Wife wont let mum come round at Christmas

[Unjeffeson]

Background:
My m(41) wife hates my mum. There wasn't one incident but she just thinks shes selfish and manipulative and just wants everything on her own terms, including spending time with pur daughter. She feels my mum tried to dominate when our daughter was born and has never considered her feelings, and is rude and catty to her. My wife also thinks I take my mums side too much when i try and explain her point of view or try and create compromises. This has led my wife to feeling like my mother is ‘the other woman’, and she sees red almost every time we discuss her.

Things have been stable if unpleasant for a while, with my wife agreeing for my mum to see our daughter every couple of months for an afternoon. In the meantime my mum is on the phone to me regularly about how depressed its all making her.

Whats happened:
My mum has asked if she can see us on Christmas day, so she doesnt have to be by herself. My wife has said hard no, she doesnt want her anywhere near us at xmas. Mum can see us at some point around the end of December but not on Christmas day. Wife says we need to maintain a united front to set boundaries with my mum on this.

Ive been managing my mum’s feelings on all this for two years now as well as putting my wife’s desires first. It is important to me that my daughter knows her grandmother and that she doesnt get dragged into it. When we argue about it my wife makes ‘it’s me or her’ noises and i refuse to break up my family for what my mother wants. But dealing with mums misery on the whole thing is very hard.

What should I do? Is it okay to say no to mum at xmas so long as we have another date lined up?

And i guess more importantly - had anyone here had a mother in law you feel is so unpleasant that you prevent them visiting, keep them away at xmas etc, in spite of the difficulty it causes your SO? Where’s the line of tolerance (if there even is one)?

Outstanding

She makes me feel I'm the only one with a key to her happiness as 'family is everything. I resent the fact she never made more effort to move on from my dad and I am effectively her emotional support. Perhaps I have enabled this but it's just kind of happened since I was too young to know not to.

@HappyintheHills
Yes he should have said something to his mother at the time.
But to bear a grudge YEARS later to the extent that she won't have her in the house on Christmas Day??

They are professionals the OP’s mother is not. Neither did she snatch the baby, she simply went a bit further than the wife would have liked.

Of course he can love his own mother, but that doesn't mean being passive and not putting boundaries in place. By his own account, she certainly doesn't sound like a great mother but love is blind.

It very much sounds like she's used him as an emotional crutch since her husband left her and OP has never broken free from this or put any boundaries in place. His own brother doesn't talk to her anymore. She's clearly a boundary pusher.

He also said she was a good mother.

There’s another thread going on at the moment called “Let Them” It’s about how sometimes saying nothing and walking away is the only way forward.
Considering how OP seems baffled about the reasons why his wife is angry with his mum, perhaps she feels it’s pointless compromising with someone who is clearly very stubborn.

I understand why you suck up being your mum’s emotional punchbag OP but she’s literally turned you into a second husband which is very unhealthy. As part of the Fear-Obligation-Guilt conditioning you want to keep your mum happy but that’s not your job really. If your wife pretended to be ok with your mum then it will make your life easier but your wife isn’t been putting up with your mum since birth so her words which you may not register because of conditioning will cut deep when others hear them

Our generation are very liberal with the use of the word “boundary”, “toxic” and “narc”, I can only hope we are perfect because we have set high standards.

The OP’s mother currently sees him once every 8 weeks so I’d say a fortress is well in place.

She may well have lent on him too much, it’s probably hard not to when something so crushing happens to you.

Yes I do. I'm not 'attributing wife work' to the wife because she's the wife. I'm attributing the prep of the dinner to her because she's going to be the one at home and the husband needs to go out. In this scenario he isn't 'sauntering off' because he's too lazy to help prepare the dinner. He's not buggering off to the pub for the whole of Christmas Day only coming back in time to eat his dinner, has he?

He's gone out to see his mother, because his wife won't allow her in the house, despite the fact that she's going to be alone on Christmas Day. She admittedly doesn't sound like the easiest woman, but if the wife could be a bit more tolerant and charitable to her husband's mother on Christmas Day, the husband would not need to saunter off anywhere and he could peel his own fucking parsnips and stick his own turkey in the oven, probably with some considerable help of his mother. And his wife could waft around eating Quality Street in her pyjamas if she wanted.

But as the wife doesn't want the mother in the house, the husband isn't left with much choice but visit her instead, is he? Would you leave your parent all alone on Christmas Day because your partner told you to?

We’re all flawed and have moments we’re not proud of. If we can take responsibility for this then that helps.

With regard to the relationship between wife and mum in law, if neither are willing to compromise that just leaves the relationship between OP, mum and the child. That’s not the wife’s decision and with regard to the child, it’s not entirely her decision.

The sentimentality of Christmas Day is nothing compared to the bigger picture.

But why should anyone have to endure someone they clearly don't like and find toxic in their own home, especially on Christmas Day? Don't you think his wife should be able to enjoy Christmas Day?

Would you be able to enjoy Christmas Day knowing you’d excluded your husband’s mother when he wanted her there.

Hardly very Christmas spirit is it?

We’ve become so conditioned to demand she have things exactly how we want them. Instagram tells us we are entitled to a perfect life.

And she's going to be alone because of her own behaviours it seems?...

I had an ex like you.

Mummy's little stand-in husband and emotional support crutch.

Forgiving of his mother because she raised him. Badly as it happens bit he always excused her.

Anyway, he became an ex because even though he would see all of the problems she caused.

You are risking losing your wife & child (to a certain extent).

You really need to call your mother out of her shit "mum, I'm the only one still talking you I'm this family and you are endanger of risking that you if you don't change. If it's a choice between you or my wife & child, you aren't coming out the right side of it"

SPOT ON

We have become conditioned to believe we are the most important thing and we must ensure we are happy regardless of the impact it has on others. In other words, we have become very, very selfish.

