I [35A] lost my non-biological brother [34M]

Backstory: I never had a stable home growing up. I had a variety of caregivers, no one actually seems to actually know all of them, and I am estranged from my biological family due to verbal and physical abuse. In high school, I started to explicitly ask friends whether they could be my family (I'm an only child but got a "sister" and a "brother"). I was staying over at their houses and they represented safety to me. I was blessed with some really kickass friends I know and love to this day. Conditional on my biological family being what it was, I was really lucky.

I also had a high school boyfriend. I didn't fare very well when we broke up, even though it wasn't very serious, so I reckoned I had abandonment issues and tried to put up a wall to avoid getting hurt like that again. I knew that I would not be able to handle another relationship disintegrating at that point in time.

In undergrad, I started dating a guy when I was 19, he was 18. We were friends first, and I told him before we started dating that if we were going to start dating, I had one rule: I couldn't handle being ghosted again. The relationship could change but I would want to stay friends no matter what. And I do mean no matter what - I was not in a good place mentally, I went through all these hypotheticals like what if I turned out to be an axe murderer and went to jail, would we still be friends then? So you see where this is going. He promises me we'll stay friends, we start dating. I'm still insecure he'll leave, he spends a few years convincing me he loves me. We talk about having sex, I ask him again if he promises we'll stay friends no matter what, as a precondition to sex, he again says he promises, we have sex. We have an off-and-on relationship through age 24 or so, I propose, he declines, we promise to at least be at each other's weddings to other people in the future, he asks me for a year's break for space so he can get over me, I agree.

Later, we start up talking again, but he's got a girlfriend and she is jealous of anything that walks. She's also from our undergrad, so I knew her when she was with past boyfriends and she had that reputation with them as well. So it seems to me from my perspective like she is slowly colouring his view of me; of course, that's not the way he sees it. Earlier on, I fucked up a major thing (I thought I knew better than him what he wanted and made a bad decision), he feels wronged by me and is right to feel wronged by me though it was an honest mistake.

He is not blessed with the greatest of memories. It hurts me no end, but he actually forgets - forgets - his promises to me. We talk about it. I agree to release him from his promise to always be friends. We still talk from time to time, for a time. I feel wronged by him, though it was also an honest mistake he made, and neither of us seems able to get past the deep wrong we feel the other has done.

I can understand a 18 year old making a mistake; it's harder when it's a repeated mistake, when over the course of many years, I'm berated for not trusting him enough and encouraged to rely on him, and when I'm again promised I won't end up with this outcome as an explicit condition before sex. I just got married, he wouldn't even come to my wedding like he had promised later on. He is not an asshole, it was an honest mistake to think he could keep those promises, but sometimes I think it takes a special kind of asshole to be so arrogant to think he could be family and then drop the ball with someone already abandoned by their family.

Over the years, he asked me to stop talking with him off and on, which I did. He asked me to limit myself to emails in one email thread which he could filter, which I did. He asked me to stop communicating with him altogether, which I did. (Well, he said I could send one more email, but I felt offended by the offer and then had a major concussion and couldn't type for a while... when I was able to again, I still didn't want to.)

It is beyond obvious to me this guy has no interest in knowing me. You can believe me that I also have no romantic interest in him. My husband, to his credit, never felt the slightest bit threatened, which is totally correct - he ain't got the tiniest thing to worry about, just not interested.

The problem is that this guy is my family. He's my family more than my mother or father, or anyone else in my biological family. He was my emergency contact for years. His number is still on the fridge along with that of a non-biological "sister", in case anything terrible should happen. I respect his preferences and choices and want all the best for him in life, including not knowing me. I haven't communicated with him at all since he asked me to stop, more than a year ago. I am very well aware of boundaries, etc., and without exception I respect them.

But I am so sad, I am devastated. I saw a music video I thought at first was about someone's younger brother dying (Ed Sheeran's "Photograph" - clearly not about a younger brother dying, upon watching again), and thinking it was about the death of a younger brother it felt so close to how I felt about it. He's not dead, he's alive, and thank god for that, and I want him to have his best life, but it's like I have a younger brother out there who won't talk with me, who's pretty much by this point forgotten everything about me and what I'm like, who I cannot connect with and have no hope of reconnecting with in the future.

I do have one over-the-top plan, because I can't help always trying. I am not interested in giving up - would you give up on a child who was fighting with you? You'd still be there, in the background, always. I thought to myself, I'll make some short videos every once in a while. Very rarely, at most one short one per year with some holiday wishes. Or a collage of photos in a card. I make them with my partner, and one day when we have kids, I'll make them with my kids and partner, like holiday cards, as one does. Maybe not everyone does, but I do. Family is important to me. And I'll keep them in a google drive, and maybe one day, I don't know how many years from now, maybe one day I can share my assortment of holiday cards and videos with him, as that last email I never sent. And just say I love you, and you're my brother, and you always will be, even as I respect your choice and try to be happy for you.

Am I the asshole? Is he the asshole? If neither of us is the asshole, how can I get past the grief?

Please be gentle. I don't want him to know me if it causes him pain, I just wish the world were different so we didn't cause each other so much grief.

TL;DR: abandoned child, now adult, lost closest family I ever had.

