Reply to Nephew with celiac - what is fair/appropriate when visiting grandma?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous] I think the fight here is against the PPs that are so dismissive of your nephew and his families struggles with this. The PPs that would really chose not to vacation with these family members. I would feel so hurt if my family chose not to vacation with us because of our daughter's diagnosis. It is cruel and hurtful.[/quote]

I am one of the PPs who would have backed out of the visit in this circumstance, and I just want to be very very clear -- it is not just because of the diagnosis. I think I'd be happy under other circumstances to vacation all together with a family member who has celiac disease. Of course! (I also would have made an illness excuse rather than make it clear it was somehow their fault, but that's just the way I'd do this sort of thing.) I want to be clear about this, because I want you to know I'm not against you or people in your situation. I'm actually trying to be kind and helpful, and do it in a way that ramps down stress, not makes people feel isolated, when I make these calls.

This is why:
1. New diagnosis of celiac and thus a high stressed family, with
2. Newborn infant, and
3. My kids being picky eaters, and
4. Grandmother already high energy about it, and (most importantly for me) 
5.----&gt; Remote location without ability to casually &quot;get away&quot; if my kids are winding up about food or whatever. This was the deal-breaker.

The problem -- for me -- wasn't the diagnosis. And it wasn't that the rest of the family was being a pain in the butt, because I think they were being rather normal. I mean, sure, better decisions could have been made, but they were under a hella lotta pressure, and that would *not* be made easier by throwing picky kids who couldn't get away for casual breaks that wouldn't stick out like a sore thumb. In my family, that would be a powderkeg.

Instead, I'd make my excuses and see Grandma and sibling family separately. I wouldn't not visit, I just wouldn't visit all at once under these precise circumstances. But things would get easier with time, and the baby wouldn't be newborn with a newly postpartum mother, and we wouldn't be out in the middle of nowhere such that any hour or two of sneaking away to decompress and &quot;buy a book at the bookstore&quot; or &quot;go pickup a bottle of wine&quot; would be impossible.

I mean, if we left, it would be obvious we left to get away, and that would be cruel, I'd think. In another context, it could have been more discreet.

[quote]Hopefully your SIL, in her attempt to make food that her 2 year old will eat, will figure out how to cook and you guys can enjoy big family meals together! [/quote]

Absolutely![/quote]

Exactly. I'd have bailed just based on the selfish postpartum SIL alone.

And why, exactly, is it selfish SIL, and not selfish BIL or at least selfish BIL/SIL? Oh, that's right, because women are to blame for alllll family dynamics...even when it's not their family of origin.
 :roll:

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