AIBU to ask DH to step back from MIL’s health anxiety?

[Stripedpyjamass]

MIL has bad anxiety, mainly manifesting as health anxiety. It seems to be reaching a crisis point. In the last 7 days she has called an ambulance 3 times, taken herself to A&E twice and called us countless times with a health issue. She calls at all hours including the middle of the night. DH has family overseas and if she can’t get hold of him she calls them, who then call us. DH spent 3 hours at her house one evening calming her down then as soon as he left she called an ambulance.

She has therapy, we’ve tried to help so many times offering solutions, she takes medication for anxiety.

DH and I have a newborn baby and a toddler. Through sheer unfortunate luck, when I had DC2 I sustained a significant birth injury which impacts my life on a daily basis with pain and mobility. I am waiting for more major surgery and I have a catheter in which is uncomfortable and limits lifting.

DH understandably is focused on helping his mum which is fine but we are literally now at breaking point. He is suggesting now that he stays her temporarily so she’s not alone? But I physically cannot manage two children alone with my health problem. He’s taking unpaid leave from work to help her, but I’m also on maternity leave so we can’t afford this. MIL is sat pots of money! I don’t want him to take the children away from me to stay with her which is his other suggestion.

I am at a complete loss of what to do. AIBU to think we can’t keep stretching ourselves like this? And that DH needs to step back? Or is there anywhere else that we can get help for me or her?

Stop trying. It's enabling her and feeding into what she wants. Have you considered whether she has factitious disorder (used to be known as munchausens)?

The ambulance trust will take her to court if she keeps contacting them for spurious reasons.

This is pure attention-seeking behaviour from your MIL and by pandering to it your DH is enabling her and it will never, ever get any better.
I’m willing to bet that your DH was conditioned to put his mother first when he was growing up, so this will be deeply-embedded guilt that he is feeling.
He needs a real wake up call and to be forced to decide whether to prioritise enabling his mother’s hobby (trust me when I say this is like a hobby to her. She will be literally feeding off his attention) or looking after his family who genuinely need him.
If this causes a huge row then so be it, but you are so far from even remotely being unreasonable, poor you.

You can't stop her calling ambulances, that's a responsibility and stress you can't carry, and its the problem of the services she's using to manage her, so helping DH see that would be a start. The biggest immediate thing is you not being alone with birth injuries, a newborn and a toddler, and hurting yourself while he stays with her so she's not alone, or takes the children away from you. Her being slumped in a chair not engaging at least prevents him rushing off out of the house to see what she's needing.

So sorry, this is the last thing you need when you're trying to recover!

Do you think if I called my own health visitor they could help me? At least by showing where we could get help? They are aware of the situation I’ve been left in after the birth. I don’t want them to take my children though.

How awful for you, you must be at the end of your tether. Of course you are not being unreasonable at all and it must be very frustrating to have your DH behaving this way.

it sounds like an unhealthy relationship between them.

if he refuses to disengage, I would try and make him see that he is not helping her by pandering to her. Persuade him that his engagement with her, needs to be entirely focussed on getting her more mental health support. That this is a mental health issue that he is not qualified to help with, and may be making worse. If she can afford it, she could be having more therapy, and more specialised therapy. That’s all he should be focused on, getting her to accept she needs more support with her anxiety. Rather than enabling her deluded behaviour which is impacting on others, including him and you. Try to make him see that he can’t help her, but he can try to persuade her to accept appropriate help.

edited for punctuation

Cold turkey.. She needs left to her own devices. Even for a short time. Your dh is feeding her anxiety. She will likely have a huge red sticker on her hospital file. Probably won't be long before she is sent to a shrink.....
Your dh needs to focus on his immediate family.

This is quite literally insane. Your husband cannot under any circumstances move in with her, he will never be able to leave. He's actually making her worse with what he's doing. Moving in with her would be disastrous.

He's totally neglecting you and your babies to pander to this woman. Funny how she got worse at the same time as you became more in need of support!
If she has plenty of money let her hire a carer or personal nurse who can pander to her all day long. Has she no shame ringing people up all over the world for attention? A genuinely ill person would never do that.

Time to put your foot down and for some brutal honesty with your husband. This cannot go on.

How old is she? She needs some medication to help anxiety. Staying with her will make it worse.

You should absolutely be his priority, but I’m short of answers on how to deal with his mother.

She certainly won’t get better with him pandering to her, she needs professional mental health support.

Definitely your HV needs to know, as responsible for your health as well as the children's, and may be able to have a strong word with DH or to think of sources of outside help (for you and possibly MiL too). Please don't worry about the children being removed, that really is a last ditch solution no one will want to take.

It can’t hurt to ask them, but it’s clear to me as an outsider (and daughter of a covert narcissist) that this isn’t about your MIL actually wanting any help. She doesn’t want resolutions. If that happened then the attention and DH at her beck and call would all go away, and she doesn’t want that.
This is purely emotional/psychological.
Your DH is helping her to regulate her nervous system which she can not do for herself. At this point she now needs him (or someone else caring) to do this for her.
There are no physical ailments, she needs counselling (which, if she’s like my mother won’t help either as she will just lie).
I had to cut my mother off and predictably she’s now latched on to anyone with strong empathetic traits and is now draining them of their life force instead.
Some people can not be helped, this is not about her now, this is about your DH either realising this and pulling back (although I’d possibly also set up carers using her “pots of money” if possible, so she has someone else’s undivided attention instead) or your marriage will be irreparably ruined by her.
What a selfish, manipulative, self-absorbed person your MIL is.

