MIL kicked us and preschool children out of holiday villa abroad

[Mamma41]

This is my first post and apologises in advance of the length of it.

At the beginning of August DH and our 3 boys aged 4, 2 and 8 months were invited by our MIL & FIL to spend a week with them in a holiday villa in Spain they had rented. The Villa was hired for two weeks. The previous week they had my BIL and his two sons aged 3.5 and 7 stay with them. They see their other grandchildren 4-5 times a week as they live local to them.

For context DH & I look after our children with no help from any family. We live close to my mother but she's 74 and is not able to help us look after our young boys.

My father died last year and his death devastated me. My eldest son was very close to him. He doesn't have the same relationship with FIL as he doesn't see him as much but I had hoped they would become close on holiday.

Anyway, whilst on holiday my PIL continually criticised my parenting of the boys and their personalities. I should add I work Full Time, 40 hours per week in a very demanding profession. We have a nanny to look after our boys whilst I'm at work. I do all the cleaning, house hold chores whilst working and looking after the boys. DH does the weekly shop and cooking. My eldest has just started school last week. DH and I haven't been on holiday for 5 years (our honeymoon) prior to going away this year. We were both really looking forward to the break and both needed time to have together too.

So on holiday FIL tells me my 2 year old son has "no balls". He constantly cries and I immediately go to him when he does. I treat him like a baby. My 4 year old is oversensitive and doesn't talk loudly enough when my FIL tries to interact with him. I still talk to him like he's a baby. I talk to myself all the time! No one needs to hear what I'm doing and about to do! For context I tell my 4 year old what I'm doing and why I can't play with him at that exact time as I'm helping the younger two, sorting out things or tidying up! I also talk out loud in the hope someone may offer to help me as it's clear I'm doing loads!

DH and I were able to go out one night and when I asked PIL if we could go out to lunch one day together too they said no as its too hard looking after our children, despite them always sleeping in their afternoon because of their young ages. Four year old would be the only one awake and would play on his iPad.

Anyway, they played with the boys in the pool for one hour whilst I lay down and my husband was asleep in bed. They said it was too much and I shouldn't have left them with them. My MIL is 67 and FIL is 65. FIL has mobility issues but is a very overweight large man and likes to eat and drink whilst MIL runs around doing everything. He's a very opinionated, outspoken man. MIL is also very opinionated. However, prior to this holiday we haven't spend too much time together as we only see them 3-4 times a year.

Previously, I have always got on well with them both hence why I was shocked by the hostility towards me and our children on this holiday. It got to Thursday eve. We arrived Sat morning. We stayed in to play a game and they had run out of alcohol. They are both heavy drinkers whereas DH & I drink in moderation. This eve we had 1 glass of wine each then went to get them more alcohol from the local shop. When I returned we played a game whilst the children were all in bed. All holiday DH & I sorted out the children. MIL cooked and did the washing. FIL did very little as usual.

Anyway, as the evening progressed FIL kept making belittling comments towards me over the game. It got to a point where DH had enough and told him not to be so controlling, demeaning etc he had done it all week about my parenting, saying things about the boys, he should just stop and play the game. DH & I already agreed when we were out we would play one game and go to bed as we
Weren't enjoying his parents company on holiday.

FIL takes offence to the way DH has spoken to him. DH proceeds to give his Dad some home truths about the way he is and made him feel growing up. DH has bottled up these feelings for years. Out of nowhere FIL offers him a punch up! This literally all came out of no-where! DH said no and that's ridiculous! DH has started swearing in all this as he's so wound up and frustrated by his parents. MIL didn't intervene and wanted me to step in! I said she should listen to what her son is saying.

DH has always had confidence issues which I never understood as he's a big, gentle giant who I think is very good looking and was surprised he wasn't arrogant like most men when we met. Anyway, from spending a week with his Dad I now fully understand his confidence issues. FIL then threatened to call the police as DH was swearing at him and told us to get out of the Villa. FIL was constantly goading him, laughing in his face, trying to do anything possible to provoke my husband to fight him.

So we literally had to go inside, pack up all of our things, the baby milk, food, wake our young children, put them into the hire car and leave. MIL at no point intervened to say this is silly, everyone should go to bed and discuss it like adults in the morning. It was 1am she handed me all our wet washing and then we left.

I felt sick, the children were crying, we were in a foreign country with no where to go. We went to two hotels who wouldn't accept us as it was 1am and who would accept a family of 5 at that hour!

We drove to the airport, waited 4 hours, with hungry, upset children to be told we couldn't get a flight home until the following morning despite seats being available on their morning flight as a computer glitch meant we couldn't get booked on. We ended up driving to a budget hotel and staying their for the remainder of the holiday until our flight home the following day. My eldest son was constantly crying saying he just wanted to go home.

