To go NC with MIL

[passthedouche]

This is a long story I'm afraid but the details are important I think. I have known my MIL since I was 13 (when DH and I were first dating), I am now 40, and we have always had a strained relationship. She is very passive-aggressive, and makes snidey underhand comments about me - everything from my looks, the way I parent, the way I run the house, how much work I do/DH does etc - that I just try to ignore. It is never outright criticism but very indirect and underhand. She also sulks with both me and DH, and we often have no clue why. She kinda gives you the silent treatment or starts blanking you. It is very weird and uncomfortable. I make a very big effort to make her feel welcome when she stays - in fact DH says I bend over backwards and am almost arse-kissy, but it doesn't help. We now live in different countries so she visits us for a week at a time about 3-4 times a year. She used to stay in our house, but I put a stop to that as it was too much pressure, so now she stays in a local B&B which is mildly better but still strained.

Things got more serious about 5 years ago, when my now 14yo DD was 9 yo. It started to become readily apparent that my DS (then 7) was the preferred child. She has other grandchildren, but she always talks about the boys more fondly. There was an incident during one of the visits at this time when she got annoyed with my DD (for not following one of her barked orders) and she 'sulked' with my DD. A time when she was alone with DD the treatment she usually reserved only for me was now being experienced by my DD - she said that granny was 'looking at her funny' (glaring), and wouldn't speak to her and would only acknowledge my DS. She kept saying to DD that she was only talking to DS because 'he does as I say', and 'he wouldn't tell tales to your mum'. I confronted her about this (the first time in my entire life) as although I had put up with years of her nonsense for my DH I was NOT going to allow her to treat DD like that. I had it out with her, she denied it all, accused DD of being a liar, me being hysterical and a liar too (as I had overheard some it), so I went NC with her for 3 years and refused to let her see the DC's as I felt she was toxic. DH was in bits about this and it broke my heart because he loves his DM and he was really hurting.

Fast forward to last year and my DD (now 13) asked to see her again and my DH was pushing for it too. We discussed it at length and she wanted to give her another chance and asked me to reconcile so I did. I swallowed my pride and said, for the kids sake, I thought it would be a good idea to start afresh. She never acknowledged any wrongdoing and we have had three visits since then and basically nothing has changed. My DD (now 14) doesn't really want any more to do with her and thinks she is awful. Same behaviour as before really. I never said anything to DD about what I think MIL thinks of me or my other children, but DD says that it is obvious that she prefers DS (13), hates me and is uninterested in my other two DD's (6 and 4). DD even asked me to promise I wouldn't let her look after our two younger DD's (which I never would). I agree it is pretty obvious that she does favour DS and he adores her. My other DD's adore her to, and at the moment they can't see that she favours DS but I am sure it is only a matter of time.

I have spoken to my DH countless times about his DM but he has never stood up for me or his DC's in this regard, and he never will. He thinks it is pointless and will get us nowhere. His view is that all MIL's and DIL's have issues and I am over-reacting and should just suck it up. He also doesn't think that her having an obvious favourite is a big deal. Am I being unreasonable because I think it IS a big deal and that I really don't want the DC's around this woman?

Passthedouche's dh - re your point 5 - there is a huge difference between someone who is 'not perfect' and someone who is capable of treating a child as badly as your mother did.

What message are you sending your daughter by refusing to stand up to her grandmother over her favouritism towards your ds - do you want her to feel that you condone this? Do you want her to learn that it is OK for someone to treat her badly?

Re. your point 4 - I have three sons, aged 17, 19 and 21, all of whom have always loved and respected their grandparents - in my opinion, teenagers usually show respect where they are receiving respect, and conversely will lack respect for those who do not respect them.

I don't think it is enough to say she is a loving grandmother 95% of the time! as if that excuses her deliberately being unkind the other 5% of the time. It would excuse human imperfection, but it think deliberate unkindness is not a human flaw, that we should forgive/understand - I think it is something we should confront, especially when it is unkindness being inflicted on a child whom it is our responsibility to protect.

