To throw estranged in-laws cards to the DCs straight in the bin?

[craprelatives]

Name changed and posting in AIBU as I want you to be blunt with me!

DH & I have not seen his parents for many years now. We fell out when our eldest DC were small - without going into details, we found something out about them that meant it was impossible to continue a relationship with them - and we didn't want them around our DC anymore.

We are over it now and the whole period of arguing and bad feeling is in the past. The younger DC barely remembers them. The eldest is old enough to have been told why and understands.

But every time there is a DC birthday or Christmas comes around, we are reminded of them by the cards that they send, addressed to the DC, with very sloppy messages in them about how much they miss them and hope they'll see them soon - no attempt at contact with us directly.

So every time it happens, we feel a bit annoyed, then sling the cards in the bin. I mentioned this to a friend today and she said she thought it was wrong - that no matter what the circumstances, whatever they've done, they are the DCs GPs, and the DC will want to know that they haven't forgotten them - and so would want to see the cards themselves.

I was a bit taken aback and it's been on my mind since. So what do you all think? Please don't ask me what the fall out was about, I really cannot go into it .

We are in a similar position to you.

We have only had one birthday since we stopped seeing my mother and her partner. Our situation was a safeguarding issue, briefly involved SS (we had an Initial Assessment that went no further on the understanding that we will not allow contact - S47 was threatened) and the police.

We have kept the card we have received and hope there will be no more.

The card she did send angered me because the sentiments she expressed were meaningless in the face of the trouble she has brought to our door and the risk to which she exposed my children.

But I want to be able to maintain the moral highground and be able to say that I always acted in their best interests and that I never acted on my own feelings.

Not nice though.

And not nice to feel that the door is still open.

Story time! Not same as you are probably nicer than my parents(!) but vaguely relevant I hope:

My parents threw all parcels & cards from my grandmother away ... And then told me about it again & again & again (when i was 5-9) Everytime emphasizing how they said that were to me but they weren't really & granny was trying to bribe me & didn't really love me or miss me at all.

I'm not sure what my parents intentions were but the effect it had was to make me feel powerless & worthless & unloveable at the same time.

Not being treated like a human by parents or grandparents was upsetting, powerless in that my parents could stop me from seeing my own letters, & I wasn't allowed to be angry about it, but had to be grateful! Worthless because my granny didn't love me & my parents didn't love me either by behaving like that. We had very few toys or clothes growing up (& heavily teased over it) & those parcels were made to sound amazing btw... & I would have loved a relationship with my granny.

Sooo, am not sure what the answer is for you, but if you do decide to throw things I'd do it very carefully (& quietly?!). I think it's better to keep them just in case it becomes important to YOUR relationship later on. I don't know how I'd have felt about it all in the context of a strong family bond with parents but in these circumstances it was one of the factors that made me realise my parents are not very nice people.

If your reasons for protecting your children from them are valid, then I think it's probably reasonable to chuck the cards in the bin. If you are stopping contact for reasons that aren't to do with actual danger to your children from their grandparents then it's unreasonable.

Although birds has got a point that it may be worth keeping the cards for when your children are older, and you are able to tell them about what happened. Your children may still want to see them.

YANBU.

I agree with keeping the letters rather than binning them, but only because your eldest DS has seen his and knows about them. Your younger DC may feel betrayed if DS knew about the letters and made his own decision, but they had no say and can't even see them to judge for themself.

I'd worry about something in the future like Doublelifehalved has written about. Don't want your decisions to come back and bite you later when DC are older.

Yes my post boils down to keeping the letters as a sign of respect towards your children's future needs (to see things that are 'theirs', to understand the truth & make peace with it IF they ever want to go back into it). And you are respecting their current needs by not exposing them to the situation now.

Doublelife gives pause for thought. In my case, I won't be keeping any of the messages or gifts that my drug addict, crazy sister sends. Indeed, I don't even take them home with me (they're left at my parents' house). However, that was an insightful post.

YANBU,

as someone who has nothing to do with my in-laws for the same kinda reason as you, if they sent they same i would bin them too.

you have done the right thing

Interesting thoughts here. Another one in the same situation.

I've been torn for years with what to do with cards and gifts. I had a whole pile of unopened gifts for my son from my father and his wife. There was years and years worth. I only opened them when I emigrated and cleared the house.
it's made me ponder, I don't want my DC to feel unloved or disrespected. If my son ever receieves them in the future, I will put them away so he can chose if he wants to see them in the future.

I hope you mean you throw the cards in the recycling and not the bin.

It's a tricky one as it is kind of the ILs to send things and if someone was doing something kind for me i would be cross if it was being hidden. But if you gave them the cards etc, i suppose they would want to see the ILs and not understand why they couldn't. I assume that the ILs are in some way dangerous to children as that would be the only fair reason to keep them apart.

"I definitely see the messages as manipulative and a way of getting at DH and I - an example was one to DC3 (two years old at the time) saying 'we miss you so much and feel so sad that we're not allowed to see you, we do love you.' Clearly a two year old was not going to be able to read that - but we were ."

Quadrangle, I really don't think the ILs are being kind. They are sending these cards in order to take a stab at their son and his wife. There's no kindness there.

Plus they must know you don't know where they live now? So it's pure manipulation on their part.

And they are allowed to see the children, under supervision.

Why give them the opportunity to confuse and hurt your children?

I think you should keep them for when the children are older.

As a GPS who help their DS look after DGDS they have no contact with late mother's family.MIL was violent alcoholic and the rest of family very unpleasant.
People kept wanting to know the GDS because thy were their mum's half sisters and one even went to court with MIL when mum died to get access. the judge threw out all claims. We have kept all court papers to show GDS when they are older. now early teens probably when eighteen. They know the full story and want no contact.

Doublelife - your post has been very helpful. I suppose it's what was in my mind when we emigrated - DS was 20mo at the time and DH wanted to dispose of most of his christening presents, because they were just "stuff" - I wouldn't let him because they were gifts to DS and therefore it was up to him what he did with them when he was older.

Same principle but it wouldn't have occurred to me to apply it in this circumstance.

Oh good thumbwitch :)

YANBU. They obviously did something vile for you to have reacted as you did initially. Forget the blood being thicker than water/duty/obligation/guilt bullshit. If people are wrong 'uns who drag you down ditch them whoever they are......life's too short.

Bear with me, don't know if this will help you. We haven't seen my ILs since May when for the hundredth time they let us down again and this time it was an emergency. They are retired and live 15mins away. It mostly stems from FiL, he said that we are selfish to ask for help, they don't have time for us and they would rather spend their time in the garden/playing bowls/sailing toy yachts than seeing DS1. As a result, DS2 born two days after DS1 in July and they still haven't seen him. To be fair MiL sent a card and present to DS1 and I did give them to him. He is 4YO and didn't seem fussed either way about the gift/card, but he did say "Grandad is mean and is a nasty child". He doesn't miss them as I guess he hasn't got anything nice to miss. ILs were also appalling parents to DH when he was growing up, physical and emotional abuse (only to him, not his younger sister).

Hopefully my point is, although I would rather bin everything, actually DCs are quite intelligent about some of this stuff and know their GPs are crap. However, if circumstances of fall-out are more serious, I would completely understand binning everything. I do not agree that just because someone is your parent/grand-parent that you have to have them in your life.