DEAR ABBY: My siblings and I are estranged. I live in a unique state.
My brother and I never got along and stopped speaking a few years ago. My older sister and I, after an extended, toxic relationship, finally had a blowout after Dad passed. We haven’t spoken since. My younger sister took my older sister’s side and doesn’t speak to me either.
I actually have communicated briefly via text and email with all my siblings regarding my parents’ trust and final matters.
My sisters still insist on texting me birthday wishes. For this reason, I feel obligated to send them a birthday text as well. I stress out weeks before their birthdays due to it.
I felt peaceful after becoming estranged from my older sister. I actually have many feelings of resentment toward all my siblings for having taken advantage of my parents, especially this older sister.
She lived with them rent-free for a few years. She refused to get a job and wouldn’t help out — not even to wash their room after they were elderly.
Doesn’t estrangement include birthdays as well? Why do I feel this manner? — ESTRANGED 364 DAYS IN ARIZONA
DEAR ESTRANGED: There may be such a thing as righteous indignation. It appears that is what chances are you’ll feel toward your siblings.
Whatever closeness there could have ever been seems to have evaporated a few years before your parents’ deaths.
Family estrangement is defined because the lack of a previously existing relationship between relations through physical or emotional distancing.
This appears to accurately describe you and your siblings.
If you happen to prefer to not exchange birthday greetings, stop doing it. I believe that after you quit responding and reciprocating, those greetings will stop.
DEAR ABBY: Two years ago, certainly one of my best friends took her life. I’d known her since we were in our freshman yr.
We dated for nearly a yr while still in class before deciding to interrupt up and remain as friends. She was much closer to me than that, though. She was like a sister. I loved her a lot.
Annually on the anniversary of her death, I am going somewhere recent, someplace she would have desired to see had she lived.
I do know nothing I could have done would have stopped her. I understand that. But Abby, how do I stop feeling like I could have done more?
I don’t wish to feel guilty anymore. I just want to recollect her. I just wish to love her. — HER ‘SISTER’ IN MICHIGAN
DEAR ‘SISTER’: Please accept my sympathy for the lack of your dear friend. The emotions you might be having after her death — whatever the circumstances — are normal.
Did we do enough? Could now we have done more? Is all of it right to go on with our life? The term for that is survivor guilt.
A technique to higher deal with these feelings about her loss is perhaps to hitch a grief support group or talk them through with a licensed therapist.
Dear Abby is written by Abigail Van Buren, also generally known as Jeanne Phillips, and was founded by her mother, Pauline Phillips. Contact Dear Abby at DearAbby.com or P.O. Box 69440, Los Angeles, CA 90069.
DEAR ABBY: My siblings and I are estranged. I live in a unique state.
My brother and I never got along and stopped speaking a few years ago. My older sister and I, after an extended, toxic relationship, finally had a blowout after Dad passed. We haven’t spoken since. My younger sister took my older sister’s side and doesn’t speak to me either.
I actually have communicated briefly via text and email with all my siblings regarding my parents’ trust and final matters.
My sisters still insist on texting me birthday wishes. For this reason, I feel obligated to send them a birthday text as well. I stress out weeks before their birthdays due to it.
I felt peaceful after becoming estranged from my older sister. I actually have many feelings of resentment toward all my siblings for having taken advantage of my parents, especially this older sister.
She lived with them rent-free for a few years. She refused to get a job and wouldn’t help out — not even to wash their room after they were elderly.
Doesn’t estrangement include birthdays as well? Why do I feel this manner? — ESTRANGED 364 DAYS IN ARIZONA
DEAR ESTRANGED: There may be such a thing as righteous indignation. It appears that is what chances are you’ll feel toward your siblings.
Whatever closeness there could have ever been seems to have evaporated a few years before your parents’ deaths.
Family estrangement is defined because the lack of a previously existing relationship between relations through physical or emotional distancing.
This appears to accurately describe you and your siblings.
If you happen to prefer to not exchange birthday greetings, stop doing it. I believe that after you quit responding and reciprocating, those greetings will stop.
DEAR ABBY: Two years ago, certainly one of my best friends took her life. I’d known her since we were in our freshman yr.
We dated for nearly a yr while still in class before deciding to interrupt up and remain as friends. She was much closer to me than that, though. She was like a sister. I loved her a lot.
Annually on the anniversary of her death, I am going somewhere recent, someplace she would have desired to see had she lived.
I do know nothing I could have done would have stopped her. I understand that. But Abby, how do I stop feeling like I could have done more?
I don’t wish to feel guilty anymore. I just want to recollect her. I just wish to love her. — HER ‘SISTER’ IN MICHIGAN
DEAR ‘SISTER’: Please accept my sympathy for the lack of your dear friend. The emotions you might be having after her death — whatever the circumstances — are normal.
Did we do enough? Could now we have done more? Is all of it right to go on with our life? The term for that is survivor guilt.
A technique to higher deal with these feelings about her loss is perhaps to hitch a grief support group or talk them through with a licensed therapist.
Dear Abby is written by Abigail Van Buren, also generally known as Jeanne Phillips, and was founded by her mother, Pauline Phillips. Contact Dear Abby at DearAbby.com or P.O. Box 69440, Los Angeles, CA 90069.
