Am I being unreasonable to dread visits of my husbands sister

[JaneMumofTwins]

About twice a year we see my husbands sister and her husband. What happens is I get left with her and my husband finds 'manly' things to do with her husband. This would be OK if I found her company remotely agreeable but I don't. She is a stream of consciousness talker and a major hypochondriac. She talks over me continually and if she wasn't my husbands sister I would have no problem in just telling her to STFU, but I am hamstrung by family duty. I find her company so difficult I stop sleeping properly when she is in the house. I am sure she means well but I have endured 3 hours of her tedious boiler story and now she has underfloor heating issues I have completely lost the will to live. I have told husband that if he leaves me alone to deal with her again I will divorce him but I know that it will just repeat itself. How do I get her to shut up without killing her? Am I being unreasonable feeling this way?

So she invites herself and her own brother admits he finds her hard work!

This is a DH problem. Why is he letting dislikeable people invite themselves to your house and then buggering off?

Next time he makes it clear it's not convenient and/or you can only manage 2 nights.

And you go and stay at your mum's for those 2 nights.

You have to make this more of your DH's problem, he is being rude to his sister. Perhaps neither of them grew up with many social graces?

Do you take annual leave for their visits? I would really resent using mine up like this!

You need to make it perfectly clear to DH that he can't skive off like this. If I were you Id get my own project scheduled in first (sewing, yoga, choir practice, deep clean of the fridge) and if dh thinks that will leave his dsis on her own, he has to deal with it.

Cross posted - if you have health issues all the more reason to not have your self-care routine interrupted. And if you don't have one currently , this could be a great prompt to start!

As it is, your dh is using you as a handy service - like the social equivalent of a sofa where he can park his sister and ignore her. That's not very respectful of him.

Yeah this and Mr Knightly didn't fuck off shooting while lecturing Emma on manners did he? He stepped up.

Christ, this was my life until I took away the spare bedroom option.
Things that helped:
Put the radio on in the house so there is some background radio 4 burble.
Talk to DH about the DIY, if everyone can start off 'helping' eg, washing plant pots whilst someone goes crazy with power tools, have a bonfire, weed etc. everyone working independently vaguely in the garden area. You start, but then excuse your self in order to 'organise lunch' or sort out the breakfast things and Mumsnet while the dishwasher churns.

As we have got older it became more apparent that DIY obsessed DH was never going to set aside annual leave for return visits so the burden was always on us. And we got fed up of entertaining slightly boring people or relatives with little imagination who wanted us to do the heavy lifting with their kids (can always tell when non resident parent BIL has realised that next week is half term and he has no plans)

I sometimes do a menial activity if a conversation bores me, like jigsaws or you could try knitting or crochet? It takes away a bit of the tedium of the conversation. I have years of practice though and can sit next to someone pretending to listen while having no clue what they say 😆

Do you all get together and trash her character?

We worked with someone like that If we were in a car and it went quiet they felt it their duty to fill the silence. So tedious.

Epic levels of unkindness evident on this thread, and everyone cheering each other on.
😔

I think it is unkind to make someone listen to your voice for 3 hours where their basic manners means the other person can't cry or run away from you. Like torture.

..... and?

Not to mention the rudeness is all on OP's DH side who can't be bothered to host his own sister.

I would go out and leave them all to it what's the worst that can happen 🤷🏼‍♀️

Then get a couple of fold up chairs and go out and sit beside them while they're doing the project and keep pulling your husband back into the conversation. Or make it very, very clear to your husband in advance that there are no projects for their visits - ALL the time is spent as a foursome, or him with his sister and her husband while you get a break. It's his family and he has to take responsibility for both of them. It's so clear that he's inviting them and then creating projects to avoid his own sister. The whole 'oh I just like being busy' is bs. If he liked spending time with his sister he'd find a way to be busy in her company.

@JaneMumofTwins
Ask your husband what subjects and things does she find as boring as he'll to know or talk about then?

