I felt like I got shut down in a weird way by my DIL

[TheWisePearlRaven]

I'm wondering if I dropped the ball with my DIL. I took my son to a baseball game recently because he’s been under a lot of pressure with work and he’s an awesome dad and I wanted to give him a bit of a break and my DIL felt like I should've offered to watch the baby so they could've gone on a date. She mentioned feeling like she's always solo-parenting and I didn't help them out as a couple. She said she felt she supports my son by raising my granddaughter saving the family money and giving my son piece of mind that she is in good hands with her mother and it’s not easy work doing this 24/7 as my son gets to leave his job but a SAHM never gets to “clock out” not to mention she handles all of the household tasks of the daily running of the household another less thing my son has to worry about it and she felt I overlooked that and only saw my son’s contributions to the family.

Now she's asked me to watch the baby next week for some me-time. Should I have thought of that date-day opportunity for them? How can I better support them both? I feel awful that my DIL feels I was just supporting my son while overlooking her as that wasn’t my intention at all. I guess as the grandmother I should be looking at it through the lens of supporting the family unit as a whole and not just focus in on supporting my son. I’m glad my DIL felt comfortable enough with me to express her hurt feelings and concern rather than harboring resentment towards me.

However AIBU to be a bit annoyed deep down that a kind gesture I did towards my son individually was basically shut down?

Way to go to invent stuff. None of that has been suggested by the OP. He might do half days sometimes, work from home other times, who knows. You’re seriously projecting to fit a made up narrative about a man you’ve never met.

So, they both work 5 days effectively and as someone who has a child (was at home until he was 2.5 due to a great redundancy package when on maternity) and also works full time, I can safely say that he is as entitled as she is to a singular day out.

Jesus Christ! What’s so bad about saying little family? that seems to be a trigger word on here for some reason. Yes sue me if I was OP’s DIL I would expect for our weekend time together to be for us as a family. When you marry your spouse and child is your immediate family. How is it isolating to want time set aside for your own family? I’m not saying seeing extended family isn’t ok but when my child was younger we typically saw extended family (parents/siblings/cousins) all together. No one thought we were isolated just that we wanted to be together during our limited time.

Are you still married?

But she had her child allll day 5 days a week he has his child 2 days a week and one of them he runs out with his mother. Why wouldn’t he want that one day to be with his wife and child? When the child is older she is going to wonder why her father that she hardly sees isn’t home with them

Yes! And very happily so thanks for asking. And our family dynamic worked fine for us worn everyone respecting that we were our own immediate family and didn’t separate us out during the limited time together by recognizing just one person. We saw my in laws and my family together

Your DIL sounds a bit spoilt and over-entitled. It's nice for you to babysit if they want to go out for dinner or drinks but there's nothing wrong with you taking your son out to a game.

My friends husband worked in the oil industry 7 weeks on 7 weeks off. .

Another friend her husband was army intelligence would disappear for long stretches.

Another friend her husband worked undercover for customs and excise internationally. That was hard because zero contact .

My mother, father worked long hours. 13 hour a day six days a week.

None of these women ever complained. Had no family nearby. They did have good friends, however.

Your support network doesn't have to be kin. Two of these friends were overseas. Three of those marriages survived btw.

Because it’s a few hours on one day! Why can’t he spend time with other people?! it’s weird to not spend any time with anyone else.

And, for the third time, if his wife wanted to go out for a few hours with her mum or a friend would you feel the same? Or is it only the man who you expect to live only at work or with his wife and child?

It’s a crazy way of thinking. Unhealthy and very dangerous.

Like I said, red flags for abuse.

You didn't have any time to see friends or family outside of your 'little family?'.

You didn't have individual identities, individual relationships or social time outside of your 'little family'.

When your DP was at work you never saw anyone?

Or did you? I think you did see your friends and family without him.

But you expected him to not see anyone without you? Because your 'little family' took priority over him having any time to himself, or time for any relationships apart from yours with you ALWAYS there?

Yeah, that's abusive.

Your friends and family weren't 'respecting' your ideas of a family, they just were scared to piss you off knowing you'd cut them off for not 'respecting your little family' so seeing their loved one with you constantly there was better than nothing.

👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

Fgs DIL gets baby sitters three weeks out of four. Are you getting more support?

Dangerous to have your limited time together with your child and spouse? And we do see other extended family together and we also see friends separately once in a while. But family was typically together because we considered our in laws our family as well once married. The dynamic worked for us and everyone was happy no complaints

everyone was happy no complaints

No complaints doesn’t mean they were happy.

And OPs DIL is getting her parents and OP to babysit alternately, so she is getting support but it’s still not enough. As I said, as someone who has had nothing except my husband to facilitate breaks due to a variety of reasons, I still wouldn’t begrudge my partner a day out with his mum nor would I demand she does it for me too. I think the DIL is an entitled little madam and am really surprised by the level of support for her on here.

The difference is my husband was at work during those times. So he couldn’t go out with me. During the two days he was home yes since we had limited time together and inside and child was a priority (don’t know why this is so triggering) or really anyone else’s business how someone’s immediate family conducts their relationship. We have a GREAT relationship with my in laws and my family. We still saw them. You act like we were cut off from the world and never saw anyone else. Different family dynamics work for different people. Different strokes for different folks and all that

Absolutely!
Mirrors our experience - DH was a workaholic and surgeon/pilot genre. There were periods when he was overseas more than at home.

I had to get on with it and sometimes when he was away, it meant one less to look after. My mother was 100 miles away, MIL 240. No other family around but I made good friends and we helped each other out.

Wouldn’t they say something if they had issue.

Different family dynamics work for different people. Different strokes for different folks and all that

That’s a change of tune!

No, dangerous to not allow anyone in your family their own time, headspace, time with others, demanding they’re with their family all the time. It’s dangerous because it separates people and they reduce their support network. I’d be really annoyed if any time I wanted to see a friend they bought their partner and kids and we’d drift apart for sure. It’s dangerous and a classic abuse tactic to separate someone from their friends and family. To demand you and the kids are always there is weird. And yes, dangerous.

If it worked out well for you then that’s great, but I’d be extremely concerned if a friend had a partner who demand they went everywhere together and weren’t allowed to see friends or family without them. Massive - and very well known - red flag for abuse.

And ‘different strokes’ - how come that doesn’t apply to anyone you disagree with?

That’s projecting. How do you know how they were feeling? You don’t know our relationship with our families and friends. We were all close. My MIL, FIL, and SIL all embrace me as part of the family and were happy to have time with with me and their GD/niece. They knew our weekends were sacred so was just happy that we made time to see them when we could be doing our own thing. It would be odd if DH showed up solo to a family function alone

I’m amazed the dil is communicating with you so well. We never see this on MN. I would love her. No silly games, just this is how I feel.

But you’re just a friend who the hell is a friend to think they have enough of a say in how their friend conducts their marriage? Yes a wife/husband relationship trumps a friend everyday and twice on Sundays

My DH is out solo today with son DIL and grandchildren. I'm not stomping my foot.

This is wild, life is about different relationships. For one relationship to be all consuming is really not safe. Why are you measuring them in this way?! What would you have done if your husband died? Or left you? You’d be screwed because you’d have no one and nothing.

It’s not safe.