Mumsnet jury needed on this one please...sorry bit long!

[honeybrown]

...and I promise to abide by your decision!

The issue: My friends' MIL is a close friend of my MIL. I have just had an email from this friend letting me know that my mother in law has been very "negative" (to put it mildly) about the fact that my husband and I haven't been up to see her with the children for 7 months. According to MIL, our behaviour is disgusting ....

Granted MIL is disabled and finds travelling difficult but what she failed to mention to her friend is that we have had a hellish few months with our ds. Ds has autism and gets very stressed in strange places, doesn't travel well and doesn't sleep if we stay over anywhere. After a two night stopover with my sister, where ds had a total of 4 hours sleep, mega tantrums and excessive headbanging, Dh and I decided we would put staying away on hold until ds could cope better with it. In the meantime, Dh visited MIL on his own and also with our dd. We even sent Dh the 260 miles to her house on Christmas day because his selfish brother decided he would rather stay at home even though it was his turn. We just haven't been up all together for 7 months.

This sounds like such a whinge but I am fed up of being slated by this woman when actually I am doing my best in less than easy circumstances. Dh thinks we should just ignore what she said to her friend. I think we need to confront her and, in as nice a way as possible, let her know that this is unacceptable.

Can the mumsnet jury help please?

[yurt1]

It's not easy to take it on the chin- especially when its your MIL, so don't be too hard on yourself. After years of it I had some counselling last year which ended up focussing on this very issue (by someone very experienced with ASD) which helped. Don't be too hard on yourself or think you should just be able to get over it- it's very difficult.