Help! My partner's family hate me & it's making me ill. Should I just walk away with my 6 month old daughter?

[Sundaygirl88]

I'm in desperate need of some objective advice.
Me and my partner have been together 2 and 1/2 years and have a 6 month old daughter. We have been recently struggling in our relationship with regaining a balance or finding our flow as parents. I've been asking for relationship councilling to help iron out any issues we have with each other. (He resents me for not working and having to be the bread winner, I think he should help out more around the house and with our daughter etc.)
These problems, although stressful would be more manageable if his family didn't hate me and we're applying extra pressure on relationship.

I met my partner on a blind date which was set up by a mutual friend. I recently moved to the area, orginally been two hours away in a different county. Even after my contract at my job ended I found a new job and stayed as the relationship was blossoming. I got on well with his parents (whom he was still living with) straight away. Especially his mother who I felt I could talk to as equals - woman to woman. She seemed very straight talking and I liked that because I felt I knew where I was with her. I was invited on a family holiday and even extended an invitation for me to live with them after I left a live in job and needed to find somewhere to live after me and DP had been serious for a year.
After a few months of living there I had to go back to my home town as both my brother and mum were ill and my dad needed help coping with them. They both suffer from mental health problems and are prone to being suicidal.
DP's family think mental health problems are a weakness and pathetic. So I didn't go into details but left on a good note.
Whilst at home I discovered I was pregnant which was a surprise - I told DP and he was in shock but also was scared and reluctant to tell his family, even after it was confirmed that I was over 8 weeks.
It was then I found out his mother hated me and had been trying to get him to leave me for the majority of our relationship and had even been bad mouthing me to extended family.
Obviously I was devastated and completely blindsided. I didn't understand what I had done wrong or what I could do to make things better.
He told me I couldn't do anything because she hated me because he loved me and it wasn't personal she was just very controlling and had a warped view of other people when it came to him.
I suggested that I spoke to her face to face about her concerns for the sake of her grandchild that I was now carrying but he assured me it would make it much worse if I accused her of disliking me or bad mouthing me and that she would get over it eventually.
She sobbed hysterically when she found out I was pregnant and then pretended I wasn't pregnant and didn't exist for the following three months. I was told I wasn't allowed back in her house and she didn't want to see me by my DP who was still living there while saving a deposit for our own home. I continued living with my family two hours away until we found somewhere to live by which point was this time last year. We had to live near his family rather than mine due to his work comitments. I didn't see his family until I was a few weeks close to my due date by which point they acted distant but not hostile and nothing was mentioned other than they had bought X Y & Z for my unborn daughter (who they now seemed willing to accept existed) I kept the peace for my DP's and unborn child's sake and sucked it up.

Since my daughter was born I have had nothing but unwanted comments about my parenting skills and pressure to leave her alone and over night with his parents. They hate my breastfeeding as it means she cant be away from me longer than a few hours and she has always refused a bottle.
His mother has not directly spoken to me in all the times I've seen her, talks to DP or DD but never to me and won't look me in the eye if I address her. She has never once contacted me about arranging to see DD or coming over to my house to spend some time with her she only wants either to have her alone or with DP present and it to be at her house on her time and when she's available. If she doesn't get her own way she argues with DP and calls her husband, older son, sisters etc and cries about how I'm preventing her from having a relationship with her own granddaughter and I'm controlling her son and ruining the family.

I'm at my wits end! Me and DP argue about them constantly and although he agrees she's trying to turn everyone against me he says there's nothing anyone can do because she always wins and she'll never back down.
When I ask him to have my back he throws in my face any our recent arguments, or says he can't cut off his family because he's scared they're going to be right about me all along and I'll leave him.
He came back from his brother and sister in laws house a few hours ago mad as hell at me because he's been having to "defend me again" and there's only so much more he can take. I'm supposed to be spending Xmas with these people and they all hate me, when I pointed this out to him he told me he knew I would try and find a way our of it and that's what they've all been saying I'll do. To keep my daughter away and ruin everyone's Xmas.
I can't win! I feel like maybe it's time I consider cutting my losses and leaving him completely and moving back near my own family because I'm feeling so lonely and anxious up here with no support and a "mother in law" (for lack of a better word) who won't stop until we break up or I do as she says all the time and be bullied into submission.

