MIL has sleep issues...... I don't want to visit anymore.....

[SleepingbeautyMIL]

This is sort of an AIBU but I want more advice rather than brutality and being ripped apart......

DH and I have been married for several years and in general I have nothing against my MIL. She has mobility issues but is generally self sufficient and lives alone. She lives far enough away that any visits tend to be weekends rather than visit a couple of hours.

Mostly, I get on great with her and she treats me like a daughter however there is one thing that pisses me off no end to the point where I’ve said to DH I won’t be going to hers anymore.

She spent a couple of years sleeping in a rise and recliner chair whilst she waited for several surgeries to help with her mobility. From January this year, she was able to go back to bed again. The problem is she doesn’t get a full nights sleep. If she wakes up to go to the toilet during the night, rather than just go and go back to bed, she goes downstairs, uses the loo, and then spends the rest of the night in the chair. Why is this a problem?

Well she has always had “issues” staying awake. Possibly because of the painkillers and other medication she is on. Mostly that’s ok. But since she’s started this weird nocturnal thing she’s not getting a full nights sleep. She goes to bed about 11pm, falls asleep (with the TV on) about 1am then wakes up 3-4 hours later, gets up, goes downstairs, and then falls asleep for another couple of hours. This means she’s constantly tired.
Basically, if she’s not actively doing something she falls asleep. Sometimes even in the middle of talking to you if you’re not quick enough to speak back to her.

There problems I have with this are:

1.She won’t admit she’s sleeping. A common scenario is, MIL nods off, we try to turn the channel away from what she’s watching – a couple of minutes later she “wakes up” and says she’s watching that and put it back. So we end up sitting with her watching god awful TV whilst she snores in her chair.

1. Whenever its anyone but us, she’s easily able to keep awake. She’ll spend several hours on the phone a day to friends and if the neighbours pop in, she’ll be fully awake and engaged with them. The minute its jus the three of us, there she goes falling asleep at the drop of a hat. The general impression is she thinks we’re boring and not worthy of her attention.

1. When she is awake, despite being able to manage on her own, she does this passive aggressive way of asking you to do stuff for her. Again, I wouldn’t mind if she said things like “would you go and get my glass from upstairs so I don’t have to get up” but she manages to ask without asking. She’ll never say “would you make a pot tea” but “if you’re making a cup of tea, I’ll have one”. I know this is minor but its one of those minor things that just seems to grate.

DH says to ignore her and just leave her to sleep. Which would be great if we weren’t giving up weekends of our time to go up and sit and watch her sleep. We get more interaction with her when we phone her 2-3 times a day. Which I don’t mind at all – I like my MIL. I just think the way she behaves is totally disrespectful to DH and I.

If she’d admit she was sleeping and/or make an effort to fix her nocturnal habits so she actually got a full nights sleep and was not so tired I would not mind so much. She has always been a bit “dosey” in terms of napping but it’s ridiculous now that her night sleeping is so bad. We’ve just spent the weekend with her and apart from when she was on the phone or interacting with neighbours/friends she managed to stay awake and interactive for a grand total of 3.5 hours from Friday night to Sunday night.

She’s due to be coming to stay with us for a week over Easter and I’ve said, if all she does is come down and sleep for the week thereby trapping us in our own home (although we do have a spare sitting room we can use) then there’s no point in her coming down again after that. A part of me is hoping that staying at ours without the easy option of going downstairs to sleep in her chair might help normalise her sleeping at night.

I have no problem with DH going to see her on his own but that would mean sometimes we would not see each other for weeks on end as he works away a lot and weekends can be the only time we see each other. Which doesn’t help me resenting her sleeping!

Unless you are visiting every month then I think there are far more annoying things your MIL could be doing. Take some books, watch tv on a tablet and try and have some sympathy, sleep issues are leaving me exhausted and it's difficult to deal with.

I'd give anything to spend time with my elderly mum, even if it was just to watch her sleep.

Sadly my mum didn't make it to old age though, and contempt like yours for your MIL makes me want to shake you.

Frangipani

You've put how I feel very well.

Frankly, I am envious, as I wished my MIL snoozed through our visits. Be careful what you wish for.

The thing that stuck out to me from your OP was where you said you felt she was disrespectful, thought you and your dh were boring or not worthy of her attention. Gosh, haven't you got yourself on a bit of pedestal? How on EARTH is it disrespectful for an old lady who clearly has some health issues to fall asleep when relaxing in the comfort of her own home, with her beloved family around her?

I'm not saying it's not infuriating, but it sounds like one of those family obligation-related facts of life that you just have to suck up.

