Grandchildren are not weapons!
My husband and I had seven kids between us when we got together 3 of his, 4 of mine, five boys, two girls all of which are adults now ranging from the ages of 18 to 26. I think the blending of the family went pretty well, no major drama until about 5 years ago when the Bio Mom entered the picture. She had no contact with the skids for 10 years, she was on drugs and didn't even bother to send them a card on their bdays nothing, let alone a dime of child support. So when she decided that she was done smoking crack and wanted to be a Mom I really tried to encourage the relationship and even let her stay in my home when the youngest skid graduated from high school. It didn't stay amicable long. I found out through my oldest skids Wife who is a piece of work herself and loves to start drama at every opportunity that she was telling her kids that her dad was abusive to her trying to shift the blame for her absence on him. My husband has never bad mouthed her to his kids and this really upset me. The longer she was in the picture the worse things got. My relationship with the two younger skids is OK I am definitely not as involved in their lives as I used to be but we get along. Now the issue is that my oldest skid and his wife team up against me and my Husband. My Stepsons Wife who I refuse to call my DIL any more used to be tolerable. She would put on her fake smile and at least attempt to act like a normal person (she is a narcissist if there ever was one)She used to include us in our Granddaughter's life and things weren't too bad. I have always known she had mental issues and wasn't a good choice for my stepson to marry but kept that between my husband and I. Well to make a long story short things have gotten to the point that We rarely see our Granddaughter anymore. My stepson got drunk hit on my Bio Sons Wife and refuses to apologize to her. My Step Sons drama loving Wife is the one who told me about it or I would have never known. My son said nothing about it nor did his wife. I was just kind of wondering what was going on because nobody was coming over for Sunday family day and dinner we all used to enjoy pretty much every Sunday since we moved back. So I told them I wanted nothing to do with any of that it was there business. My Son texted his Stepbrother trying to not make a big deal of all this and asked him to play basketball he never even returned his text. It all came to a head when my Stepsons wife decided she was gonna have a surprise bday party for my Stepson on the day him and his Dad were flying back from his grandfather's funeral. I guess she had it in her head that she was gonna have this party and everyone was gonna come and this would all be forgiven. Well my bio Son refused to come to his party stating he had not even talked to him in over a month or apologized to his Wife and they would not have anything to do with them until that was done. Well I went to the party brought food as his Wife asked me to and waited for my Husband and Stepson to arrive from the airport. My Husband was exhausted mentally and physically considering he just came home from his Fathers funeral. I didn't feel it was an appropriate time to party and as soon as the presents were opened and cake done, I woke my husband up who was asleep on the couch and took him home. Well we didn't hear from them for awhile and when I told my Husband to see if we could take the Granddaughter to Disney on Ice my Stepson texted back that he did not want her around me because he didn't want her treated like a step child like he was. WoW I was floored! that really hurt! I am very close to my Granddaughter and we have a very special relationship. My other skid told me he was mad because I had an "attitude" at his party. OMG my Husband just got back from his Father's funeral sorry if I just didn't "turn UP" as the kids say for your party. So we have seen our Granddaughter maybe 3 times in the last 7 mos and they live ten minutes away. My Bio Son and Step son have nothing to do with each other and basically the whole family is torn apart because my Stepson wont man up and apologize, I don't think my bio son is being unreasonable in his request. I am just so done with all of this I really want nothing more to do with them. They use my Granddaughter as a weapon but that doesn't even matter to me anymore, I am done! This is not the first incident of them being aholes I could go on and on but I already have didn't I say I was gonna make a long story short LOL! I love this website and am open to any input.
I am assuming you mean the
I am assuming you mean the Stepson's Wife right. If she can't use her as a weapon against us then what use does she have lol.
I think you reach out to the
I think you reach out to the wife to see the grandkid. If it doesn't work, at least you tried.
I have thought about that but
I have thought about that but at this point I am going to leave it to my Husband. I don't have anything to say that she want's to hear and I am afraid talking to her will just make things worse. He has allowed this behavior and he can deal with the consequences.
LOL I agree they do Suck!
LOL I agree they do Suck!
