Negative feelings about ILs

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't know why your DH feels that way, that is unusual. Clearly they love his kids and consider them their cherished grand kids. Which part of their lives are so alien to you? I think, if all is like you wrote, you touched upon the problem yourself. Your and your DH don't see them as family, rather as some people you are generous about allowing time with your kids. I don't think it is one sided, don't the kids like their grandparents? I would think that kids are getting a lot of it out too, relationship with loving grandparents can enrich your kids lives.

This is kinda true but I was hoping it's not as ugly as that at the root. But yeah, I feel like that, deep down.

I mean, it's not the nicest way to feel, but since you are cordial and keep up a relationship for your kids' sake, why is it such a big deal? Think about why these feelings worry you so much. Do you feel guilty? Do you resent them? Are you holding onto regret/sadness that they're not better parents/ILs for you? Getting to the root of the bad feelings might help lessen your anxiety.

Yes, thank you. I guess it's not a big deal. But yeah, I feel guilty and resent them and feel sad that I don't have different ILs.

On the adoption thing, although I know this sounds terrible to say, I am sure that I could love my ILs more if they were more "like" my DH, if I saw shared personality or physical traits, that would help endear me. But they don't.

I do appreciate that they gave DH a loving and safe upbringing, but they didn't make him "who he is." He is very, very different from them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:... 1) We are all that my DH's parents have 2) FIL is basically a saint 3) MIL is disabled. ...

I find this really, really sad. On top of this they don't ask much of you. Have you truly tried to get to know them, especially MIL? Ask questions about her past, her childhood, etc., in an attempt to really know where she is coming from.

Sad.

I agree, very sad, which is why I wrote this post, offered those details, and asked for help for how I'm FEELING.

Yes, I've really tried to get to know them. We are just profoundly different. MIL is mentally as well as physically disabled (although the mental part isn't totally acknowledged by everyone). She operates like a child. She is very, very hard to communicate with, on anything other than a surface level, and I'm actually pretty good at communicating/interviewing people/finding something interesting about anyone on the planet.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:... 1) We are all that my DH's parents have 2) FIL is basically a saint 3) MIL is disabled. ...

I find this really, really sad. On top of this they don't ask much of you. Have you truly tried to get to know them, especially MIL? Ask questions about her past, her childhood, etc., in an attempt to really know where she is coming from.

Sad.

I agree, very sad, which is why I wrote this post, offered those details, and asked for help for how I'm FEELING.

Yes, I've really tried to get to know them. We are just profoundly different. MIL is mentally as well as physically disabled (although the mental part isn't totally acknowledged by everyone). She operates like a child. She is very, very hard to communicate with, on anything other than a surface level, and I'm actually pretty good at communicating/interviewing people/finding something interesting about anyone on the planet.

Ah, the third page important detail!

So...who does and doesn't acknowledge it? Is FIL an enabler rather than a saint?

And how long has it been an issue? DH likely could really stand some counseling--mental illness, particularly untreated mental illness, in a family can really affect everyone else.

[Anonymous]

I was much more empathetic to you before you indicated your "contempt" for them.

Notebook poster gave you some really helpful suggestions about training your mind to look for the good in people, which will help you train your feelings to view the best in your in-laws, and you shut her down hard. I don't think you really want to change your feelings, I think you just want us to tell you it is OK to look down on your saintly but not interesting in-laws. It isn't really OK to have contempt for good people who aren't interesting to you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:... 1) We are all that my DH's parents have 2) FIL is basically a saint 3) MIL is disabled. ...

I find this really, really sad. On top of this they don't ask much of you. Have you truly tried to get to know them, especially MIL? Ask questions about her past, her childhood, etc., in an attempt to really know where she is coming from.

Sad.

I agree, very sad, which is why I wrote this post, offered those details, and asked for help for how I'm FEELING.

Yes, I've really tried to get to know them. We are just profoundly different. MIL is mentally as well as physically disabled (although the mental part isn't totally acknowledged by everyone). She operates like a child. She is very, very hard to communicate with, on anything other than a surface level, and I'm actually pretty good at communicating/interviewing people/finding something interesting about anyone on the planet.

Ah, the third page important detail!

So...who does and doesn't acknowledge it? Is FIL an enabler rather than a saint?

And how long has it been an issue? DH likely could really stand some counseling--mental illness, particularly untreated mental illness, in a family can really affect everyone else.

