AIBU to think that repeatedly turning up over an hour late is disrespectful

[P1nkSparkles]

Particularly when the reason you are visiting is to see a baby and you know that your going to fuck up their bedtime routine??

Usually we don't see PIL on a weeknight for precisely this reason (they are always late) but MIL asked to come round at 5pm for 10 mins as she is away this weekend. She then turned up at 6:15pm, stayed for 45 mins and seemed upset when DH told her that the reason our 5m/o daughter was overtired and grizzling and the dog was going apeshit about not being walked or fed was because her being late had completely messed up our already adjusted evening... She then proceeded to say she got chatting to people at work and acted hurt when we didn't reassure her that this made everything ok....

We make sure we see them every weekend - and normally have to work round their busy social lives (and still they're normally at least an hour late) it's driving me insane and my husband feels very conflicted as he wants to defend them but finds their behaviour frustrating.

I really want to be understanding - but I've just spent an hour and a half soothing a screaming overtired mess of a child to sleep for no reason and am dog tired and not feeling very charitable right now.

Please tell me this drives other people insane too!! And does anyone have any strategies for dealing with this that don't cause drama/make me come across as a completely controlling bitch??

[llangennith]

It certainly isn't passive aggressive to continue with your baby's routine when PIL are at yours. If they don't understand (or remember) the need for a routine then it's high time they were reminded of it.
I'm a Grandma and when I visit my DC I step back when they're doing the bedtime routine.
Stand your ground and take your DD upstairs and away from PIL when you need to begin winding down time before bedtime. Say, "Night night Grandma" etc on behalf of your DD and bugger off upstairs.

[GabsAlot]

yanbu

just carry on as u were she'll soon realise the world doesnt revolve around her

my dsis does this and although i dont have dc it really winds me up-its everytime and she just says does it matter -yes coz im not sitting here waiting like an idiot

[Strygil]

Unpunctuality is the height of bad manners, and it drives me crazy. Admittedly this is partly because I was married for twenty odd years to a woman who had been brought up to believe that the world revolved around her, and whose habitual lateness led me, on two occasions, seriously to consider belting her [I didn't].

So in this case you need to make it clear to your PIL that 5 pm means 5 pm, and that your hard-won routine with your children will not be disrupted because their grandparents have no manners. Self centred people like this need a hard lesson, and if you don't teach it to them now, you are volunteering for a lifetime of this kind of rudeness.