His sister drives me mad!

[OutdoorQueen]

Will try & keep it brief but will be difficult as it’s my favourite topic to rant on!

My hubby seems to run round for his sister non stop. Often having to alter / delay our plans!

She is a single parent to 5 DC, she chose to keep having children with a man she no longer loved. I understand she wanted them but she also chose to leave him. This was all pre planned on her part.

The kids dad is a bit useless when it comes to their hobbies, if it’s his WE with them he won’t take them etc.

So, she enrolled them all in different clubs. Think one at hockey one at swimming for every Saturday morning AT THE SAME TIME!

This means my DH has to drive from ours to hers (a 60 min journey) to take 2 of them and she takes the other 3. It isn’t a one off or an emergency, it was a ‘I need you to take A & B every other Saturday please’. No is that ok? No if you don’t have plans etc. She knows he hates saying no to her & massively plays on this.

That’s my AIBU 1 - that is massively winds me up & that she’s a CF for just expecting it.

Secondly her eldest 2 (twins) are in their 1st year of high school. They don’t like walking home (approx 10 min walk). She can’t get out of work to collect them one day a week (the younger ones go to after school club) so MY DH has to go get them & drop them off at home.

Holidays, she wants lovely family holidays. Great, don’t we all! We have no young kids, we had ours v young so they are now adults. SIL is our age. I absolutely do not want to go to an all inclusive resort surrounded by kids & ultimately ending up looking after them / being stuck with them etc. She keeps asking DH saying how much the kids want him / us there, how they were so upset we didn’t go on the last one. It’s all a guilt trip. The youngest have started saying this too. I know it’s her telling them too.

Calling him for the smallest thing. Lawnmower won’t start, shelf needs putting up, car has flat tyre etc. this is several times a week.

Father’s Day is coming up. Last year we were away. The kids apparently were ‘heartbroken’ we didn’t call & see them as they had made him cards. He is their uncle, not their dad! They have a dad who they see!!!

I’m sick of arguing about it with DH.

He is adamant the kids ‘do his head in’ and he doesn’t want to spend extra time there but feels guilty when she needs help or asks for it.

I have told him I feel like the other woman in my own marriage. She clicks her fingers & he jumps!

There is so so much more. I’m waffling now.

Am I being unreasonable or does my hubby need to decide who he keeps happy, his wife or his sister!

Possibly.

when I’ve asked about the holidays etc though he deffo doesn’t want to go etc

She is a single parent to 5 DC, she chose to keep having children with a man she no longer loved. I understand she wanted them but she also chose to leave him. This was all pre planned on her part.

You really don’t like this woman do you?! 😆

But he will

I’d say there’s no “deffo” about it

He says one thing to you
and I suspect feels something entirely different and certainly says very different to his sister

Yeah we have our own business so can be really flexible with work hours etc

This sounds maddening. Sign the sister up to a dating app so she can get a new husband - at the moment her husband is her brother! Yuck!!! I might be tempted to put the car in the “garage” for a week to put a stop to it. Or maybe get a really posh 2-seater, no room for kids!
Good luck OP I really feel your pain!

And this running around isn’t impacting business?

how old is he out of interest?

She isn’t at the top of my favourite people list

Well knock me down with a feather!

No not at all, it’s quite niche what we do so we can have random days off etc

we are both mid 40s

How much time during the typical week does he spend with you, and how much with her DCs?

So not impacting the business at all

OP, this issues aside, is your marriage happy and healthy?

It’s actually insane that he would do a 60 minute journey so that two high school age kids don’t have to do a 10 minute walk home. Have I actually read that right?

Yanbu op, she has had too many children than she can manage and is expecting your dh to pick up the slack which is affecting you as well. Surely it takes up lots of your weekend doing all this running around.

Outside of working hours he’s there Saturday mornings & in to one early evening a week

Sorry I don’t understand

how often is he with them?

Very much so

Ask husband “When she was childless and we were teen parents with 3 children….. did she give up free time every week to help us out?”

Husband “No”

”And if we have Grandkids in 10 years time and her kids are grown up…. do you think she will offer up her free time every week to help out with our Grandkids?”

Im pretty sure the answer will be again no!

So you have "exclusive time" with him Saturday afternoon/evening, all day Sunday, and four out of five evenings during the week.

Why is that so unacceptable to you? Is it really about the time, or is it actually about you despising his sister?

If you’re quite prepared to jack in decades of marriage over this OP, then I’m going to guess this the tip of the iceberg of a plethora of marriage issues .

Which might explain why he’s so keen
to be away so much?

Saturday mornings & approximately 4 hours on a weds

It’s because why should he? Or why should she feel it’s ok to ask so much of him

Because HE will be telling HER that it’s no problem at all and he is happy to help

There really are no other issues

Wouldnt blame ya when she uses your husband as a skivvy and unpaid babysitter. Its a up there with CG that expect their parents to be permanent babysitters

She's his sister. She's a single parent to five children. Yes, you've made it very clear you look down on her for that but just maybe your husband is a good bloke and it upsets him to see his sister struggling.