Need some perspective: 'supporting' disliked MIL through illness

[Treague]

MIL and I have differing outlooks on life - I could write screeds...We don't get along particularly. However, in her small family there is a pressure for everything to be lovely, so nothing is ever said (except via my grimacing features, apparently!) and nobody pulls her up on her utter selfishness. Her husband and two sons just let her get on with it, cook her dinners, cater parties etc. She isn't so keen on me and in particular lately has been quite overt about not having me around, but has tried (and failed) to cover it up in terms of 'I thought you'd like some time alone.'

So now she has cancer (contained and treatable) and is having chemotherapy. I don't dislike her in a way that means I wish this on her: I just find I'm quite detached and don't consider that I am part of the family (she has made this clear without saying the words) so I have kept slightly out of the way, but responded positively to texts or requests for me to get her certain things.

I don't know what else to do or how to behave. I don't like her and after one memorable rejection had decided not to try to please her any more. I can't talk to DH about it, he's very sanguine by nature but his mum is suffering and that's just not nice. I'm absolutely filled with resentment towards her and hating having to continue this fakery, but aware that that makes me sound like a bell-end when she's ill.

I don't know what I want from this really, I know I will continue to be nice and listen and visit when summoned etc, I suppose I would just like to hear from other people how tricky it is when you can't be really honest with anyone around. Even if you just post to tell me to get over myself.

Sorry, I forgot to say, the reason I'm finding it hard is that she keeps saying things like 'I am so lucky to have you all rally round me' or 'When I am better we will spend some time together' and it's kind of deranging me because I would like her to basically leave me alone. Unreasonable I know.

I've been where you are. My exH's estranged father was seriously ill at one stage. It was important to my exH to resume contact and I opted to support him because I loved him (at the time) even though I disliked my FIL very much indeed and couldn't have cared less. I didn't feel fake therefore, and I didn't feel my arm was being twisted in any way. My rationale for being at the bedside was clear in my own mind so I wasn't a hypocrite either.

When the man died a few years later and after we'd separated, I even sent a condolence card but chose to word it 'he will be sadly missed'. Which I'm sure he was, but not by me :)

I was in a similar situation recently. My MiL was diagnosed with breast cancer and was undergoing chemo and radiotherapy.

Like you I don't get on with her. I don't feel supported by her and I am fully aware that I was seen as the uterus for her only grandchild and am now just the taxi driver to deliver him to her. I have the added complication that my DH died when DS was a baby. This means I can't leave it up to DH to do the visits!

Mil has lots of local support to her, so I knew that I wouldn't be able to help in that sense. I sent her some ready meals for when she couldn't be arsed to cook, and I got DS to send a card. That's pretty much it. I wouldn't wish cancer on anyone, but as she isn't overly fond of me, I didn't see why I should be overly supportive of her.

This probably sounds really harsh - but we're not friends. She is my DS's grandma - but she isn't MY family, and I'm not her family. I left most of the support to her family.

She's in remission now, so it's all ok as far as the cancer goes. To outsiders I think I look like a bitch, but I've reached a point where I don't care. It took a long time to get to that point, but I'm a lot less stressed now.

Thanks for the replies and also for not saying 'you selfish cow, it's not about you'. (Which is a little bit how I feel...)

I am impressed that you both have clarity about your relationship with the ill person. I hadn't realised how much of a problem it is for me not to have that: you see, sometimes I am 'ok' in her eyes (e.g. lunch out together) and she is lovely. But if her family is around, particularly BIL, then I am to be put somewhere away from them ('Why don't you go to the hut at the bottom of the garden and read the paper?') - and I cannot figure out why she thinks it's ok to do this to a woman in her forties. Of course any reason I might find out would probably be something hurtful.

I had more or less decided that since I was dispensable according to her whim, she could naff off and I would not be spending any more time even vaguely trying to be part of her family. I've mentally sort of done that, am rubbish at pretending. It really bothers me.

I think the key is in '...don't consider that I am part of the family (she has made this clear without saying the words)'

If she has made it clear that she doesn't consider you part of her family, then presumably you staying at the polite distance appropriate for non-family members will be exactly what she would find most comfortable :)

So I would not feel guilty at treating it exactly as if she were anyone else I vaguely knew who was ill. Sympathetic, helping out if required to. But not rearranging my life, and not weeping and wailing. And I think that's how you deal with the tricky element of it: You keep your integrity by keeping a certain distance that all those who KNOW you, know is there.

Of COURSE you feel a stab of rage that someone who has actually treated you very badly and not kindly at all, is now expecting your help and sympathy, and others are expecting you to give it.

