MIL now meddling with grown grandchildren

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EasterJoy said:
I have to agree with the gist of this.

OP, if you had a hope for faciliating reconciliation or justice by stepping in, that could be a virtuous act, if your help was wanted. It wasn’t out of place for you to ask about that. As it is, though, you would just be throwing good sense in after bad if you got a bit more entangled with these relatives than you absolutely have to.

The truth is, your son would be wise to give Grandma a wide berth, too. Grandma will change the minute some angel knocks her down on her road to Damascus, and not a moment sooner…and that “angel” won’t be you! Keep out of her way, because there is no winning this one.

If Grandma’s influence is passed over–and your son knows the sale might not have been well-advised without her meddling, anyway–in 20 years, your son and his cousins might have decent relationship. Why put that generation on the spot to take sides? What good could that do? As for your chances at reconciliation with the rest of this group, I’d stay out of their orbit until after Grandma passes on to her Pearly Gate Retrospective meeting. Both now and then, pray for her. Until then, stay out of her way.

If he wants to confront her, though, stay out of it yourself. You’d be gasoline on that fire, and no more.
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You are so correct about this. As it is I have no contact with one SIL and the other will only call my husband when he is alone at work. She knows when I’m not there. Do you know what it is like to know that someone who hates you is intimate with you husband? Even if it is his sister it still feels like an extra marital affair.
I am expected to visit his mother and take her out once a month but hearing all about the SILs lives gets a little boring and the occassional judgemental remarks are painful.

I think that when she passes there may be a chance that both SILs will be willing to get to know me but I think they have been pretty poisoned and probably hate me anyway because of the few true things they do know. I’m pro-life for one and they regard that a pure religiousity and ignorance .
 
m_crane said:
You are so correct about this. As it is I have no contact with one SIL and the other will only call my husband when he is alone at work. She knows when I’m not there. Do you know what it is like to know that someone who hates you is intimate with you husband? Even if it is his sister it still feels like an extra marital affair.
Whoa, nellie. That is too much. teach yourself to CALM those feelings! I am expected to visit his mother and take her out once a month but hearing all about the SILs lives gets a little boring and the occassional judgemental remarks are painful.

I think that when she passes there may be a chance that both SILs will be willing to get to know me but I think they have been pretty poisoned and probably hate me anyway because of the few true things they do know. I’m pro-life for one and they regard that a pure religiousity and ignorance .
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I would love to have a good relationship with these people.

I dated my husband for 5 years before marrying him. I wanted to get married he held back. We weren’t chaste and I wanted to make it right. He was saving money for the future. When MIL got wind that we were looking for a house, she stepped in and talked husband into buying a house with her and SIL down the shore. A year later we married pennyless with a son on the way. At that time,MIL also divorced her husband but they had been apart living seperate lives thoughout their 28 year marriage.

Bad start for a marriage! That is why I am am almost a fanatic when it comes to living chaste.

In the next 5 years things get so hard that husband has to sell the shore house to support us.

MIL then found a boyfriend and l lived down the shore with the man for about 15 years when children were young so no problems, no interference. She doesn’t drive and is too cheap to make long distance phone calls.

Now her father dies leaves money to MIL but she steals money that should go to other relatives, Uncle dies leave money to MIL, ex-husband gives her money, boyfriend wants to leave his money to his family but she insists that he leave half his money to her. He does.

But now MIL is back. 20 minutes from my home and in my life again.
Now she has money! Lots of it! My children don’t know her and she appears to be very sweet, just a helpless old lady. She tells them that she want to give them money when she dies but they have to help her get the bonds (the ones she stole that belong to her father’s second wife and her children) put in her name because they are in her father and second wifes name currently. All of this is probably criminal and I asked the boys to stay out of it. They agree but they say basically that it’s more like finders keeper than actual stealing. I do not agree.

My MIL is jewish so I always figured that holidays weren’t a big deal to his mother. Once my husband asked her where the christmas tree was from his childhood and she said that there won’t be a tree in her house. She never hosted any occasions either. So we bonded more with my family for special occassions and anyway for 15 years I almost never saw her or SILs and or my husbands father. They all had their own people. And the first 5 year of our marriage being so difficult with her, (Once she came to our apartment and asked husband to come home. I actually broke the glass i was washing in the sink. I couldn’t believe she said that. and once she offered to take his laundry home to be washed. By the way I have a rep for being extremely good housekeeper so don’t get any ideas about me being sloppy housewife!)
I was glad she wasn’t around.

