Not heard from SiL or BiL despite our DS being in ICU

[Sausages83]

We gave birth to our beautiful DS early last week and he went straight into ICU due to a difficult birth and needing constant monitoring. We haven't left his side- it's been a stressful, amazing ride so far full of happiness and worry. We left ICU last night and spend our first night home as a family- blissful. We haven't heard once from my DH's brother, or his wife, since the day I gave birth (received a congratulations message) . We have a family WhatsApp group (which includes DH's mother) where we have updated regularly with pictures and bits of info, including the amazing news we were finally discharged last night. Nothing from them. They are much younger than us, and two children of their own, once is only a few months old. So they're busy and I understand that. But I have been a constant support and source of love (for my SiL in particular, especially when the second was born), I checked in regularly, showed her how much I cared, always asked how she and her new arrival was. Every single update and picture they sent to the family WhatsApp, I acknowledged and responded to. So to hear nothing from them is hurtful and actually really p*sses me off. I messaged SiL this morning, a slightly curt message- 'hey, what's up? Me and DH not heard from you or BiL since day of birth- why?' AIBU to expect apology and explanation, and also AIBU to feel let down?

[NickMyLipple]

How much younger are they? I am in my 30's and I spoke to someone in their early 20's the other day who told me that WhatsApp was for old people' - I was mildly offended but mostly it made sense why they never bloody replied! Have they turned notifications off? I'm in several groups where I don't see the constant messages and then when I do look there are over 100 messages I have missed. I don't always catch up, and that might annoy some.

Additionally as others have said, it's just one more message for you to reply to, and they could just be being thoughtful. I was so pissed off with the constant messages when I gave birth that it's made me decide I want to do it in secret next time! Could SIL have had a similar experience with her babies?

[Sally872]

@gaspinggeko I can understand the need for space for some people, but can you understand texting updated and getting no response? Not really the same thing.

That said op, the best thing to do is try and move on and focus on your baby. Hopefully they apologise but even if they don't try not to give it any more headspace (not easy I know)

[gracepoolesrum]

I felt that having my baby in ICU was a time when I found out who my real friends were. Some were amazing and rallied round, others I didn't hear for a month, whether that was because they didn't care enough or they were too emotionally immature to deal with it. Some of the latter group are still in my life but I know where I stand and what I can expect from them in future.

All of you saying you wouldn't want to bother the op - I can only speak for myself but I was desperate for support when my baby was in ICU and would consider someone who didn't offer that to be not worth much to me I'm afraid.

[Mydogisthebestest]

@gracepoolesrum

I felt that having my baby in ICU was a time when I found out who my real friends were. Some were amazing and rallied round, others I didn't hear for a month, whether that was because they didn't care enough or they were too emotionally immature to deal with it. Some of the latter group are still in my life but I know where I stand and what I can expect from them in future.

All of you saying you wouldn't want to bother the op - I can only speak for myself but I was desperate for support when my baby was in ICU and would consider someone who didn't offer that to be not worth much to me I'm afraid.

This is a SIL, not a friend of the op though.

Why is the op messaging her and expecting her to be the one asking and supporting, and not letting her husband and his brother be the ones to navigate that relationship?


My SILs are my brothers’ wives, they’re not my friends. Even more so my partner’s brother’s wife. It would be outwith the bounds of our relationship for them to expect me to support them. I’d leave that to DP and his brother to navigate between them.

[Ignoble]

Sorry for your loss, and I agree @GaspingGekko. I want space in those kinds of situations, and have had to explain this more than once to my (lovely) SIL, who just has a different style of relating to people (as do DH’s family as a whole) and has tended to pepper me with messages and calls. She means well, but it simply doesn’t work for me, and I’ve ended up getting impatient and having to be very clear — she seemed unable to get her head around the fact that what she felt was ‘the right thing to do’ was making me feel harassed.

[MalificentJones]

Has your husband been in contact with his brother during all of this?

[MushyPeasAreTheDevilsFood]

Youve not heard from your brother in law and his wife in a week and have resorted to a rude message? This isnt a normal reaction.

[MushyPeasAreTheDevilsFood]

@MalificentJones

Has your husband been in contact with his brother during all of this?

All this time?! Give over. It’s a bloody week. Ive gone linger without having a conversation with my dh, and we live together.

[ThreeSixNineGooseDrankWine]

I think you'd be unreasonable to expect an apology..... what do they need to apologise for?

If you have previously got on and they have sent a congratulations message maybe they just didn't want to bother you while you had all that going on?

Has DP messaged his brother? Or is all the focus just on SIL who also has a small baby and another child in the middle of a pandemic?

