To think cutting people out of your life is just cruel

[ThinkAboutItTomorrow]

I know I am risking a real flaming here, and I honestly do appreciate that every case is very different and I cannot judge anything without knowing each case. However I see a lot of advice on here, mostly in relationships, where the advice is to 'just walk away' or 'cut them out of your life'. Now, in many cases I can see the point BUT......

I have a MIL. She is enormously hard work. Totally selfish, manipulative, vindictive and cannot even conceive of not getting her own way, a real pain in the ass. She drives me scatty and on occasion her manipulation makes me very angry. She repeatedly gets the hump and has little hissy fits, stopping speaking to DP and I for months on end (once because DP told his grandmother the dog had died ) then decides to make up. If you tackle her she tantrums - literally storming out screaming that she never wants to see you again. I suspect she could benefit from counselling but she won't even countenance it.

She is the mother to 4 grown up kids. 2 of them no longer speak to her and one is emigrating (in part I think to get away). This leaves DP. Oh joy. PIL are also homeless, having sold up to go travelling and when back in the UK they end up staying with us for months at a time, without really asking properly.

Anyway, sorry for length. Despite all this I see the total utter misery and heartbreak not seeing her 2 children causes her and I think they are really nasty for continuing to refuse to see her. At least part of her bad behaviour seems to stem from this misery. last week I could hear her crying her heart out (through the ceiling) and it turned out it was her 'lost' daughter's birthday (didn't talk to MIL, asked DP if he knew what was up). This is someone who ran away at 16 and is now back in touch with many others in the family but won't have anything to do with her parents.
They weren't abusive or anything, DP was living at home as an adult when she left and said at the time it just seemed like the usual teenage angst (ok, it's a bit more complicated but not wanting to out self or anyone else).

Everytime anyone asks PIL if DD is their first grandchild they just look stricken. They have 5 grandchildren but don't even know the names of all of them and have never met any but DD. Yes they are a nightmare but they don't deserve this misery.

Anyway - AIBU to think that people should sometimes be a bit more forgiving and tolerant? families can be a PITA but to just walk away because it makes life easier is just selfish and cruel.

Go on, tell me I don't know what I'm talking about.....

[ThinkAboutItTomorrow]

Oh and please don't think I'm some kind of suffering saint. Promise you I am far from that!!

I genuinely worry that she will drive DP and I away and then be left on her own utterly destroyed. It's just not possible to talk to her about her role in the problem without a complete meltdown though.

People can be very messed up can't they?

[JessicaBeatriceFletcher]

Think - if that happens it will be OF HER OWN DOING. We can't live other people's lives for them.

[ThinkAboutItTomorrow]

Mumngran No, weirdly DP wasn't the favoured child - he is the eldest and has always been the most independent. I think he effectively broke away when he was about 9 or 10 and demonstrated that he didn't need her. But it was ok at the time because she had 3 other smaller kids needing her attention. The trouble has been with the kids she was closest to.

She once said to me "I remember x (DBIL) once saying 'I don't understand why my sister has done that, I would never do that to you mum'" And then he did.

[MayTheOddsBeEverInYourFavour]

YABU

Being related to someone doesn't mean you just have it put up with any old crap they care to dish out, it's an accident of birth.

Families are incredibly important but that's because although they may have their faults and niggles they are loving supportive units. If they cause nothing but grief then what is the point? If I wouldn't let a stranger treat me terribly I'm certainly not going to put up with it from someone who is supposed to love me

I would never cut my mum out, she means the world to me and its not because she gave birth to me, it's because she is a wonderful woman who loves me and makes my life better for her being in it

[KellyElly]

I cut my toxic mother out of my life and it's the best thing I ever did. If that makes me cruel so be it. After all the cruelty and emotional shit I put up with from her through my entire childhood, teens and twenties I can live with you thinking I'm cruel for what I did OP.

[JackieBigTits]

It may be cruel, but I wouldn't say it is 'just' cruel.

It altogether depends on the people involved. Members of my DPs extended family are not and will never be my family. MIL cut all ties about 10 years ago. I had met an aunt and cousin, but will never see them again and out of respect for MIL would not want to. He also has a sister who, while I speak to if I see her, is not spoken to by DP, his siblings or his parents.