Now the problem seems to be that I must invite them to all my family functions and parties or they are offended. At first I did but I found the meddling and comments annoying so I stopped. I pointed out the SIL never has occasions so why should I.
Normally I would never say something like this but it was my only out. Now I no longer have occasions because it’s not worth the pain. I simply can’t deal with them. I just don’t have what it takes and it’s starting to affect a marriage that I have worked 30 years to build.
 
PatriceA said:
Seriously. Most of the time you have let people be that have these kind of boundary issues.

I’m more concerned about the comment the OP made several posts back, that this was starting to put a strain on her marriage. OP, can you explain that comment further? Does your husband tend to side with the inlaws or does he see your point of view?
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I thought he did but now he is back sliding into the “she’s just a harmless old lady”. But i have a history with her and her daughters. Please read my last post! So everything she does is suspect to me.
I am terrified she will come between me and my husband again as she did when I was a young married. My husband sometimes acts meaner to me when he has been around her kinda more self-absorbed. She has money and we are in bad shape. My son’s are also trying to find careers.and could use the money she hints at giving them. She even has my sons taking her out to lunch and treating her. Which would be fine but she is rich and they are young with low incomes.

I would rather live in a hut then even consider ever wanting money for her.
 
m_crane said:
…Do you know what it is like to know that someone who hates you is intimate with you husband? …
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Do you mean people who would stop at the house and park in the driveway and take members of my family out to lunch but never set foot in my house? Why, yes I do, unfortunately. That was awful. Now they act as if nothing ever happened–they have never talked to me about what they were doing–but I don’t think I’ll ever really trust them again. I felt totally singled out and rejected as a person, and it was easily the nastiest thing that anyone ever did to me. From my point of view, I am one ill-considered incident from spending a few more years in the dog house, I’m in their circle on a contingency basis, and so I don’t take the coat off. I don’t see that changing. 😦

The behavior is called shunning, and it is indirect aggression. It is emotionally abusive, and it is bullying. Practically speaking, though, there is not much you can do about it, save to ignore it. People do the “I’m not speaking to her” thing all of the time, as if it is their God-given right, and yet they seem to think they are on some sort of high road because they don’t confront the people they’re upset with directly. It is a nasty habit, it is hard not to take it to heart (it is effective for a reason), but once you accept that the behavior is entirely about a person willing to give in to their own private snit, it is possible to pass it over.

It is not as if this is this is an enviable way to live! After all, these are people who are using brain time on how to spite their enemies. That’s not a fun life, and in spite of the glamour that the devil tries to give it, it is well worth avoiding. It is a hell on earth, to be blunt, and all of us who have done it can admit that.

The best way to deal with it is to be pleasant and loving in spite of it, or, as the Apostle put it, “Do not repay anyone evil for evil; be concerned for what is noble in the sight of all. If possible, on your part, live at peace with all. Beloved, do not look for revenge but leave room for the wrath; for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” Rather, “if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals upon his head.” Do not be conquered by evil but conquer evil with good.” Romans 12:17-21, and I hope it is obvious the underlining is mine…and come to think of it, maybe this passage explains the issue your SIL had with your cake! Gosh, your relatives may find themselves swimming in tempting baked goods! :rolleyes: 😃
m_crane said:
I thought he did but now he is back sliding into the “she’s just a harmless old lady”. But i have a history with her and her daughters. Please read my last post! So everything she does is suspect to me.
I am terrified she will come between me and my husband again as she did when I was a young married. My husband sometimes acts meaner to me when he has been around her kinda more self-absorbed. She has money and we are in bad shape. My son’s are also trying to find careers.and could use the money she hints at giving them. She even has my sons taking her out to lunch and treating her. Which would be fine but she is rich and they are young with low incomes.

I would rather live in a hut then even consider ever wanting money for her.
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I don’t think you have to be terrified, but it is worth calling your husband on it if he lets other people change how he acts towards you.