Find the 'truth' in the situation if you have difficulty pretending. If the truth is that you're acting out of duty, or obligation, or to take the moral high-ground, or the milk of Christian charity, or whatever it is that's really making you go to that hospital.... run with that and be honest with yourself. And don't be frightened to use some of her own barbs back at her just because she's sick... 'I'd have brought you some grapes but I was too busy sitting in the hut at the end of the garden reading the paper'

(She actually suggested that?.... Was it some cockeyed suburban equivalent of the women retiring to the withdrawing room while the men have their port and cigars?... Do she and BIL have big secrets you shouldn't overhear? )

I've only recently reached the point of clarity. I was always trying to get her to like me - and trying to be a part of the family. It took a while and quite a few nasty comments from her for me to realise that she doesn't care. She'll put on a show for others when they're there (she doesn't want family to think that she's a bitch to her sons' widow) but when it's just her, me and DS I'm ignored completely.

I'm in an easier situation as Mil lives 2 hours away, so I don't have to see her much - but we will be seeing her over the summer holidays. I'm not looking forward to it. Based on the last time I was ignored, I might just leave DS with her for a couple of hours while I go shopping. If she's not going to pretend, I'm not going to.

Just because she has cancer doesn't mean you have to be her friend. You can support your DH and your DC as she is their mother/grandmother - that's your job as wife/mother. She has other family to look after her. You look after your family.

TalkativeJim I hadn't thought of it being comfortable for her, and I find that enormously helpful.

Cogito yes, she has pretty much suggested on every visit there ever, at some point, that I am removed as far as possible from her family. It's always something that would be the act of a gracious hostess towards a frazzled guest, if she were a gracious hostess and I were a frazzled guest It used to annoy me because I like her DH an enormous amount and I like BIL as well, and didn't really get to talk to them. However I've come to realise that neither of them really gives a stuff about me, shows any concern or interest really (they're perfectly ok and polite), so I'm not losing anything by being removed to the bottom of the garden.

God writing all this down, I am not a very good fit for their family

Spaghettio, I would do exactly that: go and do something nice. Hope it all goes ok.

"I'm not losing anything by being removed to the bottom of the garden."

You actually retire to the hut? What happens when you say... equally graciously obviously.... 'no thank you, I'm very happy exactly where I am?'

If you don't lose anything at the bottom of the hut - make it your choice! Take a book and a glass of wine - or invite BiL or someone else with you. Make it about YOU - not about her.

Oooooh - no ignore me - do what cogito says. Just decline graciously. That'd stump her!

I didn't realise what was going on for quite some time - I mean, it didn't occur to me that someone would do this!

So now I take it each time on its merits. Quite often I say 'no thanks' ('oh but I just thought you'd like some time alone' 'oh but it's looking so nice down there, thought you might like a quiet moment' etc etc, have to be quite firm sometimes, she doesn't like the word 'no') and do stay precisely where I am. Sometimes I do go, if she's just tapping dh to sort out her computer or similar.

It does stump her. In every context, declining to go along with what she suggests stumps her. I have never met anyone quite like her. It takes quite a lot to get her to stop re-suggesting the same thing but in different words

It took me ages to figure out my MiL too - I didn't think people would be like that. I just assumed that you'd welcome a new member of the family.

My Mil also likes to suggest the same thing over and over to hope for a better answer! I now organise her, rather than the other way, as I found it so disheartening to find myself spending a day not enjoying myself and being ignored. Now I say "we're doing X, would you like to join us? We'll be there at x day and x time." It really frustrates her as she has no control over the plans, but still wants to see DS.

That way, I don't have to tell her "no" but she doesn't get to control every situation.

It'd be one of those 'polite' Jane Austen-style conversations through gritted smiling teeth wouldn't it?

'On such a glorious summer's day why not repair to the garden with a book, my dear?'
'No thank you most kindly mother-in-law, I'm quite pleasantly diverted in conversation with brother-in-law here already'
'And should you need refreshment, we can happily furnish you with a cold beverage'
'Once again, your thoughtfulness is most endearing but I fear I must decline'
'I have even arranged for soft cushions & footstools to be arranged in the garden room to make the experience more calming'
'Which will be an interesting exercise, because they'll have to be removed from your patronising gob first..... dear heart.'

Cogito

Spaghettio, my MIL has this thing where she says, vaguely, 'if you're around next Thursday, let's do something. So, you keep next Thursday free and we can think about it nearer the time.'

If I do keep it free (and again, it took me some time to work it out, so I did go through this a few times) then one of three things will happen:

1. She will pop in for a cup of tea (max: twenty mins) and then go on and on about how nice it is to spend some time with ds (who will have spent 20 mins on the computer in the next room).

