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Nothing would stop me from going to visit any relative or friend on their death bed. Nothing. Saying good bye and making amends is important to me. I need to tell them I love them and I'm sorry if i hurt them. its just my personality.
If wife doesn't call and/or visit her dying sister, she will regret it later on.
Wish I had one last call or visit with my departed brother and sister. Bought were sudden and unexpected so I never had the opportunity to say goodbye
You don't KNOW that she will regret it. That's just bs people say to try to get someone to do what THEY want them to. Sage words of wisdom...gimme a break.
I know of several cases where people didn't visit dying family member and never regretted it. Some people deserve no more than a good riddance, if anything.
As long as your SIL is still alive, there is still time for her and your wife to patch up their relationship. Your wife should go there, right now...right this second.
Your wife has to make this decision. I went through a similar situation. I spent a couple hours just sitting in her room and not much was said. I told her I loved her and gave her a kiss on the head and left. My conscience is clear. I felt I was the bigger person. I still don’t know what she was angry with me about but that was her issue not mine.
Nothing would stop me from going to visit any relative or friend on their death bed. Nothing. Saying good bye and making amends is important to me. I need to tell them I love them and I'm sorry if i hurt them. its just my personality.
But if it's important to you why not do it when the person is healthy and not about to die?
Nobody chooses who to be related to. Despite all the faaaaaaaaamily talk, the fact is there are often toxic people in our family who are best avoided if possible. I'm from a large family and a few of my siblings are backbiters, cons, and have repeatedly done hurtful things to me and even their own children. I haven't had contact with those particular people for many yrs. I hate it when others (relationship "fixers") try to force me to do so. and I have severed a few relationships because of it. I have no room in my life for that crap. I'm not seething or crying in my pillow at night. And I would not regret for one second if certain siblings would die and I didn't visit or make peace. Pffft.
The dstance is irrelevant - 5 miles or 500. Doesn't matter.
OP, I suspect there is more - a lot more - to the story that you don't know about and that your wife doesn't want to talk about. That is her right....it is what it is. Leave it alone.
I have a similar story, applej3.
In my situation, I have no peace to make. I've already made my peace with the fact that some of my family are horrible people to me. I would have no regrets nor would I feel anything if I heard one of them had died. This doesn't make me cold or hard-hearted or "dead inside" as one poster said. I have many people in my lives who I would have a very different reaction about. Cutting out toxic people from my life makes my heart freer to love those people.
Quote:
Originally Posted by wasel
But if it's important to you why not do it when the person is healthy and not about to die?
Exactly. Going to see someone dying in the absence of a relationship is only for show. Or in reaction to a guilt trip. No thanks!
Seeing your and the other person's follow-up to my post, makes me realize it was a mistake. It's genuinely how I feel, but maybe I should purchase a diary instead of making CD posts.
Perhaps compared to you, I haven't been alive a long time at 35. It's possible that if a person has had a terrible relationship with a sibling or parent for longer than I've been alive, then that could reach a breaking point where your mind just says enough, I can't "feel anything" for this person any longer under any circumstances -- if only for my own protection.
The life that I have lived and relationships built with my parents, grandparents, and sibling just do not allow me to have a proper reference point for me to properly understand your position. I can only hope things stay that way for me.
So yes, I'm (genuinely) sorry I offended you. It was not meant as an "assault"; I didn't choose my words carefully.
I sometimes get emotional about near-death stuff, since even at a relatively young age, I've seen (too many times) how frightening it can be for all involved, especially the dying.
Actually, another thought had occurred to me and that was that you were fortunate to have the family relationships that allow you to have an opinion like that. So I'm not sure I was upset as much as I was envious.
Quote:
Originally Posted by tarragon
Where does this breakdown all start in the childhood?
Many, many years ago, Patty Reagan, the president's daughter, appeared on the Oprah Winfrey show, I think it was. She was talking about emotional abuse and I remember how people in the audience booed her and said she was really not an abuse victim.
As it turns out, Andrew Vachss, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Vachss, has done a lot of study on child abuse and one of the things I always remember he said was that verbal abuse is just as bad as physical or sexual abuse in the home. He did make the observation though, that when there was sexual or physical abuse in the family, the siblings tended to draw closer together. But with verbal abuse, siblings seemed to not be close to each other, as though verbal abuse separated them more.
I doubt if there is either just verbal, sexual, or physical abuse in a household. Most of the time I would guess that all of them go pretty much hand in hand and if a person is being sexually or physically abused, they are also being verbally abused at the same time.
I was both physically and verbally abused and I know it really did divide our family. I felt the verbal abuse was so much worse, though. And I was surprised and relieved to find out it really did qualify as abuse when it's used continually to a child (for a long time I felt and was told I overreacted to my parents). People think sexual and physical abuse are so much worse and they tend to dismiss verbal abuse with a wave of a hand and don't consider it the kind of crippling abuse that it really is.
Dr. Phil is what he is, but I give a lot of thumbs up when he says "It takes 1000 'atta boys' to erase one 'you're an idiot'". You can only imagine what happens when all your parents tell you is that you're an idiot and and never, ever give you an atta boy.
An example of verbal abuse: look up Phone Call With Narcissistic Mother on Youtube. Warning--bad language. If you'd like to visit such a person on her death bed...good for you.
Is your wife asking your opinion? If not, then respect her decision. While you may not understand it or agree with it, consider by her going to visit a door she has shut for a reason, may reopen wounds she had healed. The reopened wounds could then last for years to come. It is not an easy decision to choose to stop a relation with family, but sometimes there are good reasons to do it. Posters that are choosing to judge his wife, should remember you can't walk in anothers shoes.
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Sage words of wisdom...gimme a break.
and I have severed a few relationships because of it. I have no room in my life for that crap. I'm not seething or crying in my pillow at night. And I would not regret for one second if certain siblings would die and I didn't visit or make peace. Pffft. 
