Mother in law - what would you do

[Lkakpk]

So a bit of background … my husband has one brother . Brother has four kids .Him and his wife rely heavily on my mil to extent shes almost like a full time nanny and a lot of times ive asked for help shes not been able to due to them already asking.
Me on other hand am very close to my morher and never really needed her help and i think thats been something that has bothered her over the years and there is a lot of jealousy with my mum .
Recently she went through a hard time so i tried to include her more .
She recently spoke to my husband and asked to tell me to use her for babysitting as she would love to mind our youngest more .
First time i asked she replied with i have plans but can cancel( coffee date ) - i told her its not a problem i can sort something else out but i just thought you may want to spend time with our son expecting her to indeed cancel knowing i was trying to take on waht she had said to my husband . She replied oh ill see if i can go another day . Withih minutes replied she couldnt- i was quite took aback she would turn down spending one on one time with my son she rarely sees for a coffee date with someone who is barely a close friend and even more so as my sil has her literally doing everything and she never says no .
Now comes the issue - followng day my elsest son has just started a class that his cousin goes too - i arrive to find said cousin with mil who had not even offered to take both of them ? Surely if you knew both grandsons were at same class and live five mins away you would offer to take both to keep it fair ? Couldnt help but feel annoyed especially as it was raining and had my youngest in tow. Would you be annoyed?How would you navigate this ? I wouldng ask her to babysit again nor would i want her to take my child to lesson out of principle .

Require her son, your DH, to do any of the requests for help with his children.

Hey
I don't think many people will understand your situation and are blaming you as the baddie.
It's because you know the score.
Your mil is playing victim and playing a game with you. Annoying you on purpose.
I have been through this.
When you tell others you come across as looney.
So
Best thing to do is cut off contact
Be with those who want to be with you

This is a typical Mumsnet extreme response.I would suggest taking the mother in law out for a day trip to the zoo etc so she can see the children and bond with her.

I think you know where you stand. Leave it to your husband to tell her if she chelps on at him again.

Are there genuinely posters on here who would cut off her mother-in-law because she didn't rearrange her plans to babysit once and she didn't offer to take her grandchild to a class?

OP has her mother doing childcare for her.
She criticises her BIL for having his mother act as a nanny for his kids.
She expects her MIL to rearrange plans to look after her kids and to take her child to a class along with his cousin so that OP doesn't have to go to the class with her younger child.
She says that her own mother is her and her kids preferred childcare (inference grandparent?).
She says she only asked MIL to do childcare after she said she felt left out.

Maybe the MIL is an absolute nightmare. But maybe she's not the only one.

I can see where you’re coming from but I struggle when people aren’t straightforward and say what they mean. So the whole things with the coffee and saying it’s not a problem when actually you wanted her to cancel does my head in and she isn’t a mindreader. Re the club, it’s disappointing that it hadn’t occurred to her to offer to take your son too. Did she know both her grandsons are doing it? But it would seem a good opportunity to ask her for help that she is definitely able to give and will save you dragging your youngest along every week. So I wouldn’t refuse to ask her on principle when it would actually be of great help. Maybe mention that it would help save you dragging your youngest along and she may better understand how valuable it would be and be a great way to spend time with her grandsons.

Can your husband arrange something with your MIL? If she really meant what she said, she would agree to something if her son was to sort it with her? Sometimes being the DIL trying to organise everything can be awkward (I feel that too at times)

Is it possible that potentially she realises she agreed to too much with your BIL and his family, and actually now has limited capacity (mentally and socially) for more, and maybe feels she can/has to draw the boundary somewhere, even it is not perhaps the most equitable overall, as once she agrees to something more she will not ever be able to step away. She is already full of obligations and would love to see more of your kids but she also doesn't want to sacrifice the obligation-free time she has. Perhaps she sees you have your mum who can offer up help and feels you have the support you need. Possibly she is overwhelmed with what she has agreed to already, perhaps she is concerned she will never have time for herself to enjoy retirement because of a commitment she already made to your BIL which she feels she can't step away from. I would suggest it is potentially unreasonable to expect her to reorganise her non-obligation time.

Either way, it does come off cold on her part. However, perhaps DH husband can sort times for her to see the kids adhoq as it was to him she made the offer? Otherwise maybe just lower expectations and view any time she does spend with them as a bonus.

It is always so surprising when you have kids that the people we expect to help/be engaged/supportive are often not there for us how we would have imagined, and the help/support/interest can often come from the most unlikely of people!

