Don’t want to be around bereaved MIL anymore

[turquoisepenguin]

This is probably going to make me sound like the worst person in the world but here goes.

FIL died eighteen months ago, it was quite sudden and he was relatively young (65).

MIL is now very depressed. I do feel very sorry for her because FIL was basically her whole world. She doesn’t have any other family, doesn’t have many friends, doesn’t drive, and is retired. She used to spend most of her time with FIL. So it is really sad.

She recently came to stay. This was actually my suggestion as I know she is bored and lonely and I thought it would cheer her up. Unfortunately it was a disaster. She was in a terrible mood with DH because he asked her to get the train (he used to pick her up and drive to ours but it’s a six hour round trip). So she barely spoke to him or me for the first 24 hours. She didn’t want to go out anywhere so she sat and watched daytime TV for six hours (this is not an exaggeration). She cried a lot of the time and turned most conversations round to FIL.

She is clearly depressed but won’t go to the doctor or have counselling. She is in a terrible place but she won’t accept any help and is very rude to DH. She refused to say goodbye to him, again because she was unhappy about having to get the train. At the end we were both completely exhausted and fed up and the kids were a bit confused by the whole thing.

I had suggested to DH that we should invite her to stay again in March but I’ve just said I think we should abandon that idea because I don’t think I can face it again. However, I also feel like a terrible person because she is obviously very sad. I don’t know what the answer is really. But I have my own issues with work, family illness, kids etc and I just don’t think I can face this on top.

So you clearly know it was the worst experience of your life, that doesn't mean it was the worst experience of her life. It might have been but for example someone up thread mentioned losing a baby and I'd say losing a child would be worse for me. My GM never stopped grieving her dead child till the day she died over 40 years later. She was lovely and kind and thoughtful, she would buy us Christmas presents but we never saw her at Christmas, no one did. Her child died at Christmas and she knew she would be so unhappy that week and being a thoughtful person she didn't want to spoil it for anyone else.

How would I feel? Well I'd be upset but I wouldn't want to upset my children so if I was having a bad week, like Gran at Christmas, I wouldn't see people. I certainly hope I wouldn't keep going over details that distressed one of my children to that child. That seems an ideal thing to talk to a counsellor about, I'd feel free to talk about it to someone who wouldn't be distressed.

I was in a local tearoom's garden one day. A group of older women were chatting at the next table and one was telling them about her husband's death, seemed like it was the first time she'd seen them since the death or at least the first time she'd been able to spend time with them and talk about it. As it went on there was so much "oh it's so awful" "oh poor you" "how will you cope" and eventually she must have had enough of it and said, "Well the good thing is I don't have to cook if I don't want to." Total silence and then she added, "If I don't feel like cooking I just have a boiled egg, couldn't have done that when he was alive." A silence that felt very long ensued and then more normal chat started. I did admire her, from her earlier comments she was clearly grieving and very sad but she wasn't prepared to go into some extended pity party with them. She certainly shut that down.

I lost both my parent suddenly. It has been very difficult.
But I agree the loss of someone you spent every day with is different. It changes your whole life.

@ancientgran Some women seem to be sad for a bit, then happier after their husbands died. I have seen this as well. Obviously not everyone's relationship is the same.

@Lovelysausagedogscrumpy sorry but I don’t really follow your thought process. You can measure the grief of other people losing their parents etc and confirm that the loss of a spouse is worse, but when someone says the loss of a child is worse it’s just ‘typical mumsnet’.

There's very few of us who haven't suffered grief at some stage. It is part of being a human that is still alive and everyone deals with it differently. But it doesn't give a free pass to be horrible to others or think it gives you entitlement because nobody else could possibly understand. There is no hierarchy of it is worse for me than you. Unfortunately most of us very much understand what grief is. My mother was widowed tragically twice before she was 45 which has of course had a lasting life long effect, but never acted like the OP is describing. Adult relationships are not unconditional, even family relationships, and I think the OP is being reasonable from what they describe.

Maybe losing your father is not as bad as losing your spouse but it has still been awful for him.

