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March 2016 Moms
crcosmetics
member
Need Advice for MIL
crcosmetics
member
Warning... LONG! Lol
My husband agrees just as much with me that she is crazy, but I am curious how other daughter-in-laws would react to a situation like this.
So my mom / friend got together to plan and host my baby shower. They did a very cute "Baby It's Cold Outside" theme, had a hot cocoa bar, soup bar, lots of planning involved. I made the invitations and included on the back "Hosted by -insert mom's name- and so and so" ... I was about 27 weeks when these invitations were sent out, and at this point had not even been offered any help from my MIL, which is FINE and understandable, I didn't care a bit because she takes 24 hour care of my SO's grandma who is bed-ridden and has Alzheimer's and has even forgotten how to speak/eat, so she very much has her hands full. She asked so little about it, she didn't even know the date of when it was. I just thought she was completely busy and uninterested.
so I sent out invitations (obviously she doesn't need one, but I know some people like to keep stuff as keepsakes) and she threw a HOLY FIT that her name was not under the Hostess.
In short, what she said was:
My mom and I planned this all along to not include her and just want to keep her from "the baby" (has never called him by name, she told us she had hoped by now we would have changed it.)
We wanted to humiliate her
She said she hated me and my mom and always will
Her son is not the man she raised him to be for not taking up for his mom and she was glad his grandpa wasn't alive to see him act this way (my husband is an ER physician and treats me like absolute gold and has the biggest heart.. she has so much to be proud of him for so this really hurt me the most)
She would die and go to hell before keeping that invitation
Next time she sees my mom (my insanely sweet mom who couldn't be mean to anyone) out she was going to "whoop her".
Said it should just be understood that she was a host.
I will get my payback one day for what I did to her.
(NOTE: she was in charge of throwing my household shower, and backed out 2 days before, because it just "wasn't a good time to have one". She is extremely flakey.)
My SO, his siblings and pretty much everyone told her she was acting crazy and if she was so determined to "host" she should've shown interest earlier or hosted her own (we are from two different towns = two different sets of family friends).
She did actually end up coming, and acted like nothing had ever even happened and even asked my mom for a "grandma picture" .. She brought 4 HUGE bags of gifts, and said any big stuff we didn't get, she would buy. I didn't even want to accept her gifts I was still so mad at her. My husband and I do very well financially, and do not need any help from her because she feels guilty for how she acts. (She flipped around Christmas time too over something silly and to make up for it probably bought us $800 worth of gifts)
So since the shower she has tried to call me 4-5 times, and i just don't want to answer. I have tried 5 years to have a relationship with her, and everytime I think it's normal, she ruins it with some sort of flip out like this. Her apologies are meaningless at this point because she never ever makes an effort to do any better or have a functional relationship. My husband has already told her she will not be babysitting our son alone, EVER, but we will not "keep her" from him and she can come see him whenever she wants to.
I am so done trying with her at this point, she is exhausting and just a negative human being overall. She still wants to be in our son's life but I don't want her to ever have the chance of treating him poorly like she does her own son, and me. She has made it so awkward at this point. How would you respond from here on out? My husband wishes he could cut her out, but being his only parent, he can't nor would I ever ask him to do that. Just not sure how to handle her wanting to be grandma of the year.
My husband agrees just as much with me that she is crazy, but I am curious how other daughter-in-laws would react to a situation like this.
So my mom / friend got together to plan and host my baby shower. They did a very cute "Baby It's Cold Outside" theme, had a hot cocoa bar, soup bar, lots of planning involved. I made the invitations and included on the back "Hosted by -insert mom's name- and so and so" ... I was about 27 weeks when these invitations were sent out, and at this point had not even been offered any help from my MIL, which is FINE and understandable, I didn't care a bit because she takes 24 hour care of my SO's grandma who is bed-ridden and has Alzheimer's and has even forgotten how to speak/eat, so she very much has her hands full. She asked so little about it, she didn't even know the date of when it was. I just thought she was completely busy and uninterested.
so I sent out invitations (obviously she doesn't need one, but I know some people like to keep stuff as keepsakes) and she threw a HOLY FIT that her name was not under the Hostess.
