Trial Reconciliation with MIL?
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| Wed, 11-15-2006 - 3:07pm |
Okay, so I need some advice about a trial reconciliation with my MIL. My DH has been pressured by MIL b/c she has only seen our DD (now 16.5 months old) once since early last December. She is telling DH that she has either chronic bronchitis or emphysema.
We had a bit of a "falling out" over most of my pregnancy and the first 4 months of my DD's life that ended up in us not speaking since November of last year.
MIL lived with us (DH and me). She and DH co-owned the house before I even knew him. We were married for 7 years when I got PG. Over time, MIL and I became very close, to the extent that DH said she would confide things in me that she wouldn't tell her own daughter or sons. We included MIL in the pregnancy - took her to ultrasounds, etc., only to have her tell information that we explicitly told her to keep between us to family, her friends, and anyone who would listen. She told me what was wrong with each of her DILs parenting skills and worse, told me that DIL1 never should have had children and that having to adopt was God's way of telling her that; told me that DIL2 never should have had children b/c of the alcohol abuse and mental illness in her family; told me that DIL3 never should have married her son. She said that she never should have given birth to my DH (while I was PG).
She became controlling - I said that I didn't want any visitors at the hospital except DH, MIL, and my parents. She told me that this "isn't about you - it's about me being a grandmother (for the 10th time) and I will invited whoever I want." She didn't invite her friends to the hospital, but all my DH's siblings came. She also tried to schedule me and the baby to "be available" when she had visitors coming to the house (as in - "be here on Friday morning b/c so-and-so is coming and they want to see the baby"). She'd stand over me from behind while I was breastfeeding always first thing after DH went for work and she was still in her nightgown but had her first cigarette of the day, which made me excruiatingly uncomfortable and when I asked her not to, she blew up.
I think you pretty well get the picture. The last straw was after I went back to work and she'd leave the door to her apartment area open while she sat upstairs and smoked all day. Smoke would completely pervade the house where we were and that just incensed me.
We ended up looking at a house on DD's 3 month birthday, loved it, put in an offer, and DH told his mother we were selling the house they co-owned. Now, don't be upset - their arrangement had always been that they would sell the house when he finished the renovations. The kitchen was the last project and DH finished it when I was 7 months PG. The outcome for MIL was that she got $40,000 (50% of proceeds).
MIL wanted to move in with us, and they all wanted her to. This was so I could continue to do everything for her that I already had - she doesn't drive at night or in snow, so I took her on her errands for most of the year. (Yes, I do work full time, too.) I took her to all her doctor appts. I cleaned her bathroom. DH and I carried all her packages so she didn't have to lift them, etc. So, DH's siblings just didn't want to take responsibility for their mother b/c I had been doing it for just shy of a decade at this point. Only one of his brothers is still speaking to me, but none of the women are. Several of my nieces have decided it's their right to tell me what a bitch I am for "throwing out Grandma."
I put my foot down in order for them to get the picture that the co-habitation was OVER. It was a hard-won battle, and not without much pain and problems between me and DH.
So, now DH wants his 75 YO mother to see our DD. I am considering allowing her to meet us at a restaurant for brunch to see our DD. I don't want her at our house - she completely ignores me there. And, I won't go to her place - small, senior living apartment.
Am I crazy for doing this under public, limited circumstances? DH was willing to take the Family Holiday Party off the table if I do this. That means that I don't have to deal with a room full of people ignoring me and adoring our DD, and I don't have to sit at home alone while he goes either with or without our DD.
Please tell me if I'm crazy. I really don't want to do this, but this issue rears its ugly head every 3 or 4 months. I don't want to get divorced over this and that is still a very real possibility. My primary reason for even considering it is that I really, really, really love my husband. Like I said, in the last year, I've only had to see any of his family once - that's because he hasn't pressed the issue.
Thanks in advance,
M2E


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Tell DH that you will agree to meet with his mother, together with DD, IF and only IF he sends a letter, something like this, to his family before the meeting:
Dear Family,
It is time that this “situation” comes to an end. Too much has gone on and I will brook no more nastiness. Nor will I allow my wife to suffer anymore, due to your loss of the convenience in having someone else take care of Mom and the fear that you would actually have to start doing something. Spreading that crap that my wife was throwing mom out in the street was such a low blow, it is buried underground
Instead of appreciating the sevenyears that wife gave, add the x years that I gave in taking care of Mom, and being ready to take some of the load, you all had a hissy fit that DW and I had had enough and that we deserve our own life.
