorsoak wrote: »

If you are so p'd off and offended, then losing contact won't be as upsetting.

There is the old saying "My son is my son til he takes him a wife, but my daughter's my daughter for the whole of her life".

_pale__pale_ whaaaa! (mother of three boys, no girls)

jacques_chirac

I do think you are overreacting. I don't know many men that regularly ring their parents, whether they live five minutes or five hours away. I probably speak to my brother once a month, he lives minutes away but has a very busy life - doesn't mean he doesn't love or care about me.

Jojo_the_Tightfisted

Thing is, his version of his childhood could have been sat at the table every night and attending every event whilst quietly seething with resentment because he wasn't happy and hated the pretence of it all being about 'family'. I've seen families like that, and witnessed what happened when one of the siblings decided he'd had enough of seeing his sister's every whim and violent tantrum pandered to all her life - so he avoided the big family holidays, the large parties and didn't want to sit on the phone, paying to hear her go on about her children all the time (they were beastly little things, too) - but because 'family' was so important, her having lots of them meant she saw herself as a matriarch who had to keep the faaaamily together/under control.

It didn't mean he didn't care about his parents, but it meant every time he wanted to see them, it became a huge tribal gathering which inevitably became all about his sister and her kids.


Anyhow, when he dropped out of the gathering things, he reaction was to scream and shout and get violent because she saw him as ungrateful and rejecting the family. Which kinda proved his point that it wasn't all sweetness and light for him as a kid.

But his sister - well, her perception is different. She sees a happy, close family being hurt by his rejecting them. She also saw every bit of help he was given by their parents, but never counted the significantly higher level of help she received. (Or the cash in hand money her undeclared partner brought in on top of her single parent benefits and all the other financial help she got from friends because she was trying to cope with a large family).



I'm not saying you're like this person's sister - but your brother may have had a completely different interpretation of what it was like and could find it all too stressful to deal with.

Getting on his case about it certainly won't help.

lostinrates

anrutpea wrote: »

Because we all get the same. My parents give my fiance birthday money. My grandma sends our partners and us birthday and christmas money.

They have been together for 10 years but only visit 2 times a year max.

Fwiw, DH sees his sister about once a year, and saw his brother last about 18 months ago, they all consider the,selves quite close and loving.


Its not about the number of times you see each other.

Ich_2

So how often have you/parents/family taken the trouble to go and see him and his GF?
It is a two way thing you know!!
When we moved to here 30 years ago (2 hours drive to "home") we were expected to go and see my wife's family, in fact they have only been here twice in all that time, despite both her brothers & SILs being drivers!
So we stopped visiting and when asked made the point to them, made little difference as they see it as too far to travel (for them, not us).

Person_one

Bennifred wrote: »

_pale__pale_ whaaaa! (mother of three boys, no girls)

Its not true, don't worry.

My brother sees my parents far more regularly than I do, just as one example!

angeltreats

I could almost have written your post myself except from the other perspective. My husband has a brother and a sister and hardly bothers to stay in touch with either of them. We see the brother and his wife when we go to stay with my husband's parents, and the sister lives in a different country so we see her only very rarely, once every couple of years maybe. He never phones his parents unless there's a particular reason, and is terrible at answering emails. It's not that there was ever a falling out, he's just not interested in staying in touch and has very little in common with his siblings. He does love his parents but is terrible at staying in touch with them too and most phone calls/skype/visits to see them are instigated by me, and if they email him and he doesn't reply they'll tell me to give him a nudge and I will then nag until he does reply. When he does see his siblings he does get on fine with them, especially his brother who is a really nice guy.

I phone my own parents (who live in a different country) a couple of times a week, sometimes three or four days in a row, and we visit two or three times a year (I wish it was more but sadly funds won't allow). I phone my in laws maybe once a fortnight for a chat without my husband being involved. He just doesn't have an awful lot to say and is hopeless at small talk. But he does actually love his parents.

People are strange, I guess. I wish I could make him more interested in staying in touch with his family more but what can you do.

Person_one

Jojo_the_Tightfisted wrote: »

Thing is, his version of his childhood could have been sat at the table every night and attending every event whilst quietly seething with resentment because he wasn't happy and hated the pretence of it all being about 'family'. I've seen families like that, and witnessed what happened when one of the siblings decided he'd had enough of seeing his sister's every whim and violent tantrum pandered to all her life - so he avoided the big family holidays, the large parties and didn't want to sit on the phone, paying to hear her go on about her children all the time (they were beastly little things, too) - but because 'family' was so important, her having lots of them meant she saw herself as a matriarch who had to keep the faaaamily together/under control.

It didn't mean he didn't care about his parents, but it meant every time he wanted to see them, it became a huge tribal gathering which inevitably became all about his sister and her kids.


Anyhow, when he dropped out of the gathering things, he reaction was to scream and shout and get violent because she saw him as ungrateful and rejecting the family. Which kinda proved his point that it wasn't all sweetness and light for him as a kid.

But his sister - well, her perception is different. She sees a happy, close family being hurt by his rejecting them. She also saw every bit of help he was given by their parents, but never counted the significantly higher level of help she received. (Or the cash in hand money her undeclared partner brought in on top of her single parent benefits and all the other financial help she got from friends because she was trying to cope with a large family).



I'm not saying you're like this person's sister - but your brother may have had a completely different interpretation of what it was like and could find it all too stressful to deal with.

Getting on his case about it certainly won't help.

Honestly Jojo, you're an intelligent woman but you don't half 'project' sometimes!