Wtf - there is no "maybe" about it! My friend lost her parents and her six month old baby (they knew from birth they would lose her), but when her husband died in an accident she said she had no idea of the grief that would cause. FIL wasn't old, and it was sudden - MIL shouldn't be expected to be over it by now. You cannot possibly understand how she feels.

My father died a few years ago when he was 61 and my mother has coped by keeping busy and socialising. She has done her best not to dwell on how unfair it was to lose him at quite a young age when everyone around her still has their husband. Life isn’t fair and she accepts this.

Although the past few years have been challenging, I think her personal resolve to try and make the best of life has showed. She puts a cheerful face on to make happy memories with my children even when she doesn’t feel her best. Every few months she takes the three hour train journey to visit my sister and hasn’t once demanded she be driven there and back.

But she’s also suffered a lot of bad health in her life and her attitude to that has always been the same. She’ll have days where she just sits and cries then the next day she’ll find something else to distract her and shift the focus.

I feel the OP is being unfairly criticised. Refusing to speak to your son for 24 hours after he’s invited you into his home to spend time with his family, is passive aggressive behaviour and selfish. We must all be extra patient and understanding of someone who’s grieving but that doesn’t mean they get a free pass when they treat you so disrespectfully.

Her son is grieving too but it sounds like the OP’s mil is consumed with thoughts of herself and won’t do anything to help herself either. I don’t think you can help someone who doesn’t want to help themself. I’d go visit her in the future but stay nearby instead of with her.

This is such a difficult one OP. I certainly don't think you are bring unreasonable making her get the train. She's done it once now so it will be easier next time, and I'm assuming your DH has to lose at least one day, maybe sometimes 2 of annual leave to fetch her and drop her back again. Unless it's only once or twice a year (in which case you'd be criticised for not seeing her enough), that's a huge burden for someone who works full time with kids.

You are also not being unreasonable to say something to her if she is being actively rude, particularly around the kids, and your DH wouldn't be unreasonable to say certain topics are too upsetting for him and perhaps she could find someone less close to the situation like a counsellor or friend to talk that particular topic through with. That would remind her he is grieving too.

However, I think you (or at least DH) need to keep up seeing her reasonably often as she is going through a difficult time. Perhaps without the kids every time if it's upsetting for them.

I will say I've seen my MIL widowed at a similar age and she was nothing like that - the times she could see us and dd were the times that kept her going, so despite the devastation she would put on a brave face and try to enjoy DD, and then it was as we were leaving you'd see the cracks as she was going back to being alone. But everyone is different of course. You do have to look after your kids and DH first though.

You said 18 months in your OP. Any grief counsellor will tell you that this kind of loss can be felt harder in the second year than the first because by then the bereaved person is hit with the realisation that their partner is really gone and that their life situation has changed for ever. Acceptance is the hardest part of loss and for some it takes a couple of years to fully accept things as they are. That was certainly the case for me. When you go through a loss like this, for most people the brain kicks in at the start and only allows you to experience what you can cope with. As time goes on this effect lessens and you feel the loss more keenly, and for me, by six months I was suicidal. As time goes on the realisation dawns that this is your life now, your husband is never coming back and you have to make the best of it. You stop expecting him to come through the front door at his usual time, and you start to accept things. It’s hard and the symptoms of someone struggling with realisation and acceptance are exactly as you state for your MIL - she’s weepy, doesn’t want to engage with anything but the TV, is unpleasant to those around her and complaining of anything that requires the slightest move towards independence.

I wasn’t being snippy in suggesting that her GP is the only one qualified to determine if she is grieving or depressed and I think getting her to engage with her GP will be the best thing for her when she’s ready, as it’s the first step towards grief counselling. And it sounds as though that time is not far off, although it may be difficult getting her to see that.

I have been through this myself and six year on, and happily remarried, I still get overwhelmed by grief sometimes. The loss is always there in the background and you never know what’s going to trigger it. She will learn to cope, but you and your DH have to understand that it takes time, and 18 months is a drop in the ocean. Grief is a roller coaster that nothing can prepare you for. It brings up thoughts and feelings that you never thought possible, and it is different from depression - not least because you know the cause of it and no amount of anti depressant medication can deal with the underlying cause. It’s something you have to learn to live with and it takes time.

@Inyournewdress

I know right? What makes it okay for that poster to put their grief on some sort of pedestal? Horrible.

The OP isn’t expecting her to be over it. She’s expecting her to get on with her life as best as she can whilst dealing with the grief. It sounds like the mil is expecting life to stand still so she refuses to join in with anything they suggest. She doesn’t have to take them up on every suggestion, but refusal to participate in anything else except wallowing in misery is not healthy.

Exactly.

The MIL is healthy and able. She's only 64 years old. Using up someone's precious annual leave and leisure time when she could hop a train for a two-hour ride is reprehensible.

I don't think that is very fair, you can't judge someone's relationship on the basis of how they deal with bereavement. I think it is quite unpleasant to be honest.

The woman I was referring to was clearly upset about the loss of her husband but got fed up off the mawkish talk from her friends. To suggest that means something negative about her relationship is just nasty.

When my MIL died I worried about how my husband would deal with it precisely because they had a very difficult relationship. I think sometimes the regrets about the relationship can actually make the bereavement very painful.

Typical MN in that this subject has come up on other threads and someone always brings it up. I’m not trying to minimise the loss of a child, but IME on MN the loss of a child is seen as ‘trumping’ all other losses. That’s all.

@Lovelysausagedogscrumpy

Thats because generally it is the worst type of grief.

Doesnt take a genius to realise that but it certainly gets a few peoples backs up.

@ancientgran

That lady sounded like a trooper, didn’t want to get too involved in the pity party.

In her own home, on her own time.

If she expects to visit her son, DIL and grandchildren, she should make the effort.

Sobbing when a young kid draws you a picture, 18 months after the death, is not on. Surely anyone with a modicum of consideration for others would see that as a wake-up call that they need to get some professional help?

There’s that word ‘wallowing’ again. The second year after the loss of a life partner is usually the hardest because it takes time for the realisation to kick in that your partner is not coming back and that you have to accept things as they are. That’s when grief comes back and kicks you in the arse harder than the first time round. It sounds as though that’s where MIL is now. It’s hard. As I hope you never find out.

Thinking about it, if this had happened years earlier when ops DH was still a child, no one here would be saying it was ok for her not to think about her son's grief and still be doing nothing all day and taking about nothing else 18 months later. If she came on here she'd be told to get some professional help for the sake of her child and support him.

Now obviously it's different, and not as hard for the child, when they are an adult, but for her, it's basically the same loss, yet in one situation I'm sure most posters would be telling her she had to try to move through her grief and put her child first, but in this situation people are telling the OP she is unreasonable to expect any consideration for anyone else at all.

It seems like there should be some middle ground here.

@MissWings

Really? She could've cried her eyes out about her husband dying and that's a pity party to you. No - that's normal.

And then you act high and mighty, asserting that one type of grief is worse. Maybe they're all just a pity party and everyone should just get it on with it, right?

MissWings

She has lost her husband suddenly snd shockingly in his early 60s. It's only been 18months.

Can you really not see how she might feel so angry so hurt so devastated so completely wrecked. . Really seriously you can't understand this

I don’t get into discussions generally about which type of grief is ‘worse’. The death of a parent is different to that of a spouse, and the death of a spouse is different to the loss of a child.

@MissWings I do not agree it is automatically the worst kind of grief.

What is the worst type of grief?

That was aimed at me. I was not putting my own grief on a pedestal at all. I have clarified what I meant by that comment, as I have also clarified for you that rather than ‘worse’, there are ‘different’ kinds of grief.

@ancientgran Yes bereavement where there are lots of regrets can be a complex bereavement.
Offering support to someone whose husband has recently died is not being mawkish.
I have no idea what her marriage is like (although why could she not have a boiled egg for tea when her husband was alive?). But it is noticeable that some women (and I have only seen it in women) are happier after their husband dies. Divorce used to be very difficult and so many older women stayed in marriages that while not awful, were not happy ones.
I am simply acknowledging that bereavement is not the same for everyone.