Mil ? What would you do?

[Anonymous]

My mother in law lives 45 min away and visits us once every four months sometimes once every six months. Her daughter lives close to her and she visits their son at least once or twice a week. The past three weeks she had both her other grand kids (3 grand children in total), taking them places Etc but didn't in its Dc over once. She kept posting pictures on FB of all the places she took them too. The older cousin was supposed to come to us so I've been arranging with nieces
Mom on travel arrangements. Mil wants to drop her off and I said no. So I sent MIL a text today saying she should either see Dc more or not at all. I told her that he has already started asking questions about his grandparents and soon he will start noticing that she spends more time with the one than the other. On a side note she treats one sibling way better than the other. For example at Christmas she bought her daughter a really expensive camera and Dh a money jar from cvs. Was I wrong to send the text?

[Anonymous]

I understand that you are hurt, but yes, I think there may have been a better way to address this (other than sending the text). Has she responded to the text? If it were me, I would call her immediately and say something like, "Look, I am sorry about the text I sent...I was feeling frustrated and acted impulsively. I am not really sure how to express this, but I am feeling [fill in your feelings and concerns]."

[Anonymous]

Why don't you drive over to her?

[Anonymous]

Yes, you were wrong. Maybe your kid is an ungrateful brat, or younger than the other kids.

[Anonymous]

Op here. I wi call her thanks PP.

And no my Kid is not an u grateful brat. He is 3 and in between age of the other two. He is also very timid. If he goes to anyone's house he will sit down in one spot and will ask if he could have a drink of water or if he could use the bathroom.

[Anonymous]

Doesn't sound like a fun kid to hang out with.

[Anonymous]

She did respond and said exactly what Dh said she would say, she didn't Know all this and we should have told her. She also said the only reason she sees the other grandchild more than our Dh is because he is not even a yr yet.

[Anonymous]

You were completely wrong and should not have sent your MIL such a text. It's not your place and you should have given her any ultimatum let alone such a drastic one.

[Anonymous]

Ok, hre is my question. You said she lives 45 minutes away. Do you go visit her? How often do you take your son there? You said she came to vist once every 4 months, how about you? In between did you ever take your son there? fAMILY is a 2 way street, you also have to make the effort to go visit, drop off your son ect if you want them to have a close relationship, its not just about her

[Anonymous]

I used to invite her over all the time but we never get an invite over unless it was Thanksgiving. I stopped the invitations and never received one from her until last month. She invites us over and never follows through on it. Twice while driving over to her place she cancelled on us. I think she doesn't want to got through the trouble of entertaining. The once every four months is me inviting her which is always bc of either our birthdays or hers.

[Anonymous]

You were wrong. Your husband should deal with his mother. Perhaps this is the relationship she has with him -- regardless of you or your child. This is his problem, let him fix it or not.

I will say that after receiving a text like that I am sure she is less inclined to become more involved.

[Anonymous]

Just a thought here: older people do not love texts. A text that says "running late. Will be there in 10 mins" is OK. But to address a subject that is delicate with an older person by text usually does not go over well. It seems harsh to them "u do not treat the grdkids =ly" is pretty much an invitation to bad feelings.

[Anonymous]

OP here. Yes I get it the text was wrong. I will call her when dc is not around and apologize and talk it over. I am so frustrated by her behavior and especially since Dh felt so left out growing up that I don't want dc to feel the same way. But I do understand how the text was a bad idea. Thank you all for the advice!

[Anonymous]

When my parents retired they chose to live five minutes away from one of my siblings ten hours away from me. They are with my niece and nephew all the time. They have sleepovers, take car trips together, and just hang out several days a week. The four other siblings all tease our other sib about being the favorite and how our parents love her kids more. It's not true. My sib was just geographically desirable.

My parents have 12 grandchildren in total and none of the ten remaining kids are jealous of the two that get to spend all that time with grandma and grandpa. They know the kids have a much different relationship with the local grandkids because they are local. Even when my kids were 3 they understood this and were thrilled when we were able to see them once a year.

[Anonymous]

You're not going to fix anything by taking a negative approach. Of course you know you need to apologize for the juvenile ultimatum.

If you want your child to see his grandmother more, you and/or your husband just need to take him over there more, coordinating things with the grandmother and the sister.

Let your husband step in and deal with things, especially if he's still working through his own issues of feeling left out as a kid.

Don't burden your child with any of this baggage. He just needs to spend time with and build a bond naturally with his grandmother, aunts, uncles, and cousins.

You may end up having to accept that, for whatever reasons, your child won't be as close as you'd like to those relatives. That's just how it goes sometimes, and you can only do your best to facilitate the relationships.

A lot of it has to do with her relationship with her son. I have the same issue with my MIL, and I had to give up on her.