Trouble with in-laws

[Gem1010]

So it was new years day and me, my husband (their son) and our daughter (2.5yrs) went round to see his parents. Well we walked straight into a bust up because they were apparently expecting us for dinner. Thing is, they have a tendency to have these conversations between themselves and fail to contact us to actually discuss it. So his dad started shouting and being VERY aggressive towards my husband to the point i thought there was going to be a fight. My daughter saw the whole thing. His 'mother' also shouted and kicked us all out their house. My daughter heard and saw it all. We were there less than 10 minutes. They had had a bit to drink which I think fuelled it.

Half hour later my hubby text his dad to say it shouldn't have happened to which his dad sent a major essay back stating that they never see our daughter. They never ever contact us, nor importantly their son, to ask how he is or how our daughter is. They only ever see us if we go round. It is like we literally don't exist.

So up to now we have not heard anything from them. They have literally disposed of us all so easily. And it's so sad.

I'm a little annoyed tonight because my hubby text his dad to offer us to go round on Sunday. His dad said that's fine. I can guarantee that they will never mention the whome episode nor will they ever apologise. I am annoyed because they have ultimately got away with it and I wish my hubby challenged them more about how they behaved in front of our daughter.

What do I do? Do i potentially have a row wih my hubby to tell him i don't like it or do we just go back to normal and pretend everything is fine with them?

I think ultimately your dh needs to address it with them. But I don't think you need to just pretend everything is fine and let everything go back to 'normal'. You can choose for yourself and your dd not to see them until it's sorted and they apologise. Ultimately, it's a matter that's between all of you, but I think it comes across differently if your dh takes the lead as they are his parents. Otherwise it's easy to blame it all on you and deflect attention from the real problem.

It's different but we don't really have a relationship anymore with my MIL and step-FIL (due to a risk of actual abuse of our daughter, she's fine, never been harmed, but they pose a known risk due to abuse of another child and we don't allow contact). Though I'm the one who really took issue with their behaviour (my dh thought it was very wrong, but is more passive and feels bad for them because he loves his mum, even if she has really screw up in life), it was really important to me that my dh was the one who spoke up about it. They were still very keen to scapegoat me, but it made it harder to do when he was the one challenging them on it all and I mostly took a behind the scenes roll (though we very much agreed, I tried to stay out of it). If your dh isn't willing to do that and wants to sweep it under the rug and pretend it didn't happen, you ultimately have the choice for yourself and your dd not to put yourselves in that situation again and you can say he can see them, but you two are staying home until there is some sort of resolution to all of this. In our case, I don't see my MIL/SFIL at all anymore, nor do our dc, but my dh chooses to maintain a low level of contact via phone calls a few times a year and maybe seeing his mum once a year for lunch or another family event. But whatever you decide, I do think you have to address it openly between the two of you or else it will fester in your relationship. It was really hard for us and really stressful to figure out how we were going to handle it, but it was much better than pretending it wasn't happening.

Yeah I need to speak to my dh about it again. I really don't feel ready to go there nor do I want my dd to either. It feels wrong to go on like it never happened but I know that's what they'd do.

Dh has made it awkward now because he has arranged for us to go. He sounds similar to yours. It is his parents at the end of the day and he just wants things to be calm and 'get along but by almost ignoring the fact that dd was put in a bad situation and I also haven't been apologise to and feel uncomfortable. They have forever blamed me for it all when really the issue is that them and their son don't ever communicate.