DH and my lovely family

[germinal]

Will try and be short! I have a lovely and large family. We get together maybe six times a year (3 ds 1db and partners). We live close to my parents and ds and I see them often. Children see cousins and grandparents at least twice a week. DM minds DS2 four days a week. Except for occasions (christmas, easter, big bdays) I dont ask or expect DH to attend family get togethers. However tonight he has declared he "doesn't like them (my family) and will leave me to attend most things alone. I think that is ridiculous. I don't care if he doesn't like them, they are kind and generous people and a huge part of my life and the dc life. I expect him to attend family things and be kind. Ffs. Aibu????

He is very charming and popular

uh-oh. klaxon

Tell your DH to stop being so self-centred and look at it this way:

9 weeks x 7 days = 63 days

63 days divided by 6 days = 10.5 years!

Although I am on your side to the extent that I think your husband has a cheek fussing about family when your MIL stays so long and he has free childcare, for the sake of family harmony, I would try to get to the bottom of what is bothering him about your family. Saying I hate them and won't see them any more is a cry of frustration, what is underlying that? Does he want weekends to be family times only, or just be able to chill out with you altogether without the threat of a family outing if he doesn't come up with a plan? Does he want to spend Christmas this year at your own home instead of with them? Would he prefer your mum didn't do childcare any more?

You do get very defensive about your family when you feel they are being unfairly attacked, I do too, very much but sometimes there is a place for listening and hearing the other person out. I think you need to listen to where his frustration lies without being defensive. You might find his stroppiness and declarations are covering up something quite small that could be fixed- for example, I wouldn't generally ask my family round on the weekend as that is our family time, I might very occasionally make an exception, but I don't think my husband would want to entertain my mum every Sunday for lunch for example, but is more than happy if I go off and see my family in the week, and relaxed if they call unexpectedly. I think it is about give and take- you have certainly given in the family department with the latest MIL visit, and you have every right to point this out once the main issue is identified, but as others have said, I would make an effort to get to the bottom of his strop, at least then you will know whether you are pandering to his paddies or whether actually he has a point and something might be easily fixed by rejigging how you interact with your family to be more considerate of his needs.

OP I don't think you're weird. I do understand where your DH is coming from though.

We have a very similar thing but in reverse. Luckily my DH is pretty understanding about the fact that I find the many get togethers with his huge family exhausting, so we don't go to as many now. It's difficult though because they think it's weird that I don't want to join in all the jollity, so I'm seen as the strange one and they seem to regard me with bemusement and humour me, which is really quite irritating.

DH, luckily for me, does seem to understand that I need time with just us. I would go mad if it were expected that we join them every year for all the big occasions! It has taken ten years for them to even start to not automatically assume we will join them all the time, or for dinner every week, or whatever. Some of them still just don't get that we like our own time and we get comments about how sad it is when we leave (to put this into context we live 15 mins away!!) which I find OTT and claustrophobic.

I agree that your DH needs to be polite to them, but am a little uneasy about the childcare payback being spending a lot of time with them - what fuss would it cause if he hadn't agreed to that and risked offending your mum when she offered, or said now that he wanted out of the arrangement? While I think it needs to be taken into account, I don't agree that favours should mean an automatic putting up with absolutely anything.

SqudgyMaltLoaf maybe the OP found having her DP's mother living with them for 9 weeks OTT and claustrophobic, but she sucked it up and didnt moan or make a fuss.

Wouldnt hurt for her DP to stop being rude about her family, and it would be interesting to see what he would say if the OP's mother wanted to move in for 9 weeks, I am betting it would be a NO.

In future he can entertain his own mother for 9 weeks and the OP can can to her family as her MIL living in her house is too OTT and claustrophobic for her

I wouldn't want to spend that much time with someone elses family. Sorry.

Does he like your friends?

Tell your DH to stop being so self-centred and look at it this way:

9 weeks x 7 days = 63 days

63 days divided by 6 days = 10.5 years!

I understand the first one, which is 9 weeks = 63 days. No idea what the second equation means.

Got it. It would take ten and a half years for your family to take up as much of your time as his mother has, if they carry on holding events at their current rate.

I think my way is a bit clearer - the divided by doesn't make sense.

I don't think you're being weird, OP, but I can see why he might not want to spend every Christmas etc for evermore with his in-laws.

your lovely family,
how about your lovely husband,

sounds like the lot of you rule/control his life totally,

makes me wonder why you "need" a husband at all.

poor bugger, he must feel quite paranoid the way you are speaking about "your lovely family"

so you "had his mother " for a while, big deal, what a hero you must feel.
where's the loyalty to the father (and breadwinner?) of your children.

This thread is weird.

If the OP was in the husband's position, with her partner expecting her to slot into her extended family, her own opinions being ignored, not allowed to even express the fact that she had issues with the family, there would have been pages of 'LTB'.

The OP didn't give details about her husband's 'rudeness', and I agree with a previous poster that OP has given the impression that anything less than worship of her 'lovely' family would be classed as 'rude'.

