I have a situation with my sister that I need to address. There are many issues involved; however, I will try to keep this brief. My 49 year old sister (who my adult children and husband feel has a paranoid personality disorder) has been basically abandoned by her husband who is in the process of a protracted divorce, her 25 yr old daughter who won't speak to her mother and an18 year old daughter who lives with her father and after many attempts doesn't seem to be able to live with her Mom. One of the problems that I have in supporting my sister is with our family's holidays. My sister gets very agitated when me or any of her siblings (family of 5 children, 9 grandchildren there are usually around 20 people at these holidays) contact her daughters to invite them to the family holidays. My sister believes that her daughters should go with her to family events and if they choose not to go with her then they should not be welcome. She was very depressed at Thanksgiving and Christmas when her daughters came without her and she has decided that she would not put herself in this situation again. My sister is putting our family in a very awkward situation by having to choose. My sister feels that she is the person we should have contact with and that the invitations should go through her. For Easter nobody from her family ended up coming to the family gathering since her oldest daughter said that she would not come with her mother and then the younger daughter refused to come as well. My last comment to my sister was that I would simply extend the invitation to each of them and then they would be able to work out how they want to respond.
My sister was married for over 25 years and I feel very sorry that this is happening to her. My family feels that she has brought a lot of this on by being very controlling over the years to the point that everyone has left her. I am her older sister and feel like I need to unconditionally support her; however, I truly love my nieces and feel that they need us more than ever. My brother-in-law feels that we should keep communication open and contact with his daughter’s. We are all very sad that this is happening and also feel the loss of my brother-in-law. This is the first divorce in the family and we don’t know how to handle the situation.
Thanks for any help you can give to me.