DH acts odd around his parents

[Differentaround]

For background, me and DH have been together for 15 years and have 2 DS under 5. We had a few minor issues with MIL when children were born, but nothing major and get on with them ok, although she can be a bit overbearing and negative. The big issue at the moment is the way my DH acts around them, he seems very nervous and anxious, and doesn’t socialise with them when the come and stay to see grandkids - for example I’m now sitting in the lounge with his DM and he’s in another room 🙈. Other examples, my DS wouldn’t eat dinner tonight and my DH started telling him off saying don’t be silly it your dinner, you won’t get any pudding, stop being a baby etc, which is very out of character as he often won’t eat dinner and we just let it go, and mealtimes are very relaxed and we have a laugh. I wasn’t happy and said so as I feel he upset my DS, and feel I have to explain to MIL that he isn’t normally like that! It’s starting to get to me as the atmosphere is just so awkward when they come and i actually feel sorry for my DH as he just seems so upset and kn edge. For background he is a great dad and we have a very calm home life, don’t argue etc but my DH can be awkward around other people, particularly socially awkward around his parents! For more context his parents aren’t the best at showing emotion and are very close to his sister…anyone had similar situation? What should I do?

This is what I fear and I think what DH fears as well. SIL is decent (as far as I know) and she did come up to see us a few months ago without MIL knowing which was interesting. We are very LC with her because the relationship with her and DH is so strained. A recent example from a few years ago, SIL and one of DHs other siblings went on a holiday at the same time , separate holidays to separate places. MIL gives a big, detailed description of SIL holiday and how wonderful it was, I mentioned that the other sibling had a good time as well, response oh I wonder how much weight he’s put on 🙈🤷‍♀️. There are more examples as well…at first you don’t notice the different ways she describes then but once it clicks you do notice if that makes sense.

Yes, when you start to see it you REALLY see it!

I would very much recommend seeing your SIL (and the other sibling if you like them too) separately to PIL then and not talking about them at all.

My PIL did some utterly bizarre things around shoehorning themselves between the sibling relationships - I suspect it was panic over lies they had told surfacing.

Yep, there have been 3 incidents since kids have been born where MIL shoehorned herself into meet ups I’d tried to arrange for SIL and us….might be coincidence, might not. She also seemed surprised and a bit put out when I told her about SILs visit 🤷‍♀️. This is eye opening haha

They've clearly been reading the same manual! Sadly, I think it is a pretty standard MO in dysfunctional families.

I've got a lot of anecdotes! Funny as some of them are it is actually really sad - that they are like this (in our case definitely been passed down the generations) and sad that we can't have the happy family times because of it. No one as won.

When SIL has kids, all the normal stuff kids do will be utterly adorable and cute, whereas with yours, it's something you need to get a child psychologist or an exorcism for right away.

My DS's normal toddler tantrums got alarmed side eye and mutterings about a slap sorting him out and dubious parenting. A year later Sisters kid of the same age DS was, doing the exact tantrum in very similar circumstances was the cutest, funniest thing and did you just see how good was Dsis at calming her DC down??

He sometimes does a wink to me when Granny wangs on about his brilliant cousins to him, so he knows she favours them and is old enough that it doesn't bother him and he can't really be arsed with granny now. That suits us all fine really.

I am like your DH. I don’t like my parents and they make me unhappy to be around. I do it out of duty but I cannot wait for it to be over and don’t like any moment of it.

It actually isn’t just me though, all of us (DC, my Sis, her DP and my DP) are always trying to escape DM so we will beg each other to take turns to talk to her, try to find excuses to escape.

the solution is spending less time with them and shorter periods of time.

Thanks for all the advice everyone, don’t think we are at the stage of counselling but I will start putting up my own boundaries and not mentioning them to DH now. Also I’d already started deferring arrangements to DH but will redouble my efforts there. DH has said he has to pop into work today, and last night went out and did a big shop which took ages leaving me with them! He very rarely pops into work on a Saturday so maybe this is avoidance 🤷‍♀️. I’m trying to see the bright side and will have some me time doing exercise this morning while they have the kids. Weird one last night, his DF suddenly asked me how I felt when my son started pre school and did I cry…I said I was very proud but didn’t cry (I’m not a crier!) and he said well MIL law cried loads when DH started school, she was just sitting there impassively staring ahead. I’ll prob read things into everything now!