to send him a copy of her pass-agg card?

[HubrisPolice]

I have received a marvellously nasty Christmas card from my sister-in-law. Absolutely dripping saccharine venom.

Now normally I wouldn't dream of passing shit like this around. I might take a sanity-check with someone close to me whom she'll never meet, but in general I wouldn't show private correspondence around.

I also feel strongly one shouldn't mess with loyalty between husband and wife.

Buuuuuut... she's signed my DB's name to her shit.

DB is usually the one who writes the cards to me, or at the very least they both sign them. There's nothing to show he's even seen this one.

My options are

a) I can ignore and have my DB wondering why people are apparently behaving weirdly.

b) I can speak to her directly – my normal approach, but in my old age I've learned that engaging with batshit just elicits... more batshit.

c) I can send him a copy of the card she has written and to which she has appended both his and her names.

Now it may or not be an actual good move to send him a copy: still pondering that one! But in terms of whether it's ethically permissable:

YABU: it's a private note from her to you, he's not entitled to know the contents and what's more you should be at pains never to play husband off against wife;

YANBU: it's a note with his name at the bottom, he's entitled to know what's being said in his name.

Shame you haven't got an inflatable sil.
You could have let her down also!!

I think you should send a juvenile set of bagpipes as an apology immediately.

Your DB is not exactly covering himself in glory though is he.

I think you've made a good call OP. Fuck em.

Excellent idea. Send descant recorders, quick.

AcrossThePond and others with ghastly family schisms, I'm so sorry to hear about those.

That's a marvellous card, nancybotwinbloom, and I had thought that was the sort of relationship I had with DB – he and I would totally have exchanged that for a laugh.

I was properly gutted to realise I'd got him so badly wrong. Broken, actually.

But even if he's not the person I thought he was, I don't really want to abandon him to his spineless fate. I just can't afford to invest in him right now.

I am cacking myself at some of these suggestions.

Remind me never to annoy you lot!

Sadly I think a phone call won't work.

I'm no good at all at thinking on my feet, and even worse with emotional stuff where I have to stop and think it through. I also get exhausted quickly on the phone, which will take things nowhere good at all.

On my actual AIBU, 96% say no ethical issues in sharing the card with him. Thank you, that sounds convincing!

Now just, as PP have said, to consider whether it's actually a good move...

It's a good move if you want drama and a fight. Do you? It sounds a bit like you do.

If you want to take the wind out of her sails and have her fall flat, either do not respond or just make a polite acknowledgement thanking her for the card. Don't let on that you know you've been insulted. Let her think she has failed to get to you, to the point that you didn't even realise she was trying to get to you. That plausible deniability works both ways.

She WANTS a reaction. She WANTS you to make some sort of response to do with the accusation of abandoning the kids, she wants you to do the dirty work of dragging your brother into it. You can do all that if you choose, but it's WHAT SHE WANTS AND IT WILL MEAN SHE'S WON.

She WANTS you to react. Don't do what she wants!

why cant you answer all of the questions above?

I agree with @PrincessNutNutRoast.

If you can’t resist bringing it up with your DB, I would also go for plausible deniability, and go with the approach of being a bit worried by the strange remark in the card — if you’re reading it correctly [screenshot] — and is SIL quite ok, or suffering from pandemic-related anxiety about the children yadda yadda.

@viccytwiffy

why cant you answer all of the questions above?

Make a list and I'll have a crack. I can't keep up at all!

I'm finding it all very useful food for thought though, even if I don't type out an answer for the thread.

Remember OP....the reason you feel strongly enough about this to start this thread and discuss all possible options for response and all that, is because she knows how to bait you. That itch you have to react, get your brother involved, fantasise about tearing her down? That's bait! That's how it works! She knows what gets to you and she's using it. This is BAIT! This is exactly the temptation it's designed to create! She knows you and knowledge is power for bait!

Don't take the bait! Don't do what she wants! Don't be manipulated! She's trying to start a fight in which she can make you look like the aggressor. Do. Not. Do. What. She. Wants!

It's a good move if you want drama and a fight. Do you?

Oh god no. Really, really not.

PrincessNutNutRoast I hear ya.

Just typing something longer, because I think the MN hive mind can help me with something...

Completely agree with @PrincessNutNutRoast .

If you get into an out-of-character-for-you dialogue about this, it will spiral and possibly eat away at you.

Do not let the Mumsnet mind goad you into doing something they don't have to live with.

Immediately send the children a recorder each and the sheet music of London's Burning

Two words:-

Moon Sand.

That fucker gets EVERYWHERE. She’ll be finding and hoovering it up when those children are at university.

I agree with previous posters who’ve said do not engage. That’s what she wants.

You are very very funny by the way!

i probably wont bother he'll only dfend her and you'll feel worse

i gather he wasnt like this before he met her you saw him alot etc?

send the kids loads and loads of sweets and loud toys ones which will really piss her off then you done your bit she cant say a word

I think if you do decide to tackle this with your brother you need to be prepared to explain why you didn't send the kids birthday present as that's clearly the reason why she's written what she did.

So to me, it's down to whether you want to speak to him about how he & SIL's past behaviour has led you to this point, or whether you want to just let it slide and let the relationship be what it will be.

Op. Send her an exploding glitter card. Please. With some trite, saccharine pre-written message, and just 'happy Christmas, Hubris'

OP, FWIW, I like the tone of your posts and general attitude in the circumstances. Have you considered devoting a little of your available energy to some form of comedic, self-deprecatory writing?

Well done.

I was going to say send a photo of the card to DB but PPs make a good point about giving her what she wants. If you just don’t contact him/them at all how long do you think it would be until your brother actually contacts you himself?

I was going to suggest moon sand but someone beat me to it.

OK, here's the bit I could do with some strategies to handle (even if they're just mental ones to help me feel OK about it).

A thing our not-so-DM habitually does in her emotional manipulations, is state at the outset that you will eventually capitulate to her will. You will "see sense", "get over yourself", "come to realise she's right", "grow up"...

So if, to invent a wild example, she were throwing a wobbly one day because you were wearing purple trousers she didn't like, then the next day when you wore jeans, she would cast that as a personal victory for her and say smugly, "There, I knew you'd see sense eventually."

SIL has pulled the same crap.

Helpful that she's so firmly validated my opinion of her as "just like DM", but deeply unhelpful in every other way.

So her card says I've abandoned her babies, cruel baby-abandoner that I am. She's so sorry for me that I'm like this. But maybe one day I'll come back to them again (that last bit's almost verbatim).

She also previously told me, over the packing of my very own baggage, that "She didn't want to compare me to the children, but like them I needed to be told what to do several times before actually doing it." (That's as close to verbatim as I can remember it, too.)

I've never planned to permanently "abandon" the children; just to take a break from the exhausting carousel of crazy for a bit.

But she creates a narrative where, when you do whatever you'd been going to do anyway, that's a victory for her. Thus validating her batshittery in all its glory... and encouraging her to more. Eek!

Then the only solution is to exit the narrative.