Should my wife support me on this?

[OzzyGrandad]

My wife & I attended a Christmas dinner at our daughters in laws. The dinner was on the table but there were still a few items to be placed & finalized. I asked my daughters mother in law if it was ok to start, she said yes. The rest of the party sat down & I had already begun eating. (I admit was not a good move). I believe the son of the mother in law wanted to say grace before dinner & was angry that I had started. He launched into a tirade of abuse, aggressively belittling me about my bad manners. I tried to explain that his mother had said it was ok to start, but this was ignored. I remained calm for the rest of the evening & then we went home. The next day I texted the son, explained my position & informed him that I would not tolerate such verbal abuse again, hoping he would regret being so abusive & apologize. He texted back, F off D Head.
We drop our grandson at his house every weekend & he returns him on Sunday. I asked my wife, when he drops his son off, to be courteous, but to not show any of the usual friendliness, just pick him up & say goodbye until he apologizes to me for his behavior. My wife refused, saying it was between me & him. She behaved as if nothing had happened & was friendly.
My question to the readers of this story is, should my wife have agreed to just be courteous & not friendly, or was she right to ignore my feelings on the matter.

Because women put up with loads more shit day to day and don't even think of labelling it verbal abuse and stringing the conflict on for months afterwards. Get some perspective. It was an altercation you caused and I'm sure you've been around the block enough to be able to cope with some bad language without going to pieces. Not wanting to rock boats is a wiser approach with some actual perspective instead of some cold war for months because YOU couldn't wait another minute or two before stuffing your face.

I asked my daughters mother in law if it was ok to start

My goodness, how greedy & rude! Even asking, at a family celebration meal.

You need to do some thinking about your behaviour and the way your request escalated.

Although it sounds as though you son-in-law [? or is he your SiL's brother?] is equally as uncouth & rude. But you should not even have asked to start eating before everyone in the family was seated and ready to eat. Let alone start eating. It's toddler behaviour. Or greediness, which is so unattractive in an adult.

The wife is the only one behaving as an adult in this particular room. Elsewhere, there is far too much testosterone flying around. It appears to have obscured any objectivity of vision.

It's fortunate that there is one person considering the interests of the grandchild. DW is the person to determine her own course of action here; and she's right. You don't control her, nor do you get to dictate how she behaves. Who do you think you are?

If this fella really did start screaming and swearing at you then that's not a good move. He should've just made a pointed remark about it being impolite and please wait till we've sat down and said grace.

I think you texting him slagging him off in the hope of an apology totally backfired. If you sought an apology you should've seen your own error and said sorry for starting the meal prematurely. You could've said you could see how upset he was. Then say you hope we can move on from it.

As it stands you've now fully fallen out over it.
I think it's safe to say you won't be spending Xmas day with them any more.

I tried to keep my original message as brief as possible, & in doing so I have caused confusion amongst many responders. My grandson is 4 years old. His mother, (my daughter) had an episode with an illegal drug which left her with mental scars & is officially mentally disabled. From birth the baby boy has been in my wife's & my full time care. The father is not married to my daughter but wishes to have a relationship with his son (for which I am happy to facilitate). He is single & works full time. He has the grandson (Locky) on Saturdays & his mother (Nana) has him on Sundays. We usually drop him off to the fathers house & he usually returns him to our house.
We had a friendly good relationship, having Christmas at Nana's every year. Grace was never performed until this last year. (Possibly because a friend of the father was religious) He & his fathers 2 friends who were in attendance had been in a drug rehabilitation clinic where religion was a priority.
The dinner was almost ready to go (the meat had been sitting there & beginning to go cold) & people were milling around, so I asked the host (Nana) are we ready to go? She said yes "Get stuck in") So I led the way, sat down & started carving the meat. Everyone else also sat down following my lead & were about to tuck in when the father began his tirade. I am not sure of exactly what he said because I was so shocked, but I can assure you it was aggressive, belittling & humiliating. All the other guests (fathers family & friends) sat there in silence.
I texted him the following day that his verbal abuse was not acceptable & I would not tolerate it in future. His response was F off - D head, I'm not apologizing.
Do people really expect me to accept this.
My response is to maintain a polite relationship, to continue with the grandson sharing, but I cannot be friendly with him now until he apologizes, or at the very least recognizes the hurt he has caused me. I did express regret about starting the dinner before he was ready, as an olive branch, but that was rejected.
Had he directed that tirade to my wife, I would whole heartly have supported her, however, she prefers not to get involved therefore supporting the father. Encouraging him to do or say whatever he likes to me with no consequences.

This.

Have you ever shouted at your wife?

Did she forget about it quickly to keep the peace? Did she string it out for months afterwards and demand others take her side.

The way you’ve written that is confusing. Is the “son of the mother in law” your daughter’s husband or your daughter’s BIL? Regardless, I would say you were both rude, but if your wife has to see and communicate with him on a regular basis then it makes sense to be friendly and not cause tension around your grandson. If it’s your daughter’s husband then I’d definitely make an effort to repair the relationship.

