Mil told me being hospitalised with pneumonia was a social snub

[DoneWithMIL]

I wasn't able to go to my brother in law's wedding because I was really ill at the time and 25 weeks pregnant - was physically exhausted and struggled to do much. My husband went to the wedding. A week later I was hospitalised with bacterial pneumonia for a week. Felt reduced movements and my baby had to be monitored daily.

Now after an argument with mother in law over something trivial she sent this massive email with everything I have done wrong - one of the things on the list was me not attending my brother in laws wedding. I reminded her about the pneumonia and she said well you didn't communicate this. We did.

She also said that I broke her dying mothers heart because I didn't bring my newborn daughter to see her mum. As well as the pneumonia my daughter wasn't growing in the last week, then she almost died during labour - I had an emergency c section. Then she had seizures at a few days old.
Excuse me for not prioritising people that live 60 miles away. Husband cant drive so would have had to be public transport.

You don’t have a MIL problem, you have a husband problem. He needs to stop being a spineless cockwomble and be on your side.

Your MIL is a nasty toxic bitch but your husband is your real problem. He doesn't have your back. He could shut this down but his silence and weakness and excuses enables her to keep up this crap behaviour towards and your child. He could insist she treat you with respect and stfu making ableist comments in front of your child. You're the woman he made vows to.

You can go low contact with her. Tell your husband he's free to see her whenever, but you and your kids aren't. I include the kids because she's said nasty things about one in front of them and that's emotional abuse. She's actively harming your child with that crap. Block her.

I’d love the share the benefit of my therapy from a similar MIL 😁

I do understand you’re not ready to hear this. The fact you want to send a thread to her- to righteously correct her bad behavior- demonstrates this in spades. But moving towards detachment is the only way.

her behaviour- and her examples, are a distraction. She can’t face up to her real feelings, so is using distraction by creating drama. It allows her to focus on the argument- being offended, recharging with accusations, waiting for the response, being mad, rather than deal with her feelings

her feelings are likely a deep rooted upset at her son having his own family, and one which runs differently to hers and sits outside of her span of control. This is deeply anxiety inducing. In emotionally unintelligent people, anxiety is managed by control (we all do this to some extent)

Responding is joining in the game, allowing her to distract. Allowing her to feel secure in her upset.

responding is a worse long term outcome for you.

there are ways to deal:

no contact- seems unlikely your DH would do the same so consider how much time will be spent with him nagging and guilt tripping you to see her (this is how he learnt to manage her)

low contact- detach and ignore. Move on. Send a message saying “sorry you feel tho way” and block her email address and phone number or send them to a junk folder.

divorce- consider whether DH is really worth it. Her influence is more powerful than yours because he learnt his behaviours in childhood and they are deeply embedded. This will cause ongoing stress throughout your lives and he is really unlikely to “choose” you (and consider, if he does, how strange that behaviour is- dumping one mother figure for another?)

If you divorce you could be free of this stress within the year. Forever.

shes playing childish games wirh him because image wants him back. she’d be happy to split you up to get him. hes the one that needs to say stop to her. not pander

She sounds like an unpleasant woman who resents any loss of power and control over her son. He really needs to man up and be a true partner, she doesn’t own him and he chose you

Yes definitely, she can't stand she isn't the main person in his life anymore. She wants to still be able to control everything in his life

In the email she said I need to look inwards and self reflect 🙄 I think she thought I was going to accept everything in email and apologize - which is delusional because half of the emails were just lies. Or saying the family do things we are expected to do

OP, please don't lower yourself to her level by sending this thread or get involved in a tit for tat message exchange with her. She would LOVE that. Stay calm and detach. She has shown herself up badly here by sending such a nasty message.

Oh ffs tell her to fuck off. Some people honestly.

I was in hospital and couldn't go to my brothers wedding and they "joke" about how I could have came but I genuinely think they do think I could have. And that I stole their thunder. When I was in hospital due to threatened early labour at 25 weeks. And I did indeed give birth a day and a half after the wedding 🤣

Ah. Narcissistic traits? She will never see reason.
Genuinely believes she is in control of everyone and is entitled to have things her way at all times.
No empathy or seeing things from others point of view.
Your husband needs to grow a backbone and stand up for you here, then you can both grey rock her going forward.
If she’s still behaving the same then no contact it is!

