MIL insisting DD comes to stay

[sleepoverrubbish]

My MIL has been insisting that DD (aged 12) comes to stay with her for three or four nights.
When we visit we all go and we go as much as we can. We also have an open invite for her to see us literally whenever she likes.

Its not something I understand, even with my own mum who I love and trust completely, DD has only had a sleepover when I gave birth to DS. We just see my Mum altogether and it’s never come up.

I don’t really understand her obsession with it. She has form for getting into massive strops and it feels emotionally manipulative. I also think if she wants a stronger relationship with DD she could actually come visit and help me on a day out as I also have DS aged 10 months but she would never dream of actually being helpful. DD has also said they want their grandmother to visit and would rather they came up than she goes down as she wants to show them our area. She’s excited at the thought of sharing our local haunts with her. Whenever we mention this, grandmother just ignores or laughs.

How would you deal with this? We’ve invited her to visit several times, it’s not an issue with driving as she is happy to drive three hours to us to pick up DD and take her home so another 3 hours. Which I also think is ridiculous at her age. She is 85.

AIBU? I’m exhausted from MILs manipulation. When DS was born she went insane when I said we wanted some space for a week after recovering from a difficult birth. She isn’t helpful so only came to coo over the baby whilst I made her cups of tea and dinner.

Weve had a difficult relationship for years as we are very different people. My own mum is very caring and understanding thankfully and just doesn’t do this, I just don’t know how to handle her.

It would be lovely for them to spend some quality time together. Just two caveats

Does your DD want to go?

Is your MIL still healthy and mobile to cope with DD alone?

You reply with something along these lines:

“Hi MiL,
We have had a discussion around your regular requests for DD to stay over with you and we’ve decided that it’s best to leave it at the moment. DD has a lot going on, she has her own friendships and activities so isn’t available to stay with you. Unfortunately for you this is likely to carry on for some considerable time, so we’d appreciate it if you could please stop asking.”

Or something like that.

Her DF is having a tantrum right now!

How would you deal with this? We’ve invited her to visit several times, it’s not an issue with driving as she is happy to drive three hours to us to pick up DD and take her home so another 3 hours. Which I also think is ridiculous at her age. She is 85.

Absolutely not, no way under any circumstances would I let an 85 year old drive my child for 3hours, never mind a 6 hour round trip.

I love the term "wake up dead" 😵

Thank you for all your replies

To answer some questions

We aren’t close as MIL is very cold. She often ignores DD when she’s upset and is really strict.

My biggest issues are her driving and DD being upset and not having anyone to turn to.

Agree with this being for show. Apparently there is a village party on at their local pub one of the days she wanted DD to visit so I think she just wants to show off that she’s looking after DD to her friends but doesn’t actually care about building a relationship with her or coming to visit us and enjoy the things DD likes to do

Had a chat with DH and he’s apologised for being aggressive. He’s got a lot on his plate with work too but it’s always MIL that sets us off with arguments.

Every time we go down to visit she has some sort of jibe. When I was breastfeeding DS at only 3 months she was asking ‘what am I doing’ and why aren’t I helping load the car as we were leaving etc. She barged into the room where I was feeding to relay this. So we argued about that on the way home.

DH has never backed me up or confronted her in all the years of our relationship, Im sure she talks badly of me to her friends. I met one of them and was met with a very frosty response.

Send 'D'H for a sleepover. A couple of weeks would be nice.

Does you DD honestly actively not want to go? Everyone is saying that, but I can't see where you have written it (unless I missed it). I know you said your daughter would prefer MIL to visit you, but as that isn't on the table for whatever reason (maybe she doesn't like staying away from home? My mom at that age wouldn't either, and she is a lovely person) would your dd rather go on this trip, or not see her gran.

If dd is willing to go I would go for it - you may not like MIL yourself but it is your dd's blood relative, and also it's a chance for her to have a bit of independence staying away from her parents, and just a different experience which will break up the long summer holidays - I'd go for it if I were you.

You don't have to like MIL, but don't cut of your nose to spite your face (IYSWIM) - she is offering your DD an opportunity for a little trip, and you a chance to focus on your little one for a few days.....

This absolutely! I was also concerned about GP driving DC in similar circumstances.

We had a similar issue with disinterested Grandparent insisting on 14 year old DC coming to stay (never even looked after this DC before!) I'd already organised DC meeting up with primary friends they missed, that week including paid for summer sports clubs. DC didn't want to miss this.

I offered instead to drive DC down myself and collect again in two days, but it was a whole week or nothing, Wouldn't meet us halfway.

