Some of you may have come across previous posts around this - DP and I are taking DN in to live with us. His parents (DP's sister and husband) died a long time ago and DN has been brought up by MIL. In lots of ways she is the only mother he has known.
DN's situation has been going downhill for a while, with increasingly bad behaviour at school, swearing at teachers, culminating in him refusing school for the last two months of term. He's 12. The school sent letters home but MIL just wrings her hands and does nothing. The one time she was due to take DN into the school for a meeting to discuss his behaviour he said he didn't feel well so he didn't go . She went on her own.
So, all parties agreed he should come and live with us. This will be very difficult (we live in a small flat and have a DS, 11 months) but we are determined to keep DN on track and happy.
We had arranged he would come to us when we got back from our holiday. They arrived two days late (she couldn't get him out of bed because he'd been staying up all night playing computer games and sleeping all day) but without his stuff. MIL said she didn't think he was ready, she had 'promised' him more time at 'home' etc. etc.
We'd made lots of plans for the weekend, my parents had organised stuff and I was taking him to a party where he would have met other children who were going to his school. But, MIL picked him up this morning because DN had apparently made her promise she would (before they left to come here when he was feeling insecure about leaving the house - he only goes into the garden as he's fallen out with some local kids and is scared he'll see them). But when I talked to him he seemed pretty keen to spend the weekend with us and was looking forward in particular to doing woodwork with my dad which was scheduled for tomorrow.
He's due to start school here in a few weeks time.
She has now said he's with her for the next ten days, then we get him for 5, then back with her for a few days before finally coming to us just a few days before school starts.
THis gives me no time to try and arrange meet-ups with other kids to acclimatise him a bit to a non-hermit lifestyle.
So we had a really great few days with him, baking cakes and making models and playing with DS. I talked to him about 'when he lives with us' and checked he was happy about it. He said he was. I said we wouldn't be able to lavish stuff on him like granny does, but that we would always looks after him and make sure he was happy etc. He piped up that he wasn't worried about that because granny is giving him a bank card and paying his allowance into his account. DId I mention he was 12? She's also said she'll carry on paying his contract phone (I'd said he'd have to switch to pay as you go and budget). She never said any of this to us so I don't know when that was going to come out.
Worst of all, she has told him he can come 'home' whenever he wants. Clearly we are going to put down the boundaries he has never had and badly needs, so there will be some kicking back - he'll just use her as an escape route surely?
AIBU (DP and I) to tell her she must relinquish her hold over him if we are to bring him up? He will play us off against each other, if he goes back to see her we'll never know if she'll have the guts to send him back and if he has a source of money we have no control over we're in a weak position when it comes to discipline.
So angry. It's hard enough as it is. Granny says she's desperate for us to have him, knows she's doing a rubbish job, etc. but also says she 'can't reject him'.