AIBU to feel hurt my son will not visit while my dad lives here?

[Triniette]

So I have been up tossing and turning all night and I have no idea what to do about this.
My dad is 85, he doesn’t have any official diagnosis but he is certainly struggling with memory, controlling what he says and mood swings. He lives with DH and I, he has done since my mum passed away 9 years ago. Other than his state pension he has no income, and very little in the way of savings, my parents never owned a property.
Last week my son who is 27 and his relatively new girlfriend came to visit us.
My son’s new girlfriend has a French mother and an Italian father, her skin tone is notably tan though, perhaps what you would associate with south Italy more than anything.
My dad made a very stupid comment, something along the lines of “gosh aren’t you very dark, you wouldn’t think there was any French in you! You’re darker than some of the Italians I know, are you sure your French-Italian”
Now I don’t think my dad meant this maliciously, however I appreciate that it comes across awfully and his intentions don’t matter all that much if hurt is caused.
My son pulled us aside before they left and said it had upset his girlfriend and could my dad apologise. My dad apologised but it was clearly not all that sincere, I don’t think he believed he did anything wrong.

Today we are having a family get together, my son messaged me yesterday saying he and his girlfriend won’t be attending. There was no reason attached so I replied saying that’s okay, I hope all is well. He replied saying that his granddads comment made his girlfriend feel really uncomfortable and neither of them will be back in the house so long as my dad is still there. I replied saying I was really sorry that she had been made to feel uncomfortable and that I would talk to his granddad again as the last thing I would want is for anyone to feel uncomfortable in our home. My son replied saying it is irrelevant, as the damage is already done.

This is quite out of character for my son but I understand he just wants his girlfriend to feel comfortable.

My husband thinks they are being over dramatic and it’s not a massive deal, my dad apologised etc.

My daughter thinks their reaction is valid.

I feel totally stuck, I don’t know what to do with this, I really don’t want to have a bad relationship with my son or his partner.

AIBU to be really hurt he said they won’t come to our home again? We love hosting and all our family events are hosted at home, so he would be really missed.
What do I do?

It isn’t a nice comment when you might be meeting your new partner’s family.

Also did you read op’s update? She was subjected to a lot more than the one comment about skin colour.

The fact that you don't see there is a problem says quite a bit to be fair. You talk about love and support, but where exactly was this? Someone was making comment after comment in a way that was clearly uncomfortable and hurtful, to a person just being introduced for the first time. And aside from the woman's partner, nobody said anything about it at any point. That is the exact opposite of love and support.

In situations like this, it's often not the person being a twat or a bigot that causes the most upset, it's the lack of intervention from anyone else. That is what makes you feel isolated, uncomfortable and hurt. That is not being loving and supportive hosts. If OP would have made more of an effort to dismiss the grandad's comments along with her son, I can bet you that the girlfriend would have felt differently. She felt alone and unsupported in a situation that was extremely awkward for her. Nothing to do with her age - it's a rotten situation.

Some people on this thread really thinking that everyone has to bend over backwards to accommodate granddad, but god forbid you suggest the girlfriend should have been accommodated by the rest of the family making it clear his comments were not acceptable, or doing something to nip this kind of behaviour in the bud. Unless you pull people up on things they will keep going, because your silence is essentially telling them that what they are saying or doing is ok. No different from teenage boys not being corrected about their misogyny. Sure, he might have a disability, but that doesn't mean that you can just say and do whatever you want without pushback. Something should have been done to make the girlfriend feel more comfortable and OP completely failed to do that. It was her first ever visit and the entire experience was basically about how she didn't belong.

Good for DS and his GF. Awful behaviour for her to be spoken to like that repeatedly and to have no one support her apart from DS.

Oh for heavens sake your son needs to remember this is his grandad and from what you say it’s most likely the start of some kind of cognitive decline. Why do your son (and apparently daughter) not have compassion to understand this. Your son’s girlfriend sounds like a manipulative drama queen! Why are young people so easily offended! And no, it wasn’t the slightest bit racist, your sons girl friend might have some issues from child hood but that’s her problem not everyone else’s, esp an 80 year old who appears to be in cognitive decline!

We need to be raising our kids with more resilience, empathy and backbone!

It’s all very well you saying that but unless you are in her shoes you can’t imagine how he made her feel. How old is she OP? Maybe you should speak to her explain the situation and apologise again for his behaviour. If that still doesn’t work then I’m afraid it’s a case of having to accept that they won’t visit. You and your DH, DD can still visit them or at a pub/restaurants

My Fil was the same: nothing malicious but no filter. What made the difference was my Mil and dh telling him to shut up.

I don't understand why you think she should put up with 'a rough day' every time you have a gathering? I would be mortified if someone had 'a rough day' when they came to my house.

When I first met my husbands grandad (over 20 years ago - now deceased) he made sexually inappropriate comments towards that he thought were funny. I felt really uncomfortable. There was no dementia. My husband laughed along as was embarrassed himself. I later told my husband that if he did not shut his grandfather's comments down at the time I would never visit the grandfather again. My husband did address it and the behaviour stopped. I continued to visit with husband but held a low opinion of the grandfather. Maybe your son should have asked his grandfather to stop.