Sorry for the long post, but any advice would be greatly received.

(I had orginally posted in WWYD but adevised to move thread her)

I think you both need to break away from your families as they have put undue pressure on you. When he's calm explain to him how tough it is for you to hear they have been talking about you behind your back, and stirring things until he comes home and attacks you for something you haven't done in a place you weren't even present!

In your shoes I'd want a chance to establish your own family of three. I'd stay home for Christmas, just the three of you and look in for short visits to family.

Life is very tough in the early months as you both settle down to new pressures and responsibilities and roles, all while sleep deprived. Don't walk out on each other yet. Give your new family a chance.

What Imperial said.

Fuck that for a game of soldiers.

My DHs parents especially his Mum can't stand me. She's never liked me even though I've made the effort. I even tried to arrange the hen around her but she wasn't available at all. We've been together 7 years and married this August. We have a DD(2.8) and another DC on the way. She gives money for DD but doesn't bother to see her. Difference is DH for the most part sticks up for me but does say, "that's just how she is none of it surprises me" but he has agreed not to visit them until she has a personality transplant. I won't have my kids suffering over it.

Difference is OP your partner isn't being supportive and that's the only way it could work. He complains he has to stick up for you? Tough shit! Tell him you're sick of hearing his excuses. If it bothers him that much just to sod off back to Mummy-- because he's not putting you and DD first.

You both may have valid points re: work/housework and that's a separate, annoying issue but it must make you feel even less supported.

I have no crystal ball but I predict next year will be just the same as this year and that's not a way to live your life.

op I've been where you are. If you stay in this situation your mental health with be in tatters until they have all broke you down.

Right now your dp (even though he may love you very much) is just in self preservation mode. He isn't really fighting your corner because if he was he would have told them to get to fuck

His mother befriended you because she wanted to be very close to you, to know what you were doing, how you were treating her son and getting the measure of you eg. Would you stick up for yourself ? Would your dp choose you over her?

Nothing will change - ever if you keep being passive.

I was actually ready to leave. My anxiety was through the roof with my mil and my Dh reluctance to really stick up for me was making me ill.

So I told him I was going - with dd. He knew I was serious and it really made him look at the situation and after that day he put me first or rather he just stopped letting his mum treat me like a cunt.

So I suggest you do the same. The problem here really is your DP if he can't get his shit together and stop letting his family treat you like this then do really want to be with a bloke that is emotionally bullied and controlled by his mother?

I raised dd1 on my own till she was 15 being a single parent is better than being bullied by both your mil and her son because he is actually starting to blame you now.

You hold the cards here op

If I were in your situation, I would cut my losses and run.
They sound awful, what a horrible way to live.
You don't need to put up with it.

Leave. If not for your own sake, for that of your DD. This will either escalate or remain for ever or both. Start afresh away form this toxic bunch.

OP - the only person who has the right to see your dd is your dp. Grandparents have no rights over grandchildren. especially if they are toxic people.

Move away, take your dd, move back to your home town, or anywhere you like. Arrange contact for your dd with her father (if he wants it) and leave them to it.

You do, in fact, hold all the aces.

The woman is a special brand of toxic. She has turned the family against you and is working on your DP- this will never change. She won't wake up one morning and decide to make an effort. You cannot control what she says so get the hell out and don't look back, don't try to reason with her and don't even bother to defend your decisions. The woman will twist anything you say anyway. Before you go, try and have a rational conversation with DP. Ask him what you are supposed to do about the situation, make him really examine the situation from your PoV. It may trigger some empathy for you which will help with maintaining a relationship with your dd.
If you stay prepare yourself for the old bag turning your own daughter against you. Have a look at Narcissistic Personality Disorder - it sounds like that is what you are up against, or something along those lines. This is unlikely to change. She may sweeten up briefly, but only ever to reel you back in and mine for more information to use against you.

