My brother got a new job and promotion at a different company and I found out on Facebook, not from an announcement post but just clicking on his profile and seeing his info.

A couple months ago he and my family went on vacation to see relatives without telling me.

[healingme4me]

Is it customary for adult siblings to announce vacation plans ahead of time?

1. I am entitled to my feelings whether or not you think it is customary.

2. You obviously did not read that there was a family gathering I was not invited to.

[healingme4me]

Sorry, didn't see any feelings noted so I wasn't sure.

[Deejay14]

Empty, I come from a large family. I know oft times my sister's family takes trips to Disney and visits with family down there. I don't let it upset me because I could not afford to go and I think they are entitled to time with just the husband and kids, so I am happy for them. Now, if there was a family reunion you were not invited to that would be upsetting. As for information in the family, I often find out second or third hand.

It's makes for a very unhappy life to be focused on what you don't have. Focusing on what you do have makes for a more contented life, I think.

[Crazy Hitch]

How about initiating contact and keeping up to date with them more often? A text message / phone call here and there - "Hey, just phoning to see how you're going? What's news?"

It might help you feel less isolated.

I suspect there’s a bigger story to this than what you’ve shared. When I have felt left out, it helped to just get really busy with my own things, even find a new hobby or volunteer somewhere. After a while I regain a broader perspective... people get busy... not everybody wants to include me... many times I found I was perfectly fine or perhaps better off doing my own thing independently anyway. This may or may not be the right answer for you.... The answer for me was... to focus on constructive and positive things I am building in my own life and other issues usually don’t seem so big after all.

Yes, we all have our own lives... I’m not usually unhappy over our distant relationship because it has always been emotionally withheld. Honestly I usually feel a deep awkward void when trying to talk to him so we don’t do it often. I don’t think my brother or I could say with genuine confidence that there is love for our family. But instances like these dredge up old hurts where I felt rejected from the family, my brother favored over me, and when my brother himself rejected and ridiculed me, his word overpowering my mother’s and maybe even informing it. My recent estrangement from my mother makes the feelings slightly worse, as well as having recently moved very far away where I don’t know anyone.

Neither my brother nor I have kids or significant others (to my knowledge) so we remain a nuclear family to each other, together with our parents. I don’t mind when they go places individually, but it’s a shock to find on social media that all of them are overseas with relatives to whom my mother has portrayed me in a negative light and is in competition with.

Thanks for answering. I’m focusing on my own stuff at the moment.