Sad about my brother, should be happy

[sooperdooper]

I have a strained relationship with my brother, due to his wife, who I find manipulative, and plays the 'poor little' me/helpless woman card all the time, she's caused so many problems and I try to tolerate her for his sake, but find it difficult.

They'd been having problems and split earlier in the year, he left for a while and then went back to see if they could sort things out, I spoke to him a couple of months ago and he told me that he didn't know if he was staying, he was unsure but was seeing how things went

So I've just been told, via my dad that she's pregnant, very early days, so I'm guessing not much more than 8 weeks, so must've fallen pregnant at the same time he was saying he didn't even know if he wanted to stay, sigh, I hope they don't think a baby will cover the cracks, I want to be happy for him but it's very hard :(

I'm not sure what I expect anyone to say, I just wanted to let it out somewhere

Sorry, but are you sure it is his?

Yeah, sorry but that was the first thing I thought too.

You can't live his life or his marriage for him. Then again, you don't have to be peaches and cream with your SIL either if you don't like her very much. Aim for polite, keep in touch, support him if he asks for help and otherwise, keep out of it.

The thought definitely had crossed my mind, but I could never say that to him, it just seems so close time-wise and he was very insistent when I spoke to him that he wasn't 100% happy still but wanted to see if their marriage was worth saving, to go from that to this is such a massive leap

I think given his feelings about the marriage you should maybe broach the paternity issue. He won't be insulted, I shouldn't think, sounds like they have enough problems that it is worth considering.

Last thing he needs is to stay with someone who isn't right for him to raise another man's child.

FWIW, this baby won't sort out their problems, anything but. Sorry for you OP - and him :(

I think if I try and mention that thought to him I'll end up getting the blame for causing problems

I've tried telling him things about her in the past, when I've had utter proof of her terrible behaviour, and she's twisted it round to make him turn on me

I think I just have to leave them to it, but I'm so sad, me & him used to be so close and now I can't even truely be happy for him :(

I haven't called him yet, I found out last Sat, I know I should, but I can't lie and say how pleased I am

You'd actually deserve the blame if you waded in accusing her of sleeping around... He's probably worked that out for himself already and, if he chooses to dismiss it, that's his decision. All you have to say is that you want him to be happy and, whilst you and SIL are never going to be best mates, you wish him well.

Agree with Cognito. He's a grown adult, he's obviously going to have thought of that, if he's chosen to overlook it, thats up to him. Just be there for him.

Another one who agrees with Cogito on this one

Cogito is spot on. It would be idiotic to start questioning the paternity of the child. If you want to lose your brother that's the way to go.

What he says to his sister is one thing. What he does with his partner is another. If she's pregnant he believes he's the father, he must have had unprotected sex with her. He'd also not told you about it or even dicussed the relationship with you for two months - you're obviously not that close.

I said we used to be close, before, not so much now

I'm not going to say anything about whether or not potentially the baby is his or not, I never planned to, although the thought has crossed my mind it's not something I'd ever say to him

So he went back to give it another go and she fell pregnant. Sounds entirely plausible and not terribly pleasant to speculate its not his. Are you sure she's the difficult one?

So just leave him to it. My own DB had a nightmare of a DW (a bossy spoilt brat of a vegetarian - popular on so many levels!) and, naturally, he chose her over the rest of us for a time. When it all came to grief there was a collective sigh of relief & we offered support, but nothing we could have said would have made him change his mind about her before then.

It's not ideal and babies rarely , if ever, mend relationships. All you can do is bottle up your concerns and try to be extra nice to her, however awful she is, because if they split up in the future things just got 100x more complicated.

I never speculated it wasn't his, a couple of people posted that after my OP :)

Personally, I didn't think it could be another mans child. What did cross my mind, with you saying she is manipulative, is that she has planned to get pregnant maybe to try and get him to stay, if she knew he wasn't happy and was thinking about leaving.

However, I agree that your brother is an adult and should be left to handle this his way. You can offer him support, but I wouldn't put pressure on him. If he really didn't want to become a father at this time, with things being bad, then he should of took precautions himself.

Leave them both to deal with it themselves, and just offer a listening ear if it is needed. However hard it may be.

You said the thought had crossed your mind. So you agree with the speculation. Not nice.

But that isn't what my post was about at all, I'm concerned that he was thinking about leaving such a short time ago and now they're having a baby, which will place a lot of pressure on their relationship which was already very rocky

There's nothing I can, or will do about it, they're both adults, they both had an opportunity to take precautions if they didn't want a baby, but it doesn't stop me from worrying that they're having a baby for the wrong reasons, and that makes me sad

Plenty of people have babies for all sorts of reasons. If you liked her you'd be pleased about them giving it another go and about the baby too. For your own good, stand back.

I think you can be happy that he's going to be a father and say things like you know he'll "be a good dad" without saying you're happy he's back together with SIL. Be there for him, he might need time to process it - it's going to be very new for him too. He's got to deal with that and mending his relationship.

I can see why you think it might not be his but I agree you should never say anything, it's not like a paternity test can be done while she's pregnant, so you've got 7 months to wait before it's even an issue and it might come to a head before then anyway.

I think you should wind your neck in to be honest. You see what your brother wants you to see. You have no idea what goes on behind closed doors. It wouldn't be the first time a man's family have formed a perception of his wife without seeing behind the facade. She may have acted the way she has due to low level undermining of her self esteem and emotional abuse from her husband. I speak from experience here (and everyone who knows my H has him down as a wonderful, kind, considerate, loyal man. Ha b**dy ha). I know my H's family judged me wrongly. Things like I didn't go to their's for xmas... how unreasonable of me. Reality, I didn't go to their's for xmas because my H had just spent the night away at his work xmas party and returned home with his shirt covered in lipstick. Puts a different spin on things when you know the full story doesn't it? I wasn't being difficult and needy (their view), I was trying to hold it together and really not up to playing happy families for the in-laws.

As for the baby, according to my GP most of the unplanned pregnancies she sees in her surgery are older women (i.e. not teens) who are going through emotional turmoil. I think it unlikely that your SIL rushed out and got pregnant by another man.... like that would be a good idea when her marriage was breaking down. Marriage breakdowns often involve a lot of make up/break up sex. Nothing at all unusual there.

If I was your SIL I'd really hate you right now - like she hasn't got enough problems. Her H has walked out/came back, and now she's facing pregnancy, perhaps with him, perhaps without. Have some empathy. You should either be there as a support for both of them or back right off. I'm also pregnant, we'd had a wobble, I thought it was over, I thought my H was back for good and we were a strong unit. He wasn't. So I was well into a divorce by the time I discovered I was pregnant (I discovered quite late). My BEST friend gave me hell.... was a complete b*tch to me, went on and on about 'band aid babies' and how I evil I was to have done this to a child. I bet my SIL felt the same. I am still hurt, and that friendship although still intact will never be the same.

If your brother didn't want a child he shouldn't have had unprotected sex. Same for her of course.

When I read your OP, it wasn't your SIL's fidelity I was questioning, it was your DB's, incidentally. Because he was the one who walked out.

Their marriage and how their child came to be conceived is none of your business. If you want to be an aunt to their child it's probably best to offer congratulations and mend some fences. You don't have to like your SIL or she you, but you've got another member of the family coming and if you want to be part of his/her life then you've got to get past your dislike of the child's mother.

So what has your SIL actually done?

What is "poor little me?"