Hello there, I feel for you, I had a tricky mother-in-law too. I had mental health issues when I met my husband many years ago and she really didn’t want him to be with me. My sensing this and hearing back snippets that my husband relayed caused me to basically distrust her motives ever since and through the psychological process known as ‘confirmation bias’ I would zero in the perceived ‘dissings’ she would give me and totally ignore the pleasant stuff.

Anyway, I digress. I don’t have a problem with her and I’ve learned to accept her as she is and realize that my problems are made up in my head – a complex and interwoven and manytimes incorrect narrative and not necessarily true. The relief!

We don’t attach to people. We attach to concepts about people. So the key to reducing our misery is to change how we react to our ‘stories’.

We can try to do this by really enquiring and meditating on them. Take one of the troubling thoughts: ‘My mother in law hates my breastfeeding’ and ask yourself if it is true. Really true? You have actually heard her tell you that she ‘hates you breastfeeding’ to your face? Or do you simply discern that she does from agglomerated ‘sources’ (that you are more willing to believe because you now sense that she is against you) and choose to believe that?

How would you feel if you let go of that story? After all, you can do what you like with your children – she has no control!

What if you reversed the throught. That YOU don’t like her (for whatever reason) and are projecting that onto her and it’s eroded your attachment to her.

Could it be that simply generational habits are different, she isn’t as used to it as we are now (I breastfed both mine to roughly age 4 and even my mother who fed me in the 70s til 18 months, so unusual for then, has commented!) and has expressed surprise, maybe once or twice a grumble that she can’t have your child overnight? It could really be that simple.

Anyway, meditate on it and really think. It’s a huge surprise to me how little we think, compare to how much we ‘brood’ on our brain home cinema of Made Up Shit about stuff.

Do that for the other horrible thoughts.

Here is a link to the ways you can enquire and release your troubling thoughts, it’s worth a try (in situations where actual abuse is happening, I wouldn’t recommend it as a first course of action)

happinessbeyondthought.blogspot.com/2012/05/surrendering-i-letting-go-of-suffering.html

All that said, with a new baby in the mix you should be pulling together with your husband and his first loyalty is with both of you and not his mother. He may be simply exasperated, and reacting to this trouble badly, or he have more sinister destabilizing motives. Either way, when you feel a bit more stable I would have a heart to heart with him about it. Also, his mother has to let go of him and not rely on him for happiness and shouldn’t really be involved in your lives. I can totally see how this is upsetting.

Good luck.

Having seen a gazillion posts on here like this, yes, walk away now.
It won't get any better.
Your OH is a spineless knob who will always put Mummy over you and DD.
Go to your parents house for a little while and take stock.
THIS will be your life for YEARS AND YEARS to come unless you can get the strength to get away now.
If your OH really wants to be with you he can move away closer to your family and get a new job etc.... Bet he won't though. He won't want to upset mummy dearest.
Sorry, it's really hard but in the long run it's best for you and DD to be away from this toxic, vile woman.

No offence boggis but if you like to self blame when other people are treating you like shit that's fine but i don't think you should suggest othe folk do. I'm
Sure op has had many heart to hearts with her dp about this situation

You misunderstand, it is not about self blame at all. It is about gaining real clarity about troubling notions and situations instead of reacting to slights, perceived or real like a drunken monkey - always on the back foot.

If, after deeply questioning the troubling thoughts each in turn, turning them around from all sorts of angles, you gain more self control, more calm, a greater sense of what is real and what is imagined -THEN you can take steps to remove yourself from a situation, or better manage it - whatever you decide. But acting on adrenaline without true consideration of whether these things are actually real (because let's face it, most of what we believe is heavily skewed) is impudent. Especially with a young baby.

I have used this method regarding my feelings towards my rapist. It doesn't excuse him at all, but by christ, it helped me gain distance, calm and peace with my emotions surrounding it.

I simply don't think about it at all now and it no longer defines who I am

Just a different view. A person can take or leave it. Surely it's worth really thinking about something, no?

Asteria has helpful insight, good advice in many of the comments.

OP, I feel for you. You do not deserve this, a new mother with a six month old baby girl and no support from your partner or his family, instead active hostility and abusive manipulation from them.