Did it never occur to any of you, in your selfishness, that I too deserve a LIFE? Having not lived with Mom in the past years, how dare you use DW as a scapegoat, instead of taking up the plate?
Have any of you any idea how many lines Mom crossed and how much DW bit her tongue, before she said anything? How would any of YOU like it, if EVERYTHING you did in your OWN HOME was under a microspore and you were CONSTANTLY told that you did every thing wrong. And don’t any of you DARE give me the bullshiat that this is just how Mom is, and that DW should have let it be. I think that letting it be for 10 years was not only amazing, she deserves a freaken medal.
Not to mention the fact that Mom would PURPOSELY leave doors open, after CONSTANTLY being reminded that smoke is DANGEROUS to DD. DW was run ragged with DD being sick and Mom not only did not give a shiat, she purposely did something to endanger DD, simply because she knew it would annoy DW. And then you speak to ME about gratitude? The only ungratefuls here are you guys for not appreciating all that I and my wife have done for Mom and herself, for being pissy about my finding a woman to spend my life with, and her being jealous of a woman who “took her place”. She totally disrespected DW’s every wish and tried to take over as wife and mother in this home. That is not only wrong, it is sick !!!!
None of you have the right to judge us. None of you have lived with her all these years, and none of you were witnesses to her behavior. You listened to a one sided sotry and believed it, because it was more convenient to you than to have to actually deal with Mom yourselves, instead us.
You know, DW married ME, not Mom. She agreed to be my mate, to bear my children, to love and honor me and to share MY life. No where in our wedding vows did I see that she signed on to be the family’s indentured servant. I find myself wondering if any of you would demand of YOUR spouse what you seem to demand of mine. All of you spouses, look me in the eye and tell me that you would have done what my DW did all these year? Give me a break.
DW is a lovely woman. She brings the light into my cloudy day, the sunshine after the rain. She loves me for what I am and for what I am not. She accepts me as I am and loves with all my faults. He love shows loud and clear in the simple fact that she is still with me after all the crap that has been pulled lately. Do you now what her only real “crime” here is? In loving me enough to go through everything she has
Now, as to throwing a poor old woman out, get real. No one threw Mom out into the street. She got her share of the house and DW and I made sure that she had a comfortable place to live, she has the center and she has, after all these years, actually started to get her own life. In fact, if you look at it, besides crying poor me and ragging my wife, Mom is probably happier now than she has been in YEARS.
So, here is the way things stand. Well, all you “saints” can apologize to my wife for your atrocious actions, or I am done. Although I do want Mom to see DD, I won’t allow it unless there is the acknowledgement that she was a trial and that she thinks DW is a good wife and a GREAT mother. Not only form Mom, but from all of you as well. I was disgusted that you were so vicious as the drag the nieces into this. Either fix what YOU have destroyed, or live in your pious sanctity and know in your deepest hearts that DW does not deserve all that you have rained upon her !
DW is NOT the one who caused the problems in this family. You are did, together with Mom, when we simply and justifiably decided that we wanted our own life. In order to allay your own guilt at doing NOTHING all these years, you put it all on us. Well, keep on making DW the scapegoat, keep on painting her black, but at least stop lying to yourselves and admit what the problem is.
I don't think that's harsh at all.
This isn't about reforging a relationship with her. That's long gone. She'll never be welcome in my home again. The only interactions will be very superficial on my part. She can ask me anything she wants, but I'm not going to give her anything. And, I honestly don't care about her anymore - I'm even beyond being angry, so she can blather on about whatever. I just need to do this for my DH and for our marriage. It has nothing to do with being nice to her. And it has nothing to do with what I want, either. This is all a gift from me to my DH - he needs this. Our marriage needs it.
Don't you love that I'm ostracized for no longer doing what none of them will do? They're smart enough not to dive in the middle of that mess. But, they also figured that DH would just take care of her forever, b/c he always had. And I think they were surprised when he announced he was getting married - he was already 31 and I think they never thought he'd do it. And I honestly don't care what they think, but they need to accept that I'm smart enough not to go around a bunch of people with free opinions who are waiting to ambush me. So, if they want to complain about not seeing DH or our DD, then fine, but there are strings attached.
Thanks for answering.
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“It’s sometimes hard to listen without judgement but people do appreciate being heard.†aka Sam Spade, 23rd August 2007
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