Anonymous wrote:And one last thing. People who criticize other peoples parenting need to be told to shut up. That is totally inappropriate.

From the post, it doesn't sound like this is about criticizing parenting choices. OP's spouse was yelling at the kids and observer noted that it was frightening the kids. That's not 'parenting', that's intimidating, bullying and should be commented upon.

Abusive spouses tend to try to alienate friends and family to isolate the victim. Not sure if that is what is happening but you can think about it. I also wonder how your kids are with all of this.

Anonymous wrote:True. They are here to visit us and help with the kids, however, so even if they stayed at the hotel at night we would have to go there to visit with them or they would be around most of the day.

The slight was someone said spouse was scaring the kids by yelling at them for acting up.

This is what you said prompted your spouse to kick out the family. WHen your spouse's parenting was criticized by your family, what did you do? I am guessing that your spouse hit her limit (I think it is a her) and you have been complicit in allowing your family to treat her with little regard and she blew a fuse. Let the family leave and plan a visit in the future on neutral ground before you do a family gathering at your house or theirs again. I have been through this and when your spouse's family literally treats you like crap all the time, and when it happens in your own home while you are feeding them and entertaining and cleaning, etc., it is VERY hard to take. You need to have a real discussion with your wife and you need to examine whether you have been taking your parents/sibling's side to such an extent that your wife feels attacked and alone.

And one last thing. People who criticize other peoples parenting need to be told to shut up. That is totally inappropriate.

OP, sounds like you are a huge enabler for whatever bad behavior your spouse does. Your family might also engage in bad behavior, and your role has developed over the years to be peace-maker, enabler, etc. That's why your spouse's behavior doesn't raise the same alarm bells in you that it does to all of the rest of us who have posted. When the craziness of the holidays dies down, try to give yourself some time to really analyze how the people in your life behave and whether that is the kind of day-in, day-out stress you want in your life, or if you want to make proactive moves to improve the situation.

Please understand I don't mean run away from all these people, at least not until you've really assessed the situation. I just find your sort of matter-of-fact attitude disturbing. Families have disagreement, yes, but you have to know that "kicking people out of the house" is extreme.

Anonymous wrote:Op here. Everything is fine for now. Some open discussion between all parties would help but as you can imagine, spouse is embarrassed and other family members feeling awkward. For the record, the yelling was one of those situations most posters would find understandable and the extended family does have a history of not respecting boundaries. Doesn't justify the over-reaction, certainly.

That doesn't sound "fine" to be really honest.

If my parents were asked to leave, I'd take my child and go with them.

My BIL is like this (DH's sister's hubby). He has anger issues and once threw a beer bottle at the wall in anger at a family event, talk about awkward. Quite frankly if I were the extended family I would let you know not to expect a visit from us ever again.

Anonymous wrote:Op here. Everything is fine for now. Some open discussion between all parties would help but as you can imagine, spouse is embarrassed and other family members feeling awkward. For the record, the yelling was one of those situations most posters would find understandable and the extended family does have a history of not respecting boundaries. Doesn't justify the over-reaction, certainly.

I don't know your spouse and can only judge from what you posted but there's a big difference between 'never apologize' and 'spouse is embarrassed'. When one talks about anger and 'never apologize', it makes it sound as if there truly are anger issues that are outside the norm. I can imagine a lot of people in your house are embarrassed by what happened and feeling awkward. I just don't get how you can at first depict this a an anger issue and then claim that the 'trigger' wasn't a significant even and the extended family has boundary issues.

Again, I don't know you and your spouse but it sounds like there's some gaslighting going on.

I am so confused - it is your house too, is it not? Why didn't you say that they were going to stay?

Op here. Everything is fine for now. Some open discussion between all parties would help but as you can imagine, spouse is embarrassed and other family members feeling awkward. For the record, the yelling was one of those situations most posters would find understandable and the extended family does have a history of not respecting boundaries. Doesn't justify the over-reaction, certainly.

Borderline

I have to agree with PPs that this sounds like a very bad situation with your spouse. And, it also brings up bad memories for me. Like a PP, my father had rage issues. I grew up in Indiana and his father's sister and husband would stay with us when traveling to/from Michigan and Florida. On one visit, they witnessed one of my father's rages and spoke up. He kicked them out right then and there. Once back at their own home, they wrote my father a letter expressing their concerns about his behavior towards us. As far as I know, they were the only ones to ever directly speak to my father about it but they weren't the only ones he drove away.

From your brief posts, it sounds like your spouse's behavior is outside the norm. I think you would benefit from trying to look at it objectively and make some painful decisions.