Please tell me if I am being unreasonable

[mamafridi]

I can't control my anger any longer, not now that my mother's favouritism has gone to the next generation. Just found out she is going to get her other granddaughter (my sister's dd) a £100 play house for her birthday in a month's time. She bought my dd a £31 one on sale last month for her birthday.
I have managed to keep this growing anger at all the other instances where my mother has shown clear favouritism towards her other dd and grandaughter, things like buying them gifts, coffees, lunches, taking them out, being constantly available for child caring duties. But this is just the final kick in the stomach. Too many years of seeing her show favouritism towards my sister, but now to see it happening again between her two granddaughters...I just can't take it.
What should I do? I haven't said anything because I was told on the phone this morning so I just made an excuse and got off the phone before bursting into tears.

YANBU, i can understand it would upset you to see obvious preferential treatment especially as it has transcended to the next generation.

From a personal point of view, I couldn't give two F's if my parents preferred one of my sisters to me, however i did not grow up in a house where there was any preferential treatment.

It is something that concerns me, and is one of the reasons i have chosen to have one child, as i would never want to unintentionally give one child preferential treatment, as i have seen quite a few threads like this where the less preferred child has been quite seriously emotional damaged by it.

My mum has 6 daughters but think she only has 2.

She also has 13 grandchildren but thinks she only has two (both belonging to one of the 2 above)

She also has 11 great grandchildren but thinks she only has one (one that belongs to one of the two above)

YANBU OP - it stinks! And over the years has caused massive rifts in the family which wil never be healed. The children and grandchildren all agree that she is out of order (even the favoured ones) but it hurts them when she does things for one and not the others.

The most recent was that she paid 4k for her favourite grandchilds wedding photography, and gave another grandchild a small ornament for her wedding a week later!

The worst thing is that she can't see it. she is disabled and lonely and spends all day alone despite having 3 daughters, 8 grown up grandchildren and 9 great granchildren within walking distance of her home. None of them will see her now because of the way they have been treated - and she still wont admit any responisbility for their feelings.

I have massive sympathy, OP. My DH is the unfavoured child, and his sister is the favourite. It can be absolutely soul-destroying. In fact, his situation is even more extreme than yours, as his surviving parent can't be bothered with him or our kids (the only grandchildren) AT ALL, but lavishes attention on his sister.

Ultimately you just have to try and protect yourself and your DD by distancing emotionally. It's not your fault, it's your mother's failing

This is toxic behaviour - your mother knows exactly what she is doing here, most parents try to treat their children equally. But there are lots of mothers like this and lots of children that think their mothers are like this when actually they don't know they are doing it.

My own experience showed me that the important thing is to ensure that you have close contact with your siblings and nieces and nephews. Don't involve your mother with these arrangements. Invite them over, you go to theirs, have days out. This will bring you closer together and your mother will have to relinquish control.

If you mother is innocent in all this, just doing stuff without thinking of the consequences, she will welcome the fact that you are spending time with your sister's family. Try to focus on your sister and her kids.

I know for a fact that my mum spends more on my 2 children than she does on her other grandchildren. She has 12. Most are grown up,, some with their own children now, only my sisters kids and mine are still school age. The grandchildren who are now grown up got a lot of my parents time when they were little, I was a young teen at the time and we would take them to stay for a week during the holidays etc. My dad died when my eldest was 3 months old and my my mum is now elderly and has never been in a position to support child care, mainly becasue we don't live near, 1 had 2 boys 13 months apart and they were a handful and she wouldn't have been able to cope. My sister with the similar aged kids to me lived nearer and her kids again got more attention.

Also, my kids are the only ones who have no other grandparents, the others all have another set and in some cases have great grandparents too.

My mum sees giving my kids more as redressing the balance. She is open about this and I know that my sister doesn't have an issue with it and the rest are adults so can't really compare. We are not talking loads of cash here, my mum is pensioner.

Is there a similar issue that your mum is maybe trying to redress or is it just that your sister asks and gets whereas you wouldn't ask? In that case I would occupy the moral high ground.

You may have a bigger issue, but I think, from what I can tell, if you make it about the playhouse, then that's not reasonable.

If I'm reading you wrong, then ignore, but you seemed to be saying that you asked for that particular playhouse? If you asked for it, then I think it's unreasonable to expect her to have read your mind and bought a more expensive one. She might have done that and you say "but I wanted the other one". It sounds like you each got the playhouse you asked for, which may be different in price, but doesn't sound like favouritism.

