I've lost a lot of family members to cancer. Not someone who I was this close to though. My sister in law was more like a sister to me. Sadly now, I realize we were so close to my sister in law and brother in law and their niece, because of my sister in laws efforts. It wasn't just the relationship she and I had that was lost, it was the overall relationship between my husband, myself, my sister in law, her husband and her child. 

I realize that it was through her efforts that my husband and I felt such a tight bond with her family. I know my brother in law has gone through a lot and probably had no malicious intent behind what he did. However, losing my sister in law was one tragedy, broken family ties was another tragedy that could have been totally preventable.

I miss my sister in law dearly. I only have a few close relationships with other people. One is a friend who is out of state. Another is friend who has mental illness and is going through bipolar disorder. I have another friend who is busy with her two kids and is all the way on the other side of NJ.

I was hoping my husband and I could be close with my brother in law and his daughter. I really tried hard to strengthen the bond and grow our relationships. My efforts were never reciprocated. 

Now I not only struggle with grief, I struggle with anger over my brother in laws behavior and sadness over what could have been a positive thing to come out of this relationship. I also think my husband and I are still struggling with getting to a better place in life and it has been a difficult struggle and nothing good has come out of it.

It is so hurtful to have this family member who makes you feel like shit about yourself on top of which. And aside from your in-laws, he is the family who is living closest to us. My husband thinks that because he in unsuccessful (in my husbands opinion) my brother in law is embarrassed of us.

I think it is simply that my brother in laws are insensitive. They don't realize how it affects my husband to have to continuously see pictures of his two brothers opting to socialize as friends on Facebook all the time, and never get a invitation to do the same. Never have anyone try to invest in my husband and take a interest in my husbands life.

I tried to invest in my brother in law and nieces life. It didn't seem to matter. It felt often as though my husband and I didn't exist. The first time my sister in law was taken to the hospital by ambulance we weren't made aware of it. Everyone knew my sister in law and I were close. Yet no one bothered telling us until several days later that she had been taken to the hospital by ambulance because she felt she couldn't breathe. 

I know that my brother in law was losing his spouse and his needs were the greatest. Yet throughout the entire process we try to put his needs before our own emotional needs. However, I don't feel like our emotional needs weren't even recognized.

First we found out after my sister in laws family, that my sister in law was refusing to do any treatment for the cancer. Myself and my husband's aunt has know all along that there was something suspicious all along. Her family had been coming to say goodbye to her, while we were told that my sister in law didn't want any visitors. I knew that my brother in law felt put into a difficult position, yet in a way it felt like emotional betrayal.

It felt like through his words and actions, what my brother in law was saying is that we weren't family enough to help. The other sister in law, a hospice worker, moved in. She and my in laws (who lived next door) took turns making dinner, helped clean, helped babysit and helped take care of Maryanne. I tried over and over again to help. I tried picking up a pizza. I even brought coffee over to be told, "I have a machine, we don't need coffee." The words thank you has never been uttered to us.

I struggle with the feeling, that everyone significant did something significant to help except for us. It felt like over and over again we were told we weren't as trustworthy, reliable and responsible as other people. We weren't as wanted and like as other people. 

Still I tried to stuff all this down inside. Even though my husband and I were angry and hurt over and over again. We were hurt when not told right away that my sister in law was in the hospital. We were hurt when we were never asked to help and our help was never accepted. We were hurt when our niece was sent to strangers (hired help) or friends rather then have the relationship between her and us be fostered. We were angered when we look at this photo collage of my sister in law and all the other important people in her life and neither I nor my husband's photo was on it. We were disappointed that we weren't asked to help with the photo collage. I felt invisible and so did my husband. 

I was really angered and let it be known how angry I was, after an incident involving my niece and my husband. It was my husbands birthday party and I was going to have a little cake for him and a few of his family members over the house. I asked my niece if she would like to help and she said yes. I asked my brother in law is she could come over and he said yes and as always he would get back to me. He would always say yes to us and then never get back to us. I can't tell you the amount of times we didn't make other plans with people, because we had tentative plans with my brother in law and his daughter. We would call him and instead of confirming or denying plans with us, he would tell my husband he wasn't sure of what he was doing. I can't tell you the number of times he said he would get back to us and he never did. I offered his daughter free after school care and he could care less about the relationships that may have been fostered between his daughter and I, or his brother and his daughter. He didn't seem to be grateful that we wanted to be more involved in his daughters life. Over and over again I saw how nice he was too other people. How he was so gracious complementing them on facebook for their help. He never once said thank you to us. 

He is a great guy to the other people in his family. He is not a great guy to me, my husband, his parents or his aunt. That's how I see it. And when we wouldn't accept him treating us like dirt, he turned around and just started calling a couple of his friends auntie and uncle. He just replaced us when we demanded to be treated with the same amount of courtesy and respect that he treated everyone else in his life. I am sometimes angry that we are stuck with him. He is an unacceptable replacement for my sister in law. He in unhelpful and unconcerned about what is going on in our life. I don't know if i am more angry or sad.