Power play or AIBU?

[Makinglemonadeoutoflemons]

We've been no contact with my family for almost 2 years after they totally betrayed me, and caused lots of problems & really hurt our teenage son (now 17). It followed years of them treating DH like he was a piece of poop, they haven't ever given him the time to get to know him, they just decided they didn't like him, they treat one of our children similarly.
My siblings instigated it but my parents went along with it, although had previously gotten on with DH.
There is of course a huge story to this but not the issue right now

I've been working with a counsellor & decided to try & build a relationship of sorts with my parents, they are elderly and my children don't have any grandparents as my in-laws have died.

We met with them & counsellor/mediator start to deal with some of the issues & to put in place some rules for them to have contact, and arranged a time and date for them to come pre Christmas.

The day comes and they turn up an hour early, no excuse they walked in when the door was opened & it was obvious we weren't ready/expecting them at that time I'm disabled and time is crucial for me and my care & I wasn't ready, they weren't happy to not be allowed to walk straight into my room.
We decided not to make a big thing out of it, so just made them very welcome & didn't say anything about them turning up early.
There was no way they made a mistake as I'd repeated the time several times & it was lunchtime.

AIBU to think this was a total power play, that they were trying to show we couldn't tell them what to do, or am I just being over sensitive because of the situation?

I would say after 2 years of no contact, walking directly into your home without knocking, one hour early, was at best wildly inappropriate (do they struggle with social norms?), and at worst; absoloutle power play.

When you say "walk into my room" - do you mean they then insisted on coming into your bedroom too?

I'd have stopped at the 'my family totally betrayed me' OP- family or not, unacceptable behaviour and a deal breaker in my eyes.

There's no rules that say you have to have blood relatives in your lives- sit down with your immediates and decide together what's in everyone's best interests- forced relationships never work out well (it's already started on bad footing...)?

It does sound like something someone would do as a power play. I think you know the situation better than us

Not sure why you’re bothering with them. How does your son feel about it?

They did knock on the front door, and when it was opened despite the obvious surprise they walked straight in.
They don't particularly struggle with social norms, but aren't the most thoughtful of people- they don't particularly see others points of view.

They turned the whole thing they did 2 years ago around on me & said I was being unreasonable- definitely NOT the case! They involved extended family too, who I had been quite close with, saying i was out of order, & I got nasty messages saying things like I was killing my Mum with my behaviour so I lost everyone.

Yes they tried to walk straight into my bedroom- I'm mostly bed bound, they really weren't happy to be told they had to wait, thankfully it was my support worker who stopped them not DH, who they have decided has me imprisoned & brainwashed 😂 If you knew us you'd find that as funny (not funny) as we do!

@AlwaysCheddar my son has really mixed feelings, he is incredibly forgiving, but swings from wanting contact to never seeing them again. He doesn't trust them - with very good reason!
They absolutely worship him so it was incredibly hard for him.

They’re never going to change and you were right to go NC with them

Cut them off again. Your ds doesn’t have the gp he needs to have, you don’t have the parents you needed to have. Support your dh and get these bullies out of your lives again.

It’s shit, I know, but they’ll hurt you all over again and that’s just not acceptable

Thank you all for taking time to read/reply.
It's so hard when people you thought were one thing turn out to be totally different!
My family come first & I will do whatever it takes to protect them, I just wanted to check it wasn't me being unreasonable/overreacting.

I dont think your being unreasonable at all, in fact quite the opposite- you seemed to have gone to some lengths to try and rectify a very difficult situation, it doesn't sound like its going to work out, but good on you for trying to build bridges.

I'd go NC, but like I said, the very first part of your post would be an absolute deal breaker for me- so good on you for being the better person in this.

You’re learning to trust yourself and your instincts

That’s a big deal

You do deserve better, but there is nothing any of us can do about the parents we get. If only eh? (((Hug)))

How were they during the visit?
and how far away do they live?

They were chatty & nice while with me, and the children said they were nice to them - no inappropriate comments, & they went without having to be asked. They pushed things a bit with DS1, wanting to talk about something personal that he didn’t want to, but he shut told them & they stopped.

They live about an hour away

Maybe they were just genuinely excited to see you and expected bad traffic x

If they were accidentally early, surely they would have apologised,

I don't know. Maybe they just don't think that way.

Some people are like that and think that the agreed time is the latest you should possibly arrive but that arriving earlier isn't a problem. Weird i know but it's the way some people are