When you don't get along with your family-Ideas? Warning-long...

EveKing79 · July 2010

I'm sure I'm not the only one on this board who is struggling with this kind of an issue- any thoughts/suggestions would be appreciated.

DH and I have a terrible time w/ my immediate family. We feel like all these issues areMy dad passed away several years ago, my mom is a really hopeless alcoholic and I have 4 younger siblings ages 17 to 27 who are in varying not-great situations. We all live in the same town.

To complicate matters, my Mom gave me the house she inherited from my Grandma (who I was super close with) then kind of wasted/ squandered away the rest of her inheritance-so there has not been any kind of financial equality either, and I know it will cause problems down the line. (for good reason).

DH and I have a great life & relationship, we are starting TTC now after 4 years of marriage, but things have been getting worse and worse with my family...

I am currently finishing graduate school, DH has a good job and we are ready to begin our own family. But we don't know how to deal with my existing one anymore. They are all adults, except my 17-yr old sister (who is practically living with her boyfriend anyways) and they choose to live with bad/finances/credit, drunk driving, constant lying/blaming/dishonesty, filthy house etc.

How do you keep the distance with a baby but not cut off all ties? We love our home, it is just filled with all my grandma's good happy spirits and would never move-but how to explain to DC down the road why she can't drive anywhere w/ Grandma or go over her house?

My MIL (who is awesome) just offered over the weekend to come and stay for a few weeks to help out when we do have a baby. How to explain when that happens but I won't allow my mom at the hospital (esp. if drunk, obviously) .

I want what's best for my family, but I feel DH and I need to turn inward while taking this huge step in creating our own family more. Any thoughts? Has anyone else been in a similar situation?

(Not sure if this is even the place for this post, but I thought I'd try you ladies)...any thoughts/ suggestions would be welcomed.

LadyXaverian · July 2010

I'm sorry you're going through all of this. I really don't have any advice for you. Good luck.

alwysbrdmaid · July 2010

That's rough. I don't know what advice I could give you except sometimes brutal honesty sometimes is the only thing you can do. Maybe it will make your mom realize what she's doing. idk. Sorry. Good luck with TTC.

leathersmel4 · July 2010

I don't have any advice, but I wanted to say good luck in your situation!

lovemypups1 · July 2010

Good Luck. Sometimes you have to decide if cutting all ties may actually be better for you, and your child down the road. It is a really really difficult decision, but you have to be able to live your own life.

JennyAnne022776 · July 2010

I am not in your situation, but I will say that I don't have the best relationship with my MIL and SIL. Without getting into it too much (because I don't want to offend everyone here) she makes inappropriate comments about other races, religions, and basically just other people in general. For example, as we pulled into her apartment complex the other day, we saw two overweight people walking their dog. My MIL (who had gastric bypass last October and has lost weight but is still overweight) proclaims "look at those couple of fatties." I was steaming from the backseat and DH could tell. I have had this conversation with him before. All I said was "Well, at least they are out exercising" which was a stab at my MIL because she refuses to get off her butt and exercise.

My SIL makes similar comments and is rude to my DH (her brother) all.the.time. I have already told DH that when we have kids, there will be a sort of protective cocoon that forms around us as a family unit. If you are not the kind of person who is going to influence my kids in a positive way, your face time with them will be significantly limited. DH agrees with me. I guess my only advice I can give you is that regardless of how difficult it is, the well-being of your child comes first and foremost. The feelings of your family definitely come second.

SushiNoMore · July 2010

I'm with the above poster who has problems with the in laws. My MIL is a horrible woman who is terrible to my husband, and my SIL just takes my MIL's side with everything. It's long and complicated, but that's the jist.

My husband and I have talked about it a lot, and I think what we're going to do is sit everyone down for a grownup conversation and lay out some ground rules. To keep it fair, I'd like to do it with my family, too, even though my family is wonderful (my husband really loves them).

Examples of rules:

1) You will treat any sons we have just as well as you treat daughters (my MIL favors my nieces WAY more than our nephew)

2) It is unacceptable to say anything derogatory about my husband in front of my children. Doing so will be the last time you see our child.

3) You will listen to us and our rules for our children. If we say no, we mean no. You don't get to undermine us (MIL does this with SIL and her kids).

4) Ideas and advice are appreciated, but we reserve the right to ignore it without feeling guilty about it. We're the parents, so we get to decide.

Not sure if that really helps, but I think a grown up conversation is the way to go. And ground rules like, "You will not see the baby after you've been drinking," or whatever. Or, "The baby will not be alone with you until you've been sober for 6 months."

We've also discussed cutting off my ILs - I haven't seen my MIL or SIL for probably a year and a half. I think we're going to give everyone one last chance to shape up before giving up on the relationships.

Sucks being an adult sometimes, eh? Good luck.

