The distant siblings are distant for a reason.
Ignore her. Let DH deal. You handle your family.

Anonymous wrote:Ignore and continue your plans for your trip. Obviously MIL is grieving but life is for the living. If she rages, hand up the phone or leave.

This. Suggest a grief counseling group. go on the trip with your family.

Anonymous wrote:OP here. FIL was 84 and and eventhough it’s been 10 months, I don’t think DH has fully processed it as all of my inlaws’ affairs (MIL is well off but financial illiterate) have fallen to him as we live locally and other siblings have a troubled relationship with her and live a 1-2 hr plane ride away.

He has also been slammed at work due to geo-political changes. He has been working 12-14 h days, 6 days a week and I suspect that is also being used as a coping mechanism so that he doesn’t have to deal with his feelings.

I had told him he could skip out of our family vacation to celebrate the milestone birthday but he insisted he wanted to join (not only because he gets along well with my parents and brother) but also because he said he really needs a mental break. He explained this to her when she started freaking out but she called him inconsiderate and selfish.

NoW whY Do yOu thINk tHaT iS?


She's a nutjob but FIL was covering for her so maybe you didn't see it. She always was. It's not going to get better. Time to distance yourself like the reasonable siblings.

This feels like all the other parent/in-law troll threads that have recently populated this forum.

In case you're not a troll, your husband needs to his mother that she's out of line, and put her in time-out for a while: no gifts, no trips, no enabling of her childish (or early dementia) behavior.

Go on the trip with your parents without a second thought. If your husband is reasonable, he'll be on board.

Any adult, grieving or not, should eventually apologize when they throw a tantrum like you describe. Or develop some self awareness later when they realize how ungrateful they must have seemed when she complained non-stop about a vacation you planned and paid for. Somehow old "moms" are often excused from these adult norms. I hope I never do that to my grown children. Oh, and her contacting OP's parents is way out of bounds. Honestly, how dare she? I would not stay silent on that.

Ok, if DH can summon it he needs to come at this with empathy (Mom, I miss him so much too) but insist on therapy to support her in her grief.
AND he needs to tell her in no uncertain terms that he gets her sadness, but she can not (NOT) contact your parents any more.
SOrry you are all going through his.

Sorry you are going through this. Your MIL is in tremendous pain and is lashing out at the closest people to her. There is nothing that you can do to make losing her husband ok. It’s going to take time.

I would suggest that moving forward you either don’t fill her in on your plans that don’t involve her or really downplay them.

Anonymous wrote:She thought the trip you took her on was something special, for her, for her special circumstance. Honoring what had happened to her, her family, his side of the family. It wasn't. You're going on an even bigger, better trip, that you might be looking-forward-to more. That hurts. She's hurt.

That doesn't mean she gets to say it. People feel all kinds of thing. Doesn't mean she gets to be ungrateful and rude. She's being rude.

You/your DH should not have offered-up the details. Certainly don't go into any more details. Hopefully, she will simmer down with time but no one should expect an apology in either direction.

Is that why she was complaining nonstop? Because she felt it was a super special trip just for her?

Don't take it personally. Between age and grief, she will not be a reasonable person right now. Just be kind and forgiving, and keep your joys and plans to yourself. She can't be happy for others right now.

She thought the trip you took her on was something special, for her, for her special circumstance. Honoring what had happened to her, her family, his side of the family. It wasn't. You're going on an even bigger, better trip, that you might be looking-forward-to more. That hurts. She's hurt.

That doesn't mean she gets to say it. People feel all kinds of thing. Doesn't mean she gets to be ungrateful and rude. She's being rude.

You/your DH should not have offered-up the details. Certainly don't go into any more details. Hopefully, she will simmer down with time but no one should expect an apology in either direction.

She needs therapy.

OP here. FIL was 84 and and eventhough it’s been 10 months, I don’t think DH has fully processed it as all of my inlaws’ affairs (MIL is well off but financial illiterate) have fallen to him as we live locally and other siblings have a troubled relationship with her and live a 1-2 hr plane ride away.

He has also been slammed at work due to geo-political changes. He has been working 12-14 h days, 6 days a week and I suspect that is also being used as a coping mechanism so that he doesn’t have to deal with his feelings.

I had told him he could skip out of our family vacation to celebrate the milestone birthday but he insisted he wanted to join (not only because he gets along well with my parents and brother) but also because he said he really needs a mental break. He explained this to her when she started freaking out but she called him inconsiderate and selfish.

I think your DH needs to lead this and with extreme display of empathy. Even if it's not 100000% the only feeling he has.
How's he doing emotionally with FIL gone? The exact plan hinges on that.

Ignore and continue your plans for your trip. Obviously MIL is grieving but life is for the living. If she rages, hand up the phone or leave.

FIL passes away last year. He and MIL were avid world travelers and have always taken 2 international trips and multiple domestic trips for the last 15 years of their lives.

She has been feeling depressed lately so husband and I booked a family vacation to intl destination and invited her to join. We pulled out all of the stops making sure to accommodate her limitations (food, energy level, need for luxury accommodations, etc). She spent the entire trip complaining about everything (our 2 kids and how they won’t play the card game she specifically wants to play, how she wishes we got the presidential suite instead of the executive suite, how we wake up too early, you name it).

During the trip, we mentioned that we are planning another vacation with my parents and brother’s family due to my mom’s milestone birthday this year and she flipped out. She created a scene at the restaurant we were in when she learned this. She told DH that she is extremely hurt that we would celebrate my mom’s birthday in the year before my FIL’s 1 year death anniversary. She raged at him about how lonely she is and how hurt she is. She stomped out of the restaurant, almost knocking out a plate from the waiter and refused to speak with us for the rest of the trip.

Since then, she called my mom and told her how disappointed she is with our family trip and how disrespectful it is. My parents feel really bad that it’s caused so much distress in our family and it has soured everyone’s mood.

Any thoughts on how DH and I should address?