In-laws and Grandchildren

[wishuponacloud97]

Why (in my experience) do in laws favour their daughters children over their sons?

I have seen it time and time again. The only exception being my maternal Grandmother. I also have a MIL that just blatantly favours her daughters children over ours and it grinds my gears.

Please share your wisdom with me as mother to a boy and a girl I can't imagine ever feeling or treating their future children any differently in the slightest.

Yes in my experience but hey ho, their loss.

I think sometimes because (some) daughters lean on and involve their mother's in their parenting journey more than (some) sons do. If I compare myself to my brother, I craved my mum by side from soon after I gave birth. I wanted her support, her guidance and reassurance. Over time, this has meant my mum has been more involved overall with my parenting journey and by default my children. My brother didn't seek her out for that level of involvement. He loves her and is close to her, but he hasn't invited that involvement in his parenting.

I think because my mum feels more involved in my kids lives, she's formed more of a closeness with them (which I've facilitated) and I think that can come across as favouritism and it probably is a bit. She'd welcome the same involvement with my brother's children, but she wouldn't demand it. She takes her cues from my brother and lets him set the level of involvement he wants.

I don't think btw that this is every family. In my dh's family, he's involved his parents with our kids more than his sister and I think they feel closer to our kids more as a result.

Well mine dosnt, but she never favoured me, her daughter either so it’s not been a surprise.

In my experience it’s harder to have frequent contact and form relationships with a son’s children than a daughter’s. Many DiL seem
to feel parents in law are ‘overstepping the mark’ or being ‘entitled’ if they would welcome equal treatment and access.

I think sometimes it’s a closer relationship and just comes across as favouritism. Women often (and naturally imo) want their own mums around more when they’ve just given birth, not always of course but mums maybe spend more time on mat leave with their own mums than MIL and it starts from there. Perhaps some MIL’s want to avoid treading on any toes, whereas they don’t have to be as tactful with their own daughters children therefore have a closer relationship.

Why do women end up the primary parent with men in the secondary role? Why are most of the arrangements to do with children and family left to the woman to organise? Why do women gravitate to their own parents more than to their in laws? Why might that impact on the amount of time grandparents spend with their daughters children when compared with their sons and result in different type of relationship?

I do understand the points of view in regard to involvement. That's not the case in our situation. I was incredibly close to my mother in law as my own had died (so no competition). She just isn't as thrilled by ours 😂 she denys this wholeheartedly but actions speak louder than words.

I wanted my mum there at my birth, teaching me to breastfeed, staying over and helping the first night home from the hospital.

She did ALL the childcare for me and my siblings and was a great support.

My DH didn't involve his mum as much in the newborn stage - and tbh whenever his mum was involved she upset us. She kept telling me the baby preferred her to me and asking me and DP to leave the house so she could be alone with the baby without us...

The experiences were so different. My mum is now way closer to my DC than MIL is, and MIL has lost interest in DC now they're no longer babies.

Not sure how typical that is, but that's my experience!

My MIL favoured my SIL's dogs! No competition from my mum - she died years before I met my husband. Tried so many times to help build a relationship with the grandchildren, was always refused, saw them 5 times max in 8 years!

In many cases, mothers and daughters are very close and comfortable in a way MILs and DILs are not. And lots of men aren't great at keeping in touch so that can lead to a more distant relationship between parents and sons.

It's not as simple as just saying parents favour daughters and their families.

My own mother even though she absolutely favoured my brothers over me use to say this. When I had my children she wasn’t involved at all with 1 & 2 as I would not have her in my life. With #3 we were in contact, she actually had my older children when I was in Labour, she made this massive fuss about finally getting to do “this”. “This” was her turning up shortly after birth, I was fine with that I wanted my older DCs with me. But the meds they gave me just before baby popped out were starting to work and I needed help to the toilet and cleaning up, blood was gushing and I didn’t want my DCs to see. To her it was such an important part, her being there for her DD. I honestly think she was genuine at the time and I do wonder if she actually liked me and wasn’t a nasty narcissistic bitch if she would have treat my children differently if I wasn’t her scape goat child.

As it is, it’s DB then other DB anyone else she feels benefits her and me. This is the same with my DCs.

My first serious BF/fiancé really wanted children, I think if I had had them with him I would have absolutely favoured his mother over mine. And although I never had children with him, his mother did favour his children over his sisters.

Daughters are often closer to their parents than their in laws. Wedding dress shopping, wedding planning, childminding, days out, babysitting, families holidays etc etc They often see their mum far more with the kids than they do their in laws. Not always, but often.