Sorry you are feeling this way. Would recommend trying to reframe, remove expectations and move forwards xx

@ThatsAFineLookingHighHorse Yep i thought this too … Leave it to him in future…

@Hididi11 😂😂 this a million times over 🙌🏻

@Cittrn
I agree on a lot of your points . I do believe there is a lot of guilt on her part that its not an equal split HOWEVER i think its more guilt on her son more than her grandchildren and her making that comment was more to keep face with hin rather than an actual offer of help if that makes sense .

@Himawarigirl she did know both grandsons would be present and that made it worse as last week i had took both of them . Petty maybe but if my two sons both had kids similar ages at same football class i wouldnt dream of taking one and not the other - and im sure a lot of nans ( if not most ) would think the same - seems cold to help out one son and not the other ….

Sounds a lot like my MIL.

Constant childcare for DHs sibling’s DC. None for ours, complains she never sees us or our DC but we don’t have any days off together, we’ve moved our work schedules so we can cover all childcare so one of us is always working. Also no help ever offered from my side but they at least don’t complain.

Never offers to help, I have no expectation here but if she wants to see DC she could collect from school, classes, anything but never offers. Only complains and compares us to DHs Sibling & partner who she likes to tell us “take an interest”. Well they both work M-F thanks to help from both sets of grandparents so they have time to spend. We have to take annual leave to get a day off together but we are facilitate a relationship with her GC.

Ignore and carry on, it’s clearly only said for effect as she’s making no effort her end!

Human beings are very complex.
Those who are closest can hurt us the most.
we can also get ' TRIANGULATED' the most. Which, for the uninitiated , means using a third person to try to make another person feel excluded.
This sounds like s very complicated family dynamic. Sounds like she wanted you to ask her so she could continue to TRIANGULATE you because, to HER, it appeared like you were happily cruising along in life. And to a Narc, that us tantamount to IGNORING HER.

Sorry but you sound totally entitled and in the coffee date instance, manipulative too.

I wouldn’t be cancelling a coffee date I had already planned for someone else’s short notice plans that suit THEM.

book her for things well in advance and respect her “no”

OP, her words and actions do not match.

Leave your MIL to your husband.
If he comes back with more statements about her wanting more time with them, brush it off....just words.
This is about her wanting to feel better about things being so one-sided.
You are so lucky you have your mothers support.
I certainly wouldn't ask her for babysitting, leave that up to your husband to manage.
Not your job to make her feel better about being a disinterested grandmother to your children.

This happens in familys where one side are given constant support.
My friends brother got it and she had to crack on without any offer of help whatsoever.
Her children never had one on one time with their grandparents as her brothers children were always there.
She got on with things, never complained, accepted it and managed working FT without ever having back up from her parents.

After about 12 years her brother moved 4 hours away for work and suddenly she is being asked to visit constantly and efforts to guilt her to bring the children over.
Her two boys have soccer/rugby swimming training and matches/parties.... very busy lives and have zero interest in grandparents whom they have very little real bond with.
Her parents were happy to see them every few months for a decade and that is how it remained. Once they got to their teens the refused to visit completely.
You get back from children what you put in. Come the teen years if they are not bonded with you, they will often refuse to visit as they are busy with their own lives.

You can’t just expect someone to cancel plans they’ve made because you have decided you want her to babysit, that’s totally unreasonable. If she has plans she has plans, regardless of whether it’s one time or three times, I’d never expect my Mum or parent in law to cancel their plans because I need a babysitter. Maybe try going round to see her with your child, or inviting her to you for a Sunday lunch or something instead of just asking her to babysit each time so she feels like you want her to spend time and not just babysit?

You said she tells your husband that she wants to see more of the children so let him organise when she will. Just step back and let them sort it out between them.

I would tell him that she had the opportunity to take him to the class given she was already going there but say it in a neutral way. He might be more likely to see it as weird that way

Totally see your point. If you ask DH to organise then you call her bluff so to speak.
Then you know where you really stand and you have also given her a full chance to be true to her offer. Depending on what she then does, you can move forwards whatever the outcome of that experiment.
Wishing you all the best x

@BB088 did you read original post ?! it has nothing to do with visits … she ASKED to be considered for bahysittinh its not that its been sprung out of thin air . We do visit .

@Lurkingandlearning yes ive done exactly that and he agreed it doesnt look great especially if we use our two sons as a future example and us being the grandparents to their kids …

So because you are a busy young family your time is worth more than hers as a retiree

Agree op sounds bitter that her mil has hobbies and looks after her other grandchildren .Ops own mother looks after her own children so I do not see a problem
The poor mil would be exhausted if she had to look after both sets of grandchildren .