Is this more common than not? Re: Family Communication

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skigirl1689

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Maybe I am just in an odd family, but I’m really curious if this is a unique issue or more common than I think. It is becoming more apparent to me there is a serious lack of communication on one side of my extended family. Babies are born and half of the family had no idea the said (married) couple was even expecting. This happened to my immediate family last month (baby is due next month), and then happened to my aunt and uncle today (baby born this week). Yes, two different situations, same side of the family.

In the first situation, we found out “accidentally” when someone mentioned it and she thought everyone knew. The second, some people had no clue. I understand not announcing a coming baby until the couple decides to but it’s like everything is a state secret to certain family members who are never filled in. And it’s not as though there’s a family feud where people are shunned, we all get along.

It was also like this when my grandma was sick and dying, no one kept us up-to-date, sometimes accidentally learning she was hospitalized, unless we called to get updates, and it was like pulling teeth getting the entire story. It’s not like we could go visit her every day, living an entire day’s drive away. Or when we didn’t know for 2 weeks a great-aunt passed away.

I am beginning to think my family does not like certain people since we do not get to know when important things happen. I am more and more dumbfounded by this:shrug:
 
No, I don’t think it’s normal, but I don’t think it’s too uncommon. There are families where information disseminates quickly and thoroughly and everyone is brought up to speed on everything going on. Sometimes this type of family also gossips constantly about every member to every other member, which can end up with a sort of large family soap opera.

Then there are families where a few people seem to control the family information and if it gets to them first, they filter who gets to know and who doesn’t. Or, the family might be afraid of a few members who react badly to certain types of information and blow up and cause a scene.

Or you could have people who keep things close and private and really don’t want to tell anyone their private business.

Lots of possibilities and whatever variation you have, you just have to learn to work within that particular system and cope with it.

🤷

If you’re the younger generation, you can work to change things from your generation outward, but the older folks are usually a lost cause.

:sad_yes:
 
Could it just be that in a big family people really forget to tell everyone because they are sure someone has already spread the news.

My sister-in-law is excellent at passing on all the necessary (and unnecessary) news through her part of the extended family, yet there have been times when my daughter or son-in-law has said something to a part of this family and the message has not ‘travelled’ yet.

I am reminded though of when we gave my mother-in-law a surprise 80th birthday party, one of the grandchildren living in the same house as MIL didn’t know anything about the party at all. On the day she couldn’t understand what everyone was so busy with and that was when we found that no one had told her about the party.
 
skigirl1689 said:
Maybe I am just in an odd family, but I’m really curious if this is a unique issue or more common than I think. It is becoming more apparent to me there is a serious lack of communication on one side of my extended family. Babies are born and half of the family had no idea the said (married) couple was even expecting. This happened to my immediate family last month (baby is due next month), and then happened to my aunt and uncle today (baby born this week). Yes, two different situations, same side of the family.

In the first situation, we found out “accidentally” when someone mentioned it and she thought everyone knew. The second, some people had no clue. I understand not announcing a coming baby until the couple decides to but it’s like everything is a state secret to certain family members who are never filled in. And it’s not as though there’s a family feud where people are shunned, we all get along.

It was also like this when my grandma was sick and dying, no one kept us up-to-date, sometimes accidentally learning she was hospitalized, unless we called to get updates, and it was like pulling teeth getting the entire story. It’s not like we could go visit her every day, living an entire day’s drive away. Or when we didn’t know for 2 weeks a great-aunt passed away.

I am beginning to think my family does not like certain people since we do not get to know when important things happen. I am more and more dumbfounded by this:shrug:
Click to expand...
p.s. This is a good time to use Facebook.
 
TheRealJuliane said:
p.s. This is a good time to use Facebook.
Click to expand...
Not everyone has a computer, not everyone has internet, not everyone is on FB, not everyone checks FB…

If I were you, I’d organize a telephone tree. Do they still have those? There is a list: one person gets the first call, then calls the next two people on the list. They in turn each call two people, and those 4 people each call two people, and so on. If someone is not home, leave a message and call their two people, but don’t forget to get back with the missed person.

