I don't know what to do and I'm looking for advice.
I'm going to try to be as honest and objective as I can.
My son married my daughter in law a little over three years ago.
To be honest I didn't want the marriage to happen, I didn't like her, I had a bad feeling about her since the day I met her, but there was nothing I could do as my son really loved her.
I made the mistake of being quite direct with her about the way I viewed her. I had no experience back then, and if I could go back I would, but what is done and is done and I considered it water under the bridge.
A few months into their marriage, she got pregnant and the relationship between them started going sour. My son, his siblings and I are very close and often discuss issues, try to resolve them, or simply vent as a family.
I tried to hide my issues with her for the sake of my son and my grandchild and things seemed to get better between us.
When my grandchild was born, things seemed to get a lot better between us, I asked them to move closer (they moved to the other side of the UK for my son's job) so they could have family support (her family lives abroad), they called me to have a "heart-to-heart". She said during that call that she was reluctant to move closer because of "the way she was treated" (which I found unfair, because we did have our fond moments and a great time together, I found it unfair to brush the whole thing away, but I bit my tongue) and that my extended family, whom I stupidly confided in, told her what I said about her behind her back. I was mortified. Again, I was new to all of that and I know I should not have. I don't know who exactly told her all that, but I apologised and she said she would consider the move. The thing is she holds a lot of grudges and doesn't let go.
A few months later, she texts me out of the blue to tell me she had found text messages on my son's phone of a group chat where his brother, my son and I talked about her (back when she was pregnant that is, so there would have to have been some digging). Her text message was something along the lines of "I found text messages where you all said you never wanted the marriage to happen after saying that I had no intention of marrying your son and just wanted to sleep around, that I was not respectable, that I was going to take all his money, to keep his money away from me, that I was after his passport, etc etc..." and that although she wouldn't object to seeing our grandchild, she didn't want to have anything to do with us and that she wasn't going to join us for Christmas". All in all a very dramatic text for something that happened WITHIN PRIVATE CONVERSATIONS a YEAR AGO. The rule was basically that I could go to my son's house, my grandchild would come to see us with his dad, but that she wouldn't join in.
I had my in-laws around when she sent me the text message and I made the mistake of reading it aloud to them. I was very shaken and admittedly quite angry as it meant they were probably not going to move closer anymore, and that new drama started, and I impulsively said in front of them that she was crazy, that she was a bad person and that she was looking for problems scrolling through messages to find conversations that had occurred, once again, a year prior.
Again, nothing hostile was ever said to her face since the day they moved out, I was always kind and courteous to her from that moment. My opinions were shared within private conversations AWAY from her.
I bit my tongue again and tried to give her a call to apologise and asked my son if we could speak to her, but she wouldn't respond.
A couple of months later I came to their house, spoke to her, and things seemed to go back to normal. They moved closer.
In the meantime, our second grandchild was born, and some unfortunate things happened and my son wasn't allowed to be left unsupervised with the children anymore, and my daughter-in-law is the only one who is allowed to supervise contact.
My son came to my house, found an old phone in a box and asked if he could take it to let my daughter in law borrow it because hers was broken and they couldn't afford to get it fixed yet. I allowed it, but shortly after, I got a notification that my Instagram was getting logged into. I called my son who told me it wasn't possible as she wasn't on my phone at that moment and that he had wiped it clean. I obviously didn't say anything to him after that.
I called my other son and expressed my concerns that everything was being logged into and that dodgy things were happening on my phone, and I was obviously very worried about what she was doing. He called my other son and my son came to give me back my phone despite my insistence to let her keep it.
The mistake I made was that my in-laws were there for both these conversations.
Life continued as normal until a few weeks later at a family function. I greeted my son and DIL, played with my grandchildren, all seemed normal up until the end where she looked a bit off. They left.
My son calls me back later that day to ask to have a chat, my daughter-in-law is there with him.
She tells me someone (I don't know who) walked up to her during the function and told her that things were still being said about her. They told her I called her a very bad person, a crazy woman, that she was looking for problems, that I said she was dead to me, that she had crazy episodes, etc... I felt absolutely humiliated and told off like a child. She also told me someone else told her I had been discussing her intimacy with them (I only discussed that matter with ONE person, who wouldn't have told her, so I have no idea how she found out), she refused to tell me who it was but told me that she wouldn't come. I tried to calm things down during the conversation but it didn't work. She was adamant I was not telling her the truth and she wouldn't budge.
She said this time she was going no-contact with me, and because of the unsupervised ruling, this obviously means I will not be seeing the grandchildren.
But it gets worse. She said that "because I felt comfortable speaking ill of her and spreading lies in front of everyone else" she believed I would speak ill of her in front of her children, and that she didn't want me to see them at all, even once my son is allowed to be supervised with them.
My son said he approved of the decision and he had to stand by his wife.
I believe he is being coerced into this, he "HAS" to stand by his wife.
I also believe he is scared that if he says no to his wife, he will only be able to see his children in a contact centre or maybe not at all.
I don't know what to do, I have enough problems as is, my son has enough problems as is, and life as it is is hard enough for all of us without this being added to our circumstances.
I tried to reassure her, told her I was sorry she felt that way, that she was a brave woman and that I liked her, but she wouldn't budge.
My son has tried calling me a few times since but I haven't replied yet. I don't know what to say or what to do going forward.
My grandchildren, whom I adore, are being used as a weapon. This has nothing to do with them. I don't understand why I can't see them.
To add, my son wasn't allowed to be there at the hospital during birth or at the birth registry, so he is not on his second child's birth certificate, which makes things all the more complicated for him.