To be angry that someone came to my birth when I didn't want them to?

[Seline]

Had an emergency cesarean under very traumatic circumstances during which I nearly died and so did my twins. The whole night was horrendous. When I woke up from my cesarean, my mother in law was there. I felt hurt and confused and didn't know what was going on.

She didn't stay long but she also had my brother and sister in law (adults not children or teens) in the waiting room. As soon as DH had text her to say "She's been rushed to theatre" she just decided to turn up with them.

Four months later I'm still angry about this. Am I being unfair?

I also just don't approve of how she is with kids in general. It's up to me to decide if I think someone is a bad influence.

Yet in your other threads you say that mil is not a problem and you get on with her????

All very strange

It's up to me to decide if I think someone is a bad influence.
You and your OH

Is this still going...?

Your DC are not a possession that you can guard jealously. You are their family, along with their grandparents and siblings, aunties and uncles. Part of your job is to let them develop independent relationships, starting with other family members. It sounds as though you don't want them to have a relationship with anyone other than your own Mum, which is very unreasonable.

You obviously feel very close to your own mum, but want her to be close to your children, but you don't seem to want your DH's mum to experience the same type of relationship with them. This is storing up huge issues for the future and is bound to result in family rows and resentment. You give the impression that you see your ILs as second class citizens, which could end up destroying your relationship with your DH.

You know, it’s actually hard work to hold grudges, to be angry, to be in battle needlessly.
There’s more strength in compassion, kindness, friendliness and peace. You can still keep your boundaries and you’ll find life happier.

As an aside, I went through a very similar experience to you - emergency c section under GA, blood transfusions, drs thought baby and I could die and prepared dh for he worst. I came round in the high dependency unit with dh sitting there shaken and emotional.
He’d left dc1 with his parents but he had tears in his eyes as he told me how he looked at dc1’s little face when he left him and thought he could grow up without a mother.
My method to cope with all that was to never ask details of what I went through, I didn’t read my notes at all.
I’m just so thankful I’m still here with my beautiful kids. I want them to be happy and have people around that love them and that includes dh’s family, even though I’ve had my own issues with my mil.
We all deal with things in our own way and I hope you find your peace with it all too.

In the kindest possible way you take yourself FAR too seriously.

Perhaps I do. I do take things very seriously maybe more seriously than necessary. I'm afraid that if I let go of the reigns I set a precedent for someone else to take them and that if that person is incapable then I can't easily wrangle them back.

I don't like the way she brings kids up. From speaking to DH they barely left the town they grew up in as kids and she expected us to live there too!

I see things have moved on a little. However I would reiterate that a debrief with a specialist midwife might be helpful and as part of that you could query how your mil was permitted to visit before you had an opportunity to give permission. Tbh your feelings over this are so inevitably part of the whole traumatic experience, when your control was lost and the arrival of your twins so frightening, that it would take anyone time to process, especially given your history. It so happened mil was there, but maybe your feelings would still be similar had it been dm or dh , or you felt abandoned if had noone been there.

My method to cope with all that was to never ask details of what I went through, I didn’t read my notes at all.

I've done the opposite. I've read it all several times, and had friends who are doctors give me their analysis of the reading and tests. I've researched every eventuality and need to know exactly what happened and when. I can't stand the thought of not knowing.

So what if they barely left there home town when they were growing up. I didn't go overseas until I was in my 30s and I am a graduate in a high level professional role. It's hardly neglect. She seems to have done a good job bringing up your DH and his siblings so that they have a close, caring relationship, because you probably wouldn't have bothered marrying him if he wasn't a nice person. If you refuse counselling, stop brooding and get on with enjoying yourself.

LIZ that's interesting. I wonder if whoever I saw first I would've felt upset with. I don't think I would, I think if I'd seen my mum first I'd have been fine but I'll never know really.

I don't like the way she brings kids up. From speaking to DH they barely left the town they grew up in as kids and she expected us to live there too!

Yet you live very close to your own mum, if I'm remembering another thread correctly? Some huge double standards going on here.

It is clearly your way or the highway.

She never took them to museums, castles, places of interest. Just to friends and families houses. They don't read or have hobbies outside of watching t.v. and throwing parties. I want my DC to have a better experience.

I don't mind her seeing them but on my terms.

Sometimes, you don’t need to dwell and overanalyse the past. What is done is done.
We can look forwards though.

How do you want things to be going forwards?

Yet you live very close to your own mum, if I'm remembering another thread correctly?

I do but it wasn't expected of me and secondly I travel and have travelled extensively within and out of the UK. Never leaving a town is a waste. So much knowledge out there!

How do you want things to be going forwards?

I want to go back to feeling like I did before. DH DS1 and I were a happy little family. I want that back instead of constantly feeling attacked by this woman.

He's a grown man, he can make his own choices.

And yet despite this childhood of "neglect" where he didn't read, go to castles or travel, you still deemed him worthy of you, despite him being so uncultured and uninteresting

I would honestly love to stop brooding and get on with it. But as I said she's a dark cloud looming over me.

She never took them to museums, castles, places of interest. Just to friends and families houses. They don't read or have hobbies outside of watching t.v. and throwing parties. I want my DC to have a better experience.

My grandparents smoked like chimneys, ate spam sandwiches and their main source of entertainment was coronation street !
Didn't make them bad people

Erm I said she is like that. Not him. DH is fantastic.

Youve mentioned they're a different culture to you OP, I wonder if you consider them to be a lower class too.

I don't really consider class tbh when choosing a partner.

Do you think she's going to stand in front of your car screaming "No, no, don't take them to an art gallery..." ?

I’m calling bullshit after 900 odd posts. This is just some headcase who needs someone to talk to. Literally hasn’t left this thread in 9 hours....with two 4 month twins

Yeah right

She's a dark cloud your sitting under by choice. And how can DH possibly be so fantastic when she did such a bad job or raising him and isn't fit to be near your children?

935 replies ALL telling the OP she is being unreasonable?

RTFT. This is simply not the case, unless you're only seeing what you want to see.

GnomeDePlume, you make good points about just how myopic some people can be, and how anything different from their approaches, tastes or views is often taken as a personal affront. I have in-laws who are very much like this. Whereas my attitude is very much 'vive la difference', theirs is 'different equals bad'. There isn't much room for either manoeuvre or negotiation with such people.

To some people, what OP's MiL did really isn't that big a deal (it would have been to me; thankfully I have a DH who closed that crap down double-quick before it became an issue). It might seem a lot of anger to hold onto over a seemingly trivial issue in comparison with the magnitude of the birth trauma. But what seems to be the case here - perhaps OP can clarify - is that this one act has caused a moment of clarity which has shown in glorious technicolour exactly what her MiL truly is. It's a case of once her eyes have been opened to this, she can't unsee it, or go back to the relationship they might have had before. And it's amazing the number of women who recount to the same old refrain: 'MiL was never a problem ... UNTIL we had children'.

And that's OK. Being angry is OK. As a response to this kind of situation, it isn't at all 'unhealthy'. Best to let it out of your system rather than let it fester. I've never understood why anger is such a social taboo - something to be hidden away and swallowed - if it happens to be expressed by females.

There is an old saying that when people show you who they really are, believe them.