Grandparents have dumped my son in favour of new grandchild

[CL240]

Hi all,

First ever post here so go easy on me!! Apologies if I have posted in wrong area. I'll try not to make this an essay. Just wanted some advice on next course of action.

So my husband & I have been together 15 years & we have a 3 yr old boy. We moved to the same town as PIL's to be nearer when we started a family. Up til December, they have been very involved in DS's life & had him every Monday & then he went to nursery the other 4 days as we both work. They were more than happy to do it & we did not force the issue as we never wanted him to be a burden.

Anyhow, they have a daughter who is 2 yrs younger than OH. She became pregnant & was due end of Jan. She has always been a bit of a Mummy's girl & they are close but no issue with that at all as I get mums and daughters often have a special bond & I am the DIL. I hasten to add I have always involved her & treated her like my own Mum.

Anyway she said in January, she didn't want to commit to having our son on Mondays as she wanted to be available for the daughter if needed.
We just swallowed it & said fine fair enough no problem. This then carried on into Feb way after the baby had been born & every Monday she kept letting us down at the last minute with varying excuses. She actually went completely NC with us & DS for 7 weeks in this time & didn't so much as pop over for a cuppa. Just nothing.

More often than not, the nursery couldn't take him at last minute meaning OH & I have been using a lot of annual leave to cover. Her main excuse is that she is paranoid that our son might have germs & she doesn't want to get sick if she is seeing the other baby girl. Utterly bizarre.

Anyway, we decided enough was enough & got our son booked in full time wef June. There was no point doing it earlier as we are on hol in May & with bank holidays there would only be 1 Monday in May to cover.

We said we don't want DS to be a burden (in a nice way) so we have now arranged full time nursery. Could you please however do 2 more Mondays - 29 Apr & 20 May that's it. She said she would.

My OH then gets a text today saying sorry I can't have DS on Monday. No reason given. Nursery can't have him so I've got to take another day off. At this point, I am raging (!) but call the nursery & ensure 20 May booked in with them as she will inevitably let us down again for that one.

So as at now, she is not having him any more. Me & OH both agree this for the best as MIL being so flaky. However, when I text her to say we have made alternative arrangements for 20 MAy as we can tell you dont want to have him any more, she replied with a thumbs up!!

No apology, no sorry to mess you about for 4 months continually nothing.

If she had just said pre new baby, I can't commit to having him any more, fine, but she hasn't she's just let us down at every opportunity.

In addition to that, she is keeping our DS away from his new cousin as she doesn't want him near her. I find this quite unnerving TBH & when I met the baby for the first time last week, she insisted on having our son. This is the only time she has insisted on it as she is clearly desperate to keep him away from her. I've no idea if this is some kind of germ thing or what, but her behaviour is getting increasingly erratic & I'm about to blow my lid.

On top of all that, she had secretly decided to sell the house & move to the town where the daughter lives (65 miles away). Not only did the daughter & SIL know, his parents knew & his mother let the cat out of the bag at the baby shower. MIL then gestured her to sssshhh as she hadn't told us at that point. At the time, I thought the conversation was very odd.

They then told us 3 weeks after it had gone on the market they were selling up to be near the daughter. To say I'm gutted is an understatement & I've shed a lot of tears over this. They've completely abandoned both us & DS & I never, ever expected this from them.

Anyone experienced this & what advice can you give? Seriously considering going NC now. Just to reiterate, I dont care about the Mondays, we can afford FT childcare it was more about them being part of DS's life. They've just dropped him, almost like a switch has been flicked & I am disgusted, angry, bitter, upset & all those things.

IF YOU GOT TO THE END WELL DONE :)

Smile and wave hunny! Turn up when needed/requested/required and get on with your own family unit. Leave them to it-support your DH and if his family want to be part of your child's life let them...but don't let your child feel pushed out. Bow out and use that energy that currently feels cross to treat your little boy x

Passtherioja :) so right!

DS & I had a great time tonight when he got back from nursery. He's been getting absolutely glowing reports re: behaviour, his capacity for learning & he's cracked the potty training. He really is becoming a beautiful little chap so their loss. Now I'm off work on Monday, we'll have a nice Mum & son day & I'm going to take him to a theme park.

He's never going to feel unloved from us that's for sure.

CL240 Sil has a habit of 'speaking her mind and telling it as it is', as she sees it and seems to rub people up the wrong way in life in general. DH challenged her over the letter and she couldn't defend her stance. Then mil started to wade in and NC ensued.

The thing is the letter was so unhinged we actually started to laugh reading it.

Try very low contact.

Agree with Passtherioja. We have similar-but-different in law issues, favoured other sibling, lack of support for us, favoured grandchildren etc etc over many years and many serious and upsetting life issues.