I have a chronic sleeping problem which when it flares up means I feel really awful like death and do not/cannot function properly, dragging myself through the day, falling asleep when I don't want to [usually in the evening, I just crash out]. It isn't just feeling tired, it's a chaotic, disrupting, erratic cycle which can go on for 2-3 weeks at a time. Luckily for me it eventually settles.

It's draining, it affects the quality of life and what I can do and plan for. I'm an older person and it has messed my life up, and relationships with other people who don't have the patience or experience to know how debilitating sleeping issues can be.

Sometimes I just long for someone else to make me a cup of tea, it would be lovely. But I live on my own. The situation tests my patience and I have to come to terms with the restrictions sleep issues bring and manage it as best I can, in isolation.

A lot of the problems I have, and have had, come from people who just don't understand, just don't get it, and judge me. It's very upsetting, as a degree of cooperation from others and some understanding and empathy would go a long, long way and would make life easier for me without putting others out much.

So I'm with MIL on this, she is unwell. Think it through, have some heart and try and help her. She needs compassion and to be heard and understood, not your hostility. She has enough to cope with. Being ill isn't what anyone asks for. I would hope she could at least have the support of yourself and DH, and to have your company now and then.

I honestly can't see a problem here.

You don't sound like you do like her very much.

Looks to me that you don't want to visit anymore and are just clutching at straws.

I agree with posters saying you sound like you don't like her - but you don't have to like some of her behaviour! My MIL is similar to yours sometimes. It bothers me, I would never tell her it bothers me or do anything rude but it does bother me. I do not agree with posters saying 'I would give anything to have my mum back with me, be grateful for what you have' etc.. what does that have to do with it?! It has no relevance. People shouldn't be expected to put up with shitty parents because some people's parents have passed away. Just because some people have it 'worse' doesn't make your problem invalid

People shouldn't be expected to put up with shitty parents because some people's parents have passed away

MIL is unwell,not 'shitty.'

Trying to work out the problem here - she’s ill. Try help her or leave her to it.

If her moving around bothers you when you’re there stick some ear plugs in and go to sleep.

My dad is like this - he doesn't mean anything by it, but it drives me crazy.

He was a shift worker for 40 years and now in his sixties cannot sit down without nodding off. He struggles to sleep in bed - usually falls asleep in the chair first, and is awake by 5am absolutely latest every day. He hates the fact my mum doesn't get up til 9, as for him the day is half over by then.

When we visit, which he loves us doing, he mostly snoozes in his chair, waking only to change the channel or make a dry comment.

In the evenings when the kids are asleep he snores the entire time but won't go to bed until 10 or 11. I HATE snoring and cannot bear it, so I go and sit in another room whenever he does it, on my own.

But you know what? He had a heart attack last year, he's visibly getting older, I'm staying in his home. If staying awake a few hours is all he can manage, then that's how it is. It would serve no purpose asking him to change or telling him he had a problem. He knows he does but he's not going to change (or suddenly fix sleep habits) now.

I HATE the snoring, but I just remove myself when it happens. My kids don't care and happily climb all over him.

It is harder when he visits us as he has no bedroom to go to (usually stays in a hotel so only goes there at bedtime) and I have no dining room to sit in, but I'm grateful he's come all that way so I sort of make do.

I totally get how infuriating it must be. But when they start sleeping this badly, on top of health problems, there's probably not much they can do, and possibly not that many more years to annoy you with.

Saying all of the above very sympathetically!

I have now reached the stage of life where it does not matter what time I go to bed, I still wake early. I used to love lie ins, but they just do not happen now.

Sounds like she might have sleep apnoea - the snoring and microsleeps suggest that it's actually quite severe. She's gone back to laying down, rather than sleeping upright, so it makes sense that she's waking constantly during the night, so never has proper restorative sleep. The lack of energy/effort suggests this as well and falling asleep when talking or watching TV are absolutely textbook - so much so, they're used as diagnostic criteria.

In short, it could well be a serious medical condition - one that could dramatically shorten her lifespan - that is making her awaken in the first place, as she's choking/suffocating many times over a night, putting stress on her heart in particular.

She needs to see her GP and request referral to a specialist sleep clinic, as she might need a CPAP machine.

Ok, I'll admit it, this was a reverse. I'm the daughter and its actually DH with the problem. But knowing the short shrift men get on here I wondered if I changed the sexes about if it made any difference.

I do get my mother is a pain, she drives me demented but I'm her daughter so I can ignore it. I think it came to a head this weekend as she was worse than normal.

I've been with DH 8 years and in general they've got on like a house on fire. Constantly winding each other up and calling each other names in a playful way. (e.g. him calling her the old bag and her calling him the Git). This was 100% in jest and well meaning.

The problem is DH can be controlling if you let him get away with it. And my mother is stubborn. The more you nag her to do something the less likely she is to do it. I think his main problem with her is that she won't "do as she's told".

