Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Flip

1 2 3 4 5

Original poster

AIBU to be really upset about MIL's behaviour

115 replies

3m4G33 · 30/04/2019 22:11

A former colleague of mine and acquaintance of my parents in law has sadly passed away. PIL said they wouldn't attend funeral as they don't feel the need to attend as the deceased is someone they saw periodically. I don't agree but that's their choice. They offered to have my children after school as the funeral is not local but I offered to get babysitter so they could attend. MIL has told me she has told deceased's children that she and FIL cannot attend because I've asked them to babysit so that I can go. I asked her again if they want a babysitter and she's advised she's no intention of attending. I am appalled that she couldn't just say they were unable to go and leave it at that. Instead they've created an agenda that their hand has almost been forced so that I can attend. I've been married for a long time and am used to her behaviour aimed at making her look better than she is, but this is a funeral for goodness sake. I am so upset. The deceased was a former colleague who was lovely and I'm upset about his death. I just don't understand how she can behave so badly. DH and I periodically tackle bad behaviour and have no expectation she will change. She has been a difficult woman for the 18 years I've known DH but I feel this is a new low and I've been in tears about it.

OP posts:

HoofWankingSpangleCunt · 01/05/2019 15:52

There are so many people missing the point here that it's actually very depressing.
Op is not trying to force her PILs to attend. Whichever poster (s) claimed that to be so are simply making shit up now.
Sally cinnamon, your post makes you sound a bit deranged. Saying stuff like how dare you is peculiarly aggressive, given that you presumably don't have a clue about the family's history and dynamics. Unless you're the MIL in which case you've just helped the Op make her point.
Op, I hope you feel a bit better today. Try not to give your in-laws too much head space, if you can.

IvanaPee · 01/05/2019 17:26

I’m well aware that the OP isn’t forcing her PIL to go to the funeral.

I still think her reaction is OTT and really oddly self-involved.

As if this man’s loved ones are going to give a shit that an ex-colleague got her in-laws to babysit.

SilverySurfer · 01/05/2019 19:08

YABU and OTT. The funeral is about their loved one, not whether your MiL babysits or not and the mourners won't give a fuck. Lots of people tell little white lies to smooth social interactions and your MiL doing this doesn't impact on you at all.

LotsToThinkOf · 02/05/2019 07:19

YANBU, I’d be annoyed because it looks like you’ve stopped her from going. I don’t know why people can’t see this. She doesn’t have to go, the OP doesn’t care if MIl goes or not but it’s the fact that the family now think that MIL isn’t there because she’s babysitting for OP who will be there. It isn’t fair and it makes the OP look selfish. MIL should have given a different reason.

RaffertyFair · 02/05/2019 08:26

I’d be annoyed because it looks like you’ve stopped her from going. I don’t know why people can’t see this.

It isn’t fair and it makes the OP look selfish.

It's not that I can't see what you and OP are saying, LotsToThinkOf, it's that I disagree that that is the interpretation the bereaved familiy will make. It's a different opinion not inability to understand.

MIL is an aquaintance of the deceased. I wouldn't be upset or offended if an aquaintance of my parents didn't attend their funeral even if they'd been aquainted for 20 years. So, if this aquaintance said that she had been asked by her dil, a former colleague of my parent to babysit so dil could attend, I would not think the dil was being selfish and I would not be offended.

And, as I said way up thread, its perfectly possible that MIL spoke to the family to offer her condolences, so has already paid her respects. Attending the funeral is not the only way.

IWentAwayIStayedAway · 02/05/2019 08:47

I get where you are coming from and personally i wouldnt use mil for any childcare. Is it to late to sort out other plans

NewMum19344567 · 02/05/2019 08:51

Get someone else to babysit and bring it up! 'have to go as so and so is babysitting'. I am not sure what other people are reading but it does put you in a bad light! If someone told me they couldn't attend a funeral for my family as they were forced to babysit I wouldnt be impressed!