1. I will contact her the day before and she'll get flustered and tell me at length just how busy and important she is.

1. Nothing. She won't even contact me. It will be as if nothing was arranged, because, technically, it wasn't. Utterly dispensable.

It is torturous making any sort of arrangement with her. So I decided just to not bother again. Then, she started inviting me to her place, and disinviting me at 11pm the night before. Fuck OFF.

That would annoy me soooooo much! I wouldn't bother - let DH spend his time running around after her.

I am absolutely staggered that this woman wants you to go to the bottom of the garden because she dislikes you so intensely. I'm even more staggered that you sometimes obey her. I'm angry on your behalf that your husband doesn't call her on it. Is he always so passive? I'd be livid with the pair of them and there'd be a huge row believe me. It seems as though everyone in his family has read and digested the British Book of How To Be Rude Whilst Pretending To Be Polite.

As for her cancer, you didn't give it to her so fuck her. I personally wouldn't lift a finger for her in any way.

Wow. She sounds a right pain! Love cogito's jane austen script. Maybe there's a big secret drama behind your banishment, e.g.

[MIL in swoon to BIL] "oh BIL, BIL, when will you marry? My poor nerves are sorely tested"
"I'm sorry mother, but as you know I am bewitched by treague's wit and beauty. You can send her away, but my tender feelings will never change."
[MIL] "Do something Richard!" [FIL shrugs, resigned]
"Are the shades of pemberley to be thus polluted?"....

Have been in similar situation, and (even though feel mean) am honest with myself (and a couple of old, trusted friends) about my feelings. Semi-honest (but toned down) with DH, and see my role as supporting him rather than his relative. Polite, practical, distant with the family member concerned, and avoid saying the standard platitudes / papering over cracks unless I can be sincere: even if this comes across as cold it seems better option than false gushing.

Spaghettio, you sound very generous to make such an effort with a difficult MIL in the circumstances, glad you've found ways to make it more manageable.

I think a large part of 'getting rid of me' is that she wants to have a chat with DH or BIL, if I'm there they include me in the conversation (perfectly normal) and she doesn't get a chance to shine. DH honestly did not notice anything was amiss there: he is passive where she's concerned, but then, he grew up with her and she is 'normal' to him, annoying at times, but easy to shrug off and she's pretty nice to him. She never doesn't take no for an answer from him. She confessed once she is slightly scared of him, intellectually that is. It's a win for him. She doesn't bother him too much.

Since she works on a one-to-one basis most of the time (too many people chatting and she gets overloaded and calls us all gobshites or accuses us of arguing) he rarely sees how she deals with me. His suggestion is to just ignore her demands, or stick to no. He usually isn't present when my 'no' just means she rewords what she wants me to do and carries on trying to persuade me.

But lately I've been telling him more about it and I did say I'm at the end of my tether (after a really horrible rejection/messing around with plans etc when he was abroad therefore not involved) and I need help with her, not passivity. He's been paying attention to her demands from me and offering to deal with her so I can ignore her (like he does normally).

I won't go on, but this is just the tip of the iceberg here

Thank you all, it sometimes takes outsiders to point out how outrageously someone is behaving. I'm relieved not to be alone here and definitely not feeling so bad about not wanting to be involved with her very much.

The Dance of Anger by Harriet Lerner is about family relationships and, from what I understand from the book, this sort of behaviour by MIL is due to something from her past, a relationship with a sister perhaps, or an unhappy relationship with her mother? which she is acting out or re enacting or finally getting her revenge for.
Try finding out about her childhood, are their sisters or brothers who could fill you in.
It's reassuring, if you do find the reason for her behaviour, because then you know it is absolutely not you, just her issues, and easier for you to feel uninvolved.

That's interesting, I'll look out for that book. I do know her sister and there is a story there, but quite what it is, I can't fathom. I suspect when her sister dies, I shall be told a few family secrets. She is really cagey about her mother, too.

Dozer I re-read your bit about BIL fancying me, it really made me laugh! He so obviously doesn't, it would be funny if it were in any way necessary to let me know! What a family eh? DH is lovely.

(OP back again with a cunning name change...)

Thought I'd update as this has for some reason really upset me and I can't tell DH.

I got an email this morning from MIL saying that one day I would believe her when she says she loves me, and she is very proud of me.

I just want to scream at the oddness, and the massive missing of the point that I don't care if she loves me or not, she can't seem to treat me with basic manners and respect too often for it not to matter!

Cannot say a word to DH about it (he wouldn't have a clue anyway) and obviously it isn't the time to bring it up with her - and that would play rather badly anyway, believe me.

I am furious with her, she has turned it around on me in her own head so that she herself is blameless and I cannot say a fucking thing. I do not btw think she has calculated how to do this, it is just the way she is - oblivious to her own behaviour!