i've been reading a lot of comments about this story (actually the event of her death occurred in 2010, and the original story is in the Telegraph) ....a lot of 'no way, this picture must be stage' to 'where's the dust'? (i see dust) but generally speaking people are flabbergasted she kept the apt. and apparently never returned... some of the items (stuffed ostrich?) are truly fascinating, some are totally exquisite! that mirror! and the crown moulding..the vanity is just incredible....the painting is what i find most intriguing....this was a portrait of her grandmother by a FAMOUS artist, yet she never returned to get it? wonder what fascinating story is behind that! i keep studying the apt. pics....-gg of course the mickey mouse doll (and is that porky the pig?) seem SO out of place, yet just adds to the charm of it all

"...cindylou, imagine if you can what it would be like after all you and your husband have experienced with your MIL if your own children grew up and estranged you..." If I had a child who estranged me, I would not think it had anything to do or not to do with my MIL. I would not think that they owed me a relationship because I tolerated my MIL (maybe I misunderstood what you meant by connecting my MIL into that idea). If my child estranged me suddenly and with no warning and if I asked and they said, "You know", and I truly didn't, I would make the assumption they didn't quite didn't know themselves. That they have feelings and upsets they don't quite understand themselves and that they needed time away from me to work them out. (This is assuming there's no mental illness or addiction. If there is mental illness or addiction, then I do know and frankly, maybe I'm just getting too old, but I've seen the hopelessness and heartache of addiction and mental illness, and I think I'd just be grateful for being cut out). More likely, I would have been told the answer. And I'd accept it, even if it didn't make sense. "Because you wore blue to my kindergaren graduation." Huh? Ok. I don't think I'd argue. I can't imagine arguing with an adult child. They are an adult. I barely argue with them now. My parents didn't argue with me, I never saw them argue with their parents. My aunts and uncles on both sides didn't argue with either their adult children or their parents. It's just not done. I can't imagine it. There are differences of opinion and hurt feelings and misunderstandings and on rare occasions, conflict between adult members of my extended family. Of course there is. But everyone seems to understand a basic rule. I live my life and you live yours, and I can offer my opinion and it's fair if you don't follow it. The person who's business it is, gets the final say. The person who has the most responsibility gets to decide. The person who takes the biggest risk chooses. We are none of us perfect people; but we don't squabble and manipulate and gang up on each other and form one alliance and then another to force family members to do what we want. And we don't stab each other in the back. That's such a bizarre concept to me. And we are very close--without melodrama. There's not a lot of conflict. So if a child told me, "I don't want contact from you because you wouldn't let me go to Aruba on spring break." I'd respect that. I'd figure sooner or later they'd understand. Or if not, sooner or later it wouldn't matter any more. I would absolutely believe that eventually they'd come back. Not the way they were, it wouldn't be the same relationship, but had we stayed close, it wouldn't be the same relationship at 30 as it was at 20 or 10. Would I miss them and be hurt. You bet. But I'd be comforted that I would see them again and focus on the other blessings of my life while I waited. I truly believe that if you love something you let it go, and if it loves you, it will come back. And if it doesn't come back, you never had it to begin with. If after 10 or 20 years there was still no contact, I'd have to face the fact that it's probably for the best. We didn't have the relationship I thought we had; I didn't know them, and we obviously weren't a match even if they have half my DNA. Do I hope to have close, intimate relationships with the families of my adult children? Of course. But I will be happy with any non exploitive relationship my children feel comfortable with. I may want more contact or less, depending on the personalities, but perfection doesn't happen in relationships; it's like tension between togetherness and individuality that has to be worked out in a marriage. When your children are adults with families, you renegotiate your relationship, and if it REALLY doesn't work for someone, you might have to walk away. Sad, painful, but realistic. I have a coworker who is retiring and moving to be closer to her daughter and grandchildren. They are delighted to have her. On a recent house hunting trip she was dismayed that her daughter seemed to expect/demand a lot of babysitting from her. She's not moving there to take on the responsibility of babysitting her grandchildren, altho she does hope to see a lot of them and participate in their lives. Things were tense as she attempted to come to understanding with her daughter. She came back and asked if things don't work out in the other state, can she have her job back. I sometimes in the past had wondered if she's a meddling