Grandparents being twattish?

[CwtchyBlueMama]

This is quite a long one so apologies,

It's more of a WWYD really with an AIBU thrown in.

DH has a sis who has 2 dds,we have a ds.

We live about 5 min walk from them,sis lives about 15 min walk away.

Sil has always been the favoured one out of her & dh,things like she has never had to pay any keep & yet dh had to pay 1/2 his monthly wage to them,no biggie it made us save even harder to buy our 1st home together.

When we moved in ils bought us a new bed & it cost £180,when sil moved in with her boyf they paid for their deposit.

We got married & ils told us to hurry up & have dcs,we had infertility issues & eventually had our ds through icsi.

Fast forward some yrs,sil had her 1st dd & the yr after we had ds.The yr after that sil had her 2nd dd.

She split up with their dad & sold her house,she managed to rent a lovely house a few streets away from old house & nearer to the school her eldest dd attends.

They are half living at ils house & do everything for the girls & sil.

They have never babysat ds,when my gd died i asked them to look after ds for me whilst i attented the funeral,they agreed but were waiting outside the social club after the service to give him back to us.

Their house is full of pics of them all on their many days out & luckily ds hasnt noticed yet as they have never taken him anywhere,this is not for a lack of asking on our part.

So the recent events which have really pissed me off are,this week we were picking ds up from school & ils friend asked us if 'she had had it done yet?' we looked at her perplexed & she twigged that we didnt know what she was talking about,turns out mil was in hospital having an op of some sort.

She is not in the best of health so this worried us,when we got home i rung their house phone & asked them to ring us & let us know what was happening as we had heard mil was in hospital.

This was 2 days ago & they havent rung us back.

Yesterday i rung round the local hospitals & eventually found her,her named nurse came to the phone & told me that mil had asked her to tell us she was fine & she couldnt tell us anything else.

On Bonfire Night we went to our community centre for the display & they were all there & never mentioned anything about mil having to go in so we really dont know what has happened.

We have been round to their house but fil wont answer the door,we know he is in as their car is there behind their gates.

There is more background,they dont come to ds bday parties ever yet always go to gds,all the toys in their house are aimed at girls,think pink & glitter (fil loves them to be weak feeble girls who cling to him) they have dont their spare bedroom out as the girls bedroom,again think pink & glitter.

So AweBU to think right then sod you if thats how you want to play it?

OP I totally get that the women in a family are the facilitators and organisers. I don't know any family where the MEN organise family events, call everyone, arrange everything etc etc They are the glue in the majority of families so your phoning about the hospital is not unusual in that sense.

And yes after 22 years you bloody well ARE family! Their shame if they choose not to see it like that. And NO it has nothing to do with wanting to be queen bee. I have jokingly had to remind MIL that I am not an orphan. She would be ecstatic to think my life revolved around her. It doesn't. But if you are trying to be a good DIL then of course you would be concerned if they are sick. Can you imagine, if you did nothing you would be the DIL from hell.

I have felt so empowered by taking our stance. I'm sure you will too not being regularly snubbed and rejected.

Frosty, you have gone above and beyond already. You sound like a lovely person who doesn't deserve to be treated this way. Neither does your DS or DH. It's a very sad situation, but some GPs aren't worth the bother.

I don't get why some women feel they have to be the ones doing the phone calls etc. I don't do that in my marriage. We both work and if my husband wanted info on a relative of his that was ill I'd expect him to phone and get it.
I don't understand why women wouldn't expect their husbands to do all the phoning with their relatives but are happy to take on that role for their husband's family.
Maybe if you're a SAHM who enjoys phone calls it's different. Men will only dump this sort of organisational crap on you if you let them.
It did sound here as though the OP was upset at not being told of her MILs illness and then went a bit OTT phoning round all the hospitals in the area.
If her MIL wanted to know about her illness she'd have told her. Even relatives have a right to keep their medical problems confidential.
If my SIL phoned round hospitals if I was ill because I hadn't told my brother I was going in hospital (and I wouldn't because I tend to keep medical things private, although I may tell him afterwards) I would think she was being very intrusive.

I see your point 2rebecca but i am not going ott.

You are making me sound like a downtrodden interfering dil & nothing could be further from the truth.