The only texts we received from them was about MIL missing mobile phone which DH threw into a hedge when his father said he was going to call the police!

So it's so many weeks later. DH never wants to see them again. I feel sorry things have ended like this but I don't understand any grandparents that could throw their own grandchildren out in the middle of the night. I think they expected us to leave them at the Villa but why would we when they are our children and we would never go anywhere without them. Plus all week they said they couldn't look after them when we asked them to babysit for us & had said awful things about them.

I've spoken to friends, family & my nanny who all said there's nothing wrong with my parenting. My boys are all happy, well looked after, we have no conflict at our home so this is very extreme for them to have witnessed.

So are we being unreasonable to cut all ties? To be fair I think they'd had enough from looking after their other grandchildren the week before and really couldn't be bothered with us and ours. It's clear they should have never invited us if it was too much for them to even have us around.

Absolute bollocks. Did you not read it? The FIL was goading, fighting, arguing, threatening a punch up, and then when sworn at threatened to phone the police.

Chuck the phone he had into a hedge (which would not break it) is not the action of abusive man, the abusive man was the other guy.

Honestly, some of these mad responses are why MN has such a bad reputation. Your parents abuse you, try to physically fight with you, chuck you out in the middle of the night with babies and nowhere to go,,,and MN decides its your fault and youre abusive!!

Lunacy.

And me. What an unedifying mess and you weren’t putting your kids first at all.

Your expectations of PIL, on top of a free holiday, were very unreasonable. And you can’t complain FIL is a nasty mean bully to your kids then ask for more babysitting. How’s that fair on your son?! It’s really not.

There are always a bunch of defensive grandparents on here who defend the grandparents no matter what

There’s also overwhelming support for the next generation down with little regard for the facts. Mil is blamed for this yet she’s cooked and laundered for the entire family for almost a week and her apparently blameless son threw her phone in a hedge. It’s six of one and a half dozen of the other.

For context I tell my 4 year old what I'm doing and why I can't play with him at that exact time as I'm helping the younger two, sorting out things or tidying up! I also talk out loud in the hope someone may offer to help me as it's clear I'm doing loads

I do wonder if the usual set up of having a Nanny is another issue - working round three kids was normal for me and if I needed help I outright asked didn't expect people to mind read or work out what I meant with PA comments as it easy for IL to overstep in such situations or worry doing so.

MIL was on holiday as well I expect she had expectations of a break not extra drudgery.

It does sound like FIl behavior was ingrained and OP DH may have had it all his childhood and this was the straw that broke that back - usually advice in such situations is to follow spouses lead with their parents - if he wants no contact go with it.

@WillowCraft

Totally agree. OP has a nanny for her three kids and then was passively aggressively hinting for help off MIL because in her owns words she “was doing loads” ffs it’s called parenting 🤦‍♀️ might want to try it sometime.

Are the OP and boromu222 the same person? The heated defence to posts that dont agree with the OP and rehashing of all the details makes it sound like they are one and the same person....
My only observation is, that in relation to the FIL's horrible comment, the children all do seem to be abnormally tearful, crying and getting upset all the time. Now maybe that is because of the atmosphere, maybe its because they are away from their primary caregiver ie the nanny, and feel insecure and unsettled as a result. This together with your resentment over the workload of caring for them, suggests that maybe you need to thin kthat over. The poor little mites didnt ask to be born.

If someone is "goading, fighting, arguing, threatening a punch up"; i walk away rapidly, i call the police,

in fact the police arriving is a fantastic idea so you let the other person call them in the hope it either stops the other person being a plonker or the police will hear everything.

I don't grab the phone (the op doesnt say where the phone was, was it in MILs hand?).

I think the OP has landed in the centre of a very uncomfortable group of people, I wouldn’t want to spend more time with any of them than I had to

I too don't understand why MIL gets the blame for kicking you out when she had asked everyone to calm down and had done the cooking and washing throughout. It was your choice to wake your children up and leave which was not the wisest of decisions to have made in the heat of the moment.

It sounds as though back to back grandchildren over the two weeks was too much. But realistically whilst FIL's comments on your children were completely out of order, your expectations of what the holiday would be were somewhat misjudged as well.

Perhaps some honest reflection on your side and leave it up to your DH as to what he wants to do going forward?

I agree. As usual, one semi eloquent poster has spun their own narrative and everyone is lapping it up and saying yes, well done, I agree insert smug applause here

Minimising Men’s abusive behaviour and painting OP to be an awful entitled woman is the MO of some posters though.

Cut them out , you don’t need that toxicity in your family , specially around your children .