MIL so much does she talk about her grandchildren. But I see now she's got a life outside them and is not exploiting her daughter's family to fill the emptiness (if any) in her own life. And she's not going to allow herself to be exploited by her daughter however much she loves her family. She sees her standing up for herself may result in a cut off; and I respect her handling of this delicate situation. I'm sure it will all work out, but I can see myself in her place; in any relationship, there's always the possibility that you or the other person will walk away for whatever reason. You may think, oh yeah, you are so philosophical, just wait until it happens to you. Well, like anything, what choices do you have: you either accept with grace or you don't. How does not accepting with grace help anything? The ends don't justify the means. Bullying, manipulating, harassing, yelling...none of that is going to help. If you accept with grace, while you are waiting for the problem to resolve itself enough so the child talks to you again with a willingness to compromise, at least you can still have meaning and pleasure in your life. It also gives you time to reflect as well. It might not be that you did something WRONG, it's just that you don't mesh well. And you can measure in the absence how you and your adult child's family don't mesh and what you are willing to compromise to make the relationship more pleasant for EVERYONE. "Mom, you can never be unsupervised with my kids." "Why?" "Because you are a taurus". Huh? Well, that makes no sense to me. But why jeopardize my supervised visits with my grandchildren which can be wonderful by arguing if being a taurus prevents one from being a good grandma or not. Why fill that time with strife and anger and posturing and demands and righteousness and counter accusations when I can be on the floor playing Candyland and angling for the chocolate swamp or coloring in Barbie coloring books or stacking Lincoln logs as high as the sky. Who cares if DIL is glaring at me when my darling grandson and I are holding our breathes to see if we can make a Pixie Stix teepee? I believe letting them go gracefully gets them back eventually, and if it doesn't, the relationship would have just caused heartache all around anyway, estranged or not.

When i started to notice alot of my step-son's strange behaviors i realized something was definetely wrong.i knew it had to be more than just ADD(which was what he was first diagnosed with)I spent days researching different types of conduct disorders and negative behaviors.I found a website that talked about RAD,and "all of his behaviors" matched their description of the disorder.I talked to his therapist at the time about my concerns but they blew them off and told us that he did not fit the "profile" because RAD children were alot more problematic.I was really frustrated at the time because nobody had a clue how much of a problem he really was.The school was just as useless,they kept minimizing his behavior at school insisting that he was acting up "just for attention" and the only solution they could offer was to change his medication.This was the same child that was litteraly "kicked out" of three different daycares because they just couldn't handle him.Mind you,this child was also getting suspended on a regular basis-almost monthly since the first grade!We continued to advocate for this child,in the hopes that someone would believe what he was really like.It was sad to see how not only his mother but the "community" had turned their backs on this child. After the abuse occured, we were just too distraught after the terrible shock of finding out that one child in the family sexually perpetrated upon the other children in the family.Here we were a couple by most standards, two people joined by love . Each of us was the birth parent of one of the kids involved. We were both horrified and almost inconsolable. The tears could not be stopped. The anger and disbelief on our faces was painfully obvious. The grief was too much for us to bear. I felt our sanity and health were in danger at that moment. I felt so much raw emotion that it sickened me. There were the victims; which were safe and basically unharmed physically. But would all the family love and support be enough to keep this nightmare from returning to haunt them as they reach adolescence? Will this horror cause them confusion about their own sexuality and will meaningful relationships be impossible for these kids when grown? Whether confinement or treatment will ever rehabilitate this boy is questionable. We only can pray. All I know is that this unfortunate choice on his part has damaged all involved and will be a horrible end to any life he may have had along with his innocence, and childhood.As much as i pity the circumstances that have created such a monster of a child,i just can't bring myself to "trying to help him" or advocating for him to get better treatment.I know alot of people may think i am a horrible person,but i just can't bring myself to trying to help him -when my daughter is still healing from what he did to her.I already have so much guilt to deal with over what happened after i found out.For the next few days-while my husband were still recovering from the shcok and figuring out what to do,i had to continue to care for this child...who suddenly