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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

See all MNHQ comments on this thread

Original poster

Son's wife and my grandchild

999 replies

Frenchspeak · 16/01/2013 20:36

Hello
Have changed my name to protect privacy, I apologise in advance as this might be very long and rambling. Basically I want to get some views from you to help me sort this issue

The issue is that I feel pushed out of my son?s life. I get on ok with his wife but i have always found her difficult and this has been made worse since they had a child.

When she first had the baby they requested only 2 visitors at a time. I can understand that they didn?t want to be overwhelmed with guests but feel parents and siblings are different. I wanted to see the baby with my husband and other son. This meant that my other sons girlfriend needed to come as well. So there would have been 4 of us. My son stated to please stick to what was originally said. We did do this but I feel resentful that I didn?t agree to it first of all, and that I couldn?t see my boys all together. I know this may sound silly, but i wanted to take photos of my husband, and both sons holding the baby.

This has come to a head because I was trying to organise a family party so everyone could see baby. My son said it seemed a nice idea but thought his wife might find it a bit full on. Surprise surprise, she doesn?t think she?s up to it and wants to have time just the 3 of them. I suggested she might want to just come for a couple of hours and then go home to rest. But she said she?d be taking the baby home with her. She seems to forget that we are her child?s family and need to be included.

I have tried talking to my son about it and he understands. But things just stay the same and it is very frustrating.

OP posts:
InLoveWithDavidTennant · 17/01/2013 02:12

Shock just when you think you've heard it all

wowzers!

ShiftyFades · 17/01/2013 02:18

OP can you tell us more about the wedding that you didn't go to? I think might be the root of your dislike for your DIL?

IamtheZombie · 17/01/2013 02:19

Yes, Empress. Zombie is tossing coins as to which it is.

TidyDancer · 17/01/2013 02:22

ShiftyFades - I suspect the OP didn't go because she seems to have been rather open about the fact that she didn't think the wedding should go ahead. Strange that she then didn't attend.... Wink

This is either a reverse AIBU that the DIL is refusing to admit until she has exhausted the rage of MN in order to point out to her DH or other family member just how NOT unreasonable she is and how batshit her MIL is, or a regular poster is bored and extremely amusing. I love my MIL, she is a wonderful lady, but I can't bring myself to believe that there are actually MILs that behave like the OP is saying. It's too scary a prospect.

Come on OP, own up!

burntcake · 17/01/2013 02:48

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

burntcake · 17/01/2013 03:00

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

InLoveWithDavidTennant · 17/01/2013 03:10

wind up or not... there better be a bloody update tomorrow after lunch! and if its a new thread... can someone please pm me? i really really dont want to miss it Grin

SquinkiesRule · 17/01/2013 03:45

Oh dear! French. Stop talking to your sons and trying to see what needs to be done. You are making it all 10 times worse. You need to be quiet and back off, let them alone for a little while, then follow their lead when it comes to visiting and stop trying to control everything and everyone, you will end up cut off completely.

Wouldn't it be weird if tomorrow night we get the DIL posting, "my loony MIL had words with my Dh to see what can be done about me as I won't do what she wants with my new baby"

InLoveWithDavidTennant · 17/01/2013 03:49

it wouldnt be weird... it would be bloody brilliant! she'd have so much support Grin

i hope she is on here and finds this thread... she needs to read it

LondonKitty · 17/01/2013 03:57

Ok, so I have spent the last hour or so trying to catch up with this thread (under the blankets in bed trying not to wake DH and toddler). Am totally enthralled. But it is over 900 posts long!!!! I need my sleep, I have work in the morning. Can one of you lovely, helpful mners please give me a summery of the highlights? Like one of those catch-ups at the beginning of each season of Lost? (which I am a bit). This is quite surreal, if riveting, and I am frantic to know what I've missed (mostly the middle bits between when she who calls herself Frenchspeak is hotly derided by all (except one) and the later posts that are almost fond bantering).
Please?!!!

Coralanne · 17/01/2013 04:23

These threads always bring to mind "Charlotte's Web".

You know, Where Charlotte dies when she has given birth all her little ones and they can fend for themselves.

Sounds a bit morbid when you see it in black and white but the reality is that when you are no longer needed you become invisible and put back in your box until the time comes when you are needed for babysitting or emergencies etc.

Thankfully, my own family is in no way like this. Just getting a bit tired of all these MIL threads.

I am a MIL as are most of my friends and none of us have any of these kind of problems.

Maybe because we all still work full time and have lives and interests outside of our family.

Last summer holidays I had my DD stay with me for a week and we had the most wonderful time. This weekend I am having all the DGC,s overnight because the parents are going to a wedding.

The thing is they all visit me on a regular basis and don't want anything in return.

SparkleSoiree · 17/01/2013 04:26
Biscuit

( am no longer a biscuit virgin!)

