We invited my MIL (who is single) to come down and see us in January 2024. We love 5 hours away. It was arranged for March 2024. Her dad, partners grandad then died in the February so the March visit was cancelled. Ok, can’t be helped, we saw her when he passed, family all there. Visit was rearranged for August 2024. My partner then lost his dad (his parents weren’t together) last summer(July 2024). His mum was going to come down just after it happened (August 2024). She then had an operation that summer so didn’t rearrange the visit, just cancelled it. The operation coincided with my partners dad’s death. We went up to see her after the funeral, just after her operation. She spent the week talking about how much pain she was in after surgery, barely mentioned my partner. He says he asked her not to talk about his dad so this was fine.
However, after cancelling on us and not rearranging for the visit to take place before or after her surgery, she still managed to use her weekends to find and have a relationship with a new partner (since split.)
A visit was then arranged for August 2025. She has since used her time off to visit her mother (1 week, understandable I guess) and spend two weeks off for her birthday. None of this time off she had was arranged to spend time with us for.
She has just cancelled the August 2025 visit claiming she has an operation mid May (which means rather than seeing how she feels in late August when the visit is arranged for, she must cancel for then already).
She claims she knew this operation was taking place sometime but didn’t have a date. My question to her was knowing you had to cancel March and August 2024, and knowing you may have to cancel again for another operation, why would you not use your time off to ensure you could come and see us? Her reply was because she wanted two weeks off for her birthday instead. (She didn’t do anything special for it by her own admission, in fact she says she spent the two weeks in the garden).
AIBU to be pissed that despite the constant cancelling, her priority for her time off was to sit in the garden rather than ensure she could come and see her son (who by all accounts has had a shit year.) I know operations can’t be helped, what I’m pissed about us despite knowing she let us down and may do so again, her priority was to use her time off for herself instead of arranging to come to us then. I’m very hurt by this as I feel she’s prioritising time for herself (getting a bf, spending two weeks sitting at home for her birthday) over seeing us when we’ve been asking since Jan ‘24.