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Those who are estranged from their biological relatives can struggle deeply with feelings of grief, but it is a strange grief, something that feels unnatural or out of season. No one has died, gotten divorced, or was fired from a job. But what did end was the image you had for most of your life about the people you thought you knew so well.That ending is an extremely difficult loss not only because of the sudden nature of most family cut-offs, but because that ending also changed you and how you understand yourself and, importantly, life itself. Family Aggression impacts our sense of justice, fairness, and a belief in the benevolence of the world. Additionally, estrangement and family shunning is not merely the loss of one person, but a sudden loss of an entire group of people with whom you were once intimately bound. Losing all this in one fell swoop is a profound and devastating loss, especially when parents you believe love you have now become hostile, even threatening.

Because there is no open dialogue in most cultures to help one come to terms with the reality of family cut-offs, grief and confusion can remain like a dark cloud hanging over every day. Where are the grieving rituals for family estrangement? Death and divorce are now openly discussed in many countries and there are rituals to mark these transformative moments in our lives. However, family cut-offs are typically hidden by the victims because they feel so unnatural and are so fundamentally wrong. Victims often believe that cut-offs are uncommon, which is not true. Also, families who act aggressively work hard at convincing daughters and sons who differentiate from the Family Script that they themselves are wrong, unwanted, and alone. Isolating targets is a way to pressure them to conform and return to the family's way of thinking. This is a key piece in the dominating, aggressive family behavior and one reason why family estrangements are not openly discussed.

I do celebrate Mother's Day for those who are mothers in my world. I do not celebrate it for myself. For me, it is a time of grief. You see, I was blessed with one of those wickedly funny Southern mamas you hear about. Mine was a firecracker when she got wound up. She was a fierce defender of her family. She was also a Catholic who loved her Wiccan child. I tend to shy away from the concept of being blessed, but in this I was. 

Part 1: The Question

It is October,
the veil is thin
the year is waning
the leaves are turning
I am trying to say goodbye
to my grandmother
she is dying.
I do not know what to say.

Cross-posted at Goddessing From the Heart.

My friend’s mother died this past spring.

The stroke happened suddenly and her passing came a few weeks later.  Despite a lot of preparation for a worst-case scenario, the death hit the family hard.  My friend had a difficult relationship with her mother (something many of us can relate to, I’m sure) and her ambivalent thoughts and emotions have been complicating an already difficult grieving process.

My friend announced her mother’s illness to our group, but she kept the news of her mother’s passing to herself.  She had been out of town a lot to be with family, and it was only recently that I saw my friend since her family tragedy.