SIL is overwhelming me - how can I support her

[howtosupport90]

My SIL has a heart of gold, will do anything for anyone. They have 2 wonderful children.

She has severe ADHD and is very intense. Most mornings, or throughout the day, I receive 7+ messages from her which I can only describe as a ‘brain dump’. She’s on her own some weeks as my Brother works away sometimes in the week.

when I call her, it’s the same, she asks how I am and then talks at me for 15-20 minutes about all matters (she’s very money obsessed). They are also trying for another baby.

she will often text when I’m working and ask if I’m free to talk, then calls me 2 mins later anyway. I have a demanding job although wfh so I can’t always speak. She works, but her job is very flexible.

I just feel so overwhelmed by her. I really do love her and she really is the kindest person. But it’s just too intense sometimes. Like this morning, I had 8 messages come through at 6:15am. Then a further 5 at lunchtime.

i feel like I’m avoiding her contact because I just feel so overwhelmed by it, but how do I handle this? She’s like this with others, not just me.

any advice would be really helpful!

Hi, OP. We can see your thread didn't get any replies when you posted your thread in Chat yesterday, so we've moved it to Relationships now to see if anyone as any advice for you here.

You're just going to have to communicate with her, and set boundaries. Tell her that you won't be checking text messages or available to talk during the day, for a start, and that 8 braindump messages at 6.15 am is not something you want to wake up to. That her communication style doesn't work for you, much though you value her. I would be quite explicit about the type and pattern communication you are prepared to offer.

I have a friend/manager like this. You need to protect yourself because otherwise you just become overwhelmed. Since you can’t really block her you’ll have to mute her and only deal with her when you are ready. Mine would get irrationally angry or focused on something and would fire off emails at 2am. I learned to stop responding, and the only reply if another email about the same topic came through at a later date/time. That way I knew it was important and not some brain fart in the middle of the night. Also, set boundaries - ‘I can’t talk today. I’ll give you a call on Friday’ or ‘You need to talk to Reg about that. It’s not my area of expertise’ etc.

You need to speak to your brother and explain that his wife needs more emotional support and he's the one that should be giving it to her, not you and you need to withdraw from the relationship.

It's ok to say "I feel like you're asking for more time and energy from me than I have the capacity to give at the moment. Why don't we schedule a call on Sat and I'll speak to you then."

You then ignore all texts and calls etc from her and have one call at the weekend. You are allowed to have boundaries. Your brother married her, not you.

I agree with your later points, but I don't think the OP should involve herself in whatever her brother's dynamic with his wife is.

Don't look, don't answer during the day.

Send one text at the end of the day if you want to keep some contact, maybe pulling all the dumps together in one response.

Tell her you are very busy with work and life and don't have space to have lots of conversations.

Just don't be there reinforcing her habit.

Your brother's wife / husband's sister? Whichever, speak to him and ask him to talk with her, too. Getting the same message from several people may help.

My sister is like this. I don't really have much helpful advice I'm afraid but I definitely don't respond to all of her messages that she sends. I might just respond at end of day as PP suggested. When I've spoken to her about it in the past she said she doesn't always feel like she needs a response, it's simply her way of getting things off her chest. So your sil might be the same?

Explain to her you can’t talk / read her emails during the day . Be specific
Then put her on silent so she can’t ring you could you put this as a message on your phone ?

Its up to you have a firm but polite call with her. My sister had to do this with my mum as mum didn’t understand that no calls could be taken during work hours.

Does she expect a response for the texts? It sounds like she's lonely to me.

Does she get annoyed if you don't respond straight away? I think I'd just have set times to check her messages (put her on mute if you can so you aren't disturbed or feel obliged to check?) and spend 5/10 mins responding in a general sort of way to her messages say each lunch/evening. It sounds like she's using messages as a sort of live journal rather than expecting detailed responses.

Thank you everyone for your advice. To confirm, I don’t respond to all messages and I don’t think she does expect a reply all the time, no.

I don’t reply when I’m working, but she doesn’t seem to be the hint. When I speak to her, she says I know you’re busy etc, but then still tries to call or FaceTime during the day!

I will see how it is in the new year and may talk to her after Xmas, I will try and do it in a sesitive way. I do think she’s lonely, yes @Wigglywoowho, she doesn’t get on too well with her parents and only has one very good friend.

I have a friend like this, it works because I sort of manage the friendship. For example, I always schedule the next time we'll talk/see each other rather than ever leave it hanging or vague. This means I feel free in-between times.

So you could end the call with "I'm busy tomorrow morning, but I'll call you on Sunday morning, talk to you then."

Put your phone on DND. Create rules so that your DH/the nursery/anything else urgent can bypass that setting. Mute the WhatsApp chat with her and only check your phone when it's convenient for you.

She's only getting away with what you're letting her get away with. And I mean that kindly.

That's what I've had for years and this week I have had to turn DND off because I'm expecting a call from the midwife (who likes to use a private number 🙄) and it is sooo annoying and disturbing to have this bloody thing buzz and ping all the time.

Mute her and only check messages at a specific time. Or block her and then unblock once a day at the end of the day when you're ready to review. Use technology to your advantage and set your own boundaries; surely you realise by now she's not going to do it for you.

Does your SIL have any insight into her behaviour? If so, could you or her husband steer her towards any coping strategies, counselling or similar? In the meantime, I agree with pp's that you should switch your phone off,

My mums a bit like this and I think adhd. She wakes most nights at 4-5am with rushi thoughts and sometimes I can wake up at 6am or 7am with 15 messages from her and within that around 6-8 questions about various things of mainly minor urgency.

If I’m busy I completely ignore it because I haven’t got a a choice (two small kids!!) she then panicks a few hours later and messages to see if I’m alive or dead. A quick one liner I’m fine still alive busy etc x and she calms down.

honestly she promises to change but doesn’t really, she goes through patches of less of it or more. The main thing is I just don’t feel guilty for not replying individually to each message and question most of the time. I just can’t. It’s not feasible. I sift through and reply to the time specific ones eg are we meeting on X date. Are we meeting X time? (Usually she’s just confirming again) and reassure. But the rest about what colour jumper she should wear today I just ignore.

can you do something like that