And she's probably knakkered! I keep meaning to ring my dad, I havnt in over a week. I've got two small children and by the time 7pm comes i am absolutely knakkered and cant face speaking to someone else

[Flamingolingo]

I find in-laws relationships tense and difficult to navigate at the best of times. Is she your friend or your sil? Do you have a relationship beyond you both being married to brothers?

I agree that it seems like they’ve decided to step back a bit, maybe that’s what they wanted when their babies came along, time and space? I do think it’s a bit off for them not to have at least liked a couple of images or sent some kind of one liner that they were glad you were home, but perhaps you caught them at a bad time? Sometimes by the time I’ve got through my day and settled down to my phone it’s late in the day and I’d be unsure about disturbing people, especially people who are tired and need rest.

All the above said, I have a strange relationship with my SILs. One I thought we got on well and she was the kind of person I would be friends with, but unfortunately I really offended her a few months ago with some insensitively worded unsolicited advice. It came from a good place but caused a lot of damage (potentially more so because I think she’s vulnerable, not keen on her DH and the whole family think he’s a bit controlling, and the fact that it was all blown way out of proportion might be to do with him). Anyway, on reflection I realised that we aren’t really friends, that it’s all been quite one-sided with me putting the effort in. Maybe I’m just not her cup of tea, maybe she’s done an excellent effort of making me feel welcome even if she doesn’t like me. Idk. Latterly I’m favouring the other SIL, who is cold and aloof but I know where I stand.

[ittakes2]

I am sorry your baby has been poorly but glad to see they seem to be better. One of my twins also went to special baby unit when born.
You paint a picture that you as a person likes to communicate a lot - your comments after each of their photos, your posting of photos now. I am sorry while it’s ok for you to do this - not everyone looks at WhatsApp in the way you do. When someone posts a lot it almost becomes a one way communication thing like you are reading the news...if someone is keeping me up to date on how a sick baby is...it may not cross my mind to ask them how the baby is since they have been updating me regardly on how the baby is with lots of posts. You are telling them regardly how the baby is - maybe they then don’t think they need to ask.
Having a sick baby is an emotional time. Please give your family the benefit of the doubt. It sounds like your babies will be close in age cousins - how lovely for them. Please don’t let this issue cause a family rift.

[MalificentJones]

‘All of this’ I said. Not ‘all this time’.

Quite a lot has happened during the week. I might not speak to a sibling for a week but I would if my wife had given birth and I had a baby in Intensive Care.,

[GaspingGekko]

@Sally872 That's not quite the point I was trying to make. I do understand why the OP may feel upset at having no response from the updates.
My point was rather that we tend to treat others how we prefer to be treated. I would prefer to be left alone and not get responses to my updates, therefore I wouldn't reply to updates if I was the SIL / BIL either.
The OP seems to think that this comes from a place of not caring and is therefore upset. It is totally possible that this comes from a place of caring a lot.

[Jilljams]

When my twins were in icu I didn’t really hear from any friends or wiser family. I think it was because people didn’t want to hassle us or want me to feel that I had to answer them. Also, if you’ve never been through something like this I think it’s hard to understand how scary it is. Concentrate on your new baby, you don’t need messages from them to make you feel better.

[Candyfloss99]

YABU. If you are constantly updating the family WhatsApp why would they need to ask you personally?

[IsItGinOclock1]

Why have you messaged the sil and not the bil? It’s the bil that is actually related to your husband not his wife. I would expect my husband to contact his brother, I wouldn’t be contacting the wife separately. The chances are they just have nothing to add or they don’t want to bother you?

If I wasn’t very close to the person I wouldn’t be messaging beyond initial “congratulations hope you are ok?”. Two of my best friends had babies very poorly in nicu and I messaged loads, but I’m close with them and would chat to them everyday anyway, so I was messaging to chat as much as to ask how the baby was.

[Evelefteden]

My SILs are my brothers’ wives, they’re not my friends. Even more so my partner’s brother’s wife. It would be outwith the bounds of our relationship for them to expect me to support them. I’d leave that to DP and his brother to navigate between them

Well that might be your situation. Many people can have relationship beyond the confines of allotted roles. I’m close to my sil.

OP in times of stress/crisis you see who your real friends/support are. I are with grace that they either didn’t give a shit or they were emotionally immature. I think it’s they don’t give a shit to be honest.

Don’t let it spoil the enjoyment of your new baby

[blardiblabla]

Many of the PP on here could be right, they may feel like you have other things to focus on and felt like not bombarding you was the right thing.