Next time you see her ensure you intrupt her conversations regularly and try talk incessantly about yourself often,

Obviously include subjects , things that bore the living daylights out of her too. 😴

She soon start dropping hints here and there or whine how 🤔 annoying irritating and self obsessed you are,
talking about yourself for a refreshing change etc,

Otherwise learn the conversation art trick of how to switch off zone out a bit , and just nod and agree in appropriate ways when necessary needed,

just be a bit pushy to talk about yourself too at times..

Didn't Churchill or someone say they drank to make boring people more interesting? Could you try that?

@Walkingwashingmachine - so people who are boring or have poor social skills are being cruel to other people by dint of talking to them?

I have a BIL who according to his wife (who's a disability assessor) is probably on the autistic spectrum though not diagnosed. He also has a chronic illness and hasn't worked for 20 years. He's quite hard to be around - he's a very intelligent guy who has an opinion on everything, but because of his frustration with his health and his loneliness he often dominates conversations and can be a know it all - which I think comes from low self esteem arising from 20 years of unemployment. As a family we accept that he's quite difficult to be around, but we don't denigrate him because of this. My teenage children are incredibly tolerant of him, seek him out at family parties and do him the kindness of listening to him and taking an interest in his opinions. Because he's a family member and they have compassion. I'm so proud to have raised such nice kids.

No wonder people with poor social skills have such high levels of severe depression, when even family members can't show any generosity or tolerance of them on the rare occasion that they meet.

This whole thread has made me sad.

I think most people make allowances for people with vulnerability like your BIL. I don't get from the OP that this is the case here however.

Would DH agree to limit to four nights?

At least one day out or evening out needs to be something for just the siblings, so they get a proper catch up.

Do you have some kind friends who could come over one evening to keep everyone together and dilute her talking? DH, SIL & BIL could go out for the day while you cook 😉

Can one evening be theatre? And maybe some kind of guided tour of somewhere during the day? That also reduces the opportunity for being either talked at or left alone with her.

And maybe you can take up a craft - knitting, or sweary cross stitch, or just something you can do when you're alone with her without being rude. You even ask her to bear with you a minute while you count stitches or check a pattern, just to breathe.

I sympathise with you. Your DH is being rude to her and inconsiderate towards you. But as a fellow sufferer of logorrhea, I really feel for her too.

You have a DH problem, OP. It is his DS and he should stop making it your job to entertain her.

Just go out for the days and leave him to entertain them. I always find a million errands to do with BIL and partner are here because I tire of them. They come for like a week at a time and park up in our house and want to talk about gaming and I have my limits. I just plan lots of must do activities during their visit and leave them and Dh to entertain the kids all day.

Sorry, OP, I missed your post about limited cinema and theatre options, and your own health needs.

I think it would be fair to warn them in advance that you need two hours a day resting alone and in silence in order to manage your health. And that you don't have the energy for x days of visit so it can only be x days.

Could you not at least say, politely, I really have to ask that you stop talking over me? I do have people I kind of have to see that I find a bit painful, but not for the length of time you do. I had an Aunt similar and I always got stuck talking to her, it was so tedious. My partner would just stand up and leave! However 4 days to a week is a long time to be stuck with someone. Can you organise things like meeting friends or something you have to do alone, out of the house, for some of the time? Failing that, 'I feel unwell and need some peace and quiet in my room' is a very reasonable thing to say.

Wear 1 ear bud... And half listen whilst listening to something better?
Have a lie down /long bath /unavoidable appointment /friend in crisis need to pop out /dentist /garden centre trip and lose her. Very easy ime...

Your DH with your support needs to limit visits, ideally to none at all or just for the day.

I wonder if your DH secretly would be grateful not to have her visit.

One day might be ok, 4 days to a week isn’t.
Your DH shouldn’t be inviting her then basically disappearing off leaving you to deal with her. That’s disrespectful.
Either he steps up and actually spends time with her, or I’d arrange to be out all the time .