Fed up with in laws demands to visit constantly

[Kellogswontdo]

I know this is my DPs issue to fix, he has spoken to them countless times but they never listen..
His parents are divorced and fought for our attention for years. We’ve ignored it and choose to do what suits us without picking sides but it’s got very suffocating lately.
MIL demands we visit her, except she will never come and visit us. She cries she hasn’t seen our children for weeks but she knows she’s welcome here any time.
We have busy lives with working full time so weekends are our time together to spend with our children. We tend to have day trips or days at home and our weekends are filled quickly. Some weekends we’ll visit family or they visit us, but we keep this to a minimum as we value our alone time and we are in the middle of redecorating which is taking a while due to lack of time- we have been told it should be done by now as we have evenings yet we have children to feed, bath and get to bed after long days at work.
MIL tells us we’re selfish and we can’t use any excuse. Except she lives an hour away and it takes a lot out of our weekend to visit when she doesn’t even seem happy we are there. (Awful traffic there and back every single time). We end up going home resentful we wasted time visiting when she either lectured us, moaned, ignored our children or wanted jobs doing around the house.
FIL uses guilt such as ‘but I’m old and I don’t know how long I’ve got… I want more time with my grandchildren so they remember me’ all of that awful talk. He begs for our time like arranging expensive trips just to get us to meet, turns on the water works if we can’t make it and generally makes us quite uncomfortable like our time is being bought to spite MIL. This is a 2 hour journey plus 2 hours back.
It makes us not want to see either of them as it’s not enjoyable for anyone and the pressure, blackmail and harassment is getting too much. We used to have a fantastic relationship with FIL and our children love him, but he gives us gifts to thank us for visiting assuming that we are materialistic and will only visit in return for gifts.
We’ve always told them we’ll see them regularly but on our terms when we have free time, this tends to be once a month -6 weeks which to me is more than enough. DP hates the drive and never wants to go. I have to encourage him to keep in contact with his parents as they are rarely nice to him and pick at his faults.
Everytime they phone or text we know it’ll be a demand that doesn’t suit us, not even polite just a ‘I expect to see you on Saturday no excuses’.
The latest one being ‘I sent DGD birthday money but in return you need to come over for dinner tomorrow’.
I’ve started putting my foot down and saying no to everything. I know it makes me the bad person but I just can’t take it anymore, it makes me feel like a child being parented.
Can anyone suggest anything that will make them back off and realise it should be give and take and making demands just wants us to avoid them?
(sorry it turned into a long rant, had enough of being controlled!)

Why on earth are you encouraging him to keep in touch with his parents when they treat him and you so badly?

Stop chasing him to keep in contact. Decide how often you can stomach seeing them on your (you and DH's) terms, communicate that, and let all the calls go to voicemail and texts that aren't minimal around the visit and polite, go unanswered. Return gifts that are used to blackmail and refuse receipt of future ones. Leave/tell them to leave when they are rude, they'll have to wait for the next 6 week visit to try to behave better.

Does your MIL drive? you say she’s welcome anytime, it’s an hour away, that’s a 2 hr round trip, for her.

Take your DH's lead when it comes to his parents. If he doesn't want to visit - then don't visit. And don't fall for that "I don't know how long I've got left" guff - that's pure, unadulterated, emotional blackmail and should be called out.

We can't all have what we want - it's tough, but that's life.

When MIL tells you renovations should be finished, “You want it done faster? Come and sit with the kids so we can work on it.”
“Selfish? How much time have you spent at our place MIL? Time you returned the favour.”

”FIL, we don’t have room in our house for presents. It would be great if you could come over and spend time playing with the kids so we can get some work done on the house.”

Decide between you and dh how often you will see them and stick to that.

"You need to visit Saturday "
"Sorry we are busy we will see you X day"

After visiting
"Lovely to see you mil we can see you x date unless you want to visit us before "

Do you have family visits with your own parents and if so how often and where do they take place?

I have to encourage him to keep in contact with his parents as they are rarely nice to him and pick at his faults

Stop doing this. Take the lead from him.