My parents tended to favour my brother's children because they were local & they looked after them. I live away & so always felt like we were getting in the way of their set up & actually wasn't able to have them visit much as they were tied down at weekends. I'm the daughter in this case so I don't think it's always true.

Women tend to make decisions about child rearing and initiate family contact or at least take the lead on it. And they will feel more comfortable about having their mum around in general because of that close family tie. And I think for mums with daughters as a result they have more influence over how their daughter parents and feel more comfortable with it as it's likely to be in line with how they parented. They may be less close to their son because women are more likely to take the lead in initiating relationships and there may be some clash in values with their daughter in law as she didn't raise her. There will be boundaries in place with a daughter in law that won't exist with a daughter who they've raised and known all their life. I'm not saying any of this is true in all circumstances and not all families will fit this model but I think this does help to explain it in general.

A lot of it is down to the existing relationship. I have never been close to my in laws. We get on when we visit each other but it's not the easy and comfortable relationship I've had with my own family.

That's not suddenly going to change when children are involved so they're not going to have the same relationship.

The other issue is the expectation that the DIL is responsible for nurturing and maintaining this relationship with the grandchildren which is bullshit.

Our rule is he manages his family and I manage mine. Gifts, calls, visits etc So if my partner hasn't seen his family for a while I might give him a nudge to call and arrange something, but beyond that, it's up to him.

So we see far more of my family and friends than his.

My mum is closer to my children yes because she sees them a lot more as we make the effort to visit where as my brother and his wife don’t bother at all. Sister in law is all her family even though my parents have really tried to be apart of their lives it’s been chucked back at them time and time again.

That's on your db though. He has every right to see his own family and if he wanted to he would surely.

I do think some of this is down to the dh's.
My ds actively facilitated a relationship with us after dgc was born and dil is wonderful too but I know that ds wouldn't allow us to be left out.

I've read before it's a biological/genetic thing on a primal level.

They know their daughters children are biologically related to them since they carried and gave birth to them (donors aside)

They don't know for sure on some basic level that their sons children are his

Also as women are born with all the eggs they'll ever produce then as a woman we actually carry our future grandchildren inside us for those 9 months of pregnancy therefore creating another fundamental link

Not saying it's right but human evolution/genetics/biology is a weird thing

Look at all the animals that stay together in multi generational families - mainly mothers and daughters - elephants being the main one. You don't get sons and their children staying with the herd. It's mainly mothers and daughters

Fortunately, I have not experienced this with my own mother in law, she loves our children just as much as her daughter's child and shows no favouritism whatsoever. She is one awesome lady who I will always look up to.

The same can be said of my mum, even though I was the closest to her out of my brothers, she loved all her grandchildren equally the same and was just as involved in my brothers children's lives as my own children's. Sadly my own mum passed away when my children were very young, so I am grateful that my own mother in law is as wonderful as she is.

I understand where you are coming from though, my ex mother in law, after her daughter gave birth said to me, she could never feel the same about her son's future children (potentially mine as we were married) as she did about her daughters. I actually really liked her before she said that 😆

MIL prefers her daughters children to mine- but we see them more as we live 30 mins away and SIL lives abroad. SILs MIL is very old and frail so I think my MIL feels like there’s no competition whereas she is very jealous of my Mum and her relationship with my DC.

One of my DC asked MIL why she only had photos of his cousins in her house. She couldn’t give a proper reason.

Out of interest does your dh have photos of his dm with the dgc in your house?

That sounds really hard, OP.

I think the general point holds true that often daughters involve their mothers more. I live on the same street as my SIL, with my PIL a 15 minute drive away. I get on well with PIL, but I'm not in daily contact with them or see them anything like as frequently as SIL does. Consequently, they tend to know much more about the minutiae of her kids' lives. They would be the first people she'd go to for help, whereas I have a couple of friends I would turn to first (though PIL are great and very much there for us if needed). I think they are very conscious of being fair and genuinely interested in all the children and all of us, but they do have a different relationship with SIL's family because of the relationship they have with her. And I think that's OK.

(My mum lives overseas, so doesn't feature much in the day to day stuff. I probably have more in common with MIL in terms of parenting, but neither of them would be who I'd look to for personal support really.)

My Mum favours my brother and his children over mine.

My maternal grandmother has always favoured her sons children.

I do think generally speaking it is accurate that grandparents are closer to their daughters children though.

I remember a friend of mine telling me, when we were teens, that her paternal grandparents preferred her cousins (aunts children) over her and her siblings. They quite openly said “because they are definitely part of the family, you three could be anyone’s” as the reason, on more than one occasion 😬

Our children look just like my DH so no denying genetics. In fact she always claims everything they do or are is from her side of the family. She doesn't think they're not hers 😂