It isn’t that weird. In my family the person hosting often says start whilst the final bits are being laid as the food starts to get cold. We are quite relaxed about it. If we were at a formal meal we wouldn’t but in a family environment we are pretty chill.

It's the 10th May?

He's probably embarrassed that he's incapable of looking after or paying for his own child and was looking for a way to hit out at you. I'm sure everyone else present at the dinner knows what a tool he is.

Your wife is not "encouraging him" to verbally abuse you. She is trying to maintain a friendly relationship with the father of your grandson for the sake of your grandson.

It is ridiculous for adults to be carrying on this level of grudge 5 months later.

I think you and your wife need to decide what kind of arrangement and relationship is in your grandson's best interests.
If you feel that his father and other grandparents are positive to have in his life then you need to maintain that connection and have a civil relationship.

Your wife can make her own decisions about how friendly and chatty she is in maintaining that civility.

You may decide that having one big family Christmas with the in-laws is not something in the best interests of your grandson and make different arrangements for his father amd other grandparents to celebrate Christmas eith him in future.

What actual difference in behaviour would you expect to see if your wife was being "politely civil" compared to how she is being? Are you reading too much into things?

You were terribly rude to tuck into a meal someone had cooked for you before everyone had even sat down. There is no "justification" that you had rudely asked for permission to start. But of course he should not have aggressively verbally abused you.

By being verbally abusive and calling them a fucking dickhead? Really? That just shows what type of 'man' the father is.

OP made a mistake but the kid's father sounds a lot worse. And as for getting the arse about not saying grace when he's never done it before, does he think a few words to an imaginary being are going to make up for what he's done?

You should have waited for everyone else to sit down to eat, I doubt it would have been more than a few minutes and that is good manners.

However someone who says grace before meals should not be launching into a tirade of abuse, they'd have just ignored your faux pas and carried on as if nothing had happened.

You sound like a right load of chavs.

but it's also rude to verbally abuse someone (and over praying???? Doesn't sound very Christian).

I'm imagining the grace... "Lord, we thank You for this meal and for all the blessings You give to us. We are so thankful for the love Jesus H. Fucking Christ OzzyGrandad will you stop fucking eating, dickhead? that You have given to our family. In the name of Your son Jesus we pray, amen"

It's up to your wife how she interacts with him. As other posters have suggested, maybe she's concerned that if she isn't friendly with him, then he will try and get custody of his son. Just because you would have acted differently if the situation was different, doesn't mean that her choice is wrong. Focus on your grandson and stop worrying about offence and loyalty.

OK your recent post puts a different complexion on things - so you hadn't started eating, you just started carving? In that case, I don't think you deserved the harangue (although you should have double checked that you were ok to carve, that sort of claims a bit of ownership of all the hard work I think)

Your wife is wiser than you

I think you starting early was rude. You wait until you're told. I think you should apologise for your rude behaviour and then he may apologise for his. Your wife is being the bigger person in this situation, take a leaf out of her book and grow up!

Regardless of the rights or wrongs of starting eating I’d be honestly worried about how the father of the child will shout at his son when left alone with him.

He was told it was ok.

You originally said that "I had already begun eating" and now it is that you started carving.
Anyway - still not great if everyone wasn't ready and you were carving at the table.

Also, I forgot you had angry-texted. Honestly, the father sounds terrible and is unlikely to apologise but you sound like you hold a grudge and are dragging your wife into your battles.

Your wife seems very dignified. Take a leaf from her book.

Indeed. One assumes he is probably the most senior person in the room (with wife and mother in law) so him asking over say a younger person seems politer.
also what was the delay in starting eating? 2 mins for the cook to turn off thins and sit down (fine) but longer as someone had wandered off for a bit? Not fine. who cooked -the son?( As mother in law was sat there so the hostess was ready to start?) or son’s partner?

and one assumes everyone would start eating if given the go ahead. Not just you.

It's mid-May. You're never going to get an apology for something that happened 5 months ago, whether you feel like you deserve it or not.

Also, why are you shepherding your grandson to his other grandparents/uncles house every weekend? Where are his parents?

And if this "son" who yelled at you is an adult man, still living with his elderly parents... Well... I wouldn't take it too personally.

Because he had the poor manners to ask and put the hostess on the spot! I don’t know anyone over the age of 8 who would do that.

I have remained courteous but not friendly & have asked my wife to do the same, to make him aware of how humiliated I feel, but she does not understand my feelings on this

This is controlling. You cannot expect someone else to react the same way as you just by virtue of being married to you. She has a mind of her own and can draw her own conclusions which she has.

You do have some chutzpah or shall I say lack of self-awareness to come here crying that you wife is standing her ground and not being petty like you.

She is emotionally intelligent and your post betrays a lack of it on your part.