Giving to family and friends

[Michael M]

My wife passed away 8 months ago.  Since then I have been giving things of hers to family and friends.  Many were items she specifically asked me to give to specific people.  She always said if I wanted it for myself that would trump giving it away.   She always thought of me first.  I am really fed up though.  These people make no effort at all to make this happen.   No one will actually visit me.  I am mailing everything.   Even then I don't get responses about if they would like the item(s) or even an acknowledgement that they received the item.  I am getting pissed off and feel like they are disrespecting my wife and myself.  She wanted you to have this.  If you don't want it just say so,  If you got it then do us the common decency of recognizing the gift (hell at least tell me you got the package).  I am so tired of doing this.

[foreverhis]

If I may offer some blunt advice?  You have done everything you can to honor your beloved wife's wishes.  Now it is enough.

If someone wants an item, whether she mentioned it or not, and you are willing to part with it, then they can go to the effort and trouble to either ask for it and come get it or pay to have it shipped to them.

Please, I urge you to put your own feelings and needs first. ((HUGS))

[tnd]

Michael M:  I agree with foreverhis. I am learning to put myself first now otherwise, it just gets harder and more frustrating. If we are to be of any good and get through this, we have to be good to ourselves right now. 

If you still have more items to send to one of the "offenders", I wouldn't. I would donate or keep the items or pass it on to someone else. My brother and SIL were bad at this. I'd send them Christmas boxes with gifts for their boys. I'd even tell them ahead of time when to expect it so that if it didn't arrive they could let me know and I could track it. But nope. Not a word. No thank you note, no phone call, no letter, email, nothing. So you know what? I stopped sending them gifts. It's not that I expected anything in return but it's the point. My brother and I were raised as such that you get on the phone AND write a thank you letter. Guess he didn't teach his own kids that and my SIL certainly never cared. The word "manners" is not in her vocabulary. Sorry this happened to you but don't let it eat you. Ignore the brainless self-centered ones. You don't need negativity in your life.  

 

[Gail 8588]

Michael M, 

You need to allow yourself to be done.  You have done enough. Be kind to yourself

Gail.

[widower2]

Wow does this sound familiar. Very sorry to hear this. I don't know if this helps at all, but I went through the same damn thing. I'll spare you a very long and morbid story but suffice to say it was similar...we hadn't even discussed this before, so I was on my own, but because I thought it was the right thing to do and she would want me to, I made a real effort to ask if anyone wanted anything...although I didn't have final say-so on everything because we weren't married and her kids (two of them total scum of the earth) did. Still, I asked her friends if they wanted anything. That included one of her closest friends who wanted something that I also really wanted...but he wanted something of hers and it was the only thing he really was interested in, so I gave it to him. Not so much as a thank you, the POS. And no one even said thanks for asking, or really kept in touch at all, let alone visited. Great "friends" eh? 

If I were you, I'd say (to quote an old song) "if you want it, here it is, come and get it" (obviously this can be different if they aren't local). The hell with mailing anything. You're dealing with enough; don't let them add to it.

[foreverhis]

5 hours ago, tnd said:

Not a word. No thank you note, no phone call, no letter, email, nothing. So you know what? I stopped sending them gifts. It's not that I expected anything in return but it's the point. My brother and I were raised as such that you get on the phone AND write a thank you letter.

So rude and ungrateful.  We were taught to thank people for all kindnesses, including gifts.  My sister and I still do.  So do our friends and our family-by-choice.  John and I taught our daughter that saying please and thank you applies to family as much as to friends and strangers.  We modeled that behavior at home.  We did not take each other for granted.

[KayC]

17 hours ago, foreverhis said:

If I may offer some blunt advice?  You have done everything you can to honor your beloved wife's wishes.  Now it is enough.

If someone wants an item, whether she mentioned it or not, and you are willing to part with it, then they can go to the effort and trouble to either ask for it and come get it or pay to have it shipped to them.

Please, I urge you to put your own feelings and needs first. ((HUGS))

Pretty much what I said in the duplicate thread.  BTW I reported this as a double post yesterday and I wish they would have merged them.  

[foreverhis]

4 hours ago, KayC said:

Pretty much what I said in the duplicate thread.  BTW I reported this as a double post yesterday and I wish they would have merged them.  

I noticed a number of duplicates yesterday. I think it is or was a glitch in the software processing for new threads and editing posts, so they likely got a “cannot post this” message and tried again.

I edited something I had literally just posted and got a splash screen that said something like “This message cannot be edited because it was moved, deleted, or posted too long ago.” Then the screen just hummed along with the “Saving” icon spinning as if caught in an if-then or do loop. I refreshed the page and my post showed up with the edit included. That happened with another post as well.

 Perhaps the mods will merge the double threads from yesterday?

[KayC]

Everything I did day before yesterday gave me an error message!  I reported it to them, didn't hear back but it seemed fixed yesterday.  If everyone posts to the one thread and not the duplicate, it'll slip away eventually.