Op - really - you don't know what you should do?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If he were addicted to crack or meth I'd say no, but prescription painkillers (while a terrible thing to be addicted to), isn't quite as likely to be a danger to your five year old. That said, I would want to make sure your MIL understands your concerns and promises to stay with your kid at all times and not let him go off alone with the brother.

One of the dumbest ass things I have ever read!

+1 as someone who has had pill addicts in the family for 20 years I disagree.

"I can't take the week off, neither can my husband."
OP, what's the full situation? Why does this visit have to be an entire week? Is there a week your child is off school but you and dad can't stay home with him or her, so dad sees it as an opportunity for a visit to grandma? I'm not clear on why it's a week and why your husband is fine with a child this young going anywhere -- leave out the drug addict brother, I mean anywhere at all with anyone -- for a solid week, without mom or dad. Is the trip so distant that a week is the shortest time one can really go? If that's the case, it's already too far to send a kid alone. Is this all about grandma? If your child is not used to staying with grandma, a whole week is going to be eternal, and even the best behaved kid is going to act out at the worst, and get bored and maybe whiny at best. How long since grandma was around kids this age? Does she have specific things planned they could do? Is she in good health and does she have the energy for this? Is uncle's sobriety a possible distraction to grandma, if she feels she has to watch both him and grandchild to some extent? And so on.

Sounds very badly thought out, or rather not thought out at all, by dad. Like I said -- you can even take the drug addict uncle out of the picture and it still sounds like a recipe for a bored or homesick kindergartener and a frustrated, ready-to-be-done grandma halfway into the week. Even if grandma is a champ with kids this age, it's much more usual to have kids do overnights gradually, unless they've been spending nights at grandma's since they were very, very small and are used to it. I do not get the impression that's the case here but that grandma's pretty far away.

Can you fill us in?

Anonymous wrote:Nope, I would not. Just stand your ground and offer to do some kind of supervised visit.

+1

NO!
Main reason is that DH and MIL seem more vested in protecting BIL than realistically dealing with and not enabling the addiction.
So Hell No!

Anonymous wrote:If he were addicted to crack or meth I'd say no, but prescription painkillers (while a terrible thing to be addicted to), isn't quite as likely to be a danger to your five year old. That said, I would want to make sure your MIL understands your concerns and promises to stay with your kid at all times and not let him go off alone with the brother.

One of the dumbest ass things I have ever read!

Not a chance

Saying no to this visit is not denying your child a relationship with her grandmother.

I would say no way. Visit when you and DH can go; MIL can visit if and when BIL can be trusted alone.

Q: Why is sending a 5 YO to MIL's for a week the only way to ensure the two have a relationship?

A: It's not.

Half or more of the posters here are addicted to pain killers, assorted pharmaceuticals, liquor, their spouses are the same, smoke weed regularly yet are raising kids. They have the gall to even call non users prudes.

Trust your instinct and don't hold BIL against your MIL. If you love and trust her then let your child go for the week.

Insane.

I would compromise at 3 nights away. Then I would prob fly out there and stay another 2 nights with her to make it a 5 day trip. And I would always be willing to his MIL here for a week or whatever too.

Anonymous wrote:Have MIL come to you for the week.

+1 and pay her transportation.

Anonymous wrote:If he were addicted to crack or meth I'd say no, but prescription painkillers (while a terrible thing to be addicted to), isn't quite as likely to be a danger to your five year old. That said, I would want to make sure your MIL understands your concerns and promises to stay with your kid at all times and not let him go off alone with the brother.

It doesn't matter what the drug is, addiction does terrible things to its victims, one of which is that it will cause them to do absolutely anything to obtain their drug, as in cleaning out grandma's bank account on the day after her funeral. Three months sober is just not a long enough time to be out of the woods yet.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would let it get as ugly as it needed to get if it meant protecting a 5 year old from a drug addict possibly relapsing in front of him.
Family therapy for you and your husband, or even Al-anon for you, to learn how to navigate this.

+1

And if this is the only way he can have a relationship with his grandmother, there's something really wrong. She can come visit or you can go another time. But please, do not make this into "But he's being denied a relationship with his grandmother." If he doesn't spend time with her at all, he shouldn't be going there at all without you. No 5 year should go away for a week to a strange home, even if it is his grandmother's.

+1
We skype/FaceTime several times per week with grandma. A compatible device is less than a plane ticket.