I'm way down the line, my eldest dc is 15 I'm now in the 'smile and wave' phase, any feelings towards pil are dead. I support dh but make no effort myself. His circus, his monkeys.

I just wish I'd got here years ago and had the courage of my conviction that they were nasty bastards so I didn't put up with so much from them.

They're elderly now, looking tentatively to us for support. It's not there. Their circus, their monkeys.

That's the thing you do try & suck it up to keep the peace & not upset OH but I just can't see how the relationship with us & DS will be the same again now. MIL is too fixated on the daughter & new GC.

If I hope it will improve, then I'm inevitably setting myself up to be disappointed so best to just try to forget it. Still quite raw at the minute.

I'll turn up to the various functions & do my duty but leave it at that.

Incidentally we have booked to go away for Xmas this year. Having a no family Xmas with mates for 2 weeks in the sun!! We knew that PIL's would want to see SIL & SIL had already said she wasn't travelling for Xmas so put 2 + 2 together. She has repeatedly said she doesn't have room for everyone in her house so we kinda knew we'd get shafted & be left alone.

(Despite them being more than happy to have us host every year because no one else would).

Good call on our part I would say!

Passtheroja has the right idea, and she is correct that holding onto resentment for MIL and her f¥

Really bad form on her part, OP. She shouldn't have let you down on those final childcare days in particular

Or replied with a thumbs up when I said she didn't have to have him any more.

Unbelievable! No words used just a thumbs up emoji. Clearly bothered (NOT)

Have a great Christmas and create your own traditions.

Yes we will. Right I'm knackered & DS will no doubt wake me at the crack of dawn so best go to bed. Night all thanks for replying & calming me down. x

Sorry to hear you're not so close with your siblings.

It looks like she's jealous of the siblings being close and her being ousted. Your OH needs to firmly let her know he can speak to his Dsis whenever he wants.

I love my DC having a good relationship and I like it when they're close.

To me siblings should have each other's back in a normal family, but every family has it's own dynamics and half siblings can affect the closeness relationships.

Your MIL sounds like a bit of a lunatic tbh. She seems paranoid about the siblings and about the other granny.

OP- really sorry for you. I don’t have much advice to give you except that you have to keep calm, hold your head up, go LC with your ILs and let karma do it’s work. Give it a some time, a few years?

I know how hurt you must feel, but time is a healer. All the best x

You sound lovely and reasonable, @CL240.

There is a very good 12 steps advice: do not show you are hurt. Even if you are hurt, do not show it.

It is a very good idea to foster relations with your own family. It will make your Mum SO happy to come and maybe spend the weekend and Monday with you looking after her grandchild.

Dysfunctional people (and your MIL sounds bats) are not good to be around. But feel your grief, because it is grief. When you got abandoned that was your hopes and dreams for a happy united family out the window. And that hurts.

Update – the in laws have now moved to where the SIL lives (in fact it’s the next road & is a 3 min walk so couldn’t be much closer. They were still telling us in the summer they hadn’t decided where they were going to live. They also told us, they simply had to get full asking price or they couldn’t afford to move. They then proceeded to keep dropping the price until they got the offer. The very same day they got an offer, the immediately offered on the other house, so they must have had their eye on it for quite some time. They actually paid more for the other house & have upsized & spent more at the other end. I suspect this is to cement their position as top grandparents as the other set (who also now live there) don’t have as much money. Of course I knew what was really happening….but they kept telling my DH what he wanted to hear & he genuinely believed them & swallowed it all. My heart absolutely breaks for him as their lies all year have been shown to be just that.

Over the course of the last 4 months, they’ve seen our son perhaps 1-2 times a month in a park for a couple of hours but there have been periods of 4-6 wks with no contact during that time. They didn’t once invite us to their house this year whilst they were still around – not for a cup of tea, dinner, nothing).

In addition, they’ve done nothing to foster good relations / mend fences with SIL & us or the 2 grandchildren & haven’t arranged any kind of gatherings. It seems to me the MIL is very happy to continue to feed the division between her two children. SIL naturally obliges because it is to her benefit. I don’t think she has really given us any thought & certainly not encouraged her Mum to treat us all fairly either.

The baby was christened earlier in the year & we made the decision not to take our son. Up until that point he had not been allowed to meet the baby & had been kept away from it for fear of him contaminating the baby (apparently). This decision did not go down well but we put a brave face on it & chatted nicely to everyone so we couldn’t be accused of being bitter. You would never have known what was going on. DH actually supported me wholly with this decision & told his parents & sister why we didn’t take him.