PtD DH, it is that 5% that is damaging to all your kids if you don't stand up and recognise it and do something about it. Narcissists are frequently lovely people so long as everyone is doing what they want. They can be charming and wonderful, it is when they are crossed that the trouble starts. No 95% of lovely is worth your daughter learning that she should accept being treated that way.

You are not sticking up for your daughter because otherwise there will be worse trouble. Do you not see that that is really hurtful for your DD.

What you are teaching your kids is that it is ok to brush abusive behaviour under the rug (and make no mistake, she has acted in an abusive manner) just to keep the peace. Is that something you want them to learn? No relationship is worth that.

If you do not want to go NC, please please please severely limit the time you spend with her and for god sake, stand up for your child. Your duty is first to them, regardless if they are lumpy teens, not to your mother.

oh and your argument would be fair if 5% of the time she was bad tempered or if she picked her nose or smoked in the garden or forgot birthdays. If you argued that she wasn't perfect because she used bad language or fed the kids a constant diet of sugar then I could see your point. This is a whole 'nother ballgame.

Thanks so much everyone for helping DH. Unfortunately at this point he utterly refuses to accept that his mother is emotionally abusive. I don't know whether he is just not ready to hear it, or it is the way I am presenting it. I dunno. But there always seems to be an excuse when I discuss the things she has done, or a denial, or an attack on me that 'I'm not perfect either' etc.

Despite all the fab comments on here, his reaction was that people on here are in the minority, are terribly politically-correct, and don't live in the real world. Whenever we discuss it he just bats everything off and has excuse after excuse for her. I feel dismissed and exhausted by it tbh. I just don't know where to go from here. I don't want to fight about this, and I don't want to damage our marriage over this. Can anyone who has/had a DM like this give me any advice on how best to handle it with him? I want to be gentle but firm.
Thanks so much everybody.

Whether or not he accepts that she is emotionally abusive, surely he can see that she is an arch-manipulator?

Your DH is likely to be stuck in the FOG mindset, common in children of abusive parents - Fear, Obligation, Guilt. Fear of upsetting her in case she withdraws love and affection. Obligation because she's his mum and she's nice when it suits her. Guilt because she's his mum and you're supposed to love your mum and make them happy, not upset them and go non-contact.

He's probably built several layers of wall between him and the child he was, so that he can't/won't recognise the damage of which she is capable; and he's got no intention of knocking those walls down because then he'll have to confront the real person who is his mother, not his constructed one.

Your DD is going to get the blame for her failure to accept her grandmother's behaviour - this is grossly unfair. Your younger DDs are too young to be useful in terms of peer support, as you say, they haven't yet worked out what she is like. Your DS has the biggest opportunity to show support for your DD1 and say whether or not he thinks Grandma is being fair, and maybe your DH might be more prepared to listen to him (as I've little doubt that it's deeply ingrained in his psyche that "boys are more important", whether or not he recognises that in his conscious mind)

What would I do - well you can't stop your DH from seeing his mother. You can't stop your DC from seeing her with him if he chooses to take them, as she hasn't done anything that constitutes a safeguarding issue and she's not there all the time. But you can say that they don't have to go and see her if they don't want to, and you can also refuse to see her yourself, or have her cross your threshold, ever again.

DH's brother is a drunken arse, I won't have him in our house. He's been in the yard occasionally, but I won't let the boys go out there when he's here. DH thinks I'm over-reacting some, but the man has a hair-trigger temper and has both physically attacked DH and damaged our property, while DS1 was within view and only a toddler. He has no control switch and I'm not prepared to risk their safety to pander to some ridiculous notion of Faaamly - MIL thought I was the one who was "breaking up her family" but no, it's not me, it's him. When he cleans up his act and gets control of himself, then I might think again - but I think she's given up on him as well as she has an AVO (restraining order) out on him herself, and he's not allowed at her house without her express invitation.

There are books about toxic parents - I'm sure someone will give a recommendation - your DH should try reading them to see what the longterm damage could amount to.

If he won't listen to us or you would he perhaps consider listening to a third party that doesn't have a horse in the race and talking to a counsellor. Go and see someone with the intent to find a solution to this. Tell him that you want to figure this out and find a way to make this work.

