To back teen dd not apologising to her nana?

I never did the prom, or end of year school disco whatever it was called when I was 16. I was just glad to get out of the school, and both grandmas never commented on it.
MIL was way out of order, and your daughter has no reason to apologise. It should be the other way around.

Agree.

What isn’t true?

I don’t think the poster you were replying to was directing her comment at all older women. She said “ the older woman” meaning the MIL

That isn’t true. We aren’t all right wing “anti woke”, anti feminist harridans, and some of us are even bright enough to recognise an insult and when what overstepping looks like!

I don't really understand why SIL is so anxious for it all to blow over, given that she seems to have been as appalled by her mother's behaviour as you were. I think she and your husband need to present a united front, i.e. tell your mother that the only person who needs to apologise is her and that they are both team DD. If she won't accept that, she will have to accept the consequences.

Yeah I thought this. I am totally with you on this but I think I’d also reach out to SIL and be supportive to her.

she must be totally gutted her own DD’s special day out was also ruined

I'm somebody who considers herself to be a Witch. I'm Pagan. We do such dangerous things as celebrating turning points in the year that you might know as Christmas and Easter, amongst others. They were Pagan festivals long before Christianity existed, and when the Christian church was formed they found people were so unwilling to stop marking those festivals they had to lay theirs over the top of the existing ones to get people to comply with theirs. Other such dangerous activities that we do include meditating and making healing balms out of herbs. Witchcraft is duller than you think, and not evil. Again, it was in the interests of the founders of Christianity to label our religious practices as evil, because they were having a hard time getting people to convert.

I don't take issue with the OP's daughter, but just because it's being discussed here on this thread, I do cringe when I hear the word being used as an insult, and I wish that people would stop using it as such. The word has an incredibly loaded and troublesome past, having been used as an accusation that a person - usually a woman, who behaved in any way that men decided wasn't what they thought women should be doing, was inherently evil and used to excuse the torture and femicide of many women.

It's not pleasant to see the term thrown around as a casual insult, from the point of view of my identity and religion, and from a feminist perspective. I wish people would be more mindful of the loaded connotations of the word and stop using it as an insult.

I don't blame OP's daughter for not knowing this, and given the context I REALLY would NOT like her to feel the need to apologise, but it would be nice if a few mumsnetters reading this thread were a bit more mindful about appropriate use of the term in the future.

Well done on raising a girl who is confident in her own skin, has the temperament to have tolerated so much of her Nan's crap and has the courage to call out such poor behaviour.

I can understand you feel bad for SIL, but you're not in control of her and her decisions. I think you're doing marvellously in regard you and yours.

😂😂😂

Your Dd sounds great to me.

Secure/Comfortable enough to be herself, know what is right for her, and is prepared to stand up for herself.
At 15 she can choose if she wants to see family members or not.
In her shoes I wouldn't be in a rush to be meeting up with a grandparent that felt that way about me.
Glad she is still on good terms with her cousins.
We will need an update on how mil reacts on seeing older nieces new look!

If someone family or not treated my daughter like that we would have left way before it got that bad. Your MIL was so out of line.

Amazing what you can discover in actual life as well. Like hate speech being treated as fine and dandy.

You sound like a lovely Mum Op. Give your DD the biggest hug, tell her you love her and that you have her back.
Your MIL is cruel, heartless and spiteful and she may grow old alone if she carries on in this way.
Don let any of the wider family gaslight you or your DD or minimise her feelings. Ypur DD was in the right 100%.

I like the sound of your daughter. Tell her "good job" from me.

What a nasty woman she is, that resentment has obviously been building in her for a while, and it sounds like once she started she decided to go for broke.

I'm so glad you are backing your daughter, I'm amazed your SIL is trying to get you to let it go and play nice though, the only person who would benefit from that is her so as nice as she may be, it is quite a selfish thing to guilt trip everyone else, I wonder were she gets that from!

Your dd is right, she is a nasty old witch. Your dd is smart enough. She’s going places.
No apologising needed from her, but mil needs to apologise.
Sil placating mil shows how she’s been trained by mil.

Your MiL should apologise, but she probably won't. It almost certainly wouldn't mend any bridges, even if your DD could stomach it long enough to listen. You just can't unleash a tirade like that without consequences; your MiL is past old enough to understand that some things can't be forgiven or forgotten and the wounds we acquire in childhood and adolescence are the slowest to heal. Your MiL may have to live with what she's done for the rest of her life and her relationship with your DD might not be the only casualty. Frankly, it would serve her right if the only family she sees were her FOG-bound DC - and maybe not even them.

BTW, as someone who's probably about your MiL's age, she's a vicious old harridan who doesn't deserve her DC, you or her lovely grandchildren.

Very interesting perspective! 👏

Agree with is. I loved my own DF very much but his memory for me is very much tainted by his enabling of my narcissistic mother and his desire for an “easy life”that I was always made out to be the problem for my mother’s behaviour. I started to quietly loose respect for him when he was alive but after he died and I faced up to my toxic home life and how he allowed me to be treated my whole life, respect for him just disappeared.

You need to make sure your DH understands the way he handles this could effect his future relationship with you dd.

Sorry what is there for your daughter to apologise for? That horrible bitch of a mil caused all of this really nasty and unnecessary shit. Fuck her. Do not subject your daughter to her ever again and your husband needs to be having stern words with his mother. She is totally bang out of order! If anyone should be getting a massive apology it should be your daughter!

What a horrendous experience for your dd.

I think in all honesty that you and your dh (and perhaps sil) should go and see your mil and go through all the comments she made to your dd, and explain why she was wrong on each point, firstly, but also how damaging it is to make personal comments and personal attacks and how it is, basically abusive, and explain why it is abusive, and ultimately get to a point where your mil will apologise in a genuine way to your dd to try to repair some of the damage.

I don't know your dd but most people however robust will be affected by comments like that, and so I'd spend a lot of time saying out loud to your dd that her gm was wrong, how wonderful your dd is as she is, etc. Because even if she is assertive and dealt with what happened well, she will probably benefit from hearing it all the same.

Plenty of men love girls and women like your dd, so your mil is indeed bonkers. Not that women should live their lives solely to please men!

Your husband won't be able to use you and daughter as shields against his mother anymore. He's going to have to deal with her instead of feeding the two of you to her and he won't like that.

Don't back down. Your daughter needs to know at least one parent has her back against an abusive relative. It's likely she loses respect for her dad if he doesn't support her when she's been abused.

editing to delete my comment after seeing the updates (i was confused about how it got to the point it did)

NEVER should your daughter apologise!! Say that you'll bring your daughter to family events if SHE receives an apology from your mil and then enjoy the peace and quiet knowing she's too much of a miserable old witch to ever go that

(Btw I think your daughter is very sensible to not be too fussed about prom!)

I wish she called her a bitch instead of witch.

She sounds vile. Support your DD.