EveKing79 · July 2010

I guess I have been feeling so torn-because I have a great life and my family members just...don't. But at the same time, they don't work to better themselves at all either.

I have been confronting my mom for about 17 years, unfortunately (I am definitely not one to keep quiet)-since I was about 13...she knows what she's doing but she makes those bad choices again and again. DH has already dealt with plenty, and I feel like it's unfair to him, too, at this point.

I am always pleasantly surprised when we go to visit DH's family- they are kind, funny, have gatherings with the huge extended family at evey possible holiday and have really expanded my ideas of what a family can and should be...

I know when the time comes that the well being of my child needs to come first...and before that time, my relationship with my husband needs to remain strong. Lately, it has been really hard to put aside my own "guilty daughter" feelings. Thank you for all your support!

JennyAnne022776 · July 2010

EveryWednesday:
I am always pleasantly surprised when we go to visit DH's family- they are kind, funny, have gatherings with the huge extended family at evey possible holiday and have really expanded my ideas of what a family can and should be...

My DH has made this comment to me before regarding my family. He can't believe that we can all get together for Christmas or Easter and nobody hurls insults at each other. We have had two out of our three Christmases ruined by his family excluding us at the last minute or insulting whatever meal DH decided to prepare. They have already lost the "alternating holidays" option. We spend many more holidays with my family simply because we want to be able to enjoy ourselves.

SushiNoMore · July 2010

EveryWednesday:
I know when the time comes that the well being of my child needs to come first...and before that time, my relationship with my husband needs to remain strong. Lately, it has been really hard to put aside my own "guilty daughter" feelings. Thank you for all your support!

This, I think. You definitely need to put the needs of yourself and your future family first. Stinks, though - good luck!

EveKing79 · July 2010

Thanks for the ideas about rules and regulations. It might really help to sort of formalize what we won't put up with. My Mom is the kind of person who will be sweet and charming to you face to face and then turn around and tell 5 people a story that never even happened (she has called me out of the blue on more than one occasion to complain about something my younger sister did or said, and then when I heard the full story later on it was completely different/ out of context, whatever). I don't think she will ever be alone with the baby period, unfortunately. She will have 1-2 years sober and in AA meetings and then out of the blue get drunk and speed down the highway with kids in the car...so...never.

With the exception of my youngest sister,my other siblings are so deep in denial/ have no life skills at all that they just live with it. My sister who is 27 can't even drive a car. When my grandma passed away everyone agreed that the house should be passed on to DH and me because I was closest to her, we were the only ones financially prepared to take care of it, and everyone wanted it to be kept in the family...but now there is a lot of unhappiness over that.

I am going to try to write up a list of what we can't tolerate, and then make that very clear to them.. there have been so many occasions/ holidays ruined by alcoholism, fighting and even minor violence (shoving, etc.) that I just cannot have my child exposed to. No way.

Thanks so much for this idea.

EveKing79 · July 2010

JennyAnne,

Haha, it's amazing isn't it? We went to DH's mom's house for the 4th of July and we barbequed, visited my SIL's new salon where I got a great haircut and visited with DH's favorite aunt. No one yelled insults, threw anything, etc. Amazing!

Yes, my fam has already lost alternating holidays until future notice. Even when my Mom was working for sobriety, we had holidays at my house because it was too dirty/ too many animals etc. at Mom's...we would go to such extra effort, and everyone would make snide remarks about not wanting to come over because I'm not relaxed enough/ am not a good enough cook/ don't provide videogames(!)/ want everything to be too "perfect"-about two years ago, I was like, "Why am I even trying?" Now we got to my MIL's house.

brookelynpaisley · July 2010

I'm sorry you're going through this. While not to the same extent, DH and I face the possibility of having to distance ourselves from his parents. They've had a rough relationship for years - DH and his brother each moved out at the age of 16 and at one point didn't talk to their dad for about 3 years. We've discussed what our boundaries will be, and though it will suck and be hurtful, we intend to be honest about the distance. We don't wish for our children to experience even a fraction of the discomfort and dysfunction that DH and BIL have.

I also had a mentally unstable aunt. Well, have, she's alive, but she's been alienated from the family. Our parents gave us rules, and our aunt had rules. We weren't allowed to be alone with her. We mostly saw her at our grandma's house, and my grandmother knew and respected my parents' boundaries for my aunt in regard to us. Again, my parents had to take a deep breath and be honest about their boundaries.

Families are fvcked up sometimes, but as a parent, you just have to do what you have to do. I don't want to have to tell my in-laws our kids can't visit without us, but if their relationship goes down hill in the cyclical fashion it has in the past, we will. And we'll tell them why honestly so there's absolutely no question and no opportunity to make up their own story or come to their own conclusions.

Want a personalized experience?

When you don't get along with your family-Ideas? Warning-long...

Re: When you don't get along with your family-Ideas? Warning-long...

Choose Another Board

Search Boards