I am in the club with a toxic mil who is becoming more and more unhinged following the births of our three children. Our first died when very small of a heart problem following lots of surgery and time in hospital, so we're naturally very worried and heartbroken parents.
They started looking after our toddler once a week, only at their house because they didn't want to put miles on their car, both retired with no hobbies. Recently our baby daughter was born and they've only asked about her maybe a handful of times in five months - never ask about us as parents. Mil has previously said how c-sections are the easy way out (I've had 3 with very difficult recoveries after high risk pregnancies following 5 rounds of IVF and multiple losses all in my 40s). They've never once offered to help with any of the babies during postpartum, never brought a meal. First baby was born and had to stay in hospital for 9 days due to illness and we came home a day before Christmas. They came to see baby at Christmas without even asking if we needed anything. If it hadn't been for our kind neighbors who brought a meal we'd have been eating beans on toast for Christmas Day.
We've had to put some boundaries in place because of their lack of communication and then not getting back to us when we're asking about our toddlers well-being when they look after him. Mil completely kicked off. Then had to enforce some food rules as she was only feeding him toast and rice cakes, making him severely constipated. She's forever playing the victim when in fact she's the initiator of problems and overstepping boundaries all the time and disregarding our rules.
I can live with her ignoring me, it stings when she's just mean to her own son as he's nothing but good and deserves a caring mother which she absolutely is not. But I will absolutely not tolerate her disrespecting the memory of my dead son which she has done multiple times now in recent months. She's not included him in our family count multiple times and when we called her out for it she's always played the victim. Then she's called him "broken" in a memorial card she sent. This is beyond cruel. When current baby daughter was born baby had to be hospitalized with illness at three days and we called them to ask to take our toddler for the night (we had absolutely no other option as my parents live abroad). I was terrified, especially with all we've been through. Her first response upon hearing her newborn grandchild hospitalization was: 'but we have meat for dinner!' these are just some examples of her cruelty.
Postpartum is very difficult for me with all we've been through. She has made it so much worse and I want to stay away from her as much as I can as she always drags me down with her incessant negativity and self centeredness. During our wedding all she did was complaining about a stomach ache yet managed to eat a full three course meal. Whenever she came to see her newborn grandchildren she was complaining about something and bringing all that negative energy into a sacred space. I'm so done with it all. I want to discontinue childcare from them but hubby is adamant they should still do it.
The other day mil posted something on her public social media saying how grandmother's just want to spread the love to their grandchildren and that those children shouldn't be used as bargaining chips with the parents as they will end up as collateral damage. I mean who does that? (This came after I had said no to cooking for the dinner that she's hosting whilst being in the trenches with my babies). She has taken the post down since - I didn't react.
Please be kind and compassionate when responding. I've been having a rough time with it all. Thank you for reading and sorry this is such a long post.
I guess what I want is validation for me not being too sensitive and for being right in enforcing my boundaries and limiting contact.