This is a difficult story to write but it needs to be shared. My husband Eric and I have 6 adult kids between us from our previous marriages. Their ages are from 27 to 38 years old. Three out of the six kids are estranged for different reasons. Those 3 are mine.
My youngest daughter was the first to walk away, over 10 years ago when she and her husband decided to get married without us even knowing when or where it would be. That decision was absolutely all her husbands ruling. He is very controlling. She did tell us they were getting married at first and we actually went to a bridal salon near us with my other 2 daughters one day for her to pick out a wedding dress. It was quite an emotional day for all of us, but they did not know when or where they were going to get married at that time but thought it would be in a few months. Then sometime after that, I found out from another family member that she did actually get married. I called her husband directly to ask what was going on and when they actually were married. He said to me, "It's not your business." That was the beginning. He was never involved with our family or wanted to visit. She came to see us 2 or 3 times over 10 years. Then, in 2020 I encouraged her and her husband to come visit us. They live in Texas and we were in Florida. I offered to pay for his airline ticket and eventually, he agreed to come with her to visit us for about a week.
All was good for the first day. The next day we had a family get together at our home and my sister in law asked him what he thought about BLM. The summer of riots was currently happening. Things heated up with my son in law and my brother for a while. My husband asked them to stop multiple times but they didn't listen. Eventually my brother and his wife decided to leave and the conversation continued with my son in law outside toward me and my husband. We spoke for a few minutes and things heated up again. Her husband called me some nasty names. My husband reacted by telling them to leave and go back to my other daughters house where they were visiting. I cried my eyes out having to do that but he was so disrespectful. I'm grateful to my husband who protected me and did not allow my son in law to continue his disrespect in our home. It was not my daughter who was disrespectful. It was always him, but ever since then she refuses to speak to me and has blocked me from calling her. She just gave birth to our youngest grandchild 9 months ago and I have not met her yet. I may not ever meet her at this point.
My other daughter has estranged herself from me on and off since she got married about 4 years ago. No matter what I do or not do, it is not acceptable to her and she doesn't like the fact that I pray for her or that I'm a believer in Jesus Christ. She wrote a beautiful book in high school when she was a believer. Her husband is amazing and I have a beautiful grand daughter from them now. I've tried so hard to understand why she doesn't like me and want to make things right but there is nothing I can do other than continue praying that God would heal our relationship. I love her and have always been there for her over the course of her life.
Then there is my son who I am so very proud of who has recently stopped communicating with us also. We had a huge disagreement about 6 months ago and my heart is so heavy with how things turned out that night. I believe it was more of a misunderstanding between us that turned into a bad evening. The one thing that kept me hopeful before this incident occurred, was that I knew I still had a good relationship with my son. Obviously, not as good as I thought. I believe that this generation has been so indoctrinated by TikTok and other internet platforms that they actually believe there is no need to honor their parents. We as parents are apparently narcissists, according to so many of our adult kids. No, most of us are not. When God commands us to honor our parents, it's not because we are "know it all's" or that we are to be worshipped. God wants us to honor our parents as we would honor Him. If we can not or choose not to honor our parents, we will not be able to honor our God. It's just the way he created us to be.
Forgiveness is so important here. We know that sometimes in rare situations there are some evil parents who may have done the unthinkable to their kids. In that case, we are to forgive our parents but not necessarily stay in their lives unless there is a complete repentance and turn around of that parent who hurt you so badly. I'm not speaking of those cases. Forgiveness toward those who hurt us is really for our own good. Also because we all need forgiveness for our own actions during our lives. If we can't forgive, why should we expect God to forgive us? He wants us to be like Him. Loving, forgiving, humble, peaceful and caring. He says we need to love our neighbor as ourselves. If you love God, you will seek to do what He desires. What He desires is going to bring peace to our own lives.
if you are currently in an estranged situation with one of your adult kids, continue to to pray for them and love on them.