Anyway like i said before mil has serious medical conditions meaning a ga could possibly kill her, if the ils wanted to keep it private then thats fair enough but on the same token maybe they shouldnt have told their friend before their own ds?

We have stepped away from the whole situation & if they want to include us in any further aspect of their lives then they know where we live.

I also object to the implication that all this is my fault somehow.

Frosty,

Have some toxic relationships in my own family and you have my sympathy. Backing away is certainly best.

2rebecca I agree with your point about privacy and yes I would also see it as an intrusion if my IL's phoned around like that.

BUT you're missing the point that OP found out from a non related person at school. It seems it wasn't that private and other people knew but they were choosing to keep it from their son. Weird don't you think?

'I don't understand why women wouldn't expect their husbands to do all the phoning with their relatives but are happy to take on that role for their husband's family.'

Do you NEVER phone his side of the family? How cold that sounds. IRL it isn't as extreme as you're making out. The truth is somewhere in between and where children are concerned it is USUALLY the mums who organise things.

'Maybe if you're a SAHM who enjoys phone calls it's different.' LOL are you trying to be offensive to SAHMs?

You seem to have a bee in your bonnet about something and really missing the point about the catalogue of IL's behaviour that OP has weathered so far. Perhaps OP tried too hard to smoothe things over but that doesn't make her responsible for their blatant rejection.

Op has said she is going to back off.

It might be understandable that the MIL kept the news of the hospital visit from her DS if she wanted to keep it private from everyone.

But she told an acquaintance from the school. It is NOT nice to find out important info like this out from a relative stranger.

When Dhs dad found out he had cancer and had to go into hospital for an emergency op he kept it from us at the time as he did not want to spoil our holiday.

But he rang and told us as soon as we got back.

Though it was perhaps a bit OTT to ring round all the hospitals. Ring family for info, fair enough,and if they are not prepared to talk you just have to leave it at that.

The person wasn't just an acquaintance though she was described as the inlaws friend. I would not be surprised if my mother in law discussed medical problems with a female friend that she would not discuss with my husband or me. The problem may be gynaecological. It doesn't sound as though the MIL and her son are that close. Often women feel more comfortable discussing medical stuff with women anyway and the MIL may have discussed it with her daughter who she will probably be closer to that her DIL (look at all the threads on women wanting their mothers at their births/ immediately after the births but not their MIL to realise that the mother-daughter bond is alot stronger in general than the MIL/DIL one.)
I think it's a shame the OP's son doesn't have more interested and loving grandparents, but I do think the MIL shouldn't have to disclose her medical problems to her DIL if she doesn't want to.
Imagine if this thread was the other way round and a woman was complaining her MIL rang round the local hospitals when she found she was having an elective operation.

2rebecca you are turning this into a mil/dil hate thread.

We rung their house & asked them what was happening & if mil was ok,there was no answer so i left a message hoping all was well & could they let us know if things were ok.

They never replied.

As i have said earlier in the thread,mil has serious medical conditions & we were worried that she could actually die.

Of course mil is closer to her own dd than me,i do not dispute that at all.

Anyway we have realised that they do not think much of us at all,putting friends before us so we have stepped away.

You are making me out to be a stalking dil from hell & i am not.I only rung the hospital to find out if her condition was serious enough that dh should visit as it may have been the last time he saw her,i have not rung since as they have not rung us at home,so we have taken the hint.

The least the inlaws could do was to get back to their own fricking son, if only to put his mind at rest that all was ok. I do not understand how anyone can be so cold towards their own child.

I agree saffy. It really is out of order.

OP, I can't believe how crap they have been to your son Sounds like they don't deserve him as a grandson, IMO

OP YANBU

I don't want to be overly suspicious here but,it seems like your DH father much prefers to have his granddaughters sitting on his knee than your DS...

I really feel for you and your family. Its not a nice situation to be put in.

My advice is to concentrate on living your life without them. Leave the door open yes but I dont think you should do any more running after them! They sound horrible, selfish, unkind and ungreatful. They clearly dont deserve your families love and attention... Show that love and attention to the people that really matter to you.

Dont waste you time on people that treat you like crap... Just because they're family... Doesnt make it right!!