Tortoiseonthehalfshell · 17/01/2013 04:34

LondonKitty:

OP told her son not to marry his now wife because she (OP) couldn't see why he could possibly love her, as she was not a lot like him. Son and wife got married without the presence of OP gracing them.
OP has many and varied opinions about the DIL's dog. It lies on the rug! In the lounge! And is stroked and patted by its owners! Even though, and this is the thing, even though it "looks like a wolf".
OP is usually the one in the family who has to put her foot down, so although her husband agrees with her that the situation is not right, she's the one taking charge.
OP feels that the mother of the baby is using "my grandchild to feel like she is the one in charge".
However, OP has taken on board what we have all said, and is therefore going to speak to her son. The other son, the one with the submissive traditional partner, whom she financially supports. To work out a strategy, because she, the OP, needs support. And then she is going to have lunch with her son-who-has-the-baby and seek his support. After which she will approach the DIL.

riveroise · 17/01/2013 04:38

Yep, OP get a life - hobby, job even a pet Smile to take care of.

......or is your only aim in life being "great matriarch" of the family?

Loveweekends10 · 17/01/2013 04:41

God you sound an absolute nightmare. You sound like you are quite keen to push your DIL out of the equation.
This isn't your baby. Get over it.
If I was your DIL I would move country.

CheerfulYank · 17/01/2013 04:42

Fabulous summary Tortoise :)

Egusta · 17/01/2013 04:47

Thanks Tortoise was half way through and getting a headache

knackeredknitter · 17/01/2013 05:11

This has got to be the biggest piss-take in the history of mumsnet. Either that or a journalist trying to get meat for an article.
OP if you are real, I can't believe anyone could be such a bitch by the way, you are fucking being unreasonable.
Your d-i-l has all my sympathies, and her husband sounds absolutely fantastic.
My mother in law's party trick is coming round at bedtime and trying to give children sweets etc. I no longer open the door to her unless she phones first and since she feels so entitled, she never phones. Therefore I haven't seen her for over 3 years, her loss....s
She was mad in lots of ways though, and had no real interest in my children except to take photos and mess up their routines, and make poisonous comments about autism ( two of them are autistic)
After my daughter was born, just over 3 years ago, she commented that she would teach my daughter how to cook and clean Shock that was more or less the last straw.....
S-i-l has always wanted to take babies away for hours at a time, and formula feed them even though I breastfeed. See if you can guess how much success she has had with my children.......
I am now going to speak for your d-i-l now when I say, f off you poisonous toxic mad woman.

Egusta · 17/01/2013 05:16

If this is a regular having fun, i have to say it is brilliantly crafted. Right down to such subtleties as using d-i-l instead of DIL.

Egusta · 17/01/2013 05:22

Right,. Have finished whole thread. [still have headache]. deffo a regular taking the piss. Please please own up, whoever you are, because this was a work of art.

I vote for MN classics also- for hitting all the trigger buttons so so so beautifully.

LovesBeingWokenEveryNight · 17/01/2013 06:02

Op I could see your pov quite well at the beginning but throughout this thread you have said some shocking things. If you really want to have your extended family to work please write down on a piece of paper all the things you have said. Do just justify anything, do not change any wording or add to. I want you to see all together the negative, judgy, horrible, selfish, bitchy, unnecessary things you have said. And I want you to put yourself in your done and dil position.

You may well have been the women of the family who everyone listen too, your other son gf has chosen to slot in to fit in with how things work, for your dil though she has a mother whose reputation is to protect and think first of her child, and she is following that. You are jealous, you are unhappy that she will not toe the line and you are deluded in thinking you can make your son do whatever you want such as not getting married or keeping thing from his wife.

You need to change quickly or you will be the one missing out.

Have you tried gransnet? You may get some better advice from your side of the situation.

MumVsKids · 17/01/2013 06:25

Superb thread Grin

CheeseAndMushroomToastie · 17/01/2013 06:27

I am not Exaggerating when I say op sounds like my mil.Sad very controlling, all about her three sons, loves her grandsons, not fussed about her granddaughters, dil's are just incubators/ cooks/ cleaners.

It is very sad and disturbing but sadly I can believe there are women out there Like this Sad I know one, and know its true when I say to DH that it would be her dream if I died during childbirth leaving, having given birth to about get gs. An currently 26 weeks preg. Confused

LtEveDallas · 17/01/2013 06:31

Bloody hell, I am astounded that this is still here Shock

Thankyou OP, you have helped me realise just how much I LOVE my MIL. This kind of wind up thread is fantastic for seeing the horrors that could have been out there. My MIL is FABULOUS she was a tower of support during the newborn days, she NEVER overstepped and NEVER made me feel bad - in fact she did a good line in telling off DH if she thought he wasn't doing enough. You know, she even got up in the middle of the night to give ME a cuddle when DD was doing her "I refuse to sleep more than an hour" thing. Now THAT'S a decent MIL.