If there's a bigger issue then you need to address that. It may be just that, as you say, your sister asks, so she gets. You don't ask, so your dm assumes you don't want.

I asked my mum why she did it and she got all arsey and defensive. She said that when I die I should have "it's not fair" on my gravestone!. I said it wasn't something to joke about, because I have never been treated fairly and to extend it to my children is just despicable IMVHO!

I spoke to my gran about it and she said she didn't know why I was surprised by the way my Mum is to my boys because she had never treated me the same as my brother and sister.

I am really hurt by it and really really sad for my children. There is no way on this earth I could behave like it.

I understand your pain. MIL has done this but on a grand scale. She just bought SIL a house. Not a playhouse. A HOUSE! She regularly takes them on holiday (not just down the road - to disney world/Canada etc etc) I understand she likes to treat SIL because shes a single mother, and I have nothing against SIL, but you can imagine how DH feels.

She said that when I die I should have "it's not fair" on my gravestone!

Nasty. I still think the answer always is to keep as close links with the 'favoured' sibling as possible. It is probably as painful for them as it is for you.

Im amazed at how much favouritism there is. I have 2 half sisters who are treated as if they are still children they still get stockings and expensive gifts at their lovely xmas get togethers that me and my dh and dcs arent invited to. Last year we did secret santa which was fjne till ifojnd out my sisters had lavish gifts and i had nothing because i wasnt my mums name out of the hat.
I was on my own at xmas with yojng dc for years and was never invited there cos they like a quiet xmas now they spend it with my grown up sisters.
They didnt even attend my wedding 4yrs ago on xmas eve cos they were too busy
If anyone has the answer to not letting it hurt so much then id be interested.

Lynniep That remknds me of my mate who was bought a camera when her sister had a horse. [Shock]

I wish I could help you ledkr, I assume they know that they are hurting you by excluding you in this way? I think the Stately Homes threads might have some answers for you.

PUDScan i ask how you know that you couldnt give two fucks if your parents favoured your siblings if it has never happened to you?
Sorry but that is quite patronising to those of us who are devastated by it.

ledkr, no answers here either.

My DH is very appreciative of how much my parents like him, but it just beings home how weird and unfair it is that his own aren't bothered.

Counselling helped a lot. And he realises that, as well as a weird 'golden child' dynamic being in place with his sister before he was even born, by the time he came along there were clearly quite a lot of issues. So, there was poor bonding and a lot of blaming his arrival for the tensions to avoid facing up to the real causes. Still hurts like hell, but he is less insecure about himself and his part in it now.

Is your mum scared of your sister?

Gets her exactly what she wants to avoid a tantrum?

OP, I really feel for you - family dynamics are so hard to understand and agree with EldritchCleavage that counselling would help. Sounds like this has been eating away at you for a long time

Wow, these threads always shock me. I am so sorry that some of you go through this, it's awful :(

I hated being an only child but I am glad I don't have to deal with any of this.

Don't have any advice OP but I hope it goes well if you confront this.

I called my parents (well my mother) on this sort of thing three years ago. We have barely spoken since. Life is much more placid without her shit stirring drama llama behaviours.

I do need counselling, it 's just I can't afford it and I have to find and pay for child care. No, instead I will grow bitterer and angrier and finally explode onto mumsnet where I will get loads of support from you lovely ladies.
I chickened out of a confrontation when I saw my mother today, because I knew she would use the playhouse as a way to make me look petty even though that was just a trigger for all the other things that have been mounting up.
Years ago I did confront her and she denied everything, it was like wading through tar trying to make her see what her favouritism was doing to me. At the time I was living abroad and we stopped talking for nearly two years because of what she had done. But then my sister got married and for her sake we made up our differences and as I was still living abroad I could ignore the daily grind of it. But now I am back in the uk and it is starting to dawn on me that I'm not hard skinned enough to deal with it on such a regular basis. My sister knows how I feel and depending on her mood she denies that she is the favourite or loses her temper with me for pointing it out. So now I have stopped.
But what I would really love to know from my mother is why she does it. Why do parents have favourites?

MIL killed our family by being like this. Thing is she's getting on now and will need our support in the future. I know for a fact we're not going to be available.

Mama try to forgive your sister, it will be just as hard for her as it will be for you, but in a very different way. She will be terrified that your mother might treat her like that one day. That's why I advocate that you focus your bonding on your sister away from your mother. In the meantime you could always make it clear to your mother that if she doesn't stop you will do what brass is doing, and make your availability scarce when she needs you in the future.