I’d start by talking to the overseas sibling and saying that if they don’t stop calling in the night, they will be blocked. I can’t believe they think that’s ok to do when you are unwell and have two small children, especially after the first time (when they might genuinely have thought it was an emergency).

The trouble is, it’s easy to write a big post about what else should happen, but it all requires your H to sort his priorities out and set boundaries, which you can’t force him to do. At least maybe you can speak to the sibling directly and cut that bit off at the knees? It obviously should be your H doing it, but sadly I doubt he would, from what you’ve said. I’m sorry your H is putting you in such a shit situation.

Shes in her 70s.

She takes medication, or she says she does - it’s been prescribed anyway. She has therapy.

“DH understandably is focused on helping his mum”

No sorry, OP, not understandable at all - his focus should be firmly in his own family: on his wife who has suffered during childbirth and on his newborn and toddler. Clearly MIL has form for anxiety, attention-seeking, and making a nuisance of herself to the health service. He needs to step back from his DM and step up where his own family is concerned. Taking unpaid leave to help Mumsy rather than giving a hand to his own wife is utterly unacceptable. He’s going to have to have a word with the overseas relatives to stop bothering you in the night - either that, or turn your phones off between ten and seven. Make no mistake, your DH’s behaviour is not just unreasonable, it’s unkind to you and uncaring of his own family, which is where his focus should be. You get married and leave home and set up your own family - of course your DPs are still important, but they are no longer as important, and I say that as a MIL and a DGM. Your DH is your husband, not his mother’s, and frankly, he should be more concerned for you than for her.

As always it’s a DH problem - not so bloody D in this case.

Also notable that it’s got worse since you’ve had the baby? OP you need to put your foot down here she manipulating her son for attention, if he removes the attention he will be helping her.

I’m saying this from someone who’s had therapy for health anxiety and still lives with it, for me it stems from attention seeking, a horrid thing to regonise in yourself but for some people it goes way back to childhood experiences, and a way to get attention was to be sick, then you always think you are sick then it’s spirals in times of stress. I’m remarkably calm when I am really sick like my gallbladder issues, zero panic there as it’s real!

for others it’s medical trauma etc, so she needs some more help and support but assuming your DH is unqualified the best thing he can do is get her professional help and step out.

It occurs to me that by your DH soothing her each time, he's not doing her any favours.

If she has mental health issues that impact her life and your lives this much, then she needs proper treatment for that. DH isn't helping her receive this. He's soothing her for a very short time, which is insufficient, and so it all happens again.

His presence isn't more than a not very good plaster which falls off. If he is intent on helping her, then he needs to advocate for her with her GP or A&E. There was another long running thread recently where an OP had to work extremely hard to get her DH the mental health support that he needed and your DH needs to be seeking this for his mother because what he's doing now isn't sustainable and isn't helping her in the way that she needs it.

I would say that he had a week to set things in progress. That he needs to contact her GP for an immediate assessment of her mental health as she is in crisis. He needs to explain the pressures on his family and that he cannot support her, because she needs more help than him. If that doesn't work then he needs to attend A&E with her and explain that she is in mental health crisis and that she needs immediate help for that.

He needs to seek help and advocate for her because what he's doing isn't good enough and its failure is impacting you all.

And the silly sods overseas need to be told to contact uk authorities directly. Give them her GP out of hours phone number and tell them to phone them instead not you.

All of this!

Hugs to you OP 💐

I mean what exactly is he going to do? If he stays with her for 4 weeks for instance, what happens when he eventually leaves? Surely the problem is not going to just go away? She will likely be the same but you guys will just have less money.

Maybe this is her way to try to ensure she lives with you?

I feel sorry for her, in a small number of people health anxiety like this can get out of control. There are people who go to A&E weekly and ring GP daily. They are often embarrassed but also anxious.

If anyone has felt the dread of a panic attack and fear, then you can sympathise, even if the direction of your anxiety has been different.

However one of the key things to help, is for her to practice delaying reassurance. Having your DH on hand will NOT help this.

In any case he should not go because you need him.

@Stripedpyjamass I’m not sure what qualifies for getting someone ‘sectioned’, but this can’t be far off. Your MIL’s behaviour is irrational and not normal, she certainly needs more professional help than she’s currently getting.

Hi op - he does need to step away from her - he cannot see it - why are your needs minimised and his mothers prioritesed - thats a choice HE is making - they are in a co-dependent relationship - YOU should be his priority - have you anyone around you that can support you with the children - live in nanny - it would be hard not to end the marriage over HIS choices - unsure how the HV would help but she may steer you to social services - His mother is manipulating him and hes too blind to see it - i hope you have some support in real life. He is a FOOL.

You are really ill, she THINKS she is ill. Your husband needs to stop feeding into it all as it won’t help. She needs to get some professional help, your husband needs to grow a backbone and sort his priorities out. Why would he move in with her?! He should be caring for his children and you. If he’s not careful he will be stuck there for the next 15-20 years

She is no where near qualifies for sectioning