Vent - difficult visit from parents

[Asiama]

Not really looking for advice (although any welcome) - I just need a space to vent and get this off my chest!

My parents have just left after visiting to see my 11 week old son. We have a difficult relationship so each rare visit is strained. They stayed for 2 hours. My blood pressure was up within 15 mins of them being here! Gems from my mum include:

1. Having a go at me for going for a walk when they were 50 minutes late and didn't ring or text me to let me know, or answer their phones when I called them to see where they were. Their expectation was that there is no need to inform me as I would be at home with the baby. And no apology for being late!

1. The reason the baby cries when I put him down to sleep is because none of the four cots / beds we bought for him are comfortable, they are of low quality because we cheaped out (we didn't, we have a Chicco Next2Me, a Mamas & Papas cotbed etc). We should have bought a fifth cot, the one she had commanded us to buy after she had seen the first four, because her choice would be comfortable for the baby. Repeat ad nauseum.

1. Several instructions to:

• take the baby out of my sling and put it in a cot, because the peacefully sleeping baby is uncomfortable snuggled up to me.
• wake the baby up so she can hold it.
• change how I store pots and pans in the kitchen.
• eat the curry she brought with her, which I hadn't asked for, because it's good for me. This is despite knowing that I gag when I eat that specific curry.
• keep out of the photos they were taking of the baby because I don't look good.

1. Disapproved of the new furniture that we had bought (indirectly, by just saying "oh" and looking disapprovingly, and giving suggestions on how to change the room we had just done up) and basically insulted our home by saying it was clear that we hadn't finished doing it up.

1. Told me that if I didn't have a baby she wouldn't have visited as she doesn't want to see me, because I don't do as she tells me to.

My husband refused to be here for their visit because he can't stand my mother. When I told my father this, he said he couldn't really see what she had done today that was so terrible.

AARGH!

Just be grateful they've gone now

Yes definitely grateful they are gone!

Another gem - baby being told he has a bad mummy because she won't use pillows etc to try and mould / squash his head to be more rounded. His head is fine, the doctors told me so! I'm not going to be able to leave him alone with my parents am I. Sigh.

Hopefully they live a long way away so you won't get too much interference. She's very overbearing isn't she?

Holy crap, OP, why are you still in contact with them?

The next scheduled visit will see you with d&v and Skype instead.
And maybe the next one you will be too busy washing your hair...
You are a proper grown up now op - a dm and everything - you don't have to accept this crap.

If you can't/won't save yourself from her poison, do it for your DS. Her opinions and comments are horrendous, your DF sounds like he enables her. Relax knowing that the visit's over. But seriously consider future contact with them.

Oh Asiama, when I started reading and saw 2 hours visit I thought how hard can that be. But fuck me, she sounds a treat and a half.

My mum came in, done my dishes washing etc,

Good lord. I'd be tempted to move house and not tell her where I've gone. I think your husband has the right approach...

@Singlenotsingle they actually live only about a hour away door to door by public transport, but because they insist on driving and my mum won't let dad drive at more than 40-50mph on the motorway regardless of conditions (it's not safe you know to drive at 70 ) it takes them more than 2 hours and they go on about how far away we live. That doesn't stop her from trying to interfere via email or in my relationships with other relatives!

@Maelstrop it's complicated why I'm still in contact with them. Part of me craves a normal relationship and having a mum who loves me and is proud of me, and for my son to have a nice relationship with grandparents, something I couldn't have and missed. However, that part is becoming smaller especially since becoming a mum myself, and I have been extremely low contact with them for a few years. We phone about twice a year and send about 3 short WhatsApp messages per week just to say we are alive, and visits before the baby came were about 2-3 times per year.

@Aprilshowersarecomingsoon I could never tell my mum that I'm ill! She'd tell me it was my fault, I'm not clean enough, I don't eat healthily, and if I listened to her I wouldn't be ill. This would be repeated over and over again in several long emails with instructions on healthy eating - from a morbidly obese woman! I blocked her on Skype a month ago after getting several messages telling us to buy another cot. I warned her I'd do it, she didn't stop, my dad asked me not to and I did it anyway. I felt guilty at first but now I feel so empowered.

@Justmuddlingalong I'm finding it very hard to step away completely as we have no other family in this country, but I know this is what will need to happen eventually, when my son is able to understand and they can have an influence on him. I just remembered, she told the baby yesterday "you are going to get bullied at school because of your misshapen head because mummy refuses to squash it into a proper shape". She's going to undermine me and create problem between my child and me.

Five cots? That’s bloody nuts

@TheCanyon wish my mum was like that! They always say we should ask them for help, but when we do they either refuse because they do not approve of what we are asking for help with, or they will lecture us while helping and interfere with things we didn't ask help for. It's just not worth the hassle.

@Knittedfairies we actually did move house and didn't tell them the address! But then I felt bad and gave it to them.

@PouchofDouglas yes it is! We have a Chicco next2me in our bedroom, a cotbed for when he's older, a baby box in the living room, and we use the pram carry cot. None of these are good enough and she's sad that we are not enabling him to sleep comfortably, which is why he cries (apparently) a few minutes after we put him down. It would all be resolved if we bought the cot that she's seen on the internet, and if it's not, then it's my fault for teaching him bad habits.