1. I agree with him in that if she'd just make an effort to normalise her sleep she wouldn't fall asleep as much. Until she started going back to bed she wasn't this bad. But she just point blank refuses to even try.

1. I don't agree with him about he being ignorant because she manages to stay awake for everyone else however I think this is magnified by (1) and the next point.

1. She spends HOURS (think up to 6-8 ) on the phone all day. She has three friends who phone her constantly. Think each one calling her XX times a day sometimes to tell her the most inane things or ask her what socks to put on. Not quite but you get the drift. Its so bad we installed an Alexa so we can drop in on her to ask her to get off the phone if we're trying to call her. This isn't a problem except all she does is moan about how many times they call her. But she won't actually say anything to them. If they've called when she's out the firs thing she does is ring them back. She actually likes it but moans about it. As DH says, well stop moaning if you wont tell them to cut down the calls.

This has combined with everything to make him convinced she can stay awake if she wants (she never falls asleep on the phone) but will fall asleep in the middle of us talking to her i.e. she just can't be bothered.

1. He doesn't like the fact my family are extremely two faced. She moans about specific things but refuses to say anything to their faces. They also talk about everyone behind their backs. We've asked her not to tell a certain Aunt our business. To be fair she doesn't repeat "important" things. however at the weekend, we showed her all the baby clothes we'd bought for his new born niece (think several hundred quids worth) and the first thing she did when said aunt phoned was tell her. To him this is not "doing as he asked".

Its made worse by said Aunt owing DM a lot of money and has for years. DM moans about it but not once has asked for it back despite said Aunt going on multiple holidays a year. Apparently its going to be repaid when her second house is sold but thats been on the market for five years!

Ultimately I think DH is generally annoyed that she "won't do as she's told" for want of a better way of putting it. The reaoson this bothers me is I've gone from having a nice set up where my DH and DM got along and we saw each other once a month at least to DH currently refusing to ever set foot in the house again. Which means I'm going to have to try to find excuses or tell my mum why. Which will just upset her.

When I see DH this weekend I'm planning to sit him down and "read him the riot act" and point out:

1. She treats him like a son and up until now they got along fine

1. Falling asleep and napping is perfectly normal for a 75 year old woman on opiates so get over it

1. If she'd done as she was told by now she'd have alienated her two friends and the rest of the family wouldn't be talking to her which means she'd effectively be alone except when we visit.

And I'm also going to point out in plane English that I honestly believe the reason he's so angry about this is he's finally met someone as stubborn as he can be controlling. He tries it with me but I ignore him or just let him think he's getting his own way.

I'm not going to LTB over this - its not a deal breaker.

But I just wish we'd not gone to visit her this last weekend as I think it was a perfect storm of several things at once.

So yep, your DH is an unsympathetic, controlling arse hat.
Reverses are really twatty and you’re correct, he’d have got a “short shrift” because he’d deserve it, not because he’s a man.

Good luck with the chat.

I hate the idea that men get short shrift and women get support. It is not true. You were told OP you were wrong when you pretended this was about you.
But if you had posted the real situation he would have got more criticism as you left out a lot of info. Your original OP read like a young woman who was clueless, lacking in empathy and a bit selfish. The real situation is a man who is a controlling arse.

That's a long update on it being a reverse. I am glad I didn't post before I saw that I would have been cross. Now I'm just a bit confused. Oh and I fall asleep all the time like this as I have medical issues, I hate it I am ashamed and embarrassed by it

If she is on the phone 6-8 hours a day when you visit I'd be very pissed off.

Please just leave him behind and have a nice time with your mum. You understand her, he doesn’t. If she asks, just say he’s being grumpy so you left him at home. If they used to get on like you say, maybe he’ll miss her and when he does visit, it will be because he wants to.
You really need to leave him behind for these visits. No one wants a grumpy fucker visiting; not you, not your mum and he doesn’t want to. There’s your answer. You cannot force people to get along and you’ll destroy (bit dramatic, but I can’t think of a better word) yourself in the process. Stop forcing opposing forces together; it’s pointless. Things are different now.

The problem with a reverse is that this is all your interpretation of how your DH thinks and acts, seen through the lense of you thinking he is behaving unreasonably.

She still needs checking out for sleep apnoea. Being able to stay awake during phone calls is perfectly normal, even if sitting around in front of the TV results in microsleeps.

Trust me, she sounds textbook for OSA.

In was going to say yabu and lacking in compassion when I first read the OP.

Now I see it's a reverse I agree you've added alot more info than that it's your DH's pov. He sounds horrible and controlling.

Imagine waking someone constantly like that when they have a real medical issue.