Hi all! Newbie here. Very glad I bumped into the site. Especially considering what's been on my mind the last few days

I'm going to lay this out in advance- this isn't advice seeking, it's more of a rant. Comments are certainly welcomed. But I'm not really seeking help as much as soliciting commiseration.

. The holidays and dealing with tension due to always being the lone atheist in the conservative christian family. I have 5 siblings and live 1000 miles from where I grew up. Our family has a history/tradition of really making an effort to get together on Thanksgiving(American), with the rest of the holidays being up for grabs. It's been tolerable for me going on 2 decades. An unspoken truce developed over the years- a "no man's land" of religion and politics that everyone understood was not a comfortable place to go. Not for me as much, but for them. I'm a fierce debater and take no prisoners. It was usually them who felt uncomfortable, hurt, and out of place. I did not agitate,push, mock them, and avoided snark in an effort to keep the peace; but would not hesitate to return fire if some fool wanted to "go there".

The truce has been broken. My dad died in the spring. I went back for the funeral of course. As events unfolded it became apparent that my oldest brother has hooked up with a cult of some kind. This is not the normal "loser" brother so many have- the guy who's always lost and can never get his shit together. This is a very successful stock broker. To make matters worse, he's taken it upon himself to step into the father role to the rest of us. Seriously- I'm in my mid 50's with grown children and a successful career of my own and he wants to play daddy to me and the rest of us. This includes spreading the gospel of his new found "Prophet". Yes, I'm not kidding, the guy my brother's following self glosses himself "Prophet Ron". He has his whole family following this guy- wife, 2 adult children, 3 adult step children, et al believing this guy's schtick.

My brother actually got this douche-bag "Prophet" to fly in to town and brought him along to my dad's funeral, memorial service, and other family functions surrounding my dad's death! Btw- This "Profit" never knew my father. I was pissed, and took my brother aside on several occasions and told him he was way out of line. Things got worse. I had several members of my brother's family offering to faith heal my leg(I have a minor leg disability and often need a cane). Several of the adult kids made ham handed attempts to convert me or "debate" god. Just before I was ready to leave town and head back home his wife actually grabbed me from behind and tried to pull me down onto a table to "lay hands on me" and heal me. In case you can't see the obvious here- it's really not a good thing to grab onto a person with a disability and physically yank them. I almost lost my balance and fell, at which point I became extremely hostile. While in the minds of some, myself included, I may have been justified in getting physical at that point- I did not. Instead I finally cut loose verbally. It went something like this- "No means NO; and in this case it means HELL NO. What about this do you not understand? Here's the deal guys- 1st off your attempts to faith heal in the context of us all being here is OFFENSIVE." (My dad had just succumbed to cancer after a 2 year fight.) "If your faith healing powers were worth a pinch of shit, dad would still be here. So either you tried and failed, tried and god failed, or didn't try on him. Which was it? Either you are really shitty at it or it doesn't work very well. Either way, I don't want to be party to your circle jerk. So, why don't you practice first- go to the hospital down the street. You know, the one full of people dying from stuff like dad had. Heal them all first. Then hit the hospice across the street, then the hospital on the other side of town. Get a few thousand of of those poor suffering dying people under your belt then give me a call about my leg. Until then I'm going to put all this down as just so much pissing into the wind." I left.

The stock broker brother was in another room with another family member at the time this occurred. I reamed him a new one on the phone while I was on the road. I told him their actions were rude, extremely inconsiderate, and disrespectful. He was somewhat apologetic but at the same time seemed to think I was overreacting.

So now we have the holidays coming up. Thanksgiving's been at his house for the last decade. I've had enough. I'm just saying "No". "No, I won't be there this year. I do not feel comfortable or welcomed. I'm having my own Thanksgiving here." My mom's old, but in excellent shape. There's no reason she (or anyone else in the family) can't come and see me. I'm not going to travel 1000 miles with my wife and step kids for the privilege of watching abhorrent crazy behavior, being disrespected, or to get into conflicts. The older I get, the less connected I feel to my family. I'm starting to dwell on the idea that I am connected to these people by some common DNA and random chance. I don't see myself hanging out with these people if was not related to them. If I had met them casually at a party, I don't see myself going out of my way to develop a relationship with them (With the exception of 2 of the lot of them).

I guess I'm getting old and crotchety. I do not feel bound by history, DNA, and family expectations to keep putting energy into these relationships that are obviously diverging farther and farther every year.