Can somebody link me to the stately homes thread. I can't seem to find it. Thanks.

Here you are passthe - this is the latest one www.mumsnet.com/Talk/relationships/2216998-But-we-took-you-to-stately-homes-Survivors-of-Dysfunctional-Families

Oh dear the mountain out of the mole hill is getting bigger by the moment...stately homes thread?? Really? Please look at OPs first post, this is not abuse. You can't convince your husband that it would be a good idea to dump his mother for the rest of his life and for all future generations because a few people on a website suggested it. How about family intervention or even family therapy? The more I hear the more it sounds like you have an agenda of your own, or at least some unresolved power issues. Your husband is being very patient, If I were him I would start seeing this campaign to remove my mother as a red flag.

really? What about this does not sound like narcissistic behaviour?

*Refuses to accept blame
*if challenged calls anyone who disagrees a liar
*golden child/scapegoat
*not willing to modify behaviour or work to find compromise
*manipulative and cruel (the man who is defending her says this) along with untrustworthy
*punishing family members if problems are voiced
*very conditional love
*extremely neglectful of a child that challenged her
*her children were raised to believe that it is normal to withhold affection for days or years at a time

Saltandpepa what planet are you on. This woman is a spiteful and nasty toxic woman who has caused issues with his brothers. So you think it's ok to chuck a child into the street and refuse to have them back, and make it out to be their fault! You would be done for neglect. She us still causing issues, now it's being passed to the grandchildren.Op has bent over backwards to please her, quite rightly has had enough. She can see the damage it has done to her DH and his brother. Whilst she has no right to stop him from seeing his mum, she has every right not to see her, not to invite her into the home and to protect her chikdren from her behaviour!

Salt please read self confessed post above for clarification.

Saltnpepa - are you suggesting it is the act of a loving, caring, good mother to throw her 13-year-old son out and cut him out of her life for years because he wanted to go out with a girl? And to still blames him^ for the whole thing??

And you would trust such a person with the emotional wellbeing of your children? When she has already demonstrated she has a favourite and a scapegoat. Please - if you can - explain why that is good for the children concerned.

So let me get this right op dh.

You are more than willing to upset your wife and oldest dd, but not even at least talk to your mother? Do you realise how fucked up that is.

If you grew a pair, there might be time to salvage a relationship for all involved, but by continually sticking your head in the sand you are allowing g your mother to carry on. Grow up and start showing your children how decent people behave 100% of the time. This isn't someone making a mistake or not being perfect.

I loved my gm when I was a child, adored her. I no longer see her. It was fine for her to favour my cousins over me as a child, I just wanted to please her, as soon as she started that shit with my children, I wasn't having it. No huge dramas, no big announcement of going nc, I still send Christmas cards, but I am not having my dd's thinking they've done something wrong and feeling inferior.

Good luck op, you can still have nothing to do with her or you can call her out on her behaviour every time it happens, if she sulks, her problem

PTD,
Your MIL will not change. She doesn't have to.
She is simply an awful woman and your dh doesn't want to accept this.
It's so sad

Exactly spade, your dc have done nothing wrong, yet she is playing games and making them feel like they have, and questioning themselves and their behaviour, even the little boy at 7. That is so fucked up, op has every right to. If they have done so thing wrong, tell them off straight away and it be done, but playing emotional mind games with children is not on. You can see the damage this has done to DH and his DH that they are still scared like children of her and upsetting her. Op don't let that be your kids.

My gm was like this. She hated girls/women, but loved boys. So my brothers would get to go and stay with her in her lovely flat overlooking the harbour on the south coast, and I stayed at home. My brothers got fabulous Xmas presents from her and I got a pair of tights etc etc etc.

HOWEVER, my parents - mum particularly - did their best to ensure that I got other things instead. So in the summer holidays when my brothers were away, I would get taken to art galleries, theatre, all sorts of things that I wanted to do and got individual attention too. My grandmother (the other one!) would take me to the opera, and out to dinner. Tower of London, PO Tower, all sorts of places. What made the most difference though was the individual attention, instead of having to share it with my brothers.

