To make a very long story short, my daughter does not have a good relationship with her grandfather. It has gotten worse since she is an adult now. She does not call him at all and does not want to be around him. I have tried to get her to open up to me about it but all she will say is that he is not a very nice person. If you are familar with my story, you know that my dad and I have not had a good relationship either. He is now in a facility and she has said that when she comes home, she will not visit him. My fear is that she may regret not visiting him if something happens to him. He has asked why she will not talk to him and I have told him it is because of his attitude and how he has been towards us at times.
My girls do not visit their grandmother at her MC, and I don’t blame them.
I would let your grown daughter make her own decision.
Otherwise this is well and truly her own business, and if this gentleman was cruel to her I cannot imagine why in the world she would feel bad about not visiting, nor why she would care when he is gone.
You can decide for others. It is their business and their choices should be honored.
I would simply tell her you understand her feelings in light of the fact he was not good to her.
Yes, I'm staying out of it because I want what is best for her. I did tell her that he would like to see her and that he would like a phone call from her. She stopped calling him years ago because of the negativity during phone calls. I told him years ago why she stopped calling and he said he was not going to change. He probably regrets that now. Evidently he has even told one his friends that she wont't have anything to do with him. The friend approached me and said that my daughter should be ashamed. I basically told her to mind her own business.
When she died, I did go to the viewing ad funeral. I looed at her, in her casket and thought "she looks really pi$$ed off" which, inappropriately, made me giggle and I had to leave for a minute. The saying "If you don't quit making that face your face will freeze like that".
Well, it's true.
I felt absolutely nothing when I looked at her. I felt nothing but relief when she died. That doesn't make me bad person and I have zero regrets about holding tight to the boundaries I had to set 4 years ago.
She was extremely abusive to me. And less so, but still--abusive to my kids.
Your daughter is an adult. My guess is, something happened between them that she can't deal with or has been told to NOT deal with it. This is the way she is choosing to handle it.
I can attest to the fact that she will very possibly not feel anything when he dies.
This bothers you more than it does her-just let it go.
Would you rather she visit because you urged her to and then she regrets it , and it causes a rift between the two of you ?
It happens if the adult child sees how much stress their own parent is under because of a grandparent who was never nice.
My adult children didn’t regret it after said grandparent died . They were relieved that my slog was over .
If that is the case, who can blame her? Certainly not me.
I'm guessing that it's best for her mental health to stay away.
Please respect her decision. Just because you have chosen to have somewhat of a relationship with your father, doesn't mean that your daughter has to.
Trust me on this one. I am one who has been there done that(although it was with my mother and father), and I can honestly say I have absolutely no regrets.
We all have to do what we have to to protect ourselves.