Sounds like she has long centred her life round her son(s) and as she can no longer "control" your DH (as you and DS are obviously the focus of his love/life) she's going out of her way to find ways to show her upset about you and DH to bring you both to heel and back under her control. I would ask DH to write back and tell her it's obvious what she's doing, and that without an apology from her you're not sure whether you both want to have a relationship with her. She gets a gold star 🤔 for the hissy fit about the pneumonia - ill health isn't a pissing contest about who was the sickest fgs!

As an aside I wonder if her rigidity of thinking and reaction to lack of control may indicate some degree of mh on her part too?

Has your DH read the email? If he has and is still reluctant stand up to his spiteful mother, then if I were you I'd be seriously rethinking my marriage. My DP would wipe the floor with his parents if they criticised me like this.

Your husband needs to grow a backbone. Your MIL can get in the bin whilst that happens. You need to think about your options if your husband fails though. No one should put up with that sort of shit.

her feelings are likely a deep rooted upset at her son having his own family, and one which runs differently to hers and sits outside of her span of control this definitely seems the case which is bonkers - how can someone be upset their children had children.

emotionally unintelligent people I read the book children of emotionally immature parents and my mother in law fits this perfectly - the emotional and driven parent.

I need to protect my children from her - she would mock them, use emotional blackmail if I am not there

Well isn't she a delight? I don't think I would bother engaging with her if I were you, OP. Just ignore her forever. Dreadful woman. And yes, your DH can deal with her if he wants to, but your input will be zero.

I see 4% of those who've responded chose "YABU". Looks like we've found the closest thing we ever will to a unanimous poll outcome, and now know exactly what proportion of people mistakenly click the wrong response - because no way did almost one person in twenty side with your MIL!

Yes definitely - she has Narcissistic traits. Convinced she is a convert narcissist. In 15 years I have never heard her apologise or admit fault

You've had 15 years of her shit? You must have the patience of a saint. NC all the way.

You have my sympathy. My mother is one.
I’m no contact as nothing I tried with her worked, and yet she’s still trying to control me through various means.
It’s been a heartbreaking experience but I’m stronger for facing it head on. Your husband needs to do this too.
It really is an insidious personality disorder.

Anyone, no matter who they are sent me a list of faults would be frozen out for good OP.

You're can refuse to have anything to do with her. If your husband can't have your back, then the kids wouldn't be going either.

Go no contact with her, DC too.

if DH. Kicks off about that, tell the ridiculous mummy's boy he's free to go & live with Mummy, because you are not interested in living with someone who allows others to treat them & you thus way AND MEAN IT!

Just delete the email and ignore her.

Just stop responding. She texts or contacts you delete without reading

tell your husband it’s now up to him to deal with his mother, the email she sent was the last straw for you, you won’t be attending any family occasions with him, you won’t be getting any presents etc, you won’t be doing anything, and your child will not be visiting either as you can’t trust her to do right

Agree, op I know the temptation to try and prove you are right is all consuming but it won’t work. No matter what words you use it won’t get thorough. If she’d written you an email which said “you are really a giraffe , I know you are and I dont like giraffes “ what would you say? You’d think mentalist but what you wouldn’t do is spend energy proving you were in fact human and not a giraffe world you?! So treat her comments like that and ignore.

This, you can protect yourself and your children. You can not make your DH see your way, but you can tell him clearly you are not putting up with any more of it.

I am so sorry. It sounds like it was a very traumatic time in your life and to have this on top must be very upsetting.

I think the way she has behaved is unforgivable- especially what she said in front of your autistic son, and the fact she expected you to bring a baby that was having seizures to a wedding. Both of these things would be dealbreakers for me and I would cease all direct contact.

Your husband needs to grow a pair and stand up for his children, especially your boy. My husband would be absolutely livid if this happened to our autistic child.

There's a thing called toxic people pleasing in which 'helping' has become distorted into trying to fully control someone else's life and becoming very angry if your efforts are thwarted. Imagine being a child and having that as a parent. Your alternatives are to either risk their rage by resisting, or to submit in order to keep them calm and spend all your time pretending to be happy doing things you don't want to do. So you submit, the parent becomes dependent on you, and thinks this is your actual personality and not just a coping strategy you've developed in order to survive childhood with them as a parent.

The problem with children is that they grow up and stop being readily available, and so can no longer be used as a source of stress relief/anxiety management and the parent doesn't know what to do because their coping mechanism has quite literally left the building. Fury and resentment ensue.

Not that this makes any of it right, but having been there and got the t-shirt (as the child in the scenario who was taught people pleasing and had to unlearn it) I can understand how people end up there. But it is their responsibility to face up to it and fix themselves.