It's perfectly understandable that a 12-year-old isn't mad keen on the idea of spending three or four days with only her 85-year-old grandmother for company. It's also perfectly understandable that you aren't keen on the idea of an 85-year-old doing a six-hour round trip each way to pick her up! My grandparents were all pretty fit and lively people at that age and both my grandads were still driving short distances, but not three-hour motorway trips with a 12-year-old in the car. And it sucks that she won't come down and visit and spend time with DD that way.

As always with these things, I'm not sure why it's you, rather than your husband, who is having these conversations with your MIL. But at 85, she's not going to change her ways - if anything, she'll get worse, in my experience - so you just have to say 'No, DD would love to see you but neither DD nor DH and I think it's a good idea for her stay over for several nights. It's a very long journey each way which we'd rather you didn't do with her, and 12 is an age where they want to be doing stuff with their friends really.' And then if she keeps on, you say 'I'm sorry, but however many times you ask, the answer will still be no.'

I loved staying at my grandparents too, we are lucky we had that.

But in this situation, the daughter doesn’t want to go and stay with her grandma, so I think that’s more than enough of a reason to not let her go. It sounds like she’s much happier seeing grandma on home turf, when her parents are around too.

Of course, if her daughter doesn't want to go then that's fair enough. If she had been going to stay with Granny from small it would be different. Once you reach 12/13 you're much more interested in hanging out with your mates than staying with Granny!

The child doesn't want to, why do people try to make children visit people they have no interest in.

Either way op, YANBU and DH probably learnt his behaviour from her so he needs to get into therapy to unlearn this abusive reaction, not on.

Just say no.

Just say no thanks.

Let her rip. Develop a thicker skin. Stop responding to her calls or texts if she persists.

If youve noticed that shes manipulative, then I should stay mindful of that fact in your dealings with her AND other family members could be victims of manipulation if youre not careful.!!!!!!! How do you know that anyone is doing Anything of their own free will with a manipulative person. You need a private family conference to decide how you move forward , not including MIL.

I personally don't see what your problem is. Me and my brother frequently had sleepovers with grandparents. We loved it!

Edit: Ignore my reply, only just seen your update.

I have had this for years with my SIL. She’s lives about 2 hours away from us. Always o we’d love to have the kids stay over. But unless I am desperate for child care there is no need for them to stay over for a weekend. It would be a logistical nightmare. I also don’t know why she is so insistent on it, like your MIL she has never one travelled here and then taken DC out for a day, it seems to be an obsession with having a sleep over

So has your daughter just like never had a sleepover with any of her grandparents?
i find that strange. Why not?

from specifically what you’ve written (which is all we can judge on) your mil wants to spend some normal grandparent time with your daughter which may involve staying over etc.

are you a helicopter mum? (A mum who just doesn’t/can’t let go)?
i can’t see anything wrong with grandparents wanting your kids to spend the night.

maybe she keeps insisting because she thinks it’s weird you are saying no.

why shouldn’t they spend time with other family members. As parents we shouldn’t negatively impact our kids lives, and an argument could be made that restricting access to extended family is a negatively controlling behaviour.

I'm surprised at the number of people saying I had a lovely time with MY lovely grandparents, so you should let her go. Thats bloody weird. Your grandma being fantastic does not mean OP's MIL would also be fantastic if only "controlling" OP let her child go.

That's some messed up reasoning.

Plus, OP wouldn't be letting the child go, the child doesn't want to, hence OP would be forcing her to go.

She doesn't get to insist on anything regarding YOUR children. Ever.

Ignore her, block her, walk away, say no whatever you have to do. It's not up to her.

My sister went to stay weekends with the grandmother, what's wrong with it.

Then she didn't want to go as she was just getting a social life at the weekends, then grandmother died anyway sadly.

What is this preciousness all the time?

She can't insist. She doesn't have the authority to. The people who have a final say in this are your DD and you as her parents. You hold all the cards here - you can cut off contact with her altogether if she won't back down on this.

DD has said to us repeatedly she wants grandmother to stay here and for grandmother to visit, but grandmother wants everything on her terms. I don’t want to force DD to go down there, DH thinks we should force her because it will encourage independence but this doesn’t make sense to me. She’s not a clingy child, she happily goes to brownies and school sleepovers, just doesn’t want to do this.

Also I just can’t get my head around the long drive (6 hours) for MIL to come get DD and take her down. We can go down and drop DD off then stay in a hotel but it kind of feels like we are doing this solely to please MIL because she refuses to come up.