MIL drama

[HandW123]

My MIL is really unwell mentally, she’s a hoarder and my husbands childhood sounds verbally abusive/neglectful etc. After 5-6 years of knowing her I believe she probably has a personality disorder and is a narcissist. For context, her house is not just a bit cluttered. It’s genuinely unsafe, unhygienic and being around her anywhere causes a lot of stress to both me and my husband (and probably her). When she visits us at our house, she sits down and does nothing to help, when we visit her at her house (which is 4 hours away) it’s exactly the same. We end up shopping, cooking, cleaning and most times have to clean 2-3 rooms to even be able to make a cup of tea etc.
I used to put up with it all for him because he was desperate to maintain a relationship with his mum, and this is something I really respect about my husband. However, it all changed when I got pregnant, suddenly I realised how she was going impact my child unless she made some changes to her lifestyle. Since my son was born (3 months old), she has visited twice, and has been very strange around him and has not been supportive to us. For example, we were still waiting hand and foot on her when my son was only 2 weeks old, she didn’t even make a cup of tea. She doesn’t dote on him like a normal grandmother, and has ignored pictures of him that we have both sent to her etc. During pregnancy, I stopped joining him on visits to her house and I have told my husband I will not be going back to staying in her home as I feel it’s totally inappropriate with a baby/child as it is so dirty and it’s a fire risk. When we discuss her visiting, it is so tense because my husband can feel my animosity towards her immediately and I get frustrated with his delusion every time. He is so hopeful that each visit will be different and it never is. Each time we see her she causes stress, can say hurtful things towards my husband and I’m left with an emotionally stressed and exhausted man for weeks after she’s gone. He works really hard all year and so I want him to enjoy his holidays stress free and equally want to support him if he chooses to spend his holidays around her. The topic of Christmas is always tricky and now I feel with my son, we will get maybe 10 magical childish Christmases and I don’t want them to be filled with stress because of her. The difficulty is that my mum and family are very supportive, helpful and are absolutely besotted with my son so my partner often gets jealous.
This year we are spending Christmas with my family and he would like his mother to visit us Boxing Day - I tried to remind him how stressed he gets and that this is a very special time of year but he says he still wants her to come. When I asked if she has asked to come or attempted to make plans, he said she hasn’t. I genuinely believe she is indifferent to when she sees us over the holidays, and sometimes I think we are just putting unrealistic pressure on her forcing her to participate in christmas and NYE when she honestly doesn’t really want to, she never seems upset or hurt when she has no plans (I honestly think she prefers it).
I have no idea how to navigate this going forward - not just Christmas, all conversations about her, all visits. It’s got to the point where I cannot stand her, i’m shocked at my strong dislike for her, when she holds my
baby, my skin crawls and I want to cry. It’s like all of my mother instincts are telling me to get away from this person but she’s obviously staying in my life so how do I deal with this going forward?

”My husband can feel my animosity towards her immediately”

That’s sad. You’re a hindrance, not a help to him, and he’s stuck in the middle. He loves his mum and wants to maintain a relationship while you seem to want to find every possible reason to dislike her. Her holding your baby makes your skin crawl? This woman has done nothing unkind to you. You need to stop micromanaging your husband’s relationship with her - take a step back, leave him to sort it out, and just be polite and civil when you see her. It isn’t that hard. You’re being so unfair to both of them.

I really feel for you OP, and for your H.
His mother sounds as though she has real mental health issues.

I think you are right to refuse to go to her home.
And whilst I understand you don't want her visiting you , given how important it is to your H, I think to never allow her to visit your home is not fair on him. I think that whilst her visiting on boxing day is an anathema to you it would be really unreasonable to not let him invite his mother for that day.

As a mother of a son these threads make me sad.

You talk about your husband’s stress around visits with her. You need to look at yourself for this. He’s lived with the way she is all his life. What’s causing the stress is how YOU are, around and with her. He knows exactly how you are feeling, and he is stuck in the middle.
You are being VU to your DH, and need to navigate your own emotions around her, or you are both in for decades of pain

Has DH had any counselling or therapy regarding his toxic mother? That would be a starting point.

I can understand your frustration. Can he go to her on Boxing Day instead? You can stay home with DC?

“She doesn’t dote on him like a normal grandmother”

So what? You have a loving, supportive family of your own. And instead of helping your husband cultivate a better relationship with his own mother, you seem to want to punish this woman because she’s not living up to your expectations. The state of her home is nothing to do with you. Don’t take your child over, problem solved. You’re making everyone’s lives more difficult than they need to be, and it’s needless. Would you be happy with your DH treating your family this way or look to him for support and kindness?

As someone who is in a similar position to your husband I would suggest you try to take a step back and support him by letting him take the lead in this. Growing up with someone like this is hard and how you manage the relationship with that person can look odd, or even wrong, from an outside perspective but comes from finding a way to operate when you know you cannot change them. Please don’t add on extra pressure by making him choose. You are absolutely right to have your own boundaries, and protect yourself and your child if that means things like not staying with her, but outside of that trust him to navigate the tricky relationship with his mother.

She has done many unkind and hurtful things towards me over the years -and more importantly I started the thread with mentioning that my husband had a verbally abusive and neglectful childhood. She continues to hurt him whenever she visits by saying cruel and unkind things to him. Many people would never even have visited her home - let alone stay there - I have done many things to support my husband having a relationship with her but I am finding it difficult right now since my son was born - what is so wrong with admitting that?

Well I'm disagreeing with all the PP.

