I’m using the words more or less in their most common sense, not as a general honorific for some old family friend. Anyway, Merriam-Webster’s definition (using ‘uncle’, but the same would apply to 'aunt):
a : the brother of one’s father or mother
b : the husband of one’s aunt
I have two different sets of first cousins whose mothers (my biological relatives) had already divorced from my first memory. I never considered my cousins’ biological fathers as ‘uncles’, and they definitely don’t fit the strict definition.
However, for the aunts and uncles that I have known since my earliest memory (none of whom ever divorced), I’d probably still consider the exes aunts and uncles.
Just wondering if that kind of reasoning is common. [In my case, it’s also irrelevant, since they all be daid now.]
I told my uncle’s ex-wife that divorce or not, she was the mother of 2 of my first cousins, so that means she’s my aunt. Of course, she lived in California and I grew up in PA, DE, and OH, so this was about the 2nd or 3rd time I’d ever been in the same room as her in my life, so it wasn’t that big of a deal. I’ve been in in the same room as her one more time since then. Oh, and at the time I told my aunt that, my uncle had been dead for several years, so I didn’t feel there was any disloyalty to my uncle. I hardly knew him. It was more loyalty to my cousins.
Anyone I could considered an aunt or uncle for many years, or fewer years as a child, I’d probably consider to hold that status forever. I know people with more distant ties to people that they consider an aunt or uncle for a lifetime.
One third of my aunts and uncle were married before I was born and are still married; the others married early in my childhood, but I was old enough to remember each of their weddings. I don’t have distinct feelings for the bio-rellies vs the in-law ones. Our relationships were forged in my childhood and my love for them is the same.
All of my aunts and uncles who got divorced did so before I was born, or during a time where we lived so far apart that I never met their exes. I don’t consider any of those exes family. If any of my aunts and uncles were to divorce now, I’d still consider their spouses to be family. If one of my aunts and uncles got married today, I wouldn’t consider their spouse to be my aunt or uncle. No offense to the new person.
In a general sense the term would remain in effect for blood kin only. Those who were brothers or sisters of my parents. But in the real sense I’d use the term(s) for the ones I liked whether they were blood or not. I had some of those but they’re gone. The inlaw issue is even cloudier but you didn’t ask about that.
In my case it depends on their own attitude about it.
My aunt’s first husband disappeared from our lives; he even had the bollocks to tell his daughter that he “didn’t have kids” on a chance encounter (when she verified that it was indeed him and not one of his brothers, his response was “who knows who else was that whore letting them fuck her”). We refer to him as Uncle Ray to distinguish him from his son Ray, but if he came begging I’d laugh in his face.
Her second husband made it very clear that he had no interest in being either a father to her children or an uncle to us (yeah, she sure does know how to pick them, not that she’s any kind of prize). OK then, I’ve never referred to him as “my uncle”.
There’s cousins of my parents I view as my uncles, but those two are just the two assholes who happened to marry that aunt. They’re no more my uncles than the guys she had relationships with without marrying them.
I had one aunt (my mother’s sister) get divorced when I was 18. Her (ex)husband had been my uncle my whole life and was the father of my cousins. It would have been weird to stop calling him Uncle Glenn after they divorced.
My father’s younger brother divorced when I was 9. His ex took their 2 kids, moved cross country with her boyfriend/later husband, and I never heard from any of them again until my uncle’s funeral when someone pointed out my cousins to me. I tried to speak to them, but they shut me down with a curt reply, telling me they didn’t recall me at all. I had such good memories of them as children, that was hurtful.
Although they left my life entirely, I always thought of them as my aunt and cousins, and would have kept in touch with them had they permitted me to.
Anyone who was around when I was a kid/teenager. Sure, they are always my aunt/uncle, and my daughter, born long after the divorce, still calls these people by aunt/uncle (although of course they are her great aunt/uncle).
My uncle married his second wife when I was adult. She’s a very nice lady. Mentally I don’t think of her as my aunt, though … just a very nice lady. However, she’s been married to my uncle for my daughter’s entire life, so I’ve tried to make an effort to refer to them as her (great) uncle and (great) aunt.
On Dad’s side of the family, everyone has stayed married, so there’s no issue. On Mom’s side, two of her sisters got divorces, but there’s been virtually no contact with the uncles, so it hasn’t come up.
My oldest brother, OTOH, was divorced from his second wife while their kids were still in grade school (he remained heavily involved in raising them), and their daughter is my favorite niece. Even though they separated before she was born, kayla thinks of her cousins’ mother as “Aunt Penny.”
For purely satirical reasons, I refer to Alan Jay Lerner as her Uncle Alan. And Nancy Olsen as her Aunt Nancy.
As I think of all the people who have mentioned an Uncle Someone or Aunt SomeoneElse who are not related by blood or marriage, and then my own cousin who insisted she be Aunt Cousin to my kids, and my not-really-sister-in-law who has an uncle she calls her brother I don’t think I really believe that Aunt or Uncle mean anything when I hear someone use them.