Stop giving in to their demands to see them. They are continuing to behave this way because it's working!

Your DP doesn't want to see them. Why are you engaging? He's the primary contact - pass the phone to him every single time.

Op, back your dp.
He doesn't want to see them and they pick faults.. It YOU whose pushing this?

Your the problem here, not your circus, not your monkeys. How wouid you feel if he was pushing you to see people who pick fault at you??

Let him take the lead op.

• I'm saying no to everything I know it makes me a bad person...

No what makes you a bad person is forcing and guilting your partner into contact with parents who behave like this?

Imagine!!
You can't stand them like this this poor man has had to grow up with this day in and day out.

Support him and apologise.

My advice would be to sit down with your DH and prepare a conversation or message that you will send to both of his parents (you being either him or you).
You will say in this message that as you are very busy but there is actually nothing stopping them arranging to come to your home and spend time with their grandchildren there. Remind them that roads work in both directions and you don't have the time to travel to visit them as often as they might want so they can contact either their son or you and you will arrange a day when they can come - you will have food prepared etc. so it won't be a wasted journey on their part. It won't be every time but they will have to travel to you more frequently than they are currently doing and you will travel to them too (just not doing 100% of the travelling any more).

Send it to both of them so that even though they aren't together any more, the same message is being sent out and it's consistent.

As for the gifts coming with strings attached - that needs to be stopped sharpish.

Next message reply that the road goes both ways. And repeat. Tell them you travelled last time.

Thanks everyone.
i don’t force DP to have a relationship with them, I worded that wrong (exhausted with unwell baby) he does want a relationship with them, they’re his parents and he loves them and would never cut them off, he gets overwhelmed by their constant demands and shuts off and I remind him he hasn’t spoken to them in X amount of time. If he doesn’t want to see or speak to them I never push it as it suits me just fine not being around either of them. I’d prefer no contact but he doesn’t want that. If he avoids them then they begin to harass me at work text spamming me asking why he isn’t answering the phone.
I don’t have any family so maybe that affects my reactions slightly.

I remind him he hasn’t spoken to them in X amount of time

You say you don't force the relationship - but this quote is evidence that you are. OK you may not be beating him over the head with a soggy haggis about it, but even a reminder is a nudge, a bit of judgement. Just drop it.

If he avoids them then they begin to harass me at work text spamming me asking why he isn’t answering the phone

Don't respond to them. If he doesn't want to talk to them, he doesn't want to talk to them. And he doesn't then need you, telling him that his parents called you asking why he hasn't answered the phone. There's a facility on phones you can use to step away from a contact, without fully blocking them. I've completely forgotten the word - I'm sure someone can tell us. Anyway - use it for their numbers.

I’ve started putting my foot down and saying no to everything. I know it makes me the bad person but I just can’t take it anymore

This is not you being a bad person, this is you protecting your DH and kids. No one, even Grandparents, have the right to a relationship with someone if they don't want it. From what you have told us your DH doesn't want a relationship with either of his parents, and by extension, he doesn't want his kids to have a relationship either. From a good place you have been pushing this relationship on him. Let it drop and take comfort from the fact you are protecting him. Your absolute allegiance should be to your DH, not his parents.

Do not feel bad about the grandparents - feel good about your DH

edited for spelling

Just bluntly tell them both you will only be able to accommodate every 4-6weeks and that you will not be making the journey each time, you expect them to make the journey at least on alternate meet ups if not more. If they choose not to come then that's their choice but you wont be guilted into spending between 2-4h of your weekend in a car with the children when you work all week. Help your husband write this msg and send it from his phone. Tell them you love them both very much but it's becoming too much to fit in with all the other activities your children have planned and how you both work and value close family time.

They get on board or they dont. With the FIL talk to him about the gifts, if you havent already and say you dont require gifts to visit. If he insists just let him and give them away, maybe it's just something he enjoys.

Do either of them have much else going on, friends or family where they live? Are they a bit lonely? It's hard but it's not your responsibility to fix those problems

Surely you mean bluntly tell them you aren't a bloody hotel?