While I percieve the reasons to be slight, his mother has serious depression and anxiety stemming from childhood abuse. The stress caused to her by issues (possibly triggering for her in a roundabout way) with her daughter was more than she could bear. I would never dream of saying to her that she was unreasonable to cut her out, if it saved her own mental wellbeing.

[Eyesunderarock]

'I genuinely worry that she will drive DP and I away and then be left on her own utterly destroyed. '

Do you really not understand that as adults you have that choice, but her dependent children didn't?
What position in the family is your DP, the youngest? My father grew up in an abusive home, one of 8 children. The youngest had no idea as the hate and vitriol was reserved for his older siblings, and child 7 was the golden child.
Yet you use words like cruel, selfish and nasty to describe their choices as adults?
They could have chosen to be equally abusive back, truly vicious. But all they've done is cut them out and tried to forget about them. That's pretty impressive self-control in my books.

[DeWe]

Totally selfish, manipulative, vindictive and cannot even conceive of not getting her own way, a real pain in the ass

She is not selfish or cruel. She loves her kids. She just doesn't seem to want them to grow up and be adults away from her. All the problems were in her not letting go.

Aren't compatable are they?

People i know who have cut relatives out of their lives are not taking the easy option at all. It causes much heartache and emotional trauma.

And I'll bet the "apologetic letters" are along the lines of "how can you do this to me, I did so much for you, I''m so upset...."

[Pootles2010]

Right so first you said she is selfish, vindictive and cruel now you're saying she's not selfish or cruel. Which is it?

[stooshe]

As a nearly forty three year old woman, I have cut my father out of my life. This is after realising that he will NEVER love properly. He has always been manipulative and abusive. I was put in the position of "scapegoat child", to the point that extended family would feel entitled to do so. Imagine the penny dropping at the big, old age of forty. If I was any less strong ( and didn't have an inkling about psychology/personality disorders) , this knowledge about his behaviour and my pattern of behaviour ( as a result of being put into a certain "box") may have tipped me over the edge. I even chose a similar man to have a child with ( now twenty and so much more au fait with psychology). In fact it was my daughter who for a time was brought up by my sane Aunt in America who realised that the family dynamics are "fucked up". Yes, my lovely father even collaborated with my daughter's father ( who has never supported his child) in slandering me. Going so far as to tell him that I have an inheritance from my dead ( enabling) mother. ( so that baby father could "borrow" money from me which has never and will never be returned. Yes, I know I was a fool).
Your mother in law sounds as if she is pulling the "victim" role out of the hat. Good on her daughter for recognising an insincere apology. She probably knows that if she is tempted back into the fray, it will set her back years. If only other children of toxic parents knew to cut the cords on their sixteenth birthday. It saves an adulthood of pain. Every adult is still the child of somebody and to know deep in your heart that you were singled out for some shit that was not your doing or fault is a terrible realisation and to gain the strength to live functionally usually comes at the cost of blocking the transgressor out of your life. Maybe your sister in law has chosen to break the rusty chain of toxic dysfunctional behaviour.*

• I 'd be more convinced of your mother in law's regret if she never got other people involved in sending her apologies to her daughter. If she had anything about her, she would have got a phone number by now. But phoning her daughter risks her hearing what she doesn't want to hear. Not the sign of an unconditional apology. We enlightened children of toxic parents know the signs of skulduggery...........

[ChickensHaveNoEyebrows]

I think the real cruelty is in expecting people, purely because they are related to you, to put up with vile behaviour year on year, take scar after scar of cruel words and manipulative emotional blackmail, and then keep coming back for more. Good on your MIL's children that have escaped her field of influence. I hope they're happy.

[DowntonTrout]

I'll explain how it can be that your DH view could be different from his other siblings.

In my case there are 7 and 12 years between me an my elder DB /DSis.
Mum was past 40 when I was born in the 60s. I was a mistake/accident call it what you will. My mum never got over it. My DB and DSis went away to school, my dad worked away for most of the week. My mum stayed in bed "ill". I fed myself from age about 5 or 6 on powdered mashed potato and powdered chicken soup.

