absolutely furrious with mother and stepfather

[Paddlechick666]

I'll try to keep this short because the way I feel I could go on forever!

Salient Points:

DH suffers Major Depressive Disorder, hasn't lived at home for several months. In treatment and appears to have made recent breakthru.

Due to DH's illness and ex-gf nastiness haven't seen skids for several months.

Mother's 70th b'day tomorrow, family lunch planned for Sunday along with step-father.

DH has asked to visit this weekend with the skids. I mentioned the lunch but encouraged him to come altho he was a bit apprehensive at first.

Texted mother to say DH and sds1 & sds2 would be here at weekend so would it be ok to come to lunch.

Upshot is no, apparently it's not ok for the skids to join us. Mother says stepfather wants it to be "just us" and would be okay if it was just DH.

I can't believe how insensitive they are being. I wonder how my sfather would have felt had I been excluded from something as a child?

Mother is due here later for a couple of days (she does 2 days cm for me). It's her b'day tomorrow and I barely feel like getting her a card at present.

How on earth do I tell dh that he can't come? Am anxious that he will just say he won't come for weekend at all as all too much stress etc.

I know where I'd rather be on Sunday and of course the atmosphere will be dreadful now.

I appreciate what my sfather does for me and my bro and our kids etc but you know it's always at a price. He's always been very attention seeking and controlling.

I'm sure money has some factor here, they always insist on paying for everything. Hardly ever will they graciously accept us paying for something. They're the same with friends, then they complain that their friends never pay!!!

All this has brought up all my old issues with my sfather. His rules about how to sit at the table and how to speak and it drives me nuts.

I aked him once who said "such and such" in terms of table manners and he said "the Victorians" to which I repled and who says they were bloody right!

I also hate the way he bullies my niece, have told mother if he ever treats my dd that way he can forget seeing her.

GRRR, this is so stressful. DH is making progress and I am so excited about this weekend and now I'm being put in such a difficult situation............

Please any advice on how to calm down, how to tell dh and how to communicate extreme disapointment with parents AND how to be pleasant to parents on Sunday....... and even later today when mother arrives as really don't want to see her right now!!

I would give my apologies to your mum and stepfather and have the weekend with dh and the kids. They must come first.

At least you'll get to see your mum on her birthday and give her a present and a card.

Hi

To be honest with you I'd not go to the lunch. Grit your teeth and do something nice for your mum tomorrow ( like leave her a pressie and flowers or a b'day cake etc - anything that she would appreciate). Then explain to her that you won't be able to come on Sunday as, although you;d assumed it was a 'everyone in the family welcome' kind of thing your Sfather has put you straight.
If you're mother appreciates the hard time that you and DH are going through she should understand.

Alternatively say you are all happy just to pop in on Sunday, but obvioulsy won't stay for lunch as you have increased the numbers without much notice...see what she says...?

DH comes first - tell the parents you sadly won't be able to join them.

You can then spend a relaxing weekend with DH, which is exactly what he needs right now

I totally agree AngharadGoldenhand. They are being insensitive. You put your own family first. DH needs you more than they do right now. Hope you manage it and have a really lovely time with DH.

Hi Pchick, just wanted to say hello and positive vibes coming your way.

How's your stomach?? mine always knots up terribly when this sort of thing happens. You sound like you half want to keep everybody happy, half want to throttle the lot and walk away!

I would talk it through with DH first. Express the disappointment to him but i would keep to going to the lunch yourself. If he is basically OK and you decide together what he will do with the s'kids while you are at the lunch, I think you will feel a lot less stressed TBH. It's so tricky when things are so delicate - I'm really glad that his health is looking up.

Then perhaps get a babysitter for the evening so you can do something nice with dh after the lunch is all done and forgotten?

With your mum and s'dad, well, that's how it is - i would turn up and smile/grit teeth. At least your s'dad won't be there later today - will he...?

I don't know your mother of course, but it seems to me she's been put in a similar corner to yours: to choose between what her daughter and her DH want. Rightly or wrongly, she's gone for pleasing the one she has to see more often because she lives with him! When a person gets to 70 they can surely be excused having to run their lives to please their children? So perhaps you don't need to simmer with resentment against her - though that doesn't make your choice easier.

I'd normally agree with ChoosyFloosy, after all you only ever have the one mother etc and 70 is a special birthday. But given the extreme circumstances, the fact your DH is ill and almost certainly less able to take rejection, and that you see his children so rarely, I think puts a different perspective on it. I'd go with the "be nice to mother on her birthday but be with DH on Sunday" advice.

Your feelings about your stepfather, whether he's being reasonable or totally mean, are not really relevant to the decision. Know the type of person though, and sympathise!

So you have to choose between your mother and stepfather or your husband and stepchildren (who are your children's siblings)? why is this even a contest? Obviously you say you cannot go to the lunch.

hi all

thanks for the responses.

dh hasn't seen kids for same amount of time either so it's a really big deal to have them all here. i only saw dh for first time since Boxing Day this week!

also, they live 2 hours from us so dh would take kids home then return to where he's been living.

the meal is out at a restaurant. mother wants to come to my place for pudding tho. this may prove to be the compromise if i can get them here before dh has to leave to return kids.

mainly i am dreading telling dh and don't want to outright say why. again may use the "booking can't be changed, we'll all come here for pudding" line.

i know mother will feel stressed by all this and don't want to spoil her birthday in the slightest but still feel very let down by her attitude.

altho they have been supportive of me with dh's illness in their hearts i think they believe it's all just self indulgent nonsense and he should just get over it etc.

i also know that this is bringing up lots of issues that i normally manage to keep supressed in order not to have a falling out.

i don't honestly feel i can refuse to go to the lunch. i;ve put a lot of effort into getting a nice gift (portrait of the grandkids) etc. also, mother stays 2 nights per week here and don't want awful atmosphere with her either.

i think she feels same way but is blaming sfather.

i am so torn by this tho, for dh to come and bring the boys is just an amazing breakthru......

