In laws want weekly visits, AIBU?

[Stressedmum223]

Name changed for this. My husband and I have 2 very young children. His parents, who live nearby, expect to see us at least once a week but preferably more. We’ve tried to explain that we are not available every week, but they send my husband barrages of text messages demanding visits.

They act incredibly affronted and angry that we aren’t available at their beck and call, and infantilise my husband when he tries to establish boundaries. Are we the unreasonable ones here? I would have thought seeing them twice a month was still frequent, but in their mind and actual words we are keeping them from their grandchildren.

We aren’t close with them at all, and IMO they treat their own son quite poorly. He doesn’t like them very much, but we both want them to have a relationship with our children.

YABU - You should see your in laws every week or more
YANBU - It’s fine to see your in laws every other week

He doesn’t like them very much, but we both want them to have a relationship with our children.

Why?

No, every other week is plenty. Do they make dinner if you go over on a Sunday for example. Do you trust them taking the kids to the park?
Try to make visits work for you and benefit you. If visiting them saves you making dinner that's a win. If they csn come take the kids to the park for an hour that's a win.

"We work, we have two kids, we have other family to think about, how on earth do you think we can spare so much time when we're already run off our feet?" Honeslty it's insane how fast grandparents forget how hard it was raising kids! My mum is 50 and works part time and thinks we should all be running round after her while we work full time and have kids because she's too tired from work.

I'm another one asking why you both want them to have a relationship with their grandchildren. As a child who was forced to do this with a completely unreasonable, overbearing, nasty, vindictive grandparent, please do not put your children through this. Just because you are blood related to someone it does not make them a good person.

So, more detail required for me... Do they expect you and husband to be at the visits or would they be happy with grandchildren visiting them and doing activities?

Are they imposing on your time or do they just want more kid time? If it's the latter, then let them have the kids? win win??

If they want to impose on you all as a family group then hell no.

Why on earth do you want them to have a close relationship with your children when they've treated their own son poorly??

I'd be keeping them very much at arms length.

Why on earth do you want to inflict them on your kids? They’ll only treat them
badly eventually.

No this isn't normal and one of the reasons I am single. My ex couldn't establish any boundaries with his family.

Every weekend there was an excuse.

OP, you are an adult- nobody can "demand" anything of you.

Put your foot down on this and say you can't make this commitment.

Why do you think they will treat their grandchildren better than their son?

Twice a month is plenty.
I would also let them know that the more "negative" they are in their behaviour, the less likely you are to visit them.

I did this with my mother for similar reason, IMO there is no point visiting if it's for everyone to feel crap about it and have a negative as atmosphere around the kids. It's quality over quantity.
It was affecting my mental health too because I was dreading the visits and getting anxious it wouldn't go well. I took a break for a few months in the end, told her why, and we started afresh and it's going much better (for now!).

With people like this you can never win, believe me I've lived it for 38 years with my inlaws. So on that basis if you can't please them you may aswell please yourself. Let them moan and develop a thick skin.

Unless you're expecting to rely on them for childcare, YANBU. Even every other week is far too often for us to want to see our families (that we love). We see ours 3-4 times a year and that seems average amongst our friend group (with the exception of those who have parents providing childcare).

Both sets seen our kids once a week if not more sometimes, but a great healthy relationship all round so no comparison to what you describe. You are right to set boundaries if you both don't have a good relationship with them.

Your DH needs to communicate with them and stand his ground if needed.

Compromise is always good.
What would make this work for you all?

Can he and the DC’s make a visit?
Can DC’s visit alone?
Can DGP’s come with you on trips out/take the DC’s on trips out?
Can DGP’s invite you to lunch/ make you a lunch?

Think through the various options and plan.

When communicating, a tip that we use in children’s behaviour management is ‘either/or’ - a choice of two and therefore no wriggle room…😂

For example from your DH to his DP’s
“on Sunday do you either want to come with us to the park
or would you rather take the DC’s alone?”.

No, we do not rely on them for childcare.

DH has clearly communicated with them. The more he communicates, the more unhinged they act. It’s all very stressful. I posted this because I was starting to genuinely wonder if we were missing something here. For example, if DH says we want to spend time as a family, they angrily say they are family.

As for spending time at their home or eating their cooking… their house is filthy. They do not clean it. We don’t want to spend time there for that and some other reasons (not going into detail here as don’t want to out myself). It also isn’t safe for small children unsupervised so I would not leave my children there.

They love our kids and our older child really loves them. I do worry as he gets older and is less interested in devoted grandparent time that they will take it out on him, though. I didn’t have a relationship with my grandparents as a child so have wanted this for my own kids, as my parents live in another country and can’t visit very often. But they are very toxic. My own parents are stunned by all of this.

I hear you. Believe me, if they ever start to treat my children poorly, I won’t hesitate to cut them off. But they dote on them. So much so that they don’t even say hello to DH or me — only the children. 😵‍💫

One major issue is we simply live too close. We plan to move a few hours away in a few years (currently saving and on a fixed term mortgage) in the hopes that will make this easier.

They are treating you poorly

"But they dote on them. So much so that they don’t even say hello to DH or me — only the children"

What does this teach your children? That you can be ignored. If they build a relationship with your children and then you decide to cut contact they could turn up at their school to watch you do drop off and collection, walk past when they are outside at playtime. There is nothing anyone can do to stop that.

You said "they are very toxic" I think your want of grandparents for yourself is clouding your judgement here. Don't underestimate the poison they can pour into your children's ears, we miss you, Mummy and Daddy stop us from seeing you and we love you so much, we want to give you chocolate but Mummy says no. Luckily for me I had lovely ILs but this is my friend's unhinged parents, trouncing every boundary she tried to put in place.

See if you can port that mortgage, I would be ringing them today. How likely is it that they would follow you to wherever you move?

I think retired people underestimate how intense ‘the routine’ is already when you have a full time job and a young family.

To then have a weekly scheduled meeting with them on the weekend… argh.

You live too close. Move away now, don't wait.

Very unlikely they’d move — they have another child who lives nearby (she has no kids yet), and they are very much homebodies. One of them is in very poor health.

I wish. We can’t afford it yet 😭