Reasonable or not?

Notperfectbutworthit

Hi all,

I have a question involving my inlaws, and I need an outside opinion.

My daughter is two months old, and we are in the process of moving back to our hometown. Right now we probably go back every two weeks or so to visit and see the process on our house.

Back story - For the last 8 years if we've visited we stay with my parents. We always have a bedroom there and my inlaws converted my husbands bedroom to a sewing room after he moved out (but kept his older brother's room as is). We would try and visit them while we were there.

While they aren't the worst in laws, they definitely have their quirks. They are pretty socially dumb and my MIL is very judgemental and gossips about everyone.

They've never shown interest in holidays. We don't get phone calls on our birthdays, let alone gifts, and Easter, Mothers and Fathers Day, etc, have never been important.

They also favour the older brother a lot. They flew cross country to visit him and traveled to see him more then us, bought a trailer as a wedding gift to him, etc. We are used to it and my husband says my parents are more parents to him then his own.

Throughout my pregnancy they seemed very disinterested. Talked about my BILs horses over the baby, etc. Again, used to it. I can mostly shrug it off.

Now that the baby's here we have the issues. Their house is filthy and hoarder level full of crap. They buy shit and leave it everywhere. There are two inch high piles of dog hair lying around. We tried to help clean up at Christmas and threw away 10 bags of garbage from their pantry and fridge. It's gross. The house was back to normal within weeks.

And so we decided that the baby wasn't going over there to visit unless they cleaned up, and my husband told his mom this. She laughed and said she would just come over to visit us.

That's basically what's happened. We either meet them somewhere (happened twice), they've come to visit us twice and invited themselves to my parents house three times. But we are starting to hear things from my BIL and his wife that my MIL is unhappy we don't visit. She's jealous of my parents too I think.

Am I unreasonable? Our issue is when she's mobile she will be crawling in filth. I've found sewing needles all over the floor as well as used diabetic needles. My husband is on board but sad about it.

He is planning on sitting down and hashing out a lot of issues ( lots of things are coming to a head) and this will be one of them.

Sorry for the novel.

allrightmeow

Not unreasonable at all.  Baby's well being > relatives and their hurt feelings

jenn43

I would think you were crazy if you felt okay about going over there.  That sounds disgusting.  From my (sadly extensive) experience watching Hoarders, they are probably pretty unlikely to change the situation, so this may be hard on your husband.  But you are absolutely correct- your baby should not be going over there.  If they have an issue with the situation, they can discuss it with you directly instead of talking about you to your BIL.  

MrsZ0811

Not unreasonable. The safety of your baby comes before anyone and everything. My Grandma is no longer allowed to hold my dd because physically she cannot safely hold her. It makes her mad but its for my daughters safetly. My mom is not allowed to babysit my daughter because of the manipulation that  grew up with and my mothers serious personality issues. This makes them all mad but it is what is best for my child and that is the most important thing. My Grandma is a hoarder and there is nothing that we can say or do to change that, it is a mental illness. You keeping you LO out of their house it the best decision for your LOs safety. You need to do whats best for your children regardless if it makes other people upset.

*sparky*

Definitely not unreasonable. My LO would never go over there.