As for how the rest of the family fawns over her and her money, let that pass. If you are better to her when it is obvious you want none of her money and will not pay attention to the controllling that goes with it, you’ll be on the right track. But do not let her make you into a less gracious person. It is not that she will have won; it is that the devil will have won, and that would be a loss indeed, in the big eternal picture.

The reason we Catholics keep the corpus on our crucifixes is to remind us that we are still in a vale of tears, but that if we are faithful God can take the worst thing in the world and make it over into the best thing in the world. Many are those who were won over to true conversion by someone who loved them when they had given them every reason to do otherwise. As Mr. Covey says, after all, the main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing. She is a bitter controlling old lady and the bane of your existence, but Our Lord thirsts for her soul. That is the main thing. Jesus spoke the truth to his enemies, he avoided them when they meant it harm and the time for confrontation had not come, but he always loved them. It is hard to do, but it is the best thing to do, and the way to deal with this problem in the service of God.
 
No ones posting so I’ll continue to post. I hope you can help me because my marriage is in trouble. I am a wreck today for many reasons. My business(the one my husband and I share) is in trouble financially. We are being sued and this has gone on for a year now . We fight, we win and they (the lawyers) who sue our type of business sue us again in a higher court hoping to win some money and not caring if they bankrupt us.

I have tried to bear this cross in solidarity with the some of the priests who are being unjustly accused of crimes they didn’t commit. I know it sounds odd but it’s the only thing that keeps me from going off the deep end when i think about how I might lose my home and business. The lawyers think we have money but we don’t and the accusation is a blatant lie but my lawyer says it up to who tells a better story wins. We’ve offered to settle but we can’t give them the amount they want so we have to go through with this. In the end we may lose.

My finacial difficulties are partly due to my husband not firing a person who did become hostle with a customers when he went back to alcohol. That resulted in the lose of half own revenue when clients got wind and fired us. I begged(and fought with) my husband when I saw the signs but he refused to fire this man. The end result is we lost almost half of our business and a client threated us that if we didn’t fire him they would pull out.

You would think that inlaw problems would be the least of my worries but my marriage is important to me and there are so many problems, i just can’t handle anyone driving a wedge between me and my huband right now…
 
m_crane said:
No ones posting so I’ll continue to post. I hope you can help me because my marriage is in trouble. I am a wreck today for many reasons. My business(the one my husband and I share) is in trouble financially. We are being sued and this has gone on for a year now . We fight, we win and they (the lawyers) who sue our type of business sue us again in a higher court hoping to win some money and not caring if they bankrupt us.

I have tried to bear this cross in solidarity with the some of the priests who are being unjustly accused of crimes they didn’t commit. I know it sounds odd but it’s the only thing that keeps me from going off the deep end when i think about how I might lose my home and business. The lawyers think we have money but we don’t and the accusation is a blatant lie but my lawyer says it up to who tells a better story wins. We’ve offered to settle but we can’t give them the amount they want so we have to go through with this. In the end we may lose.

My finacial difficulties are partly due to my husband not firing a person who did become hostle with a customers when he went back to alcohol. That resulted in the lose of half own revenue when clients got wind and fired us. I begged(and fought with) my husband when I saw the signs but he refused to fire this man. The end result is we lost almost half of our business and a client threated us that if we didn’t fire him they would pull out.

You would think that inlaw problems would be the least of my worries but my marriage is important to me and there are so many problems, i just can’t handle anyone driving a wedge between me and my huband right now…
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If you let this drop and treat your in-laws graciously no matter what they throw at you, they will not be able to drive a wedge between you and your husband.

Hang in there. Life is very hard now, but you can hang in there. That’s the message of the Cross: If you are faithful, God can take the worst thing in the world and make it into the best thing in the world.
 
From what I am reading here, your in-laws are abusive to you and your husband let’s them get away with it when he should be defending you…regardless of whether he agrees with what they do or not. He should always defend his wife.

For one, you are under no obligation to have anything to do with those people. If they can’t act like civilized human beings, let DH take MIL on their little outings by himself. You can’t change the way they behave. But you CAN control their accessibility to you to have a chance to mis-behave.

