Rift with MIL, what to do?

[TheWickerWoman]

I really could do with other people’s opinions on this situation I have with my MIL. I don’t know where to begin, there’s so much to tell you but I will try and keep it to the point.

Ok, so, myself and DH (together 11yrs married 5) have DS who is 10 and I have an adult daughter from previous. The three of us live at my mums, my dad passed away a few years ago and we moved in to save for our own house and because she’s on her own.

My mum is lovely, I’ve always been close to my parents but don’t get me wrong we’ve had our ups and downs and even had a blazing row last year (all’s good generally though) she’s supported us a lot over the years,

MIL was widowed 18m ago from her second husband. I’ve always got on well with her and she’s always been a generous lady to us also.

BIL, always been trouble, tells lies, used to steal, take drugs ( in fact he had to leave our city because he’d run up such debt and had to hide) generally bad news and nasty. He’s recently married a young lady with a DD (from another city) who are both lovely and he seems to have grown up quite a lot although he is still quite hard work and controlling, I tend to avoid him after some trouble he caused a couple of years ago and now my DS is cottoning on to what he is like and doesn’t like being around him.

BIL is spending a lot of time with MIL since her husband died (he didn’t bother before as he hated her husband) he didn’t even bother coming to see her when she had a heart attack. Anyway, now her husband has gone BIL is around his mum all the time. She has tried several times to take our DS to BIL’s but he doesn’t want to go.

there have been a few incidents that have happened over the last year or so where my DS has come home after being with them and told me nanny has been saying nasty things about our family. One of these things is that my own brother isn’t a real uncle to my DS (I think she’s trying to make BIL more popular by running down my brother)

There’s been other nasty things she’s said, not overly bad but uncalled for comments about my daughter and my mum (who she’s always been lovely to face to face). There was then a recent incident where she was collecting DS from school and took him to BILs house against our will rather than to meet my mum with him and caused no end of shit and confusion.

So, that’s a lot of the backstory. I called her to talk about the thing that happened after school and to also ask why she’s been saying horrible things about my family to our ten year old son. She flat out denied it and said he’s a liar. I again spoke with him the importance of this and he swears she did and that he’s not a liar. I know he’s telling the truth.

Since then we’ve tried to meet up to clear the air and she’s put obstacles in the way of meeting. She’s avoiding us a lot, she totally blanks me on FB and a whole host of other silly things which I’m happy to go into if anyone’s interested.

Today DH spoke with her and said we need to sort things out and she agreed however where the hell do we go with it? I want to sort it out but she has called our son a liar and could have potentially got him into trouble for something he hasn’t done.

When/if we do meet up to talk about it I need to make it clear that what she’s done by making out our son to be a liar to save her own skin is totally unreasonable but I know she will continue to lie so it’s a stalemate position.

I want to try and save some sort of relationship with her for my DH and DS sake but it’s a mess.

God, sorry that was long. I’m happy to go into a lot more if people want the info but didn’t want to ramble.

Sounds like she's got a guilty conscience. I'd leave her be for a while - stop trying to make things right and leave the responsibility to make amends with her.

Sparkle, myself and my mum have said this, she’s backed herself into a corner and doesn’t know what to do about it.

If you know she's going to continue to deny it I wouldn't even try and get her to admit it. I'd approach the conversation in a
"So you say X, DS says Y. We clearly aren't going to agree but something has lead to this and we are asking you to give careful consideration to the way you speak of my family around DS as you have put him, and us, in a very difficult position. You are entitled to your opinion, as we are ours but all these people are DS's family and he loves you all for different things. He too is entitled to his opinion and not having someone else's forced upon him. For instance he doesn't know how angry we are about all this as that would potentially spoil his relationship with you, and that wouldn't be fair. We don't want to limit the time DS spends with you but if you are going to go against our wishes and negatively impact his relationships with other people, ourselves included, then I am afraid that is what will happen to prevent rifts with people who have done nothing to deserve them"
I think if you try to talk about it and get her ti admit it she's just going to dig her heels in more, tangle herself up in her lie and it will achieve nothing. Find a way to make it clear its unacceptable and move forward. Stick to the things you know have happened and she cant deny like her taking her to BIL against your wishes.

Needsomebottle, thanks, everything you’ve said makes perfect sense. I will go down the route you have suggested and and stick to the facts.

I wanted to try and nip it all in the bud when it first started but she made it difficult. She would only be available on the days to chat when coincidentally BIL would be around (safety in numbers I suppose). Now it feels like the rot’s set in as it’s been left to fester. We did our best though so I feel my conscience is quite clear.

It’ll be an uncomfortable meeting but it needs doing, I think we need to be clear like you say about her not taking DS off to BIL’s behind our backs.

Is she easily influenced? I wonder if her late husband was a good influence on her so you've seen the best of her up to press. But now her less great son is around all the time and is a bad influence, so that she works to be what he wants and to make her life fit in with his, i.e. being so determined to get your son to go there.

What a shame that she's willing to toss away the relationships with you, your family and even with your mum for the sake of this silly, childish behaviour.

Peekyboo, that’s a good point. Some of it is that BIL wasn’t around much when husband was alive but you’re right in saying she’s easily led as things were ok before he died. She comes across quite sweet and ditzy although I’d say she’s quite a weak lady. She shares a lot of self pitying memes on Facebook. BIL takes advantage of her weakness, he owes her thousands of pounds, has always relied on her for lifts everywhere etc and she generally does what he says, he’s very controlling,

It’s got to the point he’s controlling her so much it’s come to this. She will always cave in to his demands even if it means letting us or others down.