You have a dp and inlaw problem, it's both. Even if your dp became a man of character and even if he totally stopped contact with them which he should, his family would still be evil and continue to try to cause strife with harassment and make your life a living hell.

The unfortunate thing is your dp is so far away from doing the right thing that the situation sounds impossible.

My guess is you've already talked and talked to him about it. Here's my advice. First, whatever you do, DO NOT spend Christmas with them. Do not let them in your house. Call the police if they trespass. Their behavior is beyond the pale. Do not go to their house. They have no right to see your daughter or influence her in any way. Do not accept gifts from them to your daughter. Make yourself a nice Christmas at home or at your parents and welcome your dp if he would like a lovely, stress free Christmas of genuine good will.

Second, if you want to give him one last chance, and this is just as important as the first thing, Say nothing. Make your house cozy and warm and inviting for you and your daughter. Try to have dinner at the table even if it's sandwiches or cereal to put in place a family routine.

Third, Imagine all of us with you and supporting you. Come here to vent (and to your family, you deserve the support) and say nothing to your husband. If he makes a fuss and he will, trying to get a reaction or goad you as his family treats you, say nothing. Hug him and walk away. Do something with love like read a book to your baby to show him what love is. Say nothing to him. It's all been said a hundred different ways. He knows what he's doing. His family knows what they're doing. They both owe you a giant sincere apology and amends. Instead, they are hounding you to death, waiting it out until they win whatever that means in their twisted heads. Control and elimination. They failed to control you now they're trying to eliminate you.

So if you stay for a whole longer to give one last chance, after a few weeks or month or so, if he doesn't soften toward you and firm up to his family, then leave knowing you tried and stay away from ill willed manipulators in the future. You will have finely honed radar after this. Good luck.

One of the main reasons you need to get away is to prevent her putting a wedge between you and your daughter. She clearly intends to erase you from the picture. That will accelerate as time goes by. Kids are impressionable.

Boggis, I like what you've said (though it's probably not apparent from what I've said above! Experience, sadly ). Quite a sophisticated process for most though? I think you've qualified it by acknowledging the facts of Mil's toxicity. We have to face facts, that's an vital part of the process of coming to terms - the truth shall set you free and all that. But your right we can work ourselves up into a state by adding narrative.

... when the initial, core, story is bad enough.

this family will turn your dd against you,op.

I agree, do not let them anywhere near your daughter. They will try to turn her against you, that would be a way to "win" in their twisted minds. They don't deserve to see your daughter or influence her in any way from how they've mistreated you.

All I can say is my deepest thanks to all the support and advice. I'm currently at my parents house with my DD, came down two days ago and finally feeling my anxiety rise up and away.
DP says he is determined to proove to me that me and DD mean more to him than anyone else and he loves us. I'm not holding my breath but I hope for a better future whatever happens.
Again, thank you x

I really hope that he does prove it. He needs to cut the umbilical cord and tell his mother that he is in charge of his own life.

For a start, have you made it clear that you wouldnt have left but for the way his family treat you and the way that he takes it out on you?

Wishing you all the best, Sunday.

Do take a look at the books I mentioned - Susan Forward's 'Toxic Parents' and 'Toxic In-laws'. It's not going to be easy for Dh to face this stuff and you both need to be on the same page with it. These books will be essential in that.

OP your posts mirrors the same experience i had with my exs mother. She acts and treated me the same. Thankfully he did my the favour and cheated and im happily married and my DH. If he was any decent man he wouldnt let you be treated in this way and wouldnt be telling you what they say about you.

Help ! My in laws are very jealous that my parents live closer to my son then they do . We always take it in turns seeing grandparents but my mum and dad see him allot more , even though they have let my son down a couple of times . I post pictures of my son out with my parents my in laws cause upset and try to come between me and my partner or if we don’t see them twice a month they kick off , it’s getting me down as it happens every year only this time other family members of there’s have stepped in and are now accusing me of dividing the family ! it’s really hurtful I struggle with anxiety and the thought of ever seeing them again makes me panic I feel really down and low about it it’s effecting my health , what should I do ?