OK, MIL has had a lifelong serious mental illness, mostly controlled from what I understand, but requiring hardcore drugs that over time have left her older than her years.

And it's established/acknowledged that she has the early signs of a disabling old-age disease. (I don't want to name the exact conditions here). She has very good care, and FIL does a saintly job of making sure of it. But I kind of feel like he's been propping her up their whole lives. Acting like she's normal and "all there" when she clearly is not.

Anyway, the mental disabilities don't make her mean or nasty or anything. Just very simple, childlike and dependent. Sometimes greedy, self-centered.

Yes, I think my DH could use some counseling. Thanks for pulling this out. I just feel like a really mean and nasty person for (privately!!!) disliking my poor ILs under these circumstances. And of course there are all these people here ready to tell me that I am in fact a terrible person, just for feeling this way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was much more empathetic to you before you indicated your "contempt" for them.

Notebook poster gave you some really helpful suggestions about training your mind to look for the good in people, which will help you train your feelings to view the best in your in-laws, and you shut her down hard. I don't think you really want to change your feelings, I think you just want us to tell you it is OK to look down on your saintly but not interesting in-laws. It isn't really OK to have contempt for good people who aren't interesting to you.

I know contempt is ugly. I am trying to do a good job of naming my feelings. I often feel contempt. Sorry! I don't ever show it, OK?

[Anonymous]

1. Sounds like maybe you should go to therapy to help you with these feelings

2. How old are your kids? I dislike my ILs, because of things they have done over the years, but my kid adores them and they shower him with attention. I try my best to forgive them for his sake.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm sorry you feel this way. It's your issue and I suggest, kindly, that you suck it up. My ILs, with whom I thought I had a good relationship, recently called me a bimbo and baby-killer bc I was a Hillary supporter. So there's that.

Are you "sucking it up" after that comment, pp?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:1. Sounds like maybe you should go to therapy to help you with these feelings

2. How old are your kids? I dislike my ILs, because of things they have done over the years, but my kid adores them and they shower him with attention. I try my best to forgive them for his sake.

Young teenage, and they have great relationships with their grandparents, esp Grandpa, but beginning to realize that "no one's home" in Grandma's head.

And baby. Everyone wants the freaking baby. Baby, baby, baby. Gotta get hands on my baby. Forgetting about the older kids because there's a baby. Etc.

[Anonymous]

I can relate, OP. My ILs were nice people and gave my DH a good home (he is NOT adoptive). DH loved them very much. I had nothing in common with them and while I was always nice, polite and did my family duty, it always bothered them that we didn't have the relationship they always envisioned having with their DIL. My DH and I nearly called off the wedding because of it (we were in relationship counseling over it). There were no hard words, no bad behavior, I just didn't have the emotional closeness with them that they wanted. In hindsight (they're both dead now), I don't think the challenge was because we had little common ground, I think I was repelled by what I sensed was their 'clinginess'. They 'needed' a close emotional relationship and I didn't. It wasn't enough that I was an excellent partner for their DS, that I was nice and did what I was supposed to. They wanted more. It got better after we had kids. They could shower the kids with all the love they wanted and they were excellent grandparents.

I think you should sit down with your DH and agree on what his parents deserve - and they do deserve to have a relationship with their grandkids if nothing else. Now, if there were abuse issues, my response would be different. I understand how this places a burden on you, you really do have to suck it up. But, the onus doesn't have to be all on you. Your DH needs to pull his weight on this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm an adoptee and an adoptive parent. Has your husband ever sought counseling to figure out his feelings towards his parents? I personally don't feel that way at all about my own adoptive parents (and I'm in reunion with my birth family), but I don't think it's rare by any means to feel like your husband. Sometimes I see adoptees who conflate what they perceive as adoption issues with non-adoption issues. I think counseling is worth exploring before this blows up into something irreparable.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't know why your DH feels that way, that is unusual. Clearly they love his kids and consider them their cherished grand kids. Which part of their lives are so alien to you? I think, if all is like you wrote, you touched upon the problem yourself. Your and your DH don't see them as family, rather as some people you are generous about allowing time with your kids. I don't think it is one sided, don't the kids like their grandparents? I would think that kids are getting a lot of it out too, relationship with loving grandparents can enrich your kids lives.

This is kinda true but I was hoping it's not as ugly as that at the root. But yeah, I feel like that, deep down.

