Last year J had the mother of all falling outs with his father. Things were starting to improve, slowly, after years of not talking, but this was the angriest I’d ever heard him. It seemed there would be no going back this time. 

J had a difficult childhood and upbringing. His mum died when he was young and his step mum is a nasty piece of work. I’ve met her, and underneath her thin veneer of friendliness is a hostility bubbling away. So the feeling between them is more than mutual. The few times I’ve met her I can understand why. She immediately soured the mood at our first meeting when she said “I’m sure you’ve heard all about me!” To me. What was I supposed to say to that?

Last year was so bad that really it was terminal. I commented it would only finally improve when she dies. His dad can’t see he’s being manipulated, even when the things she says are plainly absurd. I mean, they point blank refused to allow us to visit their home because she felt “threatened”. Really? When at no point, in our three meetings, has a single aggressive moment happened except from her tongue? When we’ve been at her house before and were roundly welcomed with great joy and comments about how wonderful it was to be a family again? She now thinks we’re planning on doing her in?

Give me a break. J was very upset after it all, and at various points during the year has brought it back up. I have tried to encourage him to drop it as it’s clearly eating him up. He thinks, and I have some sympathy with this, that she was jealous of the fact that J and his Dad were actually starting to reconnect after years apart, and his dad was actually choosing to spend time with J and me rather than with her. It had happened only a few times in a few years, of course, but that was too much for her. 

Yesterday we learned that she is very unwell in hospital. J brings up the subject and I say he must respond in some form, even if it is to say something relatively generic and sufficiently platitudinous. His dad will be sad after all, and it’s him to think about, not her. He finally does it, and likely won’t think any more of it. That’s the trouble… she knows it’s not heart felt so she won’t accept it. Assuming she survives of course. 

J however says that this is all quite normal. She is a generally unwell person. She is forever back and forward to the doctors and hospitals for tests. But I did wonder whether it’s best not to take the risk ignoring this particular message. They haven’t spoken all year. Maybe this time it’s more serious for him to leave such a message?

J found solace in the fact that my family have been more welcoming. My mum and dad especially, but so too my sisters and brothers too. And my elderly gran, who is still going. He loves her the most I think. Oh and the dog… or dogs as there is now a new one on the scenes. Another long story. It’s not quite a replacement family, but it’s good, and he’s been able to appreciate the joys of Christmas with family again, rekindling thoughts and feelings he said he hasn’t had since he was a child with his mum. 

But this year has challenged even that. After the summer incident with my family we both feel somewhat disappointed in them. I have reduced all my nonessential communication with them down to almost zero. I swore it would be the last time I offer any advice or comment on anything unless I’m asked directly for it. They don’t care and only want to hear what they are already thinking. To be fair, that feeling hits most of us, but when several outsiders are all thinking the same independently maybe they should listen.

So I haven’t seen them since and deliberately have avoided going home this summer. This week we had our annual up north work adventure, and we chose instead to spend a couple of nights in a local Airbnb instead. It was very pleasant and did the job. After all, when they visited my sister recently, just 30 miles away, they didn’t even say they were coming or try to make any arrangements to visit or ask me to visit them. And one year ago I was on my mum’s side trying to encourage my sister to let mum visit straight after the birth. She has a short memory. So I don’t feel very happy with them at the moment…

This at times makes me quite sad. They have become now quite distant to me. To be fair, my mum has reduced calling me down to maybe twice a year, so dropping it to nothing is no real difference. And, of course, this affects J too, since what little “family” vibes he got has now been killed off altogether. 

The trouble is that my parents are now too warped in their view of reality. I have now come round to my sisters’ views of her, though in any case I’ve known they receive too much of their opinions from social media for some time. But what seemed to be quite bitter judgements now look somewhat fair. I put my views to my younger sister a few weeks ago, and she thought I was being fair. 

My worry is that it’s eating me up. At first I thought I can just carry on, saying nothing. Ignoring the elephant in the room that is their blatant absorption of Russian propaganda and churning it back out shamelessly, ignoring the fact that there is nothing remotely good in what Russia have done. If I were Russian, and of the orientation I am, I might not be alive. I would fear for my life. The country is a one party dictatorship, and though I have no qualms in attacking my own country’s failings, and there are many and varied, at least we have generally accepted many socially liberal values and moved on. 

Can I bury this? Can I just say to myself it’s ok that my parents are comfortable glorifying (because that’s what it is, they hate America so much they delight in Russian provocation of them) a regime under which their own son couldn’t live a relatively “normal” life. Normal by our standards. Can I just move on and be polite and civil for the sake of keeping in touch with the handful of people left I speak with who aren’t work related?

This is challenging for sure. And it affects J, just like his parental struggles affect me too. 

2022 has been another year driving a wedge into the heart of families… and funnily enough that’s what dictators want. They want you to love them, not your own.