Replies

• Jayhawker Moderator Posts: 16,446 Senior Member

  December 2018 #2

  They just can't help themselves.....

  Sharps Model 1874 - "The rifle that made the west safe for Winchester"

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• FFLshooter Member Posts: 1,057 Senior Member

  December 2018 #3

  Yet we are the deranged ones...

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• Jermanator Senior Member Posts: 16,127 Senior Member

  December 2018 #4

  While I can't stand Trump, she needs to let that crap go. It isn't healthy. The people wearing the red hats aren't helping to unify the country either-- like the idiots in the Obama hats.
  

  Reason obeys itself; and ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it.

  -Thomas Paine

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• NN Senior Member Posts: 24,505 Senior Member

  December 2018 #5

  Bet you baited her 
  

  Shut up-----KAREN; OK Cynthia

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• tennmike Senior Member Posts: 27,105 Senior Member

  December 2018 #6

  My sister, her husband, and I havn't set down to Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner together since 1995, except for a Thanksgiving dinner at her youngest son's house once in the late 1990's. To say that you couldn't cut the tension with a BIG chainsaw is an understatement.  Isn't politically driven, either. And I don't see that get together  happening in the future, either. HER decision, not mine. And when our Mom died in 2003 she burned the bridge with a 100 megaton nuke. We talk on the telephone on rare occasions and on rarer occasions in person. Her living 750+ miles away is a good thing, for me. No way I can fix it; I've tried. If someone hates you, family included, it just seems to make sense to avoid being around them.
  

    “I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that I don't know the answer”
  ― Douglas Adams
  

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• Jeff in TX Senior Member Posts: 1,964 Senior Member

  December 2018 #7

  Wambli Ska said:

  Dear sister.  You need to respect my political views as much as I respect your decision to go through life as an ignorant, emotionally driven moron.  
  
  So let’s reach a truce.  You stop sending me your political nonsense and I’ll keep the fact that I know you are an idiot to myself...
  
  Merry Christmas, Love me...

  I'm going to borrow that one to send to her if you don't mind!
  
  NN,
  
  No, I did not bait her as I haven't had any contact since we scheduled X-mas dinner.  If I was a betting man I'd say her husband got her riled up as I don't think he wants to come to X-mas dinner or have it happen.
  
  My wife just said no to x-mas dinner as she doesn't get the whole political thing and she doesn't want to be around when the rockets red glare!
  
  Just not worth my time and effort on this one!
  
  
  

  Distance is not an issue, but the wind can make it interesting!
  
  John 3: 1-21

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• knitepoet Senior Member Posts: 20,552 Senior Member

  December 2018 #8

  Can't say as I am surprised to read this.
  Sorry to see it happening though
  

  Seven Habits of Highly Effective Pirates, Rule #37: There is no “overkill”. There is only “open fire” and “I need to reload”.
  
  
  

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• timc Senior Member Posts: 6,684 Senior Member

  December 2018 #9

  I’d send her back a picture of Hillary with the caption....
  ”Better a demon than the devil herself!”

  timc - formerly known as timc on the last G&A forum and timc on the G&A forum before that and the G&A forum before that.....
  AKA: Former Founding Member

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• Jeff in TX Senior Member Posts: 1,964 Senior Member

  December 2018 #10

  Well I I got a scathing text from left wing sis this morning. I’m back out of her life. My wife said imagine that, she said I didn’t even need a crystal ball to see that one coming. 
  
  To many important things I need to get done today, tomorrow and the rest of my life to worry about her left-wing bipolar political disorder!
  
  as a lot of you said, the truce lines couldn’t hold!

  Distance is not an issue, but the wind can make it interesting!
  
  John 3: 1-21

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• bisley Senior Member Posts: 10,787 Senior Member

  December 2018 #11

  Jeff,

  
  

  I am more or less estranged from my own sister, although not over politics, and not on any sort of visceral level, as your sister seems to have engaged in. We can still have polite conversation, and can still laugh about a few of the common experiences we had during childhood, but we rarely do, even though we are only about 75 miles apart.
  

  
  

  Much of it stems from her and her husband's failure to discipline their children and grandchildren, years ago. I'm 'old school,' when it comes to requiring respect from children, and her kids' and grand kids' lack of respect for me, my property, and my own children and grand children, led me to take remedial action towards them, on several occasions, and she was apparently offended by it, although it never seemed so, at the time, or this estrangement would have occurred early on. The irony of it is that I now see her grown-up kids about as often as she does, and they often seek out my advice, rather than hers.