asked me for hugs and kisses almost constantly.I tried my best to put my feelings aside and not treat him any differently then i had previously until My daughter saw me hugging him and ran into her room crying. As you can imagine,she was inconsolable and angry at me at the same time.I remmember leaving her room and walking into my bedroom and just collapsing on the ground where i stayed and cried for over an hour.I left after that,and stayed at my moms and did not return until my husband took him to his grandmother's house. That did more harm than good-soon after staying with her he recanted his story and said my daughter had "started it" and later we found out that she was actually "encouraging him" to defend himself and let everyone know he was innocent...When CPS stepped in and removed him from her home ,although it wasn't what we had hoped for we were relieved that he would be away from her influence.Unfortunetely all that CPS has done is put him in a theraputic foster home instead of an Intensive residential treatment Center for young offenders which is what "all of the therapists that have seen him" recommend that he go.Their agenda is to basically keep him in a safe home where there are no other kids and close the case.This is a high profile case,as our caseworker has told us.The main problem is that he is the "youngest offender" in the state of NJ and all of the programs available in resedential treatment settings are for older kids.We have written to the commisioner and various others for support but unfortunetely it hasn't done anything to get him the treatment he needs.I've spent so much time trying to advocate for this kid-that its just added to the guilt i have by neglecting my daughters needs and making him a priority.Disengaging for me was a matter of self-preservation.I just can't do it anymore.Sometimes i feel as if this marriage was a mistake,and i wonder how things would have been had i not made that decision.I just have alot of conflicting emotions about the entire thing. So here I am on my day off trying to get a bite to eat and make sense of all this. I'm feeling overwhelming pain and sadness. I'm questioning my husband and myself about the world we live in that creates such a problem. Out loud I wonder how we can protect kids and raise children who have no wish to ever do these things. How can this happen in a home like this where there was love, caring, and watching? I want badly to blame something or someone, but who? (sorry for the long vent-i really needed it today)

My knowledge of her telling him to do this is from her reaction to it. the whole story: My brother and I were playing outside, he was like 3 times my size, i was pretty small as a child, and he was kinda husky. we were throwing the baseball and he turned his head to look at a passing car, as I did, but I didn't see him look. So when my attention went back to the game, i threw the ball and it hit his arm. He yelled at me and ran inside. I knew I was in for it, so I crawled onto the swing set to get high enough up so he couldn't do anything. He came out and told me to get down because she had told him to hit me back. I said no, so he scratched my back with the mit, i was hanging onto the top bar. SM came to the door and called us in for lunch. After lunch my brother went into the living room. We had a rule that we were supposed to clean our area of the table when we got done, so i knelt down to get a paper towel from below the sink. When I knelt down, everything went blurry and I fell backward. When I looked up, he was looking at her standing in the doorway with a look like kids have as if to say "ok i did it, mom." she looked down at me, turned and walked away. Other things to back up what she would do are: She always defended her son. Once he was chasing me with a piece of water hose trying to knock me off of a bike, I jumped off, ran in to my dad and started telling him my brother was trying to hit me. I said I had dropped the bike at the back door to come in. Brother followed and told them i had jumped off the bike and just left it laying without putting the kickstand up. They asked if I had and i said yes but that he was trying to hit me off the bike, i had to get away. She paddled me, not him. Once, my brother had me by the neck in the floor of his room and was choking me cause I touched the Nintendo, which we were supposed to share. I reached for the control and he grabbed me by the head and pulled me back, got on top of me and was choking me. SM passed by the room looked in for a moment, me looking up at her, then walked away. My sister then came looking for me and saw what was going on and screamed, she was only about 3 though. That is when SM intervened. A lot of defending my brother. He would hit me, he was a rough boy. I would tell, she would call me a tattle tale and paddle me. So i told my mom, my mom talked to my dad and it was said that if she wouldn't defend me then i would take care of myself. He hit me so i hit him back the next time defending myself and she paddled me for hitting. As I said, he was about 3 of me though. When I was roughly 4, I started a new pre-school, being new, I was kinda shy and stuff still. She called my pre-school when I was 4 and told them I had lice. I didn't, the school nurse checked me. The director of the school told us she had received a call from her.