Family: Estranged, Reconnected, or Rebuilt?

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I’ve always found family a bit like technology: occasionally miraculous, often glitchy, and prone to suddenly disappearing just when you need them most.

Some relatives are now just initials in a family tree I’ve digitised. Others I’ve reconnected with after years — sometimes decades — of silence, awkwardness, or just mutual overwhelm. One cousin (bless her East Anglian socks) has become a kind of genealogical lifeline. Others, I wouldn’t recognise if they walked past me in Tesco’s, I'm sorry to say.

Over time, I’ve built something resembling a support network out of unrelated people — friends, forum strangers, even (awkward pause) AI. In many ways, that’s felt more “family” than family.

So I’m curious:

Are you in touch with your family of origin?

Do you feel closer to chosen family or online friends?

Has anyone had success repairing fractured relationships, or does distance feel safer?

Do you find ancestry and heritage fascinating, painful, irrelevant — or all three?

And does anyone else quietly mourn the family they might have had, if things had been understood earlier?

No pressure to share anything heavy — even one-liners or silly anecdotes welcome. Just wondering how everyone else navigates this very human tangle.

— Mike (@MikeCheque)

I found my birth mother just over 12 months ago and she quite shamelessly denied ever giving birth to me
Then she lied about who my dad is so I made contact with an old perv who just wanted to compare me to his dead wife

I've come to rely on myself

Yes, always have been.


No, I'm thankful for the family I have. However I do wish more had ASD or ADHD like me, as in diagnosed like me. I'm not saying I wish ASD upon anyone but at the same time misery loves company.

I am in touch with my parents, extended family not so much. I did not feel any closeness with them growing up except my cousins.

Yeah I used to have sort of cousins when I was a kid because I had two aunties and I used to live with one sometimes and the other one sometimes and the one who used to make tomato sandwiches had millions of kids and we used to play

But they're both dead now and I don't see any of her kids anymore either

I've learned not to put my trust in family. I've been dealing with my own problems for 12 years.

I have lost contact with some family, try and stay in touch with some of my other relatives, towards my children, I am a very mother-hen type of dad and hope to keep our contact for as long as possible.
BUT
My personal (and each of us has their own) approach to navigating this is: Respect has to be earned. For instance, I do not consider myself worthy of the title of father, son, nephew, etc... I have to earn this by merit of my behavior towards 'them'.

kind regards,
Kada