When the siblings/dad was home it was different but when they were away I was left to my own devices. They never saw it. It hadn't been like that for them.

Years later, when Dad retired and actually spent time with her, they ended up divorcing. He apologised to me saying he had never realised what it was like for me and just thought I was difficult. Now he knew. It was soon after that that I did cut contact because at last it was recognised that I wasn't just the bad one. Someone else had at last admitted that she was mentally abusive. DBro and DSIS continued contact because they still had never experienced any if it.

[Eyesunderarock]

How will you justify it to yourself when you eventually walk away, I wonder?

[Arcticspill]

You say she is not abusive, more a Pita. That isn't what I see from your description of her continuing behaviour which seems shocking to me. You are far kinder and more tolerant than I am of self absorbed , manipulative behaviour which I think limits life choices of those affected by it. You make no mention of any positives she brings to you. Are there any?

[Oscalito]

She just doesn't seem to want them to grow up and be adults away from her. All the problems were in her not letting go.

That's a massive burden if you are the child. You're coming into this very late, you don't know what she was like to grow up with and how she used her power... and if her problem was in not letting go and not letting them grow up I would guess she was a total nightmare.

[EllaFitzgerald]

I certainly don't think you're some kind of suffering saint.

I'm surprised that you're willing to protect your own children if it comes to it, but being really judgemental when a 16 year old child has had to walk away from the family home and your DP had to break away from his own mum before he reached his teens because the adults around them at that time weren't willing to do the same for them.

[ShadowStorm]

I think it can certainly appear cruel or selfish to cut people out of your life entirely, especially if the only side you're hearing is that of the person who's been 'cut-off' (and having your DH's perspective on your MIL's behaviour isn't the same as hearing your DBIL / DSIL's side of the story here. He may have been treated more favourably or not seen the worst of her behaviour towards them, for instance).

BUT - I think that the vast majority of people who do cut another family member out of their lives will have only done so after much thought and much effort to improve the relationship, and in the end, because they feel it's the only way they can preserve their own sanity or their own safety.

[Oscalito]

And I agree with others - people like this can be very different depending on who they are around, and extremely secretive about the worst of their behaviour. You may be getting a very edited version and not realise it.

[MayTheOddsBeEverInYourFavour]

When you cut her out it will be for noble reasons, protecting the children- couldnt be helped, but when they do it (and how do you know they aren't thinking of their children?) they are selfish and cruel

[ThinkAboutItTomorrow]

OK. She is self centered, more than selfish. And I have never seen her be cruel. She just expects the world to fall into place as she would like it to be.

I saw at least one of the apologetic letters because we suspected the same DeWe and it actually read pretty sincerely. She said (to paraphrase), 'I'm sorry if I upset you and I know that what I did was unfair. It really wasn't intended to ruin everything, I was just worried about you'.

Though I admit a lot of what she says is more along the lines of 'how could they do this to me' so maybe that is more what she really thinks.

BTW - I also feel that the menopause (which she wouldn't take any meds for as she is into natural remedies) had an impact on her relationship with DBIL as it all blew up when she was very volatile.

Anyway - thanks for the many perspectives. I still reckon a second chance wouldn't go a miss but it's not something I can actually influence so really no point raking over the coals.

[DowntonTrout]

I also developed huge problems with food. I was caught putting meat in my pockets and flushing it down the loo. No one asked why. It was just naughty.

But it was because for long periods I was eating the SMASH or something like a cucumber and nothing else. So I couldn't physically eat a full meal. I just couldn't articulate it at that age. No one could see that- therefore in their eyes it didn't happen.

[propertyNIGHTmareBEFOREXMAS]

Yabu. Plenty of people deserve estrangement. It is a very effective way of managing dysfunctional people.

[ouryve]

Why is is cruel?

No one should be obligated to be a martyr to someone's selfish and inconsistent whims. There's no medals awarded for sticking out the tantrums of a grown woman not getting her own way. No one deserves to be damaged by the unreasonable behaviour of someone else.

You don't become estranged from most of your offspring because of a bit of "teenage angst". Seriously.

It would be more cruel to your children to subject them to her stroppy behaviour just to kepe her happy (because she sounds like she wouldn't be happy and there would always be something to whine about).