When it came to Xmas and the boys got so much more than I, they would share, they would redivide presents so I got some, they would always let me play with their things from her and behave as if the things belonged to all of us.

Can you do that? Can you get your children to do that?

Glad your family dealt with it in that way, Jux. Did you bother to see your GM at all after you were old enough to make the decision yourself?

And of course passthedouche's dh has to dismiss us all as unrepresentative, overly politically correct, not living in the real world - because if he had the cojones to accept that even part of what we are saying is right, he would have to strap on said cojones and deal with his mother, and he is either incapable (through fear/obligation/guilt) or unwilling to do so.

Mrpassthedouche - if you are reading this, please answer one question - to yourself, if you can't be honest here:

When your daughters ask you - and she will - "Why does Grandma not like us? Why does she treat our brother so much better than us?" and "WHY DO YOU LET HER BE SO MEAN TO US, DADDY??" - how are you going to answer them?

How awful Jux, even though your parents and other GM treated you really well, and gave your a fantastic time, they should have raised the issue with her, and if necessary, no to boys holidays with grandma, unless you treat all the same. Is she still alive? If she is how is your relationship if there is one with her?

My DM has 4 DGC, 16, 7, 6 and 4. Not once have I ever picked up favouritism with the them. If I did my DD wouldnt spend much time with her.

Op she's really fucked up your DH hasent she! Well you can protect your children, you cannot rely on him to.

My paternal grandmother had favourites, but that was because our cousins lived just down the road and saw her weekly, whereas we lived 4 hours away and saw them once or at most twice a year. I did notice that she preferred my female cousin to me; but it wasn't that big a deal, she was never mean to any of us. And I got on better with Grandpa anyway, so it balanced out.

The trouble is even if the parents carefully compensate for the less wanted and favoured child, the children are still internalising all this. Either there is going to be superiority and guilt - I am better than you, it is normal to play games with people I love and expect to be enabled in this, I feel great/bad about this - or the children just accept the values they are given, with your daughter growing up knowing that she wasn't as valuable or wanted and you were ok with that. Some children in these relationships settle for being the underdog and live that role. Other children may decide that at all costs they are going to be the top dog one who wins, and squash everyone else around them to ensure it, because they're too afraid of the underdog rejected role. (Meet my sister, a star emotional abuser in her own right in her teens using the training she'd been given.)

Genius has this right - the children who get used in these games won't just forget about this, the hope that kids will just not realise or get over or they get more out of it in the end than they lose (low level abuse is worth the price of the relationship) is adults trying to make themselves feel better. In my 40s I still struggle with distress and anger at the memory that my DM - now 15 years divorced after he left her and a lovely lady, a good person- sat by many times and watched me be emotionally abused and physically threatened, and did nothing to protect me or imply by word, look or deed that it was anything but fine with her because her priority was her relationship. She wouldn't look when it was happening. She averted her eyes, I remember it so clearly. And afterwards we had to pretend it hadn't happened. No feelings about it could be shown or acknowledged, we had to 'love the person as he is'. And some of the time he was lovely. At the time I believed I deserved what was done to me, I had less rights than other people, I wasn't allowed boundaries or to defend myself because no adult ever modelled that no, it was not ok to treat me like that. I was therefore a very well behaved victim for bullies as a teenager and as an adult to bullying managers, plus a very co operative partner for abusive relationships as an adult. It's taken going on 30 years of adulthood to throw some of this off. My sister, with a self harming history and a lot of anti depressants, managed to shake off her EA training and has done the same.

I'm not shouting go NC, cut her out of your lives, I get it's very, very complicated and how hard it is when someone you love and need can be abusive. I have no agenda, I don't 'want' you to do anything, Spade or Spade's DH, just sharing perspective. To my mother at the time, preservation of a relationship she wanted so much seemed worth the price to her children. I think she probably still feels that at heart. She denies that things were ever 'that bad'.

Your DH can go on Lights House and do the test to see whether his mother's reactions were dysfunctional or not. The results are dependent on his responses so it's an analysis of what he feels happened.

It's a massive thing to face up to emotional abuse so he may not be ready to do this just yet. Just support him when he is ready. In the meantime, protect your DCs.