However, as someone who has also had a child in hospital/PICU as a very young baby, the absence of support from close family can be very difficult to deal with, so I really do understand why you are upset, OP. We never asked the question like you had and to be honest, I really wish we had. It's never an easy message to word so I think you've done a brave thing by being direct and asking, hopefully the answer is one which makes sense and you can all move on now baby is home.

[Iloveyoutothefridgeandback]

When I was a little girl my dad ended up in intensive care. I remember the house phone ringing almost none stop. Very well meaning, lovely family and friends all wanted to know what was happening, could they do anything to help, were we ok, were there any updates.

My poor mother couldn't cope. The situation was bad enough but all of that fuss and pestering, no matter how well meaning, made it so much worse for my mum. Eventually she started giving info to only one person, asking them to relay the info to others, and then unplugged the phone.

That made a big impression on me. Now when disaster strikes someone I know, I think twice before rushing in to make contact. It's not because I don't care, it's just because I don't want to add to their stress.

[GaspingGekko]

Thanks @Ignoble
It can be really hard to communicate the wish to be left alone I find. Kinda glad to hear I'm not alone in this. DH kept apologising to me and telling them to stop but they kept on. To be fair I do love them for it it's just not what I wanted at that time.

I wonder if this is a bit like extroverts not at all understanding that introverts need alone time. It sort of feels like the communication equivalent of that.

[Squirrelblanket]

This is your husband's brother's wife, right? Why is she getting the flack for it? Your husband needs to take it up with his brother. But honestly, it sounds like an odd thing to be focusing on while you've got more important things on your plate.

[Mydogisthebestest]

@Evelefteden

My SILs are my brothers’ wives, they’re not my friends. Even more so my partner’s brother’s wife. It would be outwith the bounds of our relationship for them to expect me to support them. I’d leave that to DP and his brother to navigate between them

Well that might be your situation. Many people can have relationship beyond the confines of allotted roles. I’m close to my sil.

OP in times of stress/crisis you see who your real friends/support are. I are with grace that they either didn’t give a shit or they were emotionally immature. I think it’s they don’t give a shit to be honest.

Don’t let it spoil the enjoyment of your new baby

But is not wrong that my SIL are my brothers wives not my friends nor that DPs brother’s wife is not my friend. Everyone has different relationships. The SIL may not feel close to the OP.

I would question why the op is messaging her, rather than her husband messaging his brother if they as a couple feel that the BIL and SIL have been unsupportive.

[Evelefteden]

@IsItGinOclock1

Why have you messaged the sil and not the bil? It’s the bil that is actually related to your husband not his wife. I would expect my husband to contact his brother, I wouldn’t be contacting the wife separately. The chances are they just have nothing to add or they don’t want to bother you?

If I wasn’t very close to the person I wouldn’t be messaging beyond initial “congratulations hope you are ok?”. Two of my best friends had babies very poorly in nicu and I messaged loads, but I’m close with them and would chat to them everyday anyway, so I was messaging to chat as much as to ask how the baby was.

Did you actually read the OP? Why don’t you read to the bottom instead of just scanning the top?

Some people can actually build independent relationships within family structures you know

[AlternativePerspective]

TBH I don’t quite understand this need for constant communication just because we live in a digital age. Presumably others on the group might have been responding, so SIL responding as well is just entering into the world of platitude for the sake of it. Let’s bear in mind that people often say things like “thinking of you” on public groups because everyone else is saying it so they don’t want to be seen to not be, iyswim.

There are also other possibilities.. My DP has muted his family WhatsApp group because if he didn’t it would be notifying constantly. He checks it once a week and there are generally somewhere in the region of 300 messages. So it’s possible BIL and SIL might not even be looking at the group.

Also, in another situation, I had a FB friend who posted continual updates when she was pregnant. Along the lines of “oh I have just drunk a coffee and the bump is soooo happy/bumpy is doing backflips today/bumpy obviously likes chocolate” you get the gist. The upshot though was that so many people got fed up of reading all about it that they hid her posts on FB. However, when the baby was born he too was seriously ill and rushed into ICU, but because so many people had stopped reading her posts they had no idea. So to her it would have seemed as if her friends didn’t care, when in fact they were oblivious.

Not saying that you are like this OP, but that there could be a multitude of reasons why SIL hasn’t been in touch, and she doesn’t owe you an apology for not being.

[DoloresOnTheDottedLine]

I can’t see what would be so intrusive about BIL and SIL sending a couple of messages along the lines of “so glad he’s doing better, can’t wait to meet him. Sending you all our love.” No response required from the OP if she’s not up for it but shows that they care and are thinking of her and her DH. Totally pathetic that they haven’t been in touch at all and, unless there is something very serious going on in their own lives that the OP has not been made aware of, I think it’s very, VERY poor form.