This is exactly how I feel! I
This is exactly how I feel! I love my Granddaughter but I don't love anyone enough to be miserable and unhappy, catering to a couple of demented aholes like them for the rest of my life. You are 100% correct they are her Parents and if they feel I have not kissed enough ass to have the honor of spending time with their little princess then so be it. I do have other Gkids and they get jealous of them too, stating we will drive all the way across town to see my Gson but won't come to their house and visit. I have gone to their house every time I have ever been invited, it's all a bunch of BS. My Husband can have whatever relationship he wants with them but I am smart enough to know that when someone shows you who they really are believe them! You don't ever have to tell me more than once you don't want me around, it is there loss I am an awesome GMA!!
Wow. I don't get people like
Wow. I don't get people like this. I would give anything for my kids to have grandparents close by who wanted to spend time with them. My mom has never held my 3 month old daughter or babysat my 4 year old and she lives 5 min away. My parents aren't kid people and my in laws live 2 hours away. I don't understand people who use their kids against their parents and take away people that want to love their kids. So much unnecessary drama.
Where do you live? we could
Where do you live? we could be surrogate Grandparents lol! that is sweet I wish more young people felt like you I agree, the more people there are to love a child the better it is not a competition
I agree with the not telling
I agree with the not telling them what or why sometimes the most powerful thing you can say is nothing at all. They just twist everything I say to fit their agenda anyway.
I agree with the not telling
I agree with the not telling them what or why sometimes the most powerful thing you can say is nothing at all. They just twist everything I say to fit their agenda anyway.
Too much drama. Stay out of
Too much drama. Stay out of feuding children's (even when they are supposedly adults) crap fest.
You/DH issued an invite for the grandchildren. Very kind of you to think of the little girl and want to show her a fun evening. Too bad her parents are assholes. Let it go. Invite again when something else comes along and you'd like to share the experience/event with granddaughter. Yeah, you'll probably get another 'no'. Not your fault You tried. Unfortunately for the little girl, she's the one losing out (ad that's a shame), but refuse to play the game with the parents. Invite. Kid either gets to or not.
Stay out of the 'hit o my wife' thing. Invite the skids/kids to Sunday dinner as usual. If they come, fine. If not, their loss. Just request a return 'yes or no' so you know how many to serve dinner to. If none of them want to come? Cool, Sunday afternoon alone and quiet with your DH. Take a Sunday drive and explore together. In otherwords...do not let adult children and their drama affect you. The adult snot butts will either work it out and come to their senses or not. You're at a point in your life that you've done your 'mommy duty'. They are raised. They are adults. If they choose to fight, be disrespectful and/or 'punish' you, meh, move on. Their loss.
I have a son-in-law who punishes me all the time. So much so that his son (my GS13, oldest daughter's son)misses out a lot. My DD herself misses out a lot. Not my problem. It doesn't stop me from interacting and enjoying all the other kids and grandkids. I refuse to allow the horse's ass my oldest daughter married to affect me, my home or my family's events/get-togethers. I issue the invite. Oldest daughter either comes or not.
I think the issue goes back
I think the issue goes back to the root cause that your DH did not put his foot up his DILs ass about the surprise party the day after his own father's funeral. And .... your BS did not beat his SB's ass for hitting on his wife.
The toxic SS and his equally toxic wife have never realized any notable consequence for their behavior and it will take bringing the pain to give them clarity.
I would engage your DH to deal with his toxic spawn, make sure that you and DH have a designed plan for the confrontation and destruction of the toxic SS and his bride and give all of his children absolute clarity on the complete history and facts of their useless POS mother. You stated that DH has never badmouthed his X and that is absolutely great. However, facts, documentation, and truth are not badmouthing. They are not good or bad. They are just facts. It is BM's behaviors that generated those facts that are bad. These kids need absolute fact, clarity, and truth including court docs, arrest records (if they exist), CS payment history or lack of it, etc.... Stripping the façade of BM's bullshit by blaringly publishing the facts and truth to her kids is the only way to give these "kids" clarity and possibly safe them from her toxic lies and ongoing bullshit.
Sadly your Gskid is the pawn in all of this but it is her parents that need to be confronted and destroyed completely so that they may re-establish some semblance of reasonable adult behavior. If they are capable of it at all.
