I need prayer for restoration of my relationship with my brother.

I have a brother who is 4 years younger than me. By the grace of God, we were always close growing up. He was a huge part of my childhood and we’ve had lots of laughs together. In our young auditions years, we both had major life events happen, and somewhere along the way, we grew distant. It just kind of happened.

I moved out of state, and in with our father, when he was 13 and I was 17. He’d visit us every summer, but then he turned 17 and his friends became his main priority. He also was hanging out with a non Christian crowd and was saying things like he didn’t know if God was real.

My best friend died in a car accident involving an off duty police officer when I was 21, the same time he was going through these things. I was very depressed, upset, and broken-hearted. He was less than sympathetic, and kind of told me to get over it. I was still in my first 5 years of my dental career, and felt distraught as I tried to maintain my professional work field.

He went to college and soon ended up nearly failing, very close to being kicked out. He changed his mind and wanted to go to a school local to me and my dad. I flew down to rent a truck and drive him and his belongings, and it was then I realized the crowd he’d gotten involved with was using drugs, marijuana and other hard hallucinogenic drugs like acid (and honesty idk what else) and I realized it had to be the reason for his world revolving around friends and for his turning his back on God. I honestly didn’t recognize him. I prayed as he got out of that environment, he would realize the changes and eventually “be the brother I recognized”.

Needless to say, we were both in very different seasons of life, myself as a young professional in the workplace, and him in his late teens trying to figure out college and what career path he wanted.

Fast forward to last year, I’m in my late 20s and he’s reaching his mid 20s. My boyfriend and I decided to wed on our 10 year anniversary. I planned a very intimate, small wedding and of course invited my brother. Life events made our wedding plans fail, unexpected expenses and car issues, so I called off the original date as painful as it was to do. My brother was upset about the plane ticket he’d already purchased. He and his girlfriend had also recently found out they were expecting, and though I found out through the grapevine (not from him), he had planned on telling me at my wedding.

Several months passed, a few from their due date, when I found out about our own miracle baby. I’d been diagnosed with a medical condition early in the year of our wedding year, I was told I had little to no chance to conceive, (a main factor in our finding out so late) so I was beyond elated... but I was also SEVERAL months along, only a couple months behind their due date! (I didn’t show until 7.5 months, and my cycles aren’t normal)

It was a lot to take in and as happy as my husband and I were, we were also pretty stressed, we immediately enrolled in birth class and found a midwife (at 38 weeks along), and besides telling our parents, didn’t announce our pregnancy until a month before our due date, after we felt more at ease with preparations. (It also happened to be a month after my brother had his baby). He was very happy for me and thought it was crazy we were so close behind them.

Long story short, I was hoping our babies very close in age would be a major life event that would bring us closer together. What a blessing for them to have a cousin so near in age! But unfortunately, it feels like he’s been more distant than ever. I’ve tried several times reaching out and hadn’t heard from him since June. I finally just texted asking if I’ve offended him and he replied (this was yesterday). He said yeah, just the way I act sometimes, and that it makes it hard to forget other things in the past. I don’t really know what he’s referring to, but it’s my validation that he is holding grudges against me.

I’ve gotten a lot closer to God these past few years and we haven’t really had much time together during that time (besides a 5 day trip to visit my dad who had a stroke when I happened to be visiting with my then 4 mth old daughter. His baby was 6 mths at the time. It was his first time meeting my daughter and he only held her twice, the day he arrived, and the days he left. Besides that, he was completely involved with his girlfriend and his baby and spending a little time with my dad.

I’d met my nephew when he was 5 mths and my girl was 3 mths, because his girlfriend flew into our state only 5 hours away for a family event and asked if afterwards she could stay with my husband and I for an extra week, which of course I said yes because I wanted to meet my nephew! My brother flew over too and attended her family event, but flew back for work before she and my nephew came over.)

There was so much I wanted to say to him, but I kept it minimal, just stating that I miss having him in my life, that we’ve both been through a lot of life changes and stress in a small amount of time, and that I don’t want to argue but that I just want to have my brother in my life and for him to be present in my daughters life, and that I hope he can find it in his heart one day to forgive me for things in the past. I to,d him I’m not that person anymore, and that I’d like to get to know him in adulthood, and I’d like him to get to know me, and I feel that he would see the change in me.

My nephews birthday party is late this month and I want to go so badly, and although finances are tight (because my husband and I relocated to the state my father is in since his stroke to be closer, and we are just getting our income stream back), we are trying to buy a plane ticket so my daughter and I can attend.

Honestly all I want is to have my brother be a part of my life, a part of my daughters life, and for the cousins to have a playmate. It’s not fair to them to not be involved in each other’s lives because their parents have some sort of unresolved sibling issue. I pray I can attend and that during my visit we can have a face to face conversation and that I can have the strength to hear what he’s held against me, so I can say sorry in person, and that he can find it in my heart to forgive me.

I just feel so sad, and I knew deep down there was an underlying reason but he kept ignoring me until yesterday. I cried and fell asleep praying to God. I keep telling myself this is an answer to my prayers, because at least he admitted to holding some grudge over something I’ve done as opposed to ignoring me. I’ve been praying for our relationship to be repaired this past year. Perhaps there’s misunderstanding, and we’ve both been on separate life journeys in different seasons, but at the end of the day we are siblings.

Please pray for my relationship with him to be repaired. And I thank you if you took the time to read all this, I just needed it off my mind and heart. I’m putting it in God’s hands and asking for the strength to make it through this. I want to be more like Jesus and just forgive him for things that made me feel hurt, and ask for his forgiveness for things I’ve done.

I just want to move on and have him be a part of my life. If you could whisper a prayer for us, I’d really appreciate it from the bottom of my heart. Thanks so much.