Dealing with 'cold shoulder'

LegacyUser

How do you come to terms with being left out in the cold by a family member?

A brother of mine(older) for as long as I can remember has used a 'cold shoulder' technique when he sees fit to use. (when arguing with him for eg). Growing up I remember spells when he would keep it going for a long time.

Fast forward to now, he still uses this on people. He has basically shut people out of his life. For example he would not initiate any contact,phonecall/visit (with brothers/sisters) ,it is up to other people to make contact with him.

I have learned he also uses this 'cold shoulder' on his wife and children (now all over 11). He could keep it up for days with them.

I have tried my best not to fall out with him as I know how difficult it can be to resolve issues with him. He ususally dismisses any attempt to rationially (sp?) talk about stuff,by saying he's too busy or has enough on his plate.

But it got to a point where I just couldn't let everything go without standing up or voicing my opinion. So now he has basically put up a cold wall again, and I'm finding it difficult to deal with.

For some reason he doesn;t seem to be able to sense what other people are feeling. It seems he could go on like this contently. He doesn't see (or care) it is hurting other people (including our parents).

How do you deal with someone like this?

JuliusCaesar

The whole point of the 'cold shoulder' is to hurt people. It works. So from his point of view, it's great.

You have to change your reaction (everyone). Just dismiss it, stop trying to talk to him, just go about talking amongst yourselves and having fun. He'll come out of it when he sees it's not working. Might take a few goes for him to cop to it, but if you get everyone to stop falling into the same old pattern, he'll be forced to change his way of coping.