We had a similar experience with my bride's SIL. Her oldest brother's wife. The bovine bride was so toxic and threatened by how close my BIL was to my bride and the rest of his family that she set out on a campaign of complete destruction against my bride, my ILs, BIL2, and my SIL and the relationship her own husband had with the rest of his family. My bride is the eldest of 4 sibs. This went on for years. My IL clan has a tendency to play a family wide game of The Emperor's New Clothes in a naïve effort to avoid tension and drama and no one ever says shit to anyone else about any thing that really should be addressed .
Things that should take about 5mins to confront and fix can go on for years with them. I am not one to tolerate bullshit but my wife was petrified that her parents would be pissed if I said anything and it would ruin family relationships so I bit my tongue for far too long. The entire clan has operated on this premise for decades. As BIL1's bovine bride continued to escalate her crap and leverage their children against my MIL and FIL and the rest of family I finally got to the end of my rope. After my Skid graduated from HS and finished his final CO's Sperm Land visitation we took a road trip to bring him home. We visited my ILs as part of that trip and the bovine bride finally pissed me off enough to put my foot down. After an upsetting family gathering we were back in our hotel and my wife was venting about her SIL. I turned to her and told her that I had heard the same crap from the entire family regarding BIL1's wife for years and I would not hear another word about it. I told her that until someone in the family grew the balls to confront her bullshit that I would not allow anyone to say one word about the bullshit any longer and if anyone said a word I would deal with the bovine bride directly.
It shocked me when instead of avoiding the issue like her whole clan normally does she told me I was right and picked up her phone and called her brother and his wife to have it out. It was brutal. She asked them what their problem was, they asked her what her problem was, DW laid it all out, went through every detail of the bovine brides bullshit for the past 7ish years and the volume went up, profanity was thrown, and eventually they hung up when her brother and his bride realized they could not hang with my amazing MBA CPA wife. Minimum wage ag workers are generally just fodder for arguments with intelligent and educated people.
To prevent BIL1 and his wife from manipulating the rest of the family my wife immediately called her parents and laid it out for them. Surprisingly my MIL said "Well it is about damned time. Maybe now things can get better." :jawdrop: I was shocked. FIL was worried but even he was complimentary that someone had stepped up and confronted the situation. My wife's youngest sib (SIL) was pissed at her for breaking the family code of never calling bullshit on anything and BIL2 just laughed, said "great". For the next year-ish no one heard from BIL1 and his family even though they all live in the same small town. Then BIL1 and the bovine bride called for a family meeting. Everyone swooned and celebrated ... except me. I smelled yet more manipulation. So, I insisted on an agenda for the meeting and that one person be appointed as the facilitator to keep things on message. Of course the BIL1 and the bovine brood animal intended to use the meeting as a platform for manipulation but the rest of the clan agreed with my agenda and facilitator demand and I was asked to create and facilitate the agenda. I did. I insisted that the discussion must be on how to move forward rather than attacking anyone about perceived past transgressions. The first words spoken after we started the meeting was bovine bride demanding that BIL2's GF be ejected from the meeting since she is not family. The meeting was at BIL2's house that his GF also lived in. I said no, she lives in the home, it is BIL2's home, she is a long term SO and she stays. Bovine bride threatened to leave and take BIL1 with her. I told them not to let the door hit them in the ass on the way out. They stayed.
5 hours later after hashing out a path forward and a few resets and attitude adjustments towards the bovine bride and BIL1 we had re-established some level of normalcy in the broad family relationships and for the past 4 years things have just continued to improve.
So, confront, destroy, tolerate no bullshit. Give it a try.
It worked for dealing with my IL clan's bullshit.
Good luck.
I was serious about your son kicking SS's ass for hitting on your DIL. A true and complete ass whupin is in order.
I agree with the other
I agree with the other posters - write them off. And refuse to discuss the situation with anyone else in the family. Let the kids & skids squabble & gossip - no need to get sucked into the negativity & relational aggression.
DH & I haven't seen our gskids for several years. In fact, we've never seen the youngest at all. Yes, it hurts like Hell, but one skid was using their offspring to milk & manipulate us while the other skid is mentally ill. We refuse to negotiate with terrorists, so we don't see them.
Being a GP doesn't mean you have to be a victim. Let the younger generation sort things out. Be consistent, and do what you do. If one day your skid and his bitchy wife decide to return to the fold, then great. Meanwhile, love on all those who come inn your sphere, and don't play games with those who don't.