We then had a clear the air talk with PIL & MIL didn’t understand how we had got to this point & she just wanted everyone to get along….I discussed the various things that had happened but she basically was in complete denial about it all.

SIL has allowed our son to meet the cousin once. On this occasion, we had to meet halfway between our houses & go to a park. They didn’t come to us & turned up over an hour late. So we drove for almost an hour, they spent 40 mins at the park & then left. We’ve not seen them since. Before the visit, we were asked if we were all fit & well as her daughter can’t be around any germs. However, in the next sentence, she said that she had just taken the baby to a swimming pool for a lesson. Surely a public pool that kids pee in & changing rooms would not be something you would participate in if you were that paranoid about germs? I find they bring out the germ excuse when it suits & it’s just not consistent behaviour.

As at now, my son is not allowed in SIL’s house. It has been over a year since they visited us as well.

I have come to the conclusion that they are all a) mad as a box of frogs b) highly manipulative & c) hurtful & d) all of the above.

I now do not instigate any contact whatsoever with his side of the family & reply only when they make the 1st move. Can someone please tell me this heals with time? I cannot tell you how upset DH & I are over their behaviour. I want more than anything not to care about it but it’s still just so so raw.

I had to delete & repost as I mentioned a name in error.

Thank you screaminglady for replying. I hate myself for being bothered but I can't let them know I'm hurting you are absolutely right. That still gives them power in our lives & they don't deserve it,

I would go NCIS I'm LC with inlaws due to favoritism with the grandkids it's easier that way.

Nc not ncis

I was not all that surprised sadly. People from dysfunctional families like your H's end up playing roles. If you are the scapegoat in your family of origin your whole family as a result becomes scapegoated as well and this is precisely what has happened. My advice to you is to stay well away from these people who use their son and his family unit as the scapegoat for all their inherent ills.

His mother lied to you both; she knew very well what she was doing and it is a continuation of the golden child/scapegoat dynamic present in their family. His sister is far more favoured and remains so even though her role is not without price either.

All the clearing the air talks will have no effect whatsoever on people as batshit or otherwise toxic as his parents are because they have to be seen as "right", they have to have the last word and the only opinion that matters to them is their own. You cannot even hope to be able to reason with people who are so outright unreasonable and disordered of thinking.

I have come to the conclusion that they are all a) mad as a box of frogs b) highly manipulative & c) hurtful & d) all of the above.

Correct. This should be your mantra re them from now on. Do read "Toxic Inlaws" by Susan Forward to further understand the dynamics they are using on you here.

re your comment:-
"I now do not instigate any contact whatsoever with his side of the family & reply only when they make the 1st move"

Good but I would not send any sort of response. You would only be setting yourself up for more hurt from them if you did. If your parents are nice concentrate your efforts on them. Your H and you will both heal somewhat over time (would your DH consider seeing a therapist re his family of origin?) but you cannot and must not keep offering yourselves up to them because they will chew you up and spit you out.

Chaos - were your children born first or second out of interest?

Welcome to the world of "not being MY daughter"!

I've had this for years - you have to accept it and move on or else it will drive you literally insane!

Leave them to it and crack on.

At the end of the day they are the ones missing out on your brilliant children!

I feel your pain!

Atilla- good to hear from you again. I reread your posts many times over the course of this year. How right you were. I did a lot of reading on narcisstic family structures after the advice I got from here. MIL is definitely a covert narcissist so harder to spot. But she is.

I had the first dgc.
Pil bought a second hand crib and I /we barely saw them despite living 3 sts away.
Sil had a dgc a year later - like Jesus had arisen tbh...
Brand new ott gifts. Fil never without the pram +baby.
Dgc were not invited together as mine were told off for touching their stuff at dgps house so I organised a set time and she would dramatically flounce home - house opposite...
Never got any better. When we split pil didn't see mine at all. Their choice.
Was warped imo to obviously differentiate between little dc that were all your dgc.
Op you are better off going nc and saving your dc from them all. And your own mh also.
Your dh is a disgrace for allowing it..

@Winterdaysarehere he is getting tougher but it's a process. Hes been conditioned to accept whatever is left once the golden child has what she needs. He is starting to see them for what they are. They have seriously, seriously affected my MH this year and I consider myself a fairly robust person.

I remember reading your original OP and thinking how awful it must be for you and your DS but particularly for your DH who is seeing his family shunned my his parents. I am staggered it's even worse now - how can they go for months without seeing the grandson they previously adored and looked after every week?? I think you're doing the right thing going LC and, frankly, wouldn't blame you for never bothering with them again. Let's hope when they're older and in need of care themselves that darling SIL steps up to the plate, because it would be damn cheeky of them to expect you and your DH to do it.