Okay so SS’s mum and dad are amicable, but this is a woman who has told her son that she never wanted him and would rather go out drinking than have her child a lot of the time. There are no courts involved, no social services involved, (despite him not having his own room, let alone a bed at hers), OH agrees for SS to see his mum because he obviously wants to, and there aren’t any immediate safeguarding concerns there. All I meant is that, if he didn’t want to go to his mums, we would not force him, but he does, so we try and accommodate her inconsistency as best we can as to avoid any unnecessary drama for SS’s sake.
OH’s mum (mother-in-law), she has been through a lot in her life and I really empathise with her. However, she is way too open with what she says in front of the kids, she was feeding SS as much food as he wanted, including sneaking snacks and sweets into him at night (and he became severely overweight), she would criticise OH in front of SS and especially if he told SS off. There are just so many things about her behaviour and attitude around SS that we as parents don’t agree with and would rather supervise her contact. She has always undermined us, gone against our wishes and had no respect for her own son. Yet, we have encouraged contact with her grandsons for their sake.
MIL’s partner does nothing around the house, expected OH to do everything, including cook for him every night, which he would tell him how shit it was every time, kick off and refuse to eat (a very regular occurrence!), yet would never cook himself. He would criticise OH for anything he did, OH would just take it because he is non-confrontational and didn’t want to make it a bigger problem. He would swear constantly, in front of the kids, often the ‘c’ word too. He is racist, homophobic, sexist and drinks to the point of being borderline alcoholic. He is manipulative and verbally abusive to MIL, and this stretches to everyone else when he’s had a drink. MIL says she knows what he’s like but can’t bear the thought of being on her own.
I stayed there with OH during lockdown (just before we moved into our house), as we had just had our new baby and wanted to be together. I witnessed many degrading take-downs of OH, often in-front of SS, and it was heartbreaking. MIL even told SS once that his dad is a liar, and now SS will call his dad that occasionally. We had many conversations with MIL asking her to respect our decisions over parenting, and she continually disregarded it and did the opposite. The final straw was MIL’s partner, having had too much to drink one evening, whilst OH was putting SS to bed, suddenly squaring up to OH in SS’s room, screaming in his face and raising his fist (in front of SS!), all because OH giggled at something MIL had said and he thought it was about him. SS was so upset, and this is the first time OH quite rightly retaliated (just by shouting back). He has never done anything to deserve the way he was treated. Anyway, this happened twice within a week. It got to the point where the school actually contacted OH about this as SS had mentioned it, and said about how concerning it was. Obviously we were aware and dealing with it, and thankfully very close to moving, and they were happy with that. So yes, we made it clear when we moved that our kids will not be having contact with MIL’s partner, but that she was always welcome to visit and to meet up with us and the boys, but she chose not to. She said if her partner is not accepted as part of the family then she wouldn’t visit us. Just to add, OH is the last one of 5 children who speaks to his mum. There are so many other stories, I just can’t fit everything in, I was trying to keep it short for everyone to read, I’m sorry that offended some people.
I accept that is her choice, obviously, but to go behind our backs, instead of visiting her own son, and both grandchildren, to go to SS’s mums (a woman she hated) to just see him, is very sneaky.
I have done nothing wrong, to anyone involved, I have been nothing but compassionate and caring with everyone, and I genuinely didn’t know what to do about a situation my OH and I have been struggling with. All I asked for was for some advice and maybe some kind of understanding from other mums, who I thought would understand wanting to protect their kids, but instead I’m just attacked for wanting to protect them. Is that what this forum is about? Where is the support? The kindness?
I’m sorry but the kids come first in everything we do, and anything to do with the kids is our business, that’s what being a parent is.