I'm living this too. My DH has had therapy to address the emotional abuse he's suffered. He still wants to maintain a relationship, but now no longer has any hope she will change. There's more of a calm acceptance that it's shit and grief for a relationship he never had.

Given the state of the house as you describe, I don't think any of you should go to hers. And the idea that you're supposed to steam roller over your emotions, that PP are suggesting is disappointing and disturbing. Why don't you also matter? So I don't think you should have her over to your house either (unless for a flying visit of an hour or two. But she's 4 hours drive away, so that's not practical).
The only solution is to meet half way. Find a nice pub, have a nice meal, have a walk, go home. Boxing day done.

I'm sorry that it's shit for you and your DH.

Comparison is the thief of joy.

He should try and be happy you have a set of supportive parents around and stop comparing his dysfunctional mother with them.

Maybe that will make any visits easier.
Equally I’m not sure why either of you are scared to tell her that you aren’t waiting on her anymore. Stop running around her then she might excuse herself from coming if she knows neither of you will do that.

But I’m sure you haven’t abused your boys? And would be interested in your grandchildren?

Oh ok. What caused the stress before I came onto the scene then? 😂 he’s been stressed his whole life and has had years of therapy because of the damage she has done and continues to do.

Once she told me herself that she locked my husband in a cupboard when he was only 2 years old so maybe that’s why my skin crawls when she holds my baby.

How much waiting on does an adult need? I presume you are cooking meals and offering drinks? Thats fairly standard for a guest.
I think Boxing Day is a nice compromise, firstly the real magical Xmas doesn’t start until they are 2/3ish as prior to that they are too young to get it. And secondly it’s Xmas eve and day that are magical and she won’t be there for that. Unless you are concerned you husband will be stressed in the days leading up to the visit? In which case suggest New Year’s Day instead?

It’s up to your dh if and when he visits her and it’s reasonable to invite her to yours too. If you don’t want your child to visit for safety reasons then that is valid.

She’s his mum and he loves her. She may have been cruel etc to him but he still wants to see her. You need to step well back and leave the relationship to him. Don’t visit if you don’t want to, he can go with your child. If she comes to your house be polite and civil, he can do the running around. She’s staying in his life and your child’s, so you need to be mature about it for your husbands sake.

So it hurts my husband when she doesn’t dote on the baby because he feels jealous that my family are involved and supportive and his family don’t seem very interested in his only son. It bothers me because I see how much it hurts him - I don’t need the support.

Thank you for such an understanding reply and this is helpful.

It's not about you @Bluelilacbella

Thank you for being so understanding. The pp are making me feel judged when I obviously wouldn’t be posting here unless I was trying to make things easier on my husband in the first place lol
i guess it’s easy for people to comment but you have no idea how draining and stressful it is until you have someone like that in your life.
the whole thing makes me really sad.
i hope your situation improves too :(

Ok, this is crossing the line from his mum is mentally unwell with narcissistic tendencies to she was so abusive that had social services had known, your DH could have been removed from her care.

You mentioned he's had therapy. I would suggest he has more. There are good and bad therapists out there. He needs a very good one, with lots of experience, supervision and having had personal therapy themselves. He's pulling himself into pieces here, wanting to have a relationship with a mother he's never had and never will have. I'm so very sorry for him.

And no I wouldn't let this woman near my child either.

You’re being a bit disingenuous if you think you’re trying to make things easier for your husband. You are making them harder.
He wants to see his mum. You are objecting to it and letting him know how much you can’t stand being around her, or having her around your child.
Don’t pretend you are trying to be kind. You are not. You are trying to prevent contact with your DH’s mum and your DC’s grandmother.

I ‘dote’ on both sets of parents when they visit. I don’t expect them to help in any way. They’re guests. But I totally understand your antipathy for the rest of it.

I would let him go and see her and ‘have a relationship’ but I’d bow out of the rest of it. Including Christmas. If he wants to see her on Boxing Day - let him go but you and baby stay at home with the Christmas lights and a nice film.

She sounds like she doesn’t have the wherewithal to care about herself let alone her son or grandchild so you’re probably irrelevant to her. That’s good though, it means you bear no responsibilty to maintain any good relations or host her. Drop the rope and leave it all to your husband. Concentrate on your baby and leave her to live in her warped disgusting world.

The thing is we rarely hear about the good MIL/DIL relationships*. My lovely MIL has three sons. One lives a good distance away. MIL is now in a nursing home and has two local DILs (me being one) willingly visiting and helping her.

So take heart 🙂

*Ditto the good DH's.

I mean, she sounds like a pretty useless MIL (most likely some MH issues contributing to this). Couldn’t even help out or make herself a cup of tea when they had a 2 week old. Doesn’t sound like OP would feel the same if she was more helpful, loving, and had better standards of cleanliness. I’m not a clean freak by any means, but I think I’d feel the same OP.
Unfortunately you do need to put up with her visits for DH’s sake, but I agree that I wouldn’t be taking my child to her house, and I absolutely wouldn’t be waiting on her. “You know where the kettle is”.

Just to add, I have a lovely relationship with my MIL. We message very regularly, enjoy regular visits, help each other out whenever possible.

My DH mum is similar but only he can decide if he sees her or not. I agree you shouldn’t take the baby to her house, it’s not safe. But whilst I agree with you it has to come from him. He is the one who has grown up in an abusive household and he has to make the decision to step back. After the last time my MIL visited out house when DS was 2 and she completely ignored him for 4 hours my DH finally gave up with her and we haven’t seen her since. So I really do understand what you are going through but it worked better for us when my DH made the stop to it himself because he wanted to and was at peace with it.