Submitted September 03, 2019 at 12:12AM

Backstory: I never had a stable home growing up. I had a variety of caregivers, no one actually seems to actually know all of them, and I am estranged from my biological family due to verbal and physical abuse. In high school, I started to explicitly ask friends whether they could be my family (I'm an only child but got a "sister" and a "brother"). I was staying over at their houses and they represented safety to me. I was blessed with some really kickass friends I know and love to this day. Conditional on my biological family being what it was, I was really lucky.I also had a high school boyfriend. I didn't fare very well when we broke up, even though it wasn't very serious, so I reckoned I had abandonment issues and tried to put up a wall to avoid getting hurt like that again. I knew that I would not be able to handle another relationship disintegrating at that point in time.In undergrad, I started dating a guy when I was 19, he was 18. We were friends first, and I told him before we started dating that if we were going to start dating, I had one rule: I couldn't handle being ghosted again. The relationship could change but I would want to stay friends no matter what. And I do mean no matter what - I was not in a good place mentally, I went through all these hypotheticals like what if I turned out to be an axe murderer and went to jail, would we still be friends then? So you see where this is going. He promises me we'll stay friends, we start dating. I'm still insecure he'll leave, he spends a few years convincing me he loves me. We talk about having sex, I ask him again if he promises we'll stay friends no matter what, as a precondition to sex, he again says he promises, we have sex. We have an off-and-on relationship through age 24 or so, I propose, he declines, we promise to at least be at each other's weddings to other people in the future, he asks me for a year's break for space so he can get over me, I agree.Later, we start up talking again, but he's got a girlfriend and she is jealous of anything that walks. She's also from our undergrad, so I knew her when she was with past boyfriends and she had that reputation with them as well. So it seems to me from my perspective like she is slowly colouring his view of me; of course, that's not the way he sees it. Earlier on, I fucked up a major thing (I thought I knew better than him what he wanted and made a bad decision), he feels wronged by me and is right to feel wronged by me though it was an honest mistake.He is not blessed with the greatest of memories. It hurts me no end, but he actually forgets - forgets - his promises to me. We talk about it. I agree to release him from his promise to always be friends. We still talk from time to time, for a time. I feel wronged by him, though it was also an honest mistake he made, and neither of us seems able to get past the deep wrong we feel the other has done.I can understand a 18 year old making a mistake; it's harder when it's a repeated mistake, when over the course of many years, I'm berated for not trusting him enough and encouraged to rely on him, and when I'm again promised I won't end up with this outcome as an explicit condition before sex. I just got married, he wouldn't even come to my wedding like he had promised later on. He is not an asshole, it was an honest mistake to think he could keep those promises, but sometimes I think it takes a special kind of asshole to be so arrogant to think he could be family and then drop the ball with someone already abandoned by their family.Over the years, he asked me to stop talking with him off and on, which I did. He asked me to limit myself to emails in one email thread which he could filter, which I did. He asked me to stop communicating with him altogether, which I did. (Well, he said I could send one more email, but I felt offended by the offer and then had a major concussion and couldn't type for a while... when I was able to again, I still didn't want to.)It is beyond obvious to me this guy has no interest in knowing me. You can believe me that I also have no romantic interest in him. My husband, to his credit, never felt the slightest bit threatened, which is totally correct - he ain't got the tiniest thing to worry about, just not interested.The problem is that this guy is my family. He's my family more than my mother or father, or anyone else in my biological family. He was my emergency contact for years. His number is still on the fridge along with that of a non-biological "sister", in case anything terrible should happen. I respect his preferences and choices and want all the best for him in life, including not knowing me. I haven't communicated with him at all since he asked me to stop, more than a year ago. I am very well aware of boundaries, etc., and without exception I respect them.But I am so sad, I am devastated. I saw a music video I thought at first was about someone's younger brother dying (Ed Sheeran's "Photograph" - clearly not about a younger brother dying, upon watching again), and thinking it was about the death of a younger brother it felt so close to how I felt about it. He's not dead, he's alive, and thank god for that, and I want him to have his best life, but it's like I have a younger brother out there who won't talk with me, who's pretty much by this point forgotten everything about me and what I'm like, who I cannot connect with and have no hope of reconnecting with in the future.I do have one over-the-top plan, because I can't help always trying. I am not interested in giving up - would you give up on a child who was fighting with you? You'd still be there, in the background, always. I thought to myself, I'll make some short videos every once in a while. Very rarely, at most one short one per year with some holiday wishes. Or a collage of photos in a card. I make them with my partner, and one day when we have kids, I'll make them with my kids and partner, like holiday cards, as one does. Maybe not everyone does, but I do. Family is important to me. And I'll keep them in a google drive, and maybe one day, I don't know how many years from now, maybe one day I can share my assortment of holiday cards and videos with him, as that last email I never sent. And just say I love you, and you're my brother, and you always will be, even as I respect your choice and try to be happy for you.Am I the asshole? Is he the asshole? If neither of us is the asshole, how can I get past the grief?Please be gentle. I don't want him to know me if it causes him pain, I just wish the world were different so we didn't cause each other so much grief.TL;DR: abandoned child, now adult, lost closest family I ever had.