So he has no actual diagnosis? I would get that sorted so at least there is a genuine reason for him being a racist obnoxious old man.

Only on Mumsnet can someone be subjected to comments about their skin colour, accent, weight and appearance and still be told they are the problem and are a manipulative drama queen

Your dad may be elderly, but clearly he is no gentleman. Who on god’s green earth comments on a persons colour?

He may have lost that filter, but it seems that his personal remarks to a young woman he had only just met, were pretty relentless, and sounded critical.

Your dad may not be able to stop himself, but you needed to step in and quiet him down.

We have some of this going on with a sibling of DH, and yes, we are all getting older, but trust me, we shut her down every single time.

If your daughter sees the issue too, then it does seem as if you are just enabling your dad’s rudeness.

This! You didn’t feel the need to do anything to make your guest feel comfortable until there were consequences for you. Maybe she’d be willing to put up with his behaviour if she knew you cared about her feelings and tried to rein it in, but you blew it.

My toddler would often make similarly accidentally offensive remarks. I didn’t just sit there and let them happen. I corrected them, apologised profusely and would have taken him away if he kept doing it to the same person.

and yes as PP said why on earth did you and your son let the remarks carry on ? It’s not rocket science to see how she was feeling you should have told grandpa to be quiet or escorted him out of the room. I’m afraid you and your son should have read the room and alleviated the situation

My mother had Alzheimers - the things she said the family and friends used to make my toes curl.😳

But, everyone had the sense and maturity to understand it was the illness causing the outbursts.

Your son needs to grow up a bit.

Dementia causes people to say some really hurtful things - it isn’t the real them. If the GF and DS don’t understand that then that is their problem. DS will later regret not seeing his grandfather more often.

I still think that, despite lots of people thinking otherwise, that it’s absolutely fine to ask someone where they are from, as long as you don’t make derogatory remarks. Assuming he didn’t use the N word, then I doubt he was being racist,

Even then it can still get a bit weird - asking if someone is Spanish (for example) seems a lot more acceptable than asking if they are from Pakistan.

You need to have been teased in school for having dark skin to understand this. Colourism is a thing.
You don't understand this.

What the comment was implying is that she is not European enough. Then he told her she was too thin. Then he commented on her accent. And you didn’t apologise to her. In fact you think, knowing that she has a history of being bullied for the colour of her skin she’s being too sensitive.

You admit she had a ‘rough day’ and the comment about her skin tone wasn’t a one off. He said multiple things to her about her weight and her accent and no one apart from your poor son defended her.

Of course she doesn’t want to come back!

There is no point ‘correcting’ someone with dementia. They will forget what they said 5 mins later and probably just start down the same track again. OP probably knows that and is tired of ‘correcting’ when it doesn’t change anything!

Just change the subject and carry on.

And it wasn't a one time? He went on about it. Yeah, I am on her side. But then I am dark skinned.

The grandfather might have form for this though , so it IS the real him, OP just always dismissed it and now has an added excuse. Unless OP comes back to clarify, we don’t know.

Are you not mortified that a first time guest to your house had to listen to comments about her weight, accent and skin colour? And no one stood up to it or apologised for it. I am staggered that people think she’s the problem.

It’s bad enough meeting the parents of your BF for the first time. Imagine if they let someone pick on you, sit by silently, and if you decline to visit tell you that you are a snowflake for being triggered.

Should she just see it as good old fashioned British banter then?!

My mum has dementia. This means that all the racist, homophobic and sexist stuff that she previously kept inside and you only saw a tiny glimpse of them have now come to the surface.

Would I put a new boyfriend/ girlfriend through that? Not a chance, my husband has known her for 25 years so he knows and tells her to stop if she’s being offensive.

I don’t know the OP’s dad, but not everyone with dementia starts off lovely and says horrible things just because of their illness. Some of them start not very nice and it becomes more obvious.

editied to say we don’t even know if he has dementia at all of course!!

Amazed that this isn’t clear cut.

The comments were rude and racist but:

• Young people are too sensitive;
• Older people are misunderstood;
• Older people with memory issues get a free pass;
• Older people lived in a much more racist era so another reason they should be cut some slack;
• DS should know what his GF is like;
• DS & Gf should accept the insincere apology;
• DS & Gf should draw a line already;
• Gf’s reaction is OTT etc…

All BS of course.

Being upset by an upsetting situation is not unreasonable and wanting to avoid a repeat is understandable.

The poor woman likely felt awful with each comment aimed at her yet she stayed put and didn’t cause a scene.

OP your future gatherings are a minor issue here. There’s some repair work to be done first. The poor woman obviously has some trauma related to the school bullying. +Your son must feel mortified too.

To those minimising, what if instead of racist the comments were old school sexist… it would be equally bang out of order if an old man was making crass comments of that ilk to a young woman.

Team DS/Gf here and his DSis thankfully backing him up.

The first post didn't make it clear that he'd directed a whole string of awful remarks at her. So at first I also thought she was being unusually sensitive as it was just one remark and he hadn't said anything outright insulting about her race or colour. But then when I realised it was one of many unpleasant remarks I changed my mind.

Dementia or not, the family have to step in and deal with this and support the girlfriend or the OP is going to find herself increasingly isolated with her father.