I supervised every interaction with my in-laws until my kids were old enough and outspoken enough to stand up for themselves. Thankfully, while my DH didn’t see or understand in-laws’ abusive behaviors, he believed me when I said it was abusive. Since he grew up with it, to him it was normal. He would say “she didn’t mean it that way, or in a bad way” or “that’s just the way she is. Everyone just ignores it or doesn’t let it bother them”. However, he stood by me when I said that it bothered me and pointed it out that if she didn’t mean it in a bad way, then she would want to told how she was coming across so she could change.
When I started a relationship with my DH, I put up with a lot of nastiness, but I still required him to be on my side and put me first. We both spent years feeding into it by showing our upset and still making regular visits out of obligation and not rocking the boat. We ended up moving a very long distance away and that forced us to take a break from them. We got used to the peace and both realized that we needed to break the cycle. We started working on ourselves and surrounding ourselves with supportive people.
It was a few years later, during a very difficult and medically complicated pregnancy with my first child that I started hard boundaries and really put my foot down. We were poor as church mice and lived in a shoebox apartment, with barely room for us, let alone a baby. Some of the in-laws were trying to insist on traveling to us and staying with us for the baby’s birth and first three months. They were demanding we pay for the travel as we were the ones who moved.
My DH was considering trying to compromise, only paying for half of the travel and a three week stay. I refused it all. Told him that the baby and I were not going to be available to visit them while I was vulnerable and recovering from pregnancy/chilbirth and learning motherhood. I also pointed out that we needed the money for the baby, so couldn’t afford to “help” with their expenses.
I countered with that they could start saving now and would be able to afford travel and a few days in a hotel when baby was a few month old. By then he could use a few days vacation time for their visit, since I refuse to see them without him. He saw that this was reasonable and proposed it to them. They lost it. Blamed me for our move, when we moved for him, and said they were filing for grandparents’ rights and custody and visitation of our baby. I was terrified and devastated as gpr’s were a thing in their state. This woke his protectiveness towards me and baby even further. We researched and thankfully, the state we lived in wouldn’t enforce gpr’s.
I was ready to cut them off at that point, but knew he wasn’t. I played the long game. While I was so angry I could chew nails, I only expressed my fear and hurt that they would threaten to take baby away. He wanted to give them another chance, if they could calm down and be reasonable. This is where I put in hard boundaries as my compromise to him. I agreed to save up and visit them in a few months, once I was fully healed. We would have our own accommodations and would visit them, but he had to make sure they didn’t do or say anything hurtful. If they did and he didn’t address it in a way that showed me he was willing to protect us, I would cut them off from myself and any children.
I had spent the time away from them learning to gray rock like an ice queen. The visits were stressful, but only happened once a year at that point, and I let little jabs at me go, but made sure to point them out to my DH in private. He started calling them out privately, telling them he wouldn’t tolerate me or the children being mistreated. A few times, they would do or say something when he was out of earshot. This is when I very calmly pointed out their rudeness and told them we would leave. I would tell DH, in front of them and with no emotion, exactly what they said or did. Then I would announce that it was time to go and we would leave.
At first, it was a performance for me. I was seething inside. I wanted to argue and give them the brunt of my anger. I wanted my Dh to blow up at them on my behalf. The problem was, they spent two decades programming him to take their abuse. They normalized it to the point that he didn’t see it. He was so used to drama, shouting, gossiping and backbiting that if I behaved like that, it wouldn’t phase him or them. Because I spent our time away from them being the opposite of them, he got used to the peace.
We visit less often as a consequence of their behavior. I’m not willing to see them more and my DH understands why. He also now sees how damaging his childhood was and wants to protect our children from that. He has understood that he doesn’t always recognize their abuse because he was conditioned to accept it, so was willing not to take the children without me until they were able to call out anything hurtful. We have several children, but he has also only taken one at a time so he can fully supervise the visit. Only two of our children have been willing to visit without me and both have told the in-laws things they did or said was rude or inappropriate. My oldest is especially brilliant at this and is very calm and clinical when she does it.