OP,
If I was on holiday with my kids and someone else did all the cooking I presume for all meals, and the laundry for my whole family and then babysat 3 small children while I had an evening out then I would feel like they were doing more than their share especially if they were 65 and had had a houseful of guests the previous week too.
That being said if they are as heavy drinkers as you say why would you go out and leave them in charge of a 4 year old a 2 year old and a baby. That doesn’t really add up for me.
I think talking out loud about what you are doing in the hope that people will realise and help you is passive aggressive and irritating. If you need more help divide the jobs with your husband either privately or make a direct request at the time. Also if you were constantly maintaining a clearly audible dialogue about everything you were doing with your respective children then it will indicate that you are whiny and/or not coping or your kids need near constant attention which I think is what your FIL has zoned in on.
That being said the FIL comment about your 2 year old was horrible and would really upset me.

Your FIL sounds like an total arse and obviously expected he could start critiquing you in the same way he does his son. Your DH defended you which was great and then it opened the floodgates on so many resentments that your DH had been carrying since he was a child that were nothing to do with you.
I think your MIL wanted husband and son to be apart for that evening when the situation was so volatile and everyone had had a drink which was probably quite wise. The fact that police were going to be called and your husband threw a phone is probably not a situation I would wake all the kids up in the middle of. She probably thought it was OTT to get all the kids up in the middle of the night when you and your husband could have gone off until the morning and then officially left with kids the following morning
I feel like your MIL was caught in the middle of a tricky situation and I don’t know why you would be focusing any negativity towards her.
I think your feelings towards your FIL are perfectly normal in view of his behaviour but I wouldn’t be forcing any decisions on your husband about whether you think he should cut contact with his mum.

Your FIL is obviously a twat but fuck me I couldn’t be coping with someone making a running commentary of everything they were doing either. I’ll be honest, it doesn’t sound like you are actually used to looking after your own children.

There is some confusion here. OP said

MIL at no point intervened to say this is silly, everyone should go to bed and discuss it like adults in the morning.

But did she mean

MIL at ONE point intervened to say this is silly, everyone should go to bed and discuss it like adults in the morning. ?

Makes a difference to the narrative.

How about we assume she meant what she said, and not what she didn't say?

Seems reasonable.

And if that is what the MIL didn’t say then why didn’t the OP say it? Why expect someone else to step in and be the adult?

Are you advising her to LTB? Because her husband doesn’t come out of this smelling of roses.

Yep it happens every time with posts like this one. It's very annoying. If they can get a dig in there about the OP expecting other people to look after their kids/not being used to looking after their own kids etc, then so much the better.

This hasn’t come out of the blue, they’ve been abusing your DH for years and he reached his limit.

They’re using his reaction to them as “proof” he’s the issue when he isn’t.

Support your DH when he says he wants to go no contact and keep your DC away from them. Too toxic for DH, too toxic for DC.

He’ll be processing a lot of things that have happened to him and will benefit from talking to someone to get it all out.

All of this.

Quite.

Because that is what a reasonable mother and grandmother would have said, obviously, when her husband is being such a massive dick.

Obviously.

OP is pointing out that MIL made no attempt to intervene or help, in fact she supported her husband in his abuse.

Oh @Mamma41 , what a horrible situation, I feel for you!! Some years ago we found ourselves trapped as spectators in a similar situation between PIL and SIL. PIL rented a big villa in the sun for us all to go on holiday together. We had one 2 year old and SIL had 3 under 10 at that time.

PIL and SIL have a complicated relationship. The whole thing blew up on the holiday, with a spectacular argument which ended with SIL and her DH storming out ( DH and I quietly looking after kids and keeping our mouths shut as best we could).

My conclusion, as a bystander, was that there had just been too many expectations on both sides. SIL had hoped she might get a break and see her parents spend some quality time with her kids. PIL were not that interested in the kids but instead had hoped the holiday might provide a chance to repair their relationship with their daughter (which came across as trying to 'fix' it/her).

All this while trying to keep everyone - including four young kids - fed, clean and entertained (which DH and I ended up doing, mostly). AND adults trying to relax.

So the lesson I took away is that self-catering villa hols with groups of family are HARD WORK, unless everyone is exactly on hte same page and have a healthy day to day functioning relationship, where they can function seamlessly as a unit.

An all inclusive resort break would hav been much better suited to 'we need to tune into them and catch up' holidays.

@Katrinawaves You've hit the nail on the head.

Cut all ties, just because they’re family doesn’t mean you have to see them and get on with them etc. my dad had similar parents and we saw them very little growing up. Surround yourself with people you want to be around.

I think this is probably the most sensible comment of all. There was so many years of antagonism below the surface between the FIL and son that adding close confinement and alcohol it was bound to blow up.

Or we could just believe what the OP says seeing as none of us were there and she's telling us what happened, instead of presuming bad faith on her part.

How was the OP meant to cook dinners for the whole family while also looking after her three kids without help?