@ReadingSoManyThreads
This is where we differ. I think OP's mother has foibles ( don't we all?) and has clearly cheesed off her DIL on many occasions.
But unless she has done something we don't know about, the things on the OP's list this doesn't make her "toxic" or poisonous.
Taking the baby downstairs ( in DIL's house)... hardly a million miles away.
Taking baby to a friend's house ( unless a heavy smoker/lots of dogs/dirty) not a real problem.
Talking about her failed marriage ( the OP's problem)
Commenting that her son was overweight... maybe he is. Yes she's a busy body and he should have had it out with her ( I definitely would have done so myself) but not a reason to flounce off and go NC
Commenting that she found breastfeeding easy- insensitive but not "toxic"
And Christmas is the season of goodwill to all men ( and women) so yes, I think on Christmas Day they should include her.
If you wanted YOUR mother on Christmas Day and your husband said a "hard no", could you enjoy the day knowing your mother wanted to come and was on her own?

After the crap my MIL has pulled over the years, if she spends it on her own, she's brought that entirely on herself through her own behaviour and I do not feel bad at all. I've never been on Instagram and don't think I'm entitled to have a perfect life by any means - with two SEN DC and a full time job life sure ain't that! But I do want a little bit of peace with my own family unit at Christmas, and not to have to accommodate someone who does not respect DH, me or our home, or the way our family needs to work.

I'm never going to stop her having a relationship with the DC and we always visit after Christmas. We do gifts, take her out for a meal, etc. But that's an experience we can all cope with much better after a few days unwinding after the end of term/work etc and having Christmas on our own terms, not with somebody who constantly has to moan, pick, criticise, gripe and be "woe is me, my life is so hard".

I think some posters here are lucky enough never to have experienced a genuine covert narcissist, a toxic person (a stinging jellyfish, Rebecca, in Bridget Jones). There is a difference between someone being a bit difficult, a bit insensitive, and being actually toxic- and it’s hard to convey it. But the toxic person can render those around them utterly miserable, damaged and floundering. And then they minimise what they said (or their flying monkeys minimise it) so you’re left even more confused, because your emotional reaction is at odds with what you’re being told about the interaction. It’s incredibly damaging.

Maybe if mother had shown contrition, apologised, tried to repair the relationship you would have a point.
She hasn’t, she’s carried on undermining a new mother.

I agree with others that the mother sounds toxic and I wouldn't want a relationship with her either.

Ultimately OP if you don't support your wife on this you might lose her. You can have a relationship with your mum but that can't be forced onto your wife.

SPOT ON. All families have frictions and misunderstandings

Yes, I would. Thankfully, my husband would never put me in that awkward situation by imposing his controlling evil mother on us at Christmas.

Not very Christmas spirit no, but if you knew a fraction of how evil my MIL is, I highly doubt you'd be suggesting I spend Christmas with her.

I'm wondering whether this is a very "English " thing. I'm British but parents not, and everyone puts their two oenn'worth in/gets on each other's nerves, can say hurtful things. BUT that's just families and we will "have it out" but not be cold and cruel and ban them from our lives especially on festive occasions.
I feel so out of kilter with people who think MIL is toxic and should show contrition (!!)
Are you all so perfect? Let she without sin cast the first stone!
Interestingly enough, my mother in her 80s has recently acquired some VERY English friends from U3A. About HALF of them have been "cast aside " by their families. Equally "" funnily" enough, my own mother has become very sweet with me ( worryingly so haha) and I'm guessing they've told her I'm the best daughter in the world because I still have a relationship with her
Most people are a mixture of good and bad. DILs included

Whether it's due to her own behaviours is not the point. Her list of crimes don't seem that bad really, they could easily have been blown out of proportion by the OP's wife, but she's clearly not the easiest woman. I get that.

However, HER SON and her only source of company and comfort on Christmas Day does NOT want her to be alone. So the OP would then have a choice, wouldn't she? Either plaster on a smile and get through the day with the MIL as best she can, for the sake of her husband, or accept that as a quid pro quo for not having MIL there for Christmas, her husband and child will need to go out for a few hours.

Or do you think that the wife should have absolutely EVERYTHING her own way and the OP should not be allowed to take his DD to visit his mother on Christmas Day either? Is that what you are saying? Forget whether the wife needs to do the 'wifework' of dinner prep or not. That's irrelevant and a red herring.

Unless I've missed it, there has been no mention of the wife's parents and wider family. I wonder where they figure in all this. The wife may not actually have to spend any time alone at all, if her parents are around.

Seems like your mum's 'failings' have been exaggerated/misrepresented?
Taking baby downstairs whilst wife recovering from birth, what is wrong with that?
Breastfeeding- ease of it or otherwise is a frequent conversation after birth with people sharing their experiences.
Your mum wanting to be more involved and feeling she is pushed out??? Can u blame your mum for feeling like this with a permitted visit of alternate months?
Taking baby to friend's house instead of getting her to nap???????? It seems your mum cannot do right for doing wrong!
I could go on but I feel your wife is being selfish and inconsiderate. What about her own mum? Has she been allocated alternate monthly visits also?
I really feel for you OP and you are in a no win situation.
Of course your wife and child are your priority now but your mum is your daughter's GM and should be allowed to be an integral part of her life and welcomed into your family. I'm sure your mum has faults (like us all) but I feel you have to have a separate discussion with them both to work on a solution of moving on from this situation. They would both need to 'back down',
Your wife is extremely unkind in putting you in this situation on xmas day. What would be the problem with a few hours over xmas dinner. We have all had situations where we have to paint a smile on our face.
I really hope you can all move forward with this