In short, what she said was:
My mom and I planned this all along to not include her and just want to keep her from "the baby" (has never called him by name, she told us she had hoped by now we would have changed it.)
We wanted to humiliate her
She said she hated me and my mom and always will
Her son is not the man she raised him to be for not taking up for his mom and she was glad his grandpa wasn't alive to see him act this way (my husband is an ER physician and treats me like absolute gold and has the biggest heart.. she has so much to be proud of him for so this really hurt me the most)
She would die and go to hell before keeping that invitation
Next time she sees my mom (my insanely sweet mom who couldn't be mean to anyone) out she was going to "whoop her".
Said it should just be understood that she was a host.
I will get my payback one day for what I did to her.
(NOTE: she was in charge of throwing my household shower, and backed out 2 days before, because it just "wasn't a good time to have one". She is extremely flakey.)
My SO, his siblings and pretty much everyone told her she was acting crazy and if she was so determined to "host" she should've shown interest earlier or hosted her own (we are from two different towns = two different sets of family friends).
She did actually end up coming, and acted like nothing had ever even happened and even asked my mom for a "grandma picture" .. She brought 4 HUGE bags of gifts, and said any big stuff we didn't get, she would buy. I didn't even want to accept her gifts I was still so mad at her. My husband and I do very well financially, and do not need any help from her because she feels guilty for how she acts. (She flipped around Christmas time too over something silly and to make up for it probably bought us $800 worth of gifts)
So since the shower she has tried to call me 4-5 times, and i just don't want to answer. I have tried 5 years to have a relationship with her, and everytime I think it's normal, she ruins it with some sort of flip out like this. Her apologies are meaningless at this point because she never ever makes an effort to do any better or have a functional relationship. My husband has already told her she will not be babysitting our son alone, EVER, but we will not "keep her" from him and she can come see him whenever she wants to.
I am so done trying with her at this point, she is exhausting and just a negative human being overall. She still wants to be in our son's life but I don't want her to ever have the chance of treating him poorly like she does her own son, and me. She has made it so awkward at this point. How would you respond from here on out? My husband wishes he could cut her out, but being his only parent, he can't nor would I ever ask him to do that. Just not sure how to handle her wanting to be grandma of the year.
Re: Need Advice for MIL
She actually sounds a lot like a person in my family who has multiple personality disorder and it has been very, very hard on her children. I guess moving forward it's going to be up to you and your husband to find a balance of keeping a (emotionally) safe distance for you and your kid(s) while still allowing them to have some kind of relationship. Normally I am the type to give advice to 'be the bigger person' but since I've dealt with someone similar I know that it actually doesn't benefit anyone to continuously forgive her childish behaviour and act like it never happened. I don't have a solution, what works for us with the particular family member is just limiting our time, phone calls/texts (when she's on a rampage they come fast and furious and she feels they are ALL an emergency) being kind and friendly when we see her but certainly never relying on plans that involve her and trying really, really hard not to take it personally when she gets in a bad mood. When she wants to be in a bad mood there is truly nothing anyone can do about it, she will find something to throw a fit about even if everything is going just fine.
I don't have quite a similar situation but MIL has said some pretty snarky and mean things about my family in the past and I've honestly never been able to move past that. Like if you're not a big enough person to be nice to people that matter to me I don't really need that in my life.
I would suggest not cutting her out but just keeping her at a distance. Obviously you don't have to leave your son with her alone or overnight or anything like that. You can simply include her where necessary, go visit on occasion, etc. It will be HER loss when she misses out on a truly loving relationship with her grandchild.
ETA: I also had to work on not constantly bitching about her to DH. It just made him feel awful for her stressing me out and me feel awful for making him feel bad about his mom. Try to stay emotionally detached from her and focus on what makes the two of you happy.
relationships and family life are hard enough as it is without the added external drama from in laws. If she's making an effort, I'd play along as along as she's not doing anything destructive. In the end everyone's lives will be easier. Sounds like you're already making steps in that direction so good for you!
btw...my MIL lost her temper with me once and I never thought I'd ever be able to forgive her for some of the stuff she said, but we worked past it and now we have a super close relationship. She sometimes jokes that I'm her favourite child. Anything is possible.