I mean, it's not the nicest way to feel, but since you are cordial and keep up a relationship for your kids' sake, why is it such a big deal? Think about why these feelings worry you so much. Do you feel guilty? Do you resent them? Are you holding onto regret/sadness that they're not better parents/ILs for you? Getting to the root of the bad feelings might help lessen your anxiety.

Yes, thank you. I guess it's not a big deal. But yeah, I feel guilty and resent them and feel sad that I don't have different ILs.

On the adoption thing, although I know this sounds terrible to say, I am sure that I could love my ILs more if they were more "like" my DH, if I saw shared personality or physical traits, that would help endear me. But they don't.

I do appreciate that they gave DH a loving and safe upbringing, but they didn't make him "who he is." He is very, very different from them.

Your DH seems to have a lot of baggage regarding his adoption that you are taking on. My ILs have tremendous problems (addiction, mental illness, family dysfunction). My DH is very, very different from them, and they didn't give him a great upbringing. The fact that they're his biological parents doesn't make them endearing to me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm an adoptee and an adoptive parent. Has your husband ever sought counseling to figure out his feelings towards his parents? I personally don't feel that way at all about my own adoptive parents (and I'm in reunion with my birth family), but I don't think it's rare by any means to feel like your husband. Sometimes I see adoptees who conflate what they perceive as adoption issues with non-adoption issues. I think counseling is worth exploring before this blows up into something irreparable.

+1

+2 OP is also attributing some of her own feelings/problems to the adoption, as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't know why your DH feels that way, that is unusual. Clearly they love his kids and consider them their cherished grand kids. Which part of their lives are so alien to you? I think, if all is like you wrote, you touched upon the problem yourself. Your and your DH don't see them as family, rather as some people you are generous about allowing time with your kids. I don't think it is one sided, don't the kids like their grandparents? I would think that kids are getting a lot of it out too, relationship with loving grandparents can enrich your kids lives.

This is kinda true but I was hoping it's not as ugly as that at the root. But yeah, I feel like that, deep down.

I mean, it's not the nicest way to feel, but since you are cordial and keep up a relationship for your kids' sake, why is it such a big deal? Think about why these feelings worry you so much. Do you feel guilty? Do you resent them? Are you holding onto regret/sadness that they're not better parents/ILs for you? Getting to the root of the bad feelings might help lessen your anxiety.

Yes, thank you. I guess it's not a big deal. But yeah, I feel guilty and resent them and feel sad that I don't have different ILs.

On the adoption thing, although I know this sounds terrible to say, I am sure that I could love my ILs more if they were more "like" my DH, if I saw shared personality or physical traits, that would help endear me. But they don't.

I do appreciate that they gave DH a loving and safe upbringing, but they didn't make him "who he is." He is very, very different from them.

Your DH seems to have a lot of baggage regarding his adoption that you are taking on. My ILs have tremendous problems (addiction, mental illness, family dysfunction). My DH is very, very different from them, and they didn't give him a great upbringing. The fact that they're his biological parents doesn't make them endearing to me.

OK, good point.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can relate, OP. My ILs were nice people and gave my DH a good home (he is NOT adoptive). DH loved them very much. I had nothing in common with them and while I was always nice, polite and did my family duty, it always bothered them that we didn't have the relationship they always envisioned having with their DIL. My DH and I nearly called off the wedding because of it (we were in relationship counseling over it). There were no hard words, no bad behavior, I just didn't have the emotional closeness with them that they wanted. In hindsight (they're both dead now), I don't think the challenge was because we had little common ground, I think I was repelled by what I sensed was their 'clinginess'. They 'needed' a close emotional relationship and I didn't. It wasn't enough that I was an excellent partner for their DS, that I was nice and did what I was supposed to. They wanted more. It got better after we had kids. They could shower the kids with all the love they wanted and they were excellent grandparents.

I think you should sit down with your DH and agree on what his parents deserve - and they do deserve to have a relationship with their grandkids if nothing else. Now, if there were abuse issues, my response would be different. I understand how this places a burden on you, you really do have to suck it up. But, the onus doesn't have to be all on you. Your DH needs to pull his weight on this.

Thanks, I relate to what you wrote about your relationship with the ILs. I 100% agree on the relationship with grandkids. That is never in question.

I'm not really trying to change anything except my feelings about them. And maybe some of the responsibility in mine in DH's relationship for who deals with them.