#family-estrangement

#family-estrangement

Because of work, we had to move about four hours away. Since then, we have felt increasingly isolated. I tried to call weekly, visit often and send gifts for every holiday. About a year in, I realized we were initiating all the contact and tried a little experiment. We stopped calling them. It took more than eight weeks for anyone to contact us. His mother calls his other siblings who live elsewhere every week, but not us.

I was waiting in line to enter the church for the funeral. I couldn't believe he was even having one... A church funeral? The only times I ever remembered him going were Christmas Eve or Easter, but whatever-I shrugged it off. Why was I having these thoughts at a time like this? Why does it matter when he went to church?

My brother is almost 90, a Repub for years, and a committed Trumpie from the beginning. He knows he is looking at his sunset and will die a Trumpie. He dismisses, rationalizes, or denies every critical fact about Trump. No fact, no failure, nor any reversal of policy by any court causes him pause. He only watches FOX. He has successfully alienated his wife, two very adult children, siblings, relatives, and friends who are not Trumpies.

Daniel Aruebose's mother had been estranged from her family for 10 years - the first time they had ever seen him was when his photo was shown on the news

Signs she's avoiding or preparing to avoid me - I open the door off my dining room, call down, Mom, and she doesn't answer, even though I heard her moving around moments ago. She texts two-letter replies, such as OK and no. She locks the door off the dining room. She takes out her trash before sunrise. She stops feeding the squirrels and birds. She keeps her lights off. She keeps her phone off. She stacks cardboard boxes in the laundry room or garage or on the deck.

"We started to have issues when I began having my own opinions," says Bruce, reflecting on the growing divergence between his and Scott's perspectives during their teenage years.

"I assure my kids that the separation from their grandparent is not their fault. Nor is it their responsibility to fix it."

Many described it as a difficult and sensitive topic—one they might only share with close friends. For the most part, respondents worried about others' negative reactions or judgment.

"Financial marginalization may seem like small potatoes compared to fighting for the right to exist, but the unacknowledged systems keeping the LGBTQ+ wealth gap in place are the same systems working to erase queer history."