Do I do anything? Send a card maybe?

[ticktockali]

My fiancè has a 21yr old son, he separated from the Mum of son 14yrs ago. I met my finacè 4yrs ago.

Son was house sitting at his Mum’s who was then on holiday with her husband.
At about 6am last Saturday morning my fiancè received a very distressed call from son saying that he had come in late on Friday night after being with his friends in town, he was heavily intoxicated and had put on the upstairs shower. He had then fallen asleep.
The shower had overflowed and water was pouring through the lights and 3 rooms downstairs were now under about 3inches of water.

Fiancè said he & I would come over and try and sort things out.
It took the 3 of us 4/5hrs to get rid of the water. We had gotten hold of 3 wet/dry hoovers and extracted the water off the wooden floors. By some miracle all furniture was sufficiently raised off the floor so not to get damaged.

Son’s Mum & her husband returned from holiday yesterday and son explained what had happened. Mum is now livid my fiancè & I had been at their house. I must admit, it did feel uncomfortable but we genuinely tried to do the best we could.

Should I write a card to Mum expressing that we thought helping her son was the best thing to do in the circumstances? He was very distressed etc or just leave it?

Any advice would be much appreciated please.

Thank you so much for your replies and advice.
Think I’ve been programmed to always saying ‘sorry.’
I’ll not be doing at jot more and unless some gratitude comes our way from them, I will be putting my invoice in for OOH emergency 🆘 and I won’t be cheap!!
Thank you again so much everyone.

From her pov, her son wrecked the house while drunk and irresponsible, he contacted his dad who helped clear it up but someone probably should have contacted her and her husband asap to let them know what had happened. Presumably there is some damage if it was that bad. You can’t have undone all signs of it? Maybe she might have wanted someone else to deal with it. I mean, it’s likely she’s just angry and being irrational but I’m putting myself in her shoes. Maybe her insurance would have covered a professional to clear it up or she needed photos of the damage or something?

I think very few people would act rationally in that situation, tbh.

Honestly I'd just ignore her

Its a testament to how much your DSS thinks of you and DP. He knew it was bad but that you wouldn't hesitate on driving over in the night to help him. He called you first and that's what you take from this, being able to help your children in worrying times.

Absolutely don’t send a card btw. I don’t know why you would even think of doing that. And if I were you, I wouldn’t offer to help or get involved with them in future. Your fiancé’s son is an adult and he’s been separated from his ex a long time. There’s no reason for you to be involved with them.

No, neither you or your fiancé should mention it again. Leave her alone to cool down. Her son, once she's calmed down, will make his case for calling you, and she'll realise that he didn't have any other option (and that she's fortunate that his dad had all the gear to sort it, and saved both her house and a lot of money).

No, you can't excuse her being angry with people who tried their best to help out in her and her son's time of need.

I wasn’t excusing her, I was explaining - not the same thing.

The OP helped out a family member in a crisis, which is a nice and very normal thing that people do. How strange to criticise her as if she has some abnormal level of involvement in her fiancé’s son’s life.

Well, I wasn’t. I was reminding her that she needn’t necessarily do this if it’s going to cause problems and they’re not going to appreciate it. I wouldn’t.

She should be grateful so unlikely you will be able to reason with her. Let your DP deal with the messages. Xxx