Hi,
I don't know if I am posting in the right place. I have lived in a new country for many years now and my mother and sister had moved over 3 years after me and my hsband.
My mother lives an hour and half away whiloe me and my sister live close. When my mum would come and visit, my husband and I would always make the effort for it to be an opportunity for all of us as a family to have food together at ours. My sister would not do the same however. Whenever my mum would come down to visit, my sister would only cook for my mum so me and my husband could only meet together before their meal (always brief visit because it was after work too). After their meal my mum always leaves for the long trip back.
In the end me and husband stopped doing these meal get togethers, because the effort was always only one sided. It has turned out now that we never do anything together as a family, Where it has been this way, me and my husband feel we do not belong to a family. Before we moved abroad, we had lived a different lifestyle with his family who do not live in the country where we are. We would meet together at weekends and do things together. Lack of this makes me and my husband feel low now like we don't have a family. Also depressed at times. We will never move back to our roots country again, but I don't know how to turn this feeling around.