The heartbreak of grandparents not able to see their grandchildren - Yorkshire Post Letters

Another day of misery. I belong to a group of women called Wolds Grandparent Support Group.

We no longer have contact with our grown up children and grandchildren. We have meet ups and daily contact by text or email.

I am finding writing this to you sad but therapeutic, just having you hopefully read this makes me feel as though I’m being heard.

We live each day broken hearted, we dread each special occasion eg Mothers Day, Xmas Day, birthdays, the empty letterbox hits like a dagger in the heart. In most cases but not all, we have done very little wrong to warrant it. I believe after 21 years of nurturing and supporting and doting on them my crime was not saying ‘I love you’ enough. I was brought up in a strict household where I always felt loved but actions spoke louder than words and I became the same.

A mothers love is hard to put into words, its in-built inside you from the moment they are born, you know in those first few seconds there is nothing on God’s earth you wouldn’t do for them.

I am in my Autumn years now and running short of time and I can see this going to the grave with me, as can many others.

If I could have just one small window of time with my parents again I would love it because it never felt enough when I had them.

These ‘grown up children’ are destroying lives and have to live with the possible regret that one day it can’t be fixed. If anything did happen to me I live with the knowledge that they will find out probably via the Police. In my heart I believe I will never see my family again.

There are a lot of us out there, it is becoming an epidemic and there is no support except the clusters of self help groups which are great.

In the meantime we wander around watching others have the flowers and cards on Mothers Day, the weekend visits from the grandchildren, meals out in pubs and restaurants, we then go home and cry.

If only one family can be reunited or by word of mouth by reading this I will be a happy woman.