MIL favours daughters children

[elderlyparentshelp]

A situation arose today which made me realise MIL really favours spending time with her daughter’s children over mine. Ive known this for a while, but today really shone a light on it.

I’ve read a few threads on here and it seems this is fairly common (although was absolutely not the case for me growing up, I was really close to my dad’s mum and she never differentiated between GC, so has come as a bit of a shock to me).

So if you’ve been in this situation with your MIL, what did you do? I’m torn between asking DH to have a conversation with her / making even more effort on our part to go visit her OR going in the opposite direction and accepting I can’t change her and so need to change my own expectations. My children are all under 6, so we have years of this still to go and I’d really appreciate some advice from others further ahead.

No big back story, we all get on well (at least I’m not aware of any issues), but MIL has alluded in the past to mothers being closer to their daughters children etc.

It probably hurts more as my own mother is terminally ill, so can’t be the type of granny she would want to be - MIL knows this and yet it hasn’t resulted in any more engagement with my DC.

I wondered if there was something instinctial about it as it's just so common.

I thought maybe it's that the grandmother's know with 100% certainty that the dc of their daughters are their bloodline, so they put most of their resources in to them vs dc that are potentially another man's instead of their sons.

(Caveat that obviously this would be an insane way to think, and in our family both sides have always been treated as equal. I've just seen this play out with so many families, from different cultures too, that I wondered if there was a throw back biological reason for it).

What an utterly bizarre take on it!!! Baffling in fact

It’s an animalistic trait for mothers to be closer to their own daughter’s children. Their own blood has carried that baby yet when their son has a child it is essentially a stranger carrying the baby. It’s just natural instincts.

I'd love to see the studies to back this statement up, and prove that it's not purely cutural. You sound so certain.

I wondered if there was something instinctial about it as it's just so common.
I thought maybe it's that the grandmother's know with 100% certainty that the dc of their daughters are their bloodline, so they put most of their resources in to them vs dc that are potentially another man's instead of their sons.

As previous posters have pointed out, it's cultural. In cultures where the sons are expected to care for/live with elderly parents, it works very differently. Also in many cultures, sons are heavily favoured, so their offspring are too.

Be careful of the easy lure of pop evolutionary psychology - it's largely bollocks.

How did you treat your mil when your children were born? Did you keep her at arms length and treat her as a loving grandparent or did you treat her, like so many people treat their mils with contempt. Was she included at Christmas and family events?

Having recently reached an age (my children's ages) where I'm starting to get a glimpse of what it might be to be a MIL, I think it's an impossible job.

You're either too involved or not involved enough. You say perhaps you could make more effort to see her more frequently, so maybe she's taking the lead from you, and is trying to give you the level of involvement you demonstrate you want.

I only have sons.

Would I prioritise one son’s family over the others?

No I would not.

If you have only DD’s you probably wouldn’t prioritise one over the other.

The truth is it’s a subconscious, or maybe not so subconscious self preservation act. Who will I get to see the most? Where can I do as I please? The answer is your DD, so that’s where you put all your eggs. It’s an insurance policy.

I’ve experienced this first hand and it’s all about control.

If she tried to take over you mother's role in current circumstances, would that be the right thing to do?

What opportunity have you given her to be an involved GM?

Mumsnet:
It's totally fine for you to not allow your inlaws to meet the baby until they are 3 months old. How dare they disturb your baby bubble?!

Why should you phone / visit/ Talk to your inlaws? They're not YOUR family!

Also mumsnet: why don't my inlaws show more interest in my children?

In a nutshell … yes.

There are a lot of assumptions on this thread considering that the hasn’t even responded with any details.

My husband and I bent over backwards to accommodate my in laws.

They were the first family member to see and hold our children, we drove to see them every week or they came to us, we dragged the then very young dc to endless family events even though it wasn’t ideal or convenient, I sent photos of the dc to pil all the time, dh gave them lifts, did loads of work in their house (builder).

Once sil had a little girl our ds was relegated to being 2nd class.

The favouritism was glaringly obvious and it is horrible.

It’s more likely that she prefers spending time with her daughter over her daughter in law.

My in-laws saw all our babies within hours of them being born, pass the parcel. No babies were withheld.

We don’t need childcare or rather very rarely so have rarely had to ask and in fact when we have 8/10 something else suddenly crops up so I always have my mum prepared as back up.

Before the other children arrived they wanted and asked to spend time and we would happily let them take one or more off together or alone for trips and whatnot as much or as little as they wanted. Round for weekly meals they invited us as the whole family, even went on some holidays together at their idea and some ours.

But as soon as they arrived it was basically bye something betters come along. Used to call in after the school run some days, got told we called in too much.

Now we get we never see you. Well you never invite us, you moaned when we did come.

I’m sorry to hear that.
Yes op could have a similar situation but without more detail we are kind of stuck making assumptions or not replying at all.

I get that. But do you treat the sets of gc differently? I bet not. That’s the difference.

But that's naturally going to happen from having a better relationship with tha parents.

More sleepovers, more time spent in houses, more days out and then more money spent.

If parents want better for their children they have to be the first ones forward.

To many people on MN expect to take from the village without putting in.

But why more sleepovers?
That makes no sense. Surely you'd want more time with the DGC you don't see as much?

What do you mean by be the first ones forward?

Accept that you cannot change other people’s thoughts, emotions and behaviour.

Not really, you'd have better lines of communication with the child you have a better realtionship with.
More opportunities to offer, more opportunities to be asked.

Plus look at how many posts are put on here at the outrage of a MIL asking for a sleepover.

Much easier to communicate with the adult you're closest to.

Because it's no longer just a parent child relationship. It's 2 mutual adults.
And if the adult child isn't putting in the effort then the Grandparent doesn't have to chase for it.

My son’s daughter spends significantly more time with her maternal grandmother even though we both look after her one day a week. DIL likes to hang out with her mum a lot so the joke is that I am “no. 2 grandma”. If both grandmas are in the same place (we get on well and spend time together) GD will always favour no. 1 grandma. I don’t mind tbh, it’s just how things are.

In your situation I would assume your In-laws see more of their DD’s kids so have built a stronger relationship with them, you could ask your DH to have a word as they may not have really thought about it but they may have a “it’s just how things are” attitude too. In any case I am very sorry to hear about your mum which is probably making the whole thing more raw for you.