It could be easy to contact everyone and say, I was so sorry not to hear about (an event) that I have decided to have a telephone tree. Would you like to be involved? Is there anyone in particular that you would like to be responsible for calling?
 
My first thought was that this might be a Facebook issue. If you’re not on FB you’re out of the loop. It’s a rare FB person who will stop and take the time to communicate with someone not on FB. Otherwise, if you’re on FB and they are too … that wouldn’t make sense. If it’s any consolation, we’re not close to our family either. Most of them are on FB and while we’ve never been close even before that … we’re really out of the loop now. We’re an island.
 
TheRealJuliane said:
No, I don’t think it’s normal, but I don’t think it’s too uncommon. There are families where information disseminates quickly and thoroughly and everyone is brought up to speed on everything going on. Sometimes this type of family also gossips constantly about every member to every other member, which can end up with a sort of large family soap opera.

Then there are families where a few people seem to control the family information and if it gets to them first, they filter who gets to know and who doesn’t. Or, the family might be afraid of a few members who react badly to certain types of information and blow up and cause a scene.

Or you could have people who keep things close and private and really don’t want to tell anyone their private business.

Lots of possibilities and whatever variation you have, you just have to learn to work within that particular system and cope with it.

🤷

If you’re the younger generation, you can work to change things from your generation outward, but the older folks are usually a lost cause.

:sad_yes:
Click to expand...
I agree with you completely…the dynamics for each situation is different. It’s just weird because I don’t think it is a privacy issue because pictures were posted online of the new arrival; yet some were shocked there was a new baby. Who knows, none of it has ever made sense:shrug:
Dacinom said:
No, sadly your situation is not unique. However, there could be several contributing factors. One factor could simply be absent-mindnedness or disorganization. Some people are frankly not good at keeping track or making lists of who has been contacted about something important. Another instance could be laziness not wanting to bother to contact people, worse yet could be bitterness and not wanting to pass information along. Whatever the reason behind what is happening in your family, sadly there is not much you can do to change it.

As far as announcing pregnancies, I would not put too much into this. Even though it is joyful news it is not news that needs to be circulated immediately to all extended family members so there probably is no sense of urgency to spend a lot of time on the phone making calls. I tried to let people know when I was expecting but that news spread gradually and I suppose some people got missed right away. The sicknesses and deaths on the other hand are an entirely different matter. Serious matters should be communicated to everyone immediately.

In many families, especially larger ones it can be tedious to make dozens of phone calls, especially when you are tired or grieving in the event of a death. I know of family members that offered to make phone calls for me when in that situation and it was a blessing. Perhaps when hearing news in the future, you can offer the person to make phone calls for them? Aside from that there isn’t much else you can do. Since you cannot force other people to contact you all you can do is pray for harmonious family communication.
Click to expand...
You are make some good points…I know we have used phone trees when it is really urgent and it works well. But they still forget to tell us some really crucial info. Maybe because we’re geographically removed from the majority of the rest??? But like I said above, I have no idea why it seems like certain people always are left out of the loop. I don’t think it’ll change any time soon.
TheRealJuliane said:
p.s. This is a good time to use Facebook.
Click to expand...
That option is a blessing and a curse. For example, someone was diagnosed with cancer, and he thought he had emailed/called everyone, but he missed someone, and of course people found out when it was mentioned on Facebook. And one of the worst things is finding out a close relative died via Facebook.

But I’m glad it is not just my family…someone joked we should just use Morse code, it might improve something as none of the great technology of our time is helping:D
 
In my family, we don’t always hear about babies until they’re already born or about to be. But I have 25 first cousins that I can’t even keep all straight as to who is married to whom, let alone who’s pregnant.

One time my husband took a phone call from his mother and I could tell he was really upset about something, and he just handed me the phone and I found her in mid conversation about something random and I had to stop her and ask what the terrible news was.
 
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