Choosy, good to hear from you. hope all is going okay with you.

thanks again everyone, i feel calmer for having posted on MN. I just need to clear my head and find a way to keep everyone happy.

I'm swimming against the tide here but it is your mum's birthday

she has had it all planned and then at the last minute you invite some children that as you say yourself you haven't seen for months

I'd be a bit hurt if I were her to be honest (though your stepdad sounds like a nightmare); two extra children at the table would completely alter the atmosphere if your mother wanted a grown-up family lunch

after all you didn't ask her first before inviting extra people to her lunch

I agree that you need to put your family first and not go if it is important that it is this weekend that you see dh

but I don't actually think that your mum is being that unreasonable. She had a birthday celebration planned and now it is getting out of hand and going wrong. It is her day after all.

buy her a present, maybe take her out somewhere nice for coffee and a cake on your own this weekend, and then stay at home for the lunch if that's what you feel you need to do

I think it would be awful to go to the lunch tbh. Don't your children miss their father? I'm sorry but I'm not sure you CAN please everyone. If you say that it is non-negotiable that the stepchildren come (find it incredibly that your STEP-father should exclude your stepchildren!) then THEY are the ones making the decision, not you.

Do you have children with your dh,Paddlechick? How old are these children and how old are your stepkids and how many of them are there? I do not think stepchildren are just random kids. They are your family.

I agree that the stepfather/ stepchildren thing is odd

but are there going to be other children there? because if the answer is no, I don't think it's about whose actual biological children they are, it's more the difference between an adult event and a child-friendly one

and we all know how different they are

cappucino & aloha, your posts both sum up exactly where I'm at!

I agree with you both on some points.

Thanks for the perspective Cappucino, you're right I did glibly extend the invitation without thinking. Which is rather rude now I think about it.

It's just another pointer to how conditional the support I get is tho.

My dd is 15 months and adores her daddy and half-brothers, she will see them Saturday and Sunday morning tho.

My mother does a huge amount for me and I'm so pleased with her relationship with my dd. I don't want to spoil her day on Sunday but you know, it'll probably be spoiled anyway because they are so intolerant of my niece & nephew's behaviour!

I have a faint hope that mother will arrive later having changed their minds and agree to the skids coming along.

My sfather's relationship with his own son is dreadful, I can understand why too!

sorry x posted!

my dd is 15 months, sds1 is 9, sds2 is 8, nephew is 15, neice is 13.

sfather is 74, mental age: 6!!!

I agree, these are not random kids. They have been included in many of "my" family's events in the past. Including weekends away, xmas presents etc.

I think sfather just wants all my attention and dd's attention at the lunch. Which he knows he won't get if skids are there.

He's pathalogical about table manners, can't even look at any of the kids at the table. Nephew & neice will be sulky tho as they're up all night Saturday at a big birthday bash so they're bound to commit some disgraceful faux pas like mumbling or putting elbows on the table!

oh ffs, where's my passport. think i'll flee the country and leave 'em all to it!

I'd say, either the skids come or I just can't sorry. Up to you. It's supposed to be a family lunch. This is your family. I'm a stepmother btw and have two children of my own, and it has never even crossed my mind that a family invitation would exclude my stepdaughter.

Don't go, it sounds horrible.

I wouldn't go unless my whole family were welcome, including the stepchildren. I certainly would not reinforce the idea that excluding your stepchildren is acceptable by attending the lunch. I would tell them I wouldn't be going and also why. No way on earth would I leave dh and stepchildren out like that. Very selfish of your mother and stepfather but that's their choice and you have your own choices to make. Personally my dh and children always come first and there wouldn't be anything to consider.

And by excluding the skids they are excluding your dh, the father of your child. That's not a family lunch! He may have been seriously ill, but that's no reason to exclude him either IMO.

So your step-father is saying no? What does your mother want - it is her lunch after all!

I think if it were me I wouldn't go but the compromise of pudding at your house is a good one. And - maybe less stressfull for your DH.

i think my mother wants a quiet life! secretly i think she agrees with my sfather. she likes to get on her high horse about things but then so do I! probaby why we don't get on brilliantly lol!

there are a number of things that i've let go in the past and i'm sure she thinks i'm a fool for "putting up" with the situation. as i said, they don't subscribe to the fact that depression is an illness........

i am just hoping that her attitude has changed when she gets here later today.

otherwise i think i'm going to have to go the booking can't be changed pudding here way and hope that dh won't twig.

i shall be making my feelings known tho and i hope they are suitable ashamed of themselves.

either way, the lunch itself won't be the nice occasion i'd hoped it would be.

at least being able to "speak" to MN about it has calmed me down a bit......

why do you feel the need to go at all?

agree with JodieG1- either it's all of you, or they can please themselves without you.

Still can't understand why you're going when they won't "allow" your family to be there. The only was they'll learn is by you standing by your family, and by your family I mean your husband and children

Agree - can't understand why you would want to go. As you have said it won't be a nice occassion anyway.