And the 9 weeks v 6 times a year is a red herring - the OP's mother is a physical part of their life all the time. How often does her mil visit?

However, the thing that really bothered me on this thread that I don't think anyone has mentioned is that the OP more than once compared her husband unfavourably with her siblings partners, saying that they join in etc. They are different people, OP. If your in-laws like your family set-up, bully for them. Your husband has the right not to like it.

And, by the way, I like my in laws better than my own family but am grateful that I barely see either set, because I hate large gatherings.

He husband isn't being "lovey" at the moment - he''s being petulant. Do you have to think your DH is lovely even when he isn't?

How is he the "breadwinner" - is OP's salary just pin money then? Bless her pretty little head, I suppose it keeps her out of trouble.

OP's mother does the vast majority of their childcare for free, she hosted his mother for 9 weeks without comment and now he's being rude to her family and wants to never go to a family occasion with his wife and children but for them to attend alone.

And you think she sounds controlling?

She does sound controlling.

What has her husband done that sounds controlling? Refusing to see someone himself but not restricting her contact is not, for a start.

Kewcumber - he has NOT said he will NEVER go to a family occasion. You are not the first person to pick up on this but the OP herself said he will leave her (and the kids) to attend MOST family functions alone. That is not the same thing at all.

You're right - I re-read. So out of 5-6 events he will at most attend 2 a year? I think that, combined with his expectation that she host his mother for a lengthy period, is unreasonable.

If thats the case then there should be no problem with having a quid pro-quo of two days of both families a year. And not expecting her mother to provide free childcare if you can't even bring yourself to be polite on those occasions when you do see them.

Isn't that a ridiculously nit-picky way to behave to your in-laws who provide you with an enormous amount of free childcare? HE sounds like a spoilt teenager.

Kew - I don't think it's quite as black and white as that, because one set of parents lives either 5 miles or 5 minutes away (I can't recall which) and is a daily presence in their lives - in addition to childcare the OP speaks with her mother every single day and clearly, from other postings, sees other members of the family very regularly while his mother lives overseas and is seen very, very rarely.

I do agree that if he has a problem with the family then the childcare arrangement is a bit of a cheek.

I do agree that hosting a parent for 9 weeks, even if they live overseas, is pushing things.

You're quite of course NotNew and normally I would be the voice of reason in these kinds of things but very black posts like frizettes above does may me want to post anything which opposed her (his?) view so white from me it is!

In fact I think OP has accepted that her DH may have to opt out of some family events.

I don't see the problem apart from that - she's perfectly entitled to have whatever relationship she wants with her family.

The husband opting out of family events seems on the surface to be a reasonable suggestion, but then look at what those family events are. Those six times a year include the major holidays - Christmas Day, Boxing Day, and Easter. There's no suggestion from the OP that she, her husband and the kids might spend those dates together without extended family. Her solution is that she takes the kids to her family and her husband stays home. Her being with her parents and siblings is apparently non-negotiable, so instead her husband either has to suck it up and go with them, or he has to spend the big holidays away from his wife and children because the OP regards her parents and siblings as more important. I'm not surprised the poor man is pissed off, I would be furious.

Hello!! Sorry, took a break.

Nine week stay of mil came about because DH asked me if it would be ok, I said "yes, of course" and dh booked her flights that day! Was fine, first week a bit awkward but we adapted quickly.

I now accept that I should not expect DH to attend family get togethers which he would prefer to avoid. Have apologised to DH and said as much. DH said he was sorry he said some mean things about my family and says he is very happy that I and dc have them in our lives.

So the issue has been resolved (mostly) with the help of good mumsnet advice!

As a footnote I am absolutely delighted to inform frizette that my income is four times that of dh. Though if I did earn little income and stayed at home caring for dc I dont think I would be any more or less "loyal".

Leaving aside my admitting that I was wrong about asking DH to spend time with my family so frequently I am surprised at the amount of people declaring my "loyalty" is to dh . And the suggestion that I should spend less time with or even talking to my family (without dh) as dh was sure to be "aware of it" and might find it "grating" or "suffocating". Good grief.

Well done on a pretty sane and normal outcome OP.

Yay for common sense.

DH has never, btw, suggested we spend "big holidays" as a nuclear unit. He enjoys lots of people around at Christmas and Easter and, funnily enough, those are the days he would like to see family. Its the incidental events he finds too much.

I think the implication was that women should be more loyal to a man who is the main breadwinner (I can't work out any other way to take it!). So maybe you can breathe a sigh of relief that you don't need to be at all loyal as you are the main breadwinner! You can happily tread DH underfoot...

Phew! I have licence to continue my controlling ways, since I (the woman!!), have more financial capital.

I love how frizette assumes dh is the "breadwinner" but (possibly realising that assumption is a bit retrograde) softens it with a question mark. The "father of your children (and breadwinner?)". [Grin]