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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To have binned MILs batshit gift to my DC?

135 replies

FreshJeffhasleft · 14/05/2018 11:52

If the gift was dreadful? And we're no contact and I'd like to believe the gift was a horrible joke but no- it was "sincere"

OP posts:
Tamingoftheglue · 14/05/2018 13:17

MoltenLasagne maybe it's time for a round of MN bingo?! Grin

WizardOfToss · 14/05/2018 13:18

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

SpandexTutu · 14/05/2018 13:23

The half eaten cake is a statement, "Look how we celebrated your birthday without you. Poor us."

BlueJava · 14/05/2018 13:28

OP, I'm sorry. I really think those "gifts" are beyond strange. They are the sort of thing you might get if someone was mentally ill. I'm sorry I don't have advice for you but that's almost creepy.

Juells · 14/05/2018 13:33

Perhaps you should show them to your DH? Nobody could think they were proper gifts.

Aridane · 14/05/2018 13:36

I think you should be showing them to DH to he can see quite how grim / bizarre the presents are

Original poster
FreshJeffhasleft · 14/05/2018 13:41

Aridane believe it or not they have given worse

He shrugs it off.

OP posts:
QuizzlyBear · 14/05/2018 13:43

My mother's the same way - as kids (I lived with my dad from age 11) she'd buy bizarre gifts that always had a subtext; for birthdays my brother and I would get 'I love Mallorca' (or similar) t-shirts from their recent holiday which they hadn't invited us on.

She was insistent that I become a hairdresser or beautician (despite my talents being in writing) and bought me a charity shop manicure kit (which didn't work) for Xmas and then patted herself on the back as 'starting off my career' 🤔

She sent 6 pound shop toothbrushes one year as she 'noticed in photos that dgc had yellowed teeth' (he didn't) and though we no longer receive gifts she sends me a paper-thin birthday card ever year that she must have time-travelled to the 1970s to buy. I think it's a passive aggressive way of reminding me of the high jinks we got up to when I was a child 😶

It doesn't. It makes me shudder as she's the Queen of Shit Gifts and the Empress of Can't be Arsed.

Cornishclio · 14/05/2018 13:44

Those aren't gifts. They are obviously a retaliation to you going NC with them. They are trying to make a point they have celebrated your DS birthday without him by eating half his cake and wrapped up loads of trash too. Evil people so yes just chuck it and if your DH complains tell him gifts are given with thought and love and these do not reflect that.

Userme · 14/05/2018 13:48

I have a similar MIL. Used to give DD gives that stink of smoke too. Always binned them.

Now we’re NC completely but if she’d had the gall to send DD the gifts the OP received I’d have bagged them all up (water tight sealed bag for the cake) and posted them back to her. Luckily DH would support me as he sees her for what she is.

QuizzlyBear · 14/05/2018 13:48

I must say I do agree with pps- this sounds mentally ill rather than just crap. I worked on the front line for a trade association years ago and a lady used to send in envelopes daily containing weird crap - buttons, pea shingle, words and pictures cut from magazines and - most notably - a vast collection of nail trimmings 🤮

I guess it meant something to her but looked batshit from the receiving end. I get a similar vibe from your PIL...

MadMags · 14/05/2018 13:49

He shrugs it off?

Sorry, but I couldn’t love or respect a man who allowed his children (my children) to be treated so abysmally!

Orangecake123 · 14/05/2018 13:50

I wouldn't blame you for throwing those items away.

Original poster
FreshJeffhasleft · 14/05/2018 13:53

Cornishclio- when we weren't NC the gifts were just as ummm interesting.

Agree re the cake though.

OP posts:
Flexoset · 14/05/2018 13:58

Basically what your MIL was doing was actually fly-tipping.

Original poster
FreshJeffhasleft · 14/05/2018 14:02

Oh yes we've had that a lot.
Not to mention when they went through all of our rubbish and gave us the stuff they deemed valuable and refused to let us bin it

They left- I chucked it out again

They're not mentally unwell. They are tightfisted,mean, entitled and control freaks.

MIL makes sure she has the finest jewellery, cars and clothes - she's very showy.

OP posts:
Flexoset · 14/05/2018 14:03

WTAF I just saw the photo of the cake.

I take it back. This is way worse than just fly-tipping. Those are some creepy sick individuals.

Cath2907 · 14/05/2018 14:05

My nan was brilliant for batshit gifts. I am not at all sure whether she meant them to be insulting. I know she was a bit of a shit stirrer between my Dad and his brother and a generally miserable boring old woman but I always rather enjoyed the crazy gifts. Birthday cards with wildly incorrect ages on them or the one I got for one of my teenage birthdays that was definitely meant for a baby. She once gave me a rabbits foot brooch (made out of an actual rabbits foot!) that I kept for years. Crappy plastic toys, strange old woman headscarves... They were ace.

If you can manage to see them as assuming it is SO much easier. My nan's presents were the highlight of any birthday as the whole family vied to guess what she'd buy this year. And yes they were always wrapped in Xmas paper or Easter paper of "Congrats on your new baby" paper! A half eaten cake and a rusty compass is brilliant. Well worthy of my old nan!

Original poster
FreshJeffhasleft · 14/05/2018 14:16

Excellent Cath I'll bear that in mind the next time she gifts my 4 year old daughter a bottle of Vagisil 👍🏻

OP posts:
Peterrabbitscarrots · 14/05/2018 14:17

If my DH refused to let me throw the manky cake remains in the bin, I’d be serving him up a slice after dinner for the next 2 weeks Grin And make something delicious for you and DC to eat instead

AjasLipstick · 14/05/2018 14:19

It sounds like some Morrissey lyrics

"A half eaten caaaakke and a rusty compass....."

Juells · 14/05/2018 14:19

could the rusty compass be a really valuable antique?

(just stretching)

Mmmmmmmchips · 14/05/2018 14:19

Not as bad as yours but went to ILs on weekend. As we were leaving she shoved a denim jacket in my hand saying that to give it to DS7.
The jacket was a females jacket size M Confused

TuTru · 14/05/2018 14:25

Put it all in a box in the attic. If child wonders where presents went once they are adult you can show them the box of shite xx

SchadenfreudePersonified · 14/05/2018 14:33

He knows they were delivered. He doesn't know what happened to them after they were left on the step. And neither do you.

This ^

It is heartbreaking that casual petty-thievery is on the rise in all areas - a little cild's birthday gifts - have they no shame?

Does your DH know what a load of shite the gifts were, or just that they'd left "something"?

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