  
  

  All I really have to offer is that the relationships you were born into are sacred, and require a great deal more forbearance than most other relationships. In our case, we both realize that without the 'blood bond,' we would likely never see each other again. Out of respect for our deceased parents, we avoid the subjects we will never agree upon, as best we can. They always creep in, eventually, but we almost never let it go very far. In the cases where they do, we seem to extend the separation times between us. Even so, I would be there for her in a time of need, and likely she would do the same. Even if she wouldn't, I still would.

  
  

  All I'm saying is that, however harsh the words are, and however much you both may need to stay apart, there may eventually come a time when one of you will need the other, and if you ignore that, it will haunt you, and make you less happy, overall. Also, as long as you don't escalate your own animosity too far, she may someday have a much needed epiphany, and come out of the psychosis that seems to be gripping her, now.

  
  

  As always, please feel free to disregard this bit of Internet advice - it is probably worth exactly what you paid for it.
  

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• zorba Senior Member Posts: 22,984 Senior Member

  December 2018 edited December 2018 #12

  I totally agree with Bisley's words.

  With that said:

  Sometimes, there comes a point of no-return, "blood" or not. Such was with my late Mother - who had borderline personality disorder and refused to admit it even to herself and get some kind of help. There was absolutely ZERO reasoning with her, because she'd change the rules to keep the chaos flowing (classic BPD).

  To have my peace in my life, I had to cut off all contact, and didn't see or directly hear from her for the last 10 years of her life - although she raged at the boundaries I'd set, but that was the only boundary I could enforce.

  Goddess knows it cost me, but it would have cost me more to continue to subject myself and my family to her. She's been gone from this earth for almost 10 years, and a couple of "sensitives" claim she's very sorry for her behavior - which isn't surprising as the spiritual world gives clarity. I'm *STILL* trying to forgive her, the best I've done thus far is to be a bit less angry - I'm working on it. At this point, I do NOT want that soul waiting for me at the "pearly gates" - may the Good Goddess Bless and Keep her...

  ... FAR away from me!

  As for my sibling, she is quite a bit older than I am, being of the so-called "First Cohort" of the "Baby Boomers", whereas I'm of the "Second Cohort". The two "Cohorts" really should have been called something completely separate, as they have little in common with each other. She came of age in the 60s, with all the Liberal crap that entails. I came of age in the 70s. Aside from an utter distrust of all Gov't, large and small, we don't have a lot in common politically. But we manage to have good conversations regardless.
  

  -Zorba, "The Veiled Male"
  
  "If you get it and didn't work for it, someone else worked for it and didn't get it..."
  

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• zorba Senior Member Posts: 22,984 Senior Member

  December 2018 #13

  cpj said:

  And on the flip side, I’ve got MUCH better “family” that ARE NOT blood relatives. 

  THAT'S for darn sure!
  

  -Zorba, "The Veiled Male"
  
  "If you get it and didn't work for it, someone else worked for it and didn't get it..."
  

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• Diver43 Senior Member Posts: 10,348 Senior Member

  December 2018 #14

  cpj said:

  I’ve never really understood the whole “but they are family, the only ones you have” line of thinking.
  
  Thats not how I think. Blood doesn’t bind you to people. I can, and have, dismissed family just the same as I’ve dismissed people who I thought were  friends. It sucks a bit at first, but I’ve learned it’s far easier to let them go than to keep beating your head against the wall.
  
  And on the flip side, I’ve got MUCH better “family” that ARE NOT blood relatives. 

  CPJ speaketh the truth.  I have so called close family that has treated me like crap since I was a boy.  It used to be "but they are family", but no more.  We talk on the phone occasionally,but we do not even visit for Holidays anymore.  It sucks, It is sad, but as much as I hate the expression, it is, what it is  

  Logistics cannot win a war, but its absence or inadequacy can cause defeat. FM100-5

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• Jermanator Senior Member Posts: 16,127 Senior Member

  December 2018 #15

  I will give family a bit more room before I call it quits, but I will call it quits. Blood doesn't mean I have to put up with your crap unconditionally.
  

  Reason obeys itself; and ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it.