It’s your husband’s problem not yours

I can’t get past the bit where your 10 year old son doesn’t like being around the BIL. How much have you delved into this?

It’s your husband’s problem not yours

Of course it's not!

It's about the OP, her family and her DS! It's very much her problem.

Chunkers, since BIL being on the scene a lot lately DS has got to know him better and has noticed that he’s not a very nice person. For example, we went round for a few hours on Xmas eve last year and DS was playing with his cousins, they knocked an empty box on the floor and BIL got really shirty ‘oh for god sake, they’ve knocked that over, that’s my mums stuff over there’ etc etc so I said ‘it’s an empty box and they’ve picked it up’! He then said they needed to sit and do their word searches and not talk. He also put a film on for us to ‘sit quietly and watch’ honestly he’s so controlling. Another thing he does is argue in loud whispers with his wife in the kitchen, you can hear parts of it and it’s so uncomfortable.

It feels so toxic and uncomfortable around him. DS has started picking up on it and just doesn’t like spending time around him.

It’s so good to talk about this with other people. It’s good to get fresh opinions on it.

I’d just leave them all to it and keep your ds away , honestly there is little benefit for your ds in being forced into a relationship with someone who doesn’t have his best interests at heart .

thats would be ideal, DS has been clear that if she keeps saying he’s told lies then he won’t want to know her and I don’t blame him. I’ve told him he can make the decision to do what he wants with their relationship.

We don’t have one with BIL since late last year, he’s not been a problem since as we don’t see him. MIL is trying to force a relationship with BIL and that’s where the problems start.

Is it possible BIL is trying to engineer an estrangement between MIL and the rest of you? I may be totally wrong, but I'd be suspicious he's "borrowing" more money. Or worse getting control of her bank account etc.

Of course you must protect DS, but I'd see if there was a way for your DH to try and make sure MIL is operating freely, IYKWIM.

I wouldn't waste my time with someone who will only lie right to your face. Leave your husband to deal with her.

Midweek.. funny you should say that, MIL has been estranged from SIL (now that’s a whole other big story) for ten years.. MIL never sees SIL and her kids anymore (this was nothing to do with BIL) but it is like, without us in the way he has MIL all to himself (to take advantage) maybe.

MIL is savvy enough with her finances but he does guilt trip her into borrowing/giving them money which he never pays back.

Aqua.. it may come to that, if she doesn’t duck out of our meeting then I know myself and DS won’t to have a relationship with her if she keeps lying. DH’s contact with her right now is minimal when previously it was very close.

It’s such a shame it’s come to all this over some silly comments and lies but she’s being so dishonest and devious.

Hmm tough one. If you didn’t get on with your BIL cos he had just been a bit of a twat that’s one thing but the fact he’s been into drugs is another level and I wouldn’t want him around my son if I wasn’t there, if at all.
You’ve made it clear how you feel about her lying and so she’s just hiding! What has your DH said to her? He’s really the one that should be saying something as it’s his mother.

You may now be seeing the real person if she cut off other family for ten years, I wonder why?

Step back, I had to with my DC`s when my own DM started dripping poison into my youngest sons head. He has not seen her for years.

Somewhereovertherainbow - the BIL and drugs thing is definitely in the past, he doesn’t even drink now (since he met and married his wife) I just included that to give you an idea of why I’ve never liked him however he is still a nasty, lazy, controlling twat.

DH thought it was all a misunderstanding at first but the way MIL has behaved since has made him realise it is what it is. He agrees with me, he’s pissed off at her for her comments/lies and wants to talk to her properly about it as much as I do. He said on the odd telephone calls they do have she never mentions it. When he does say to her we need to get together to sort it out she will agree at the time then when we try to make meeting days she comes up with excuses that she can’t.

I’m at the point of just giving up on her seeing as she hasn’t made any effort whatsoever, it’s all been us.

Narcs. divide to conquer with their families sadly.

Right, so an estrangement wouldn't be new territory and pushing the BIL issue would be within normal behaviour for her?

It's good she is financially savvy, but I'd also say it's possible bereavement has made her a bit more vulnerable to being manipulated.

Has she seen your DS since? These comments definitely came from her and not BIL and she just didn’t argue them? Families are bloody strange things!

Justasking - exactly that, it speaks volumes doesn’t it that she’s been estranged from her own daughter and three grandchildren for ten years. This is what puts me off.. it can’t always be everyone else’s fault like she likes to have you believe.

I used the term ‘dripping poison’ too.. exactly how I described what she was doing with DS when she was running my family down. The other infuriating thing (which I haven’t mentioned as there’s so much) is that she said DS has been doing exactly the same with her, tittle tattling things to her about us and try to play us off against each other. When I asked her for examples of what he’d said there was nothing she could give, just silly general stuff.

Somewhere - definitely MIL comments as they were alone in the car together when she said them (Mil & DS) it’s always been when she’s dropping him home to us.

Midweek - sadly I’d say the estrangement is normal behaviour for her seeing as it’s happened with her daughter. You could be right about her being more vulnerable now, having said that she always used to give BIL money behind her husband’s back while he was alive.

She’s not seen DS since the after school thing happened which blew it up four months ago. She used to see him at least once a week before that.