NC Parents Secretly Seeing Kids

FIL called his own grand-daughter with cerebral palsy a 'sp*z'. I think that makes him a danger to his grandchildren.

If your DS is old enough to pursue the relationship with his grandparents independently he has to be allowed to make an informed decision. That requires you being able to have a calm but thorough chat with him about exactly why you felt you had to go NC. He needs this information. Now you know he’s meeting them, if he only learns it later on, he may feel mis-led by you as well as GPs. Please be honest with him.

OP in this situation my 15 year old would not be meeting up with them.

I have a 15 year old son - if his sister was called that, alongside all the other delightful spoutings they utter, there's not a snowball's chance in hell he'd meet up with them.

Encouraging him to lie to you is not on. I'd worry about further manipulation too.

Tricky. I went NC with my parents- the trigger was their racism, but that was against a background of their longterm treatment of me. I never stopped DS1 talking to my mum on WhatsApp, and always thought they'd ask to see the kids at some point and, if the kids were up for it, I'd be willing to facilitate that.

What they did instead was make contact with abusive XP and arrange with him to come down and see the kids in secret 🤦‍♀️. Turns out XP arranged all this to get back at me because his ex girlfriend- who played quite a big part in the DC's lives- sees them occasionally, and he doesn't like her anymore.

The stress, arguments and rearrangements this caused was off the scale. Eventually I managed to sort it so that I took the DC to meet my parents (and waited around while they hung out).

But the important thing is that the DC enjoyed seeing their GPs. I'll never stop that if it's what the DC want, I just don't particularly appreciate 2 sets of toxic people joining forces against me 🙄

Dear god, that is horrific. Thank goodness you have your BIL and SIL onside, too.

I'm NC with MIL and very low contact with FIL so I get it, but I also think you've gone about this wrong.

Your son would have been 14 when you went NC -old enough to make his own decision. It was poor of them to tell him it's a secret and be sneaking around but it's equally poor form to expect your son to break his relationship with his grandparents unless he also wants to.

Unless they are a danger to him then I think your should have left the decision of contact to him and facilitated access if he wanted it. Or at least not interfered.

Edited to say, have a talk with him first so he can understand your reasons, but it's then upto him and you need to respect that decision.

I am absolutely shocked at this. I have heard some terrible things on Mumsnet but a grandfather calling his grand-daughter such a horrible word is one of the worst things I've ever heard on here.

They should be shunned by all decent people.

I think the most important thing is to ensure your son doesn’t feel he needs to keep secrets from you about this or anything else.

I would explain the reasons of the NC but try to keep it factual with no opinion or emotions swaying things. I would also explain that he can see them if he wishes but you would just like it to not be a secret and in future if he is doing something he knows you would not be happy with, you want him to feel able to tell you. You may not be happy about it but you will be proud of his honesty.

At his age and stage I think he is sort of old enough to make the decision to see her

You could always tell him the full truth as to why you decided it was not in his interests in your opinion

I think it’s very sly what they have done

You are making this an exciting game for them both.

Just say okay thats fine. We'd prefer you didnt but No need for secrets.
Let me know when you are visiting and ill drop you off.

Your pearl clutching is petrol on the drama fire

Most warm loving families struggle to get their teenage children to bother as they should with GPs.... a main driver of this is the secrecy and illicit nature. He is getting his teenage rebellion out and GPs are point scoring on you.

Do they use racist slurs in front of your son? You mention their lack of interest in your DD due to her additional needs. Do they use similar language about people with disabilities and additional needs? If so, I would be very honest with your DS about why you don't want him to have contact with his grandparents.

I totally get that but I also think your ds at 15 is definitely old enough for the conversation that some people have horrible racist views, the impact on others this has and why they are wrong. And also what to do when you hear someone speaking like that. I would put all of that in place for him and then let him decide. My guess is eventually he'll want to distance himself from them too.

He's 15 not 5 you cannot keep him away from people whose views you don't agree with. Does he enjoy spending time with them?

Be honest with him. I think this is all you can do. Say that they are already manipulating him by asking him to keep secrets. Ultimately if he wants to see them then he needs to do it openly and honestly. He does need the full picture and an understanding of context. I would not stop him but let him know you are concerned about it and that he can ask anything he needs to.

She sounds like a nasty piece of work.

I think you need to be more honest with your son and explain more detail about why you’ve gone NC. If he still wants to meet up with them after that, I would insist on full transparency - he tells you what they’re doing and when, etc.

This. He has his own relationship with his grandparents that at age 15 does not need to involve you.

Do you know why your DS wants to see them? He talks about not wanting to let them down but does he know about their poor treatment of his sister who has additional needs?

But if your son wishes to see them then you should let him. He will make up his own mind soon enough whether he wishes to keep up contact but presumably if you have been NC for a year he must have enjoyed spending time over the last 14 years with them or he wouldn't still be seeing them.

You need to sit down and clearly but without prejudice explain why both your family and you bil & sil are no contact with them. You then need to say that you would prefer if he stopped seeing his grandparents for these reasons but ultimately make it his choice and that you will respect his decision.

I think your son is old enough to make his own choices. However bit sounds like he doesn't have all the facts to make that decision on. Is it possible to have an age appropriate talk with him that puts the facts across in a calm way?