This is a long one however the context is key, so apologies!
As the title said, my partner of 12 years and my mum have fallen out whilst on a family holiday. He (in my opinion) took his bad mood out on her and behaved very rudely towards her, which she is upset and angry with him for. I was embarrassed by this however he has owned this and is willing to apologise for his behaviour.
During a talk, he maintained that his behaviour was triggered by a wider context of struggling with her general mood and attitude towards him, me and our children (5 and 2) and that I needed to address this with her so we can move forwards.
These are long standing issues he (and to some extent I) have with her. I suspect she is undiagnosed autistic and struggles with depression - she is very expressionless, really struggles with change in routine and plans, can’t really make any small talk at all and is quite cold and stilted generally however the biggest issue is her general irritability, snappiness and passive aggression. There have been multiple times which it has been downright uncomfortable to visit her and my father due to her mood. My partner is really affected by this and feels she often brings his mood down and detracts from events. He feels her behaviour is rude and that she doesn’t like him very much. It is worth mentioning though that my partner is quite sensitive and emotionally reactive so tends to feel these things quite deeply.
However his biggest issue is that she directs this towards our children. This is mostly in the context of her attempting to correct behaviour and discipline them however it is completely over the top - ie: snapping at my 5 year old for dropping a spoon or walking too slowly, harshly telling him to stop crying instead of comforting him and generally being irritated by him.
This is something we have discussed on multiple occasions and I always find myself stuck in the middle of as I can see how (if she is autistic) she finds these things hard but also recognise that my partner comes from a very warm, caring family who would never dream of treating our children that way.
An added complexity is that 4 years ago. My partner became an Alcoholic and suffered a breakdown after experiencing 2 significant family traumas in short time (loss of a parent and a close family members suicide). This actually occurred at my parents house and was very traumatic and his alcoholism really affected our relationship for 18 months afterwards. Thankfully, he is now in a healthier place and whilst he still drinks on occasion he mostly manages it well and no longer uses alcohol as a way to soothe his feelings. We have been fighting to overcome all the shit that goes along with an event like this, and have been in couples counselling for the last 5 months to address the anxiety I feel around him drinking on occasion. My parents never knew the extent of the issue beyond his initial breakdown but obviously this did some damage to their already strained relationship!
So. On holiday my mum is being her usual self (with added eye rolling and sighing whenever we asked her to help with the kids, but then saying she is happy to do it etc) and my partner begins to be affected by it after a few days. He goes out for some beers with another family member and we have an argument when he returns (not because of the drinking, but rather because he was late back for some plans) the argument put my partner into a bad mood and then he was further triggered by my mum later that night, he bit back at her and thus we have the fall out.
I spoke to my mum today to try to explain where my partner was coming from in his response to her (ahead of him texting her) however the conversation went very badly. My mum basically denied that she behaves in this way towards our children and denied that she was rolling her eyes (even though I saw it multiple times) she began shouting that what i was saying was bullshit and I was making her out to be a horrible person. She stated “from now on I’ll just do as I’m told and won’t bother getting involved at all” before hanging up. She also said she feels my partner was in a bad mood because he had been drinking too much over the holiday and was deflecting this onto her.
I feel absolutely wretched about this as mum has a hard life and clearly isn’t happy, I don’t want to be another source of unhappiness for her. I am also upset because I feel like my partner pushed for me to talk to her about her general attitude and I did so despite knowing she probably wouldn’t recognise it or accept it. The statement she made about him drinking too much has resonated as I did feel this way too and the whole thing has just left me feeling deflated and exhausted and with a sense that I am once again dragged along on the rollercoaster ride created by the impact of my partners drinking and his sensitivity and reactiveness to situations. However I am also mindful that my mums reaction was ridiculous and it is reminiscent of many times in my childhood where I felt intense anxiety at the thought of ever upsetting her because of her reactions. So I feel confused, upset, and don’t even know who is right or wrong anymore. I just want to run away and clear my head. sometimes I dream of leaving my partner and having a fresh start but the reality is that I won’t.