Asiama

Many now adult children of such parents blunder around in their own fear, obligation and guilt re their parents as you are doing.

Are you still on some level trying to seek their approval, it is approval they will never give you. Why do you maintain any sort of relationship with them. You would not have tolerated this from a friend so why are they any different?.

It is not your fault your parents are like this. You did not make them this way and your dad cannot be let off the hook here either. He is merely your mother's willing enabler and hatchet man, he cannot be relied upon at all either. Personality disorders cut across all creeds and classes and it is not beyond the realms of possibility here that your mother has some form of untreated and untreatable personality disorder. What, if anything, do you know about their family backgrounds; that often gives clues. Chances are their own parents treated them abusively as well and they have simply gone on to repeat the same with you and now your child is in their firing line. You need to protect yourself from such malign influences because they will go onto emotionally harm your child in not too dissimilar ways as to how you have been harmed otherwise. You do not need such toxic family in your lives; you all need emotionally healthy people as role models to be around.

Look again at your boundaries here and raise them. One boundary you can certainly apply now is cutting back on the amount of WhatsApp messages you send them in the course of a week, do this gradually over time to a point where you do not send them any.

Do have a look at the "well we took you to Stately Homes" thread on these pages. It could well help you and I would suggest you read "Toxic Parents" by Susan Forward.

Their actions are not based out of love but out of wanting power and control over you, your child and your entire life. Its what is best for them, not for you that matters to them here.

Presumably your parents, particularly your mother, put pressure on you to have so many cots in the first place. Start removing the excess to requirements here from your home.

Fair Play... Sounds a lovely visit! You showed astonishing restraint by not killing, dismembering and eating her! OMFG!

My faves were:
"because we cheaped out"
"keep out of the photos they were taking of the baby because I don't look good"
"Told me that if I didn't have a baby she wouldn't have visited as she doesn't want to see me"

Wow!! You deserve a medal. Id have been tempted to say "you dont look good either mum" and "I didnt want to see you either mum" but im petty like that!
Yes every baby in the UK cries because they dont have the cot your mother recomended. Lovely woman haha

Good for you for starting to stand up to her, please realise she will never change and be the mother you wished she was. She will never be proud, nothing will ever be good enough, but thats down to her nastiness.

You can crave a healthy relationship til the cows come home but you must now realise that you will never ever get it. Set boundaries now. The best you could do for yourself is go NC but if you don't wish to do that then the very least you can do is start standing up to her. If she comments negatively stand up, tell her that's enough and ask her to leave. She does not own you and has no right to be so dismissive of you and your parenting. The very fact your mother said she only wants to see the baby is enough to never have to see the bitch again. And as your dad stands up for her he's as bad.

@AttilaTheMeerkat I have always sought their approval but yesterday's visit made me realise I care very little about it anymore as after 30+ years it's just not going to happen. I've tolerated their behaviour so far because I literally don't know any of my blood relatives, I wouldn't even know how to contact them to build a relationship. They have always told me how bad they all were and now I'm older I'm beginning to wonder if they are actually the ones that are the problem, I can't believe every single one of my relatives are bad people! This means I know very little about her family background - she tells me she was her father's favourite because she was the prettiest child, and she didn't get on with her mother for reasons which I can only describe as being "normal" eg she wasn't bothered by looks whereas my mum places great value on looks. She has two sisters who she doesn't get on with because they don't do as she tells them, and she's been mean to them so they want little to do with her.

@Newdadofgirl @ThankYouNext19 yes I deserve a medal!

I think your DP being out was very unhelpful. When I had issues it was very helpful to have DP day ‘thats not an acceptable thing to say to xx’ .
Sounds like reducing your contact further would be good for you.

I don't think 2-3 WhatsApp messages and 2/3 visits a year is massively low contact - there's certainly room for further reduction! You don't have to have any contact you know.

@Newdadofgirl @ThankYouNext19 oops hit posted to early! I try not to be petty but I may have said that she can bring up her own child in the way she wants when she has another one and I will bring up mine how I want... except she's nearly 60!

I know I will never be good enough and I'm slowly starting to accept it. I have also noticed that over the past months I have been emotionally detaching from them as I think about how to protect my son.

@Drum2018 Reflecting back on yesterday, the only thing that stings a bit is that she said she doesn't want to see me but only came for the baby. I can't imagine treating my son like that, and I can never confront her over what she says because she will only deny it. I did very nearly ask her to leave when she said she didn't want to see me, made me feel like she was using me just to have her needs met. It's going to be a very long time before I'm willing to see them again.

You’re never going to win their approval.

You may win tiny victories in your mind but is it really worth it?

They’re crappy parents. They’ll never be decent ones.

So not sure what’s the point in contact really...

@cheminotte I know what you mean. The added complexity is that my parents and I speak a different language so often these things are said in our language and when I translate, she tells him that's not what she said. DH knows she's lying. Sometimes when she does say things in English he sticks up for me and she straight up tells him that that's not what she said or tells him he misunderstood. She's also started being "mean" to him - last time she asked him why his hair is grey. How are you supposed to answer that!

@reallybadidea yes I'll be cutting down contact even further! I had hoped that maybe a baby would help to repair our relationship and it's so disappointed that she has upped the ante and it's just not going to happen.

What kind of freak recommends squashing a baby’s head into a different shape?!!!