  -Thomas Paine

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• FFLshooter Member Posts: 1,057 Senior Member

  December 2018 #16

  I’m suing my brother in laws insurance company over an expensive incident that wasn’t any bit of my fault (long story). You’d think that I was personally going after him in a civil suit demanding his house and possessions, he’s so pissed. I’m not upset though because he’s a little beta male and his wife is someone that I loathe with a passion. In other words, family can be a bitch.

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• Jayhawker Moderator Posts: 16,446 Senior Member

  December 2018 #17

  It seems that most families have at least one member that thrives on drama/ chaos...and if there is no drama or chaos to be had they will damn well create it. When that same person has control issues, you have a monster on your hands.
  
  We have a person like that in the family and it was extremely frustrating for them to find out that my wife and I do not participate in drama, family-related or not, nor will we enable the controlling nature of the adult children of alcoholics in the family.. 
  
  

  Sharps Model 1874 - "The rifle that made the west safe for Winchester"

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• Michakav Senior Member Posts: 2,620 Senior Member

  December 2018 edited December 2018 #18

  zorba said:

  I totally agree with Bisley's words.

  With that said:

  Sometimes, there comes a point of no-return, "blood" or not. Such was with my late Mother - who had borderline personality disorder and refused to admit it even to herself and get some kind of help. There was absolutely ZERO reasoning with her, because she'd change the rules to keep the chaos flowing (classic BPD).

  
  

  
  

  I have been in the same boat with my mother for decades. I believe she is still living but have not had any recent updates. She suffers from depression and bipolar. It was a nightmare growing up with her and we NEVER got along. I eventually got to live my dad, which is all I EVER wanted, at 16 yrs. old after I went off the rails with using drugs, failing school and getting into trouble. That turned my life around in a matter of months. I gave her some rope here and there but I always got burnt. Have not had contact in several years. My 10 year younger sister has done the same the last couple years.

  
  

  Toxic is toxic, no matter if blood or not!
  

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• jbp-ohio Senior Member Posts: 10,078 Senior Member

  December 2018 #19

  I imagine I am the Black Sheep tonight. Went to Thanksgiving and one of the crumb munchers coughed in my face and I've had a cough since. 
  
  Every time a kid showed up last night everyone asked, ''How are you feeling? Still sick?''
  
  We bailed............

  "The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not." Thomas Jefferson

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• bisley Senior Member Posts: 10,787 Senior Member

  December 2018 edited December 2018 #20

  I'm really only saying that family members and very close friends are given my best efforts at calmness and moderation. Certainly, anyone can display unreasonable levels of contempt for anyone else, regardless of 'blood.' There is a finite amount of contempt that anyone should have to deal with, from anybody.
  

  
  

  I just avoid 'lines in the sand' for as long as possible, with people I have had important common experiences with. On the rare occasions when I have 'written off' someone who I believe has betrayed the bond that I believed we had, I have always wondered if maybe I was too prideful. It's just better to be as sure as possible, because it leaves a certain amount 'emptiness,' whether justified or not.
  

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• zorba Senior Member Posts: 22,984 Senior Member

  December 2018 #21

  I don't know about "prideful", but sometimes you have to take care of yourself and put the poison at an acceptable distance. But yes, it does indeed leave emptiness...
  

  -Zorba, "The Veiled Male"
  
  "If you get it and didn't work for it, someone else worked for it and didn't get it..."
  

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• CaliFFL Senior Member Posts: 5,483 Senior Member

  December 2018 #22

  Jeff in TX said:

  Shoot we didn’t make it to Xmas dinner before my sister blew up the truce. She couldn’t resist herself. Got this text this morning!
  
  Got to say I’m done with her for awhile. 

  Just ask her if she supports Trump's bump stock ban. See if she implodes. 
  

  When our governing officials dismiss due process as mere semantics, when they exercise powers they don’t have and ignore duties they actually bear, and when we let them get away with it, we have ceased to be our own rulers.
  
  Adam J. McCleod
  
  

  
  

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• Armoredman Member Posts: 362 Member

  January 2019 #23

  Haven't had a family gathering in years. Everyone is pretty much dead, parents, step parent, brother, and the rest on the wife's side disowned us. No tree, no lights, her parents died right next to Christmas, so she can't take the strain of the holidays. Christmas I spent at home making burgers and drinking some rum while watching NetFlix.

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