RaffertyFair · 02/05/2019 09:10

I am not sure what other people are reading but it does put you in a bad light!

I for one, have just explained how I see the situation differently. Why is that hard to understand?

RaffertyFair · 02/05/2019 09:15

And I'm really taken aback at people suggesting OP making a point about it at the funeral! I can't imagine putting my feelings above those of the bereaved family.

IrmaFayLear · 02/05/2019 09:18

It is fil's funeral next week.

Whether an acquaintance or former work colleague attends or doesn't is of no consequence. And I'm positive that no one will be dissecting people's reasons/excuses.

MRex · 02/05/2019 09:24

it looks like you’ve stopped her from going
No it doesn't, why do people keep winding up the OP when there's no reason to believe the family would be so odd as to think that? They will have heard "sorry for your loss + politely can't come" and eight have thought any more about it.

I'll ask the next few "tell them the PIL aren't babysitting" the same question as earlier. What do you hope this would achieve? Why do you want a grieving family to be hurt or confused by this information? Would you like someone at your parent's funeral to say "X said they couldn't come BUT THEY LIED, subtext that they didn't care about your dad even though they told you they did"? Why do you think it's necessary to drag grieving people into OP's disputes with her PIL?

Armadillostoes · 02/05/2019 09:50

YAMBU OP. I am shocked at how many people have missed the point and obviously didn't bother to read your post properly. It wasn't even a long one! The point isn't them not attending the funeral, the OP said that is there choice. The issue is her MIL using the OP as her excuse and pretending that she would have gone but for the OP's request. Not that hard to grasp surely?

Summersunsareglowing · 02/05/2019 10:03

I am sorry for your loss OP. I totally agree with what you are saying. Another poster referred to your MIL's polite social lie in her having used you as an excuse not to go. WTF?

She didn't need to lie. She didn't have to say she couldn't be arsed as she hadn't been in contact in ages but she could have just said she wouldn't be going.

I'm shocked at the number of posters who don't find your MIL's behaviour unacceptable. Standards in society have definitely fallen.

I would be appalled to be used by MIL in this way. You feel she has put you in a bad light and I agree. She has made it look like she/they cannot attend precisely because she is looking after your DC so that you can go. Oh what a martyr.

She should have had the decency to just say that she was unable to attend. The deceased's relatives aren't going to interrogate people for reasons why they can't come.

As for PPers asking you why you were in tears/upset or so invested in it, they clearly lack empathy and compassion. Your behaviour strikes me as far more normal than a number of opinions on here.

BlueJag · 02/05/2019 10:15

I don't know how old you are but I've noticed every year I go to more funerals. It becomes quite obvious as we get older that one day it's going to be us.
Just understand that they don't want to go and felt they needed a good reason.

ChipSandwich · 02/05/2019 12:14

I don't know how old you are but I've noticed every year I go to more funerals

Ditto. Both my parents, my brother, ex-fil, ex-mil, current fil, two next door neighbours, grandmother-in-law, a friend I made through children's school, same age as me. There are some others it would have been reasonable for me to go to, but seriously, there comes a time when a certain level of closeness has to be reached before one feels the need to attend. I do pay my respects in whatever way I can. A card or donation. If I'd been to the funeral of 'every' acquaintance or ex-colleague who has passed away, it would become draining.
I'm not talking about very old people here either. I'm early sixties, and I expect as I get older the number will increase.

So I don't think OPs mil has done anything terrible. Nobody knows what she actually said to the family, as none of us were there. It might have been as simple as saying she was babysitting. The bereaved family won't think anything about it I've been in their shoes enough times and can assure OP that they have more on their mind than who might have been there but didn't bother. They won't think in those terms at all. Please don't use them in petty squabbles with your mil. ( i.e the ridiculous suggestions that you drop into conversation that your mil isn't babysitting and could have come. That will make you sound either mad or bad) There will likely come a time when you reach this 'new low' yourself OP.

Flip

1 2 3 4 5

Swipe left for the next trending thread