Hello, I am under a new profile for privacy.
I have been with my husband for 3 years now, we are newlyweds, and we have an 11 month old baby. He is a great guy with normal flaws and he may or may not be a DuH.
I met his family when we first started dating and they seemed really sweet and together. They were a bit clingy, to me, but I didn't mind it since we did not live close to them. During the first year of our relationship they were the poster family of happiness and love.
We got pregnant and engaged our second year and we were completely excited. My family, with the exception of my mom, was less than happy and his family was extremely excited and wanted to be involved every step of the way.
A few months before LO arrived his parents hit a marital speed bump and it got messy fast. They weren't only close with happiness, but also drama. FIL started telling DH and his brother every dirty detail of their marriage, even sexual things. Then he started telling me. I quickly told him I was uncomfortable with knowing details of any sort and left everything else to DH. He thought things would get better after LO arrived because they would see that they had a healthy happy grandbaby to love on right!!!...wrong.
When LO arrived they became kind of weird. MIL became catty and FIL was excited but still a little depressed. My BIL on the other hand was still as happy as before even through me cussing him out once during my pregnancy. They were set to come down immediately after her birth, I was completely okay with this, but MIL decided that she didn't want to. I was cool with that and didn't think much about it.
They came down three weeks later and DH was excited. Immediately MIL stated, "IDK who this baby looks like, I guess she got more of your looks" and passed her on. My mom was livid at the comment but kept it to herself. DH shut her down and told her our LO was her twin. The visit went on and MIL warmed up to LO and everything seemed normal again.
*I'm going to jump to the recent issues and I will add smaller events if you guys care to read them.*
Current issue...
DH, LO, and I went to visit IL's for the holiday. DH was excited because he doesn't get to see his family much since we live 6+ hours away. We finally arrive and we were all happy to see each other. FIL and DH go to run errands and LO, MIL, and myself stay behind to cook and catch up. MIL got a phone call while we were there and it seemed innocent, it was on her work phone. FIL and DH come back and immediately FIL starts drilling her about why her work phone was out. *Keep this in mind*
Later that evening at dinner I asked MIL about the get together that was supposed to happen the next day, she tells me the details and says how excited everyone is to meet LO. I ask about the personality of the group since I had never met this side of the family before and I get nervous around big groups since having PPD. She informs me that the group is rowdy and loud. I reminded her that LO does not do well around too much noise and could possibly get a little cranky. She responded "LO will just have to get used to it. People will be all in her face and touching her and she will just have to suck it up. If she gets out of hand she will just get a spanking, aunts, uncles, everyone in our family is allowed to spank the babies." I flipped to simply put it. I told her no one was to invade my child’s personal space and if anyone even attempted to touch or spank her they would be losing a hand. (DH was down stairs fixing something for FIL so he did not hear any of this)
The next day rolls around and their nephews baby mom's comes by to visit with me and show me her new baby. She had been shunned by most of their family (a-whole-other crazy story within itself) but she and I kept contact through it all because I felt the situation was none of my business to get caught up in. She makes the remark that LO looks just like DH and MIL says, "If you feed someone long enough they will look like you." I got super pissed and said "well she should look just like me since I've been the one supporting us her whole life. (DH is not a dead beat, he is a college student and takes a full load, I did as well but my schedule allowed me to work more than him so I am the "bread winner" for the time being). I was livid and (Lets call nephews baby mom Laila) Laila caught on to it so she changed the subject. We went into the next room with the kids and they began playing. IL's home is not very baby proof so they have little things she can get into, so I hovered over her to make sure she didn't break or eat anything she wasn't supposed to. She starts messing with some things on the table and MIL thumps her hand. I grab LO and tell MIL not to hit her. (Again DH is not around and I try not to over react since children are in the room.)
After all of that the last day MIL starts talking about LO staying with them for a week for Thanksgiving, I told her that was a no go. She then says "we will just keep her for Christmas than and you could come get her after" DH says no, and then asked her what made her think we would leave our baby for Christmas! She got mad and goes "You let her stay at OP's moms for a week" (LO and I stayed with my mom for 9 months until I graduated college so I could save up for our family and she watched LO every day while I was at school) I quickly reminded her LO was only there 3 days without us being there and we had to leave for business related reasons, not just because.
The weekend continues to be a drag and we leave finally. When we got home I told DH about everything and how I felt about it. He said he had no idea and would talk to his parents about it. He talks to his dad first and told him that LO would not be staying without us there with her. FIL said he understood and would talk to MIL about everything.
The next day at 5:30 A.M. DH's phone goes off and its FIL, he is yelling and pissed. He said that MIL was still talking to other men and he was fed up with her. (It's more BG to