Two…I really think you and your DH need to find a good marriage counselor and hash this stuff out. It sounds like you’ve got some very deep issues here that can’t really be solved in this forum.

As for your adult son, unfortunately he is going to have to learn what grandma is all about on his own…the hard way. Yea, it stinks. But that’s just part of growing up and maturing as an adult. It’s hard to watch as a parent but be assured, he will figure it out eventually.
 
m_crane said:
I would love to have a good relationship with these people. …
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So basically you’re saying, you knew what you were getting into.

And you keep inserting yourself into the drama.

Well if so, then you have no right to complain. And none of our advice is going to do you any good.
 
m_crane said:
No ones posting so I’ll continue to post. I hope you can help me because my marriage is in trouble. I am a wreck today for many reasons. …
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Praying for you. EasterJoy has given some excellent advice. Counselling from your priest or someone he recommends, will help. Continue to throw yourself on God’s mercy and He will support you.
 
Thank you all for your replies. I wrote an extensive response but I can get it to load.
I do think counselling may be in order.

Thank you for empathizing Easterjoy and Patrice ,it helps alot.
 
Rainaldo said:
So basically you’re saying, you knew what you were getting into.

And you keep inserting yourself into the drama.

Well if so, then you have no right to complain. And none of our advice is going to do you any good.
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Maybe YOUR advice won’t do any good, but don’t speak for the rest of us that have dealt with similar situations with our inlaws. Your response is quite insensitive to anybody that is looking for similar advice and comes here and posts their experiences. Unless you’ve walked a mile in any poster’s shoes, please don’t be so quick to be so insensitive when a poster makes themselves vulnerable when they post their family history.
 
m_crane said:
Thank you all for your replies. I wrote an extensive response but I can get it to load.
I do think counselling may be in order.

Thank you for empathizing Easterjoy and Patrice ,it helps alot.
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Counseling sounds like it would be best. You are in my prayers.
 
m_crane said:
The grandmother then went to my son and told him that his cousin asked her opinion about buying insurance and that she told him not to buy it.
My son called his cousin and got the story that it was cousin’s mother who called grandmother not him. This rings true because his cousin is not in the habit of calling grandmom and he had no reason to lie to my son.
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Grandma can’t cancel a life insurance policy that her adult grandson signed for. This is between two adult males that need to act like adults.

For the record I highly discourage people from doing business like this with family.
 
Rainaldo said:
Not really. Have you ever heard the saying, “Simplicity is the hallmark of truth”?
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No - that is not until now.
Now having peeked through many sources, I see that is a phrase upheld by theosophists.

from
dictionary.reference.com/browse/theosophy?s=t
Code: 
World English Dictionary
theosophy  (θɪˈɒsəfɪ)  
 
— n   
1.  any of various religious or philosophical systems claiming to be based on or to express an intuitive insight into the divine nature  
2.  the system of beliefs of the Theosophical Society founded in 1875, claiming to be derived from the sacred writings of Brahmanism and Buddhism, but denying the existence of any personal God
The last point, “denying the existence of any personal God” is most
often diluted or ignored perhaps to obscure the actual nature of theosophy.
Code: 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Simplicity as a Christian virtue IS familiar to me.

As the catechism presents it:

2520 Baptism confers on its recipient the grace of purification from all sins. But the baptized must continue to struggle against concupiscence of the flesh and disordered desires. With God's grace he will prevail
 
- by the virtue and gift of chastity, for chastity lets us love with upright and undivided heart; 

- **by purity of intention which consists in seeking the true end of man: with simplicity of vision, the baptized person seeks to find and to fulfill God's will in everything; **

- by purity of vision, external and internal; by discipline of feelings and imagination; by refusing all complicity in impure thoughts that incline us to turn aside from the path of God's commandments: "Appearance arouses yearning in fools"; 

- by prayer:
 
Rainaldo said:
You have no idea how ironic you’re being.
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You’re right. I don’t know how ironic I am being in that post. I do know the OP and others reading this thread that may be going through a similar experience could probably do without the nasty tone in some of the posts and would benefit more from our prayers than anything.
 
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