A childhood loss in my family is being re-explained decades later and I don’t know how to handle it
TW: Infant death (alleged SIDS vs possible foul play), child neglect, substance use, family trauma
Names changed for privacy.
Current family: Me (F35), Dad (M52), Mom (F54), Sister D (F29), Stepmom (F47), Stepsister J (F30), Stepsister K (F23), Stepsister F (F18), and Stepsister E who passed away at 2 months old.
I’m posting this because I’m genuinely shaken and don’t know how to process what I’ve just learned, and I’d really appreciate outside perspective.
For context, I’m mostly low contact with my dad due to a long history of parentification, instability, and emotional neglect. My sister D still has contact with my parents because she has a young child and feels some obligation to maintain the relationship.
On Father’s Day, D called my dad. During the call, he made a comment along the lines of, “I don’t know how F can side with Stepmom when she is a baby killer.” D immediately stopped him and asked what he meant. He initially tried to backtrack, but eventually gave a version of events around E’s death that I had never heard in that form before.
According to him, E’s death was not ruled SIDS by the Coroner, but instead “unexplained asphyxiation,” with bruising around her mouth noted. Dad also claimed that the night before E died, my stepmom left all the children (J, D, K, and E) at home unsupervised while she went out partying with my dad at a the hotel he had been staying in. Dad said she told him a friend came over around midnight to watch the kids, but he did not verify this & the friend in question had a husband & 2 kids of her own to attend to.
The next morning, J and D went to school as normal, and J checked on E before leaving and noticed she looked blue and raised concern. My stepmom dismissed it and told her everything was fine.
What complicates this is that when we were children, we were never told this version of events. We were told that Stepmom went to check on E during a nap, after J & D had left for school, and found her blue and unresponsive, and that she called 911.
At the time, D & I were told E died of SIDS. I was also told both my dad and stepmom gave this same account to police, and that there had been an investigation following her death that cleared them of suspicion.
When I arrived home that day, the house was full of extended family (grandparents, an uncle, a family friend, etc.). I was told before my siblings came home from school. I was completely shocked and overwhelmed and spent a long time alone in E’s room crying.
When J and D got home, they were told immediately what had happened. I tried to be there when they were told, but an adult pulled me out of the room saying I was too emotional and it would be easier if they were together. I ended up leaving and going to a friend’s house because I couldn’t cope and needed support, I just wanted a hug from someone who genuinely cared for me, & I was gone for less than an hour. I later heard neither of them, but J especially, did not take this news well.
After this, custody arrangements for all of us changed. My dad and stepmom lost custody of all the kids. J and K were placed with Stepmom’s parents in the United States after briefly staying with other family in Canada. D & I went straight to our Moms' house.
Communication didn’t just fade naturally for us with J & K after everything. Stepmom’s parents actively blocked contact and hid the fact that my sister D and I were trying to reach out & maintain our relationships with J and K for years. We were repeatedly unable to get through, calls answered by one of the Grandparents and we were told J & K were unavailable as they were “out”. Eventually, I was told directly by Stepmom’s mother that J didn’t want a relationship anymore and was “moving on,” and that K “doesn’t even remember you” because she was so young.
What’s hitting me hardest is that I was told my whole life that E died of SIDS, but I’m now hearing a completely different version of events involving possible neglect and inconsistencies in the cause of death. I was heavily parentified growing up and already have a complicated relationship with my parents, so this is really destabilising & is reopening that guilt & shame surrounding me setting boundaries & keeping them.
I also carried intense guilt for over 15 years because I didn’t cancel the appointment I had, to go watch my sisters, I blamed myself for not being there. I grieved heavily the lost connection with my sisters who were still alive (J & K) and felt as though I lost 3 of my sisters that day, & really we (D & I) kind of did lose 3 sisters that day.
I’m not trying to make accusations. I understand that likely this is not something that there will ever be legal justice for, I’m just trying to understand the truth. I need to know what really happened, because I felt that the story was wrong when I was 15. I questioned why Stepmoms friend would leave her house & family in the dead of night so that Stepmom could go party, & was told to stop prying when Stepmom is already in so much pain. That it wasn’t fair to grill her with questions after such a profoundly shaking loss.
If you were in my position, what would you actually do with this information? Would you confront my dad about it, and if so, how would you approach a conversation like that without it immediately turning into denial or chaos? Is it realistic at all to request or access coroner or police records from something that happened over 20 years ago in Canada?
More broadly, I guess what I’m struggling with is how you even begin to approach “truth” in a situation like this when the people involved have clearly given conflicting accounts for decades, and even extended family members seem to have known more than they ever admitted. How do you even start pulling something like this apart without destroying whatever remaining relationships are left, or do you try to accept that some answers may never come clearly?