To not feel sorry for MIL

[Unbeknownsty]

MIL has three sons. She has never been a very 'present' mum to them, she always opted to work over Christmas (key word, opted to, as she didn't like Christmas) never did anything for their birthdays, never went on holiday with them, never hugged them or said she loved them.

As adults, she still doesn't effort with them but moans that no one makes effort with her. She regularly forgets DHs birthday. He phones her every week to check on her but all she does is talk at him.

I refuse to see her as she was very rude to me several times, of course I'd never mind DH seeing her but he just doesn't.

She's recently retired and is now laying a big guilt trip on DH, how lonely she is etc.

This past Christmas no one invited her to theirs, and no family visited her or sent anything. I think she suddenly realised that without work, she actually hasn't got much.

AIBU to think you get what you give?

Different time??

The era/generation has nothing to do with how much love and care and presence you have for your children!

No one is a perfect parent but this is total emotional neglect.

I think this is very unfair on OP's DH. Perhaps he is a loving person because of how much he didn't want to treat others as he had been treated. Perhaps he's had loads of therapy to break the cycles of trauma (this is how my own mother was able to mother me so so differently to her own experience).

This reminds me of my teenage years when I repeatedly asked to be moved down a set in maths because I was struggling to understand what was going on. They refused saying I just wasn't paying enough attention. Then I taught myself everything from revision guides the two weeks before the exam and got the top grade and the teacher had the absolute CHEEK to say it was a good job they didn't move me down! Obviously far less serious but an illustration of how someone might succeed despite rather than because of the adult who should have been helping them.

I would say there is a huge difference in the type of parent here.

There is one who is possibly mentally ill and totally unable to cope with life and one who actively chooses to ignore her children (and why have 3 fgs?)

Or perhaps she is just entirely selfish and self-cantered?

Another one asking the OP if - as it seems - the mother in law was working for the whole family or if there was a father involved. Maybe work was her way of providing for and loving the family in the only way she was good at/felt confident in. Or she was depressed and Christmas didn't sit well. Or she earned double time over bank holidays. Of course she may simply have been a career minded person with no emotional bandwith for her children. I agree that making special occasions and memories with children is something no parent should forego, but there's a huge piece missing in the OP's description.

What 'support' would you expect young children to provide?

"She has never been a very 'present' mum to them" Really? You've witnessed ALL this since they were born? YABVU!!!

???

So is leaving your children on Christmas day! And I bet with no tree or presents.
And the same on their birthdays

I think that's FAR worse

Then??

When is then??

I'm 70. That 'school of thought' didn't exist when I was a child

Was she a single parent? Or was the family struggling financiallY? Because working over Xmas (double pay?), not going on holiday etc. sounds like a family with financial issues to me.

Good balance of views on this thread, but some of the replies still seem to have strongly interalized the social assumption that women will be the default carers. The support humans. The drudges. The ones who are urged to be kind, and to whom other women will make fairly sly, covert suggestions about 'what kind of person do you want to be?' It's transparently manipulative, and I hope, OP, that you will discount it.

It's far easier to volunteer others to be kind than it is to do it yourself. It's a huge, very hard commitment. What's worse is that some of the women volunteering other women for a carers' role clearly have an idea what this entails. I've done it - when my own mother fell terminally ill at far too young an age. Of course, the hospitals and home support systems defaulted to me as the female, rather than my brother, even though we shared joint responsibility for her. It is HARD. We did it because we wanted to but it can by no means be an expectation, particularly one that automatically defaults to one specific sex.

OP, do not let anyone tell you you are unreasonable for not wanting to take this on. This would be equally the case whether you got on well with this woman or not. Aside from anything else, she's not your mother.

You're wanting to know whether her past behaviour to you justifies you now prioritising your own needs. You need no such justification. You can, with your husband taking the lead, help her figure out what support works best for her, and when the time comes, put that in place.

In your shoes, I'm afraid that would be the limit of what I'd be prepared to do for her. (My MiL and SiL, incidentally, rubbed my face in it when my mother died).

It's okay for women to say 'no'.

I wouldn't bother with her either. She sounds similar to my MIL but she also added child neglect to her parenting.

She now has no one. H sees her out of duty infrequently. The children and me refuse to see her at all.

Meanwhile my parents are helping us in all sorts of ways and she wonders why we have a good relationship with them.

The final straw was when my son asked her to buy him a packet of sweets when she was already at the counter. He said please. The woman is very wealthy and still asked me for the 80p back.

She can rot as far as I'm concerned.

Quite hard hearted responses here!

Yes. And sometimes - when you have been unfortunate enough to be on the receiving end of shit parenting - you have to be hard. To protect yourself.

For those saying "have compassion", you can have compassion for the other person without causing more hurt to yourself. I would bet good money that everyone who has had a similar experience to the OP's partner has spent a long time realising what happened to them, coming to terms with it and finding a way to make their peace. Often that is by putting in place boundaries and/or distance.

I am endlessly frustrated with the "But she's your MOTHER/She did her BEST" that gets trotted out. Not everyone who is a mother should have been one. Being a mother doesn't give you a free pass and a guarantee that your children will always forgive you. Some people's best simply isn't good enough. Not everyone bothers to do their best.

As a PP wisely said, at this stage in the game it's about not having regrets rather than having revenge or dragging up a past that can't be rectified. I have - largely - made my peace with knowing they were emotionally absent from my life, put themselves first and were occasionally downright vindictive. I won't see my parent struggle or suffer, but neither will I let them hurt me again and that means keeping them at arm's length. It is much too late for anything else.

I'm 70. That 'school of thought' didn't exist when I was a child

I'm younger than you and recognise it. Both

• as a justification for prostituting your own children for gain and acting as the brothel keeper and
• acting to underpin the menace of "I brought you into this world, I can take you out" (high levels of violence and threat to life intended).

She’s not just a not very present mum, she sounds neglectful and emotionally abusive.
Shell now expect full care when she’s older. DH has finally gone LC with his parents and they expected care after not being interested in him his whole life, I’m so proud of him for getting to this space as I never thought it would happen and the effect they’ve had on him beating him down his whole life is horrible.

I don't hug my children or tell them I love them but they know I do. I involve them with stuff we take them out and do things. They're all adults btw and DD would kill me if I hugged her without a reason,like a relative's death.

I'm taking her away for a weekend soon , just the two of us for a slightly girly weekend, I've shopping and booze.

You reap what you sow

Oh that's really sad to me.

Did you hug them as children?

Yes it was a different time. And those of us of a certain age know that this is true. I distinctly remember how much of a stigma it used to be in this country to even talk about your feelings. We used to laugh at the Americans and deride them for being sentimental. I remember when it changed when we all became obsessed with American talk shows like Oprah where people talked about feelings etc. Then the therapy and self help culture kicked in and it was suddenly ok to seek counselling and talk about yourself. Yes, some families were a lot more touchy feely but many just weren’t. When she died I realised that my mum was so exhausted as a working class single mum that she had nothing left over after work. For her, love was making sure we never missed a meal and had clean clothes. A child will always want more and won’t necessarily understand or see the bigger picture. To carry a child’s resentment into adulthood is not always for the best.

All that said, in the end I know nothing about OP’s dh background, but I do feel sad for a woman whose kids left her out at Xmas. If we reap what we sow her sons may be in for a reckoning of their own when they get older.

My own mother sounds similar to your MIL. Our physical needs were looked after like food, clothes and water but that is it. I remember distinctly as a small child I saw another child fall and they got up and went running to their mother crying. I just didn’t get this I watched on thinking why. It leaves a hole in you when you don’t have a mother who loves you or prioritises you or who enjoys spending time with you. It’s very difficult to have compassion for a person who has caused you such hurt and trauma. And yes it does cause trauma because at the end of the day the mother carries you and births you and if they can’t love you it causes so much damage to you as a person.
Showing kindness allows them close enough to hurt you again. So to protect yourself you start to put up boundaries in the relationship with that parent. I am very sure my mother has a reason for not being able to be a present, loving mother.

I think leaving 3 children to fend for themselves, never spending Christmas with them, never cuddling them or showing love is beyond how a normal person is selfish.
it is neglectful and shows symptoms of Narcissistic Personality Disorder for a start….
Sounds to me like the woman needs medication and therapy.

@Peaceandquietandacuppa you will need to ask her, if you want to know.
I only pointed two questions. Some people is bitter since childhood, some people get bitter through experiences in life.
The whole story changes depending of it.

Was she a single mother? I am guessing she was paid more by working over christmases?

As other posters have mentioned, the world is much more child centric now and much more is expected of parents. My DM is 74 and her mother would have provided basic care and that would have been seen as good enough mothering. My mother went one step further but is not very supportive or emotionally connected with her children. I’m not sure this is her fault , sometimes we need to cut older generations some slack as expectations change and our children will likely feel the same about us.

I would also never leave someone out on Christmas Day, that’s just cruel

Was your birthday and Christmas recognised? Were you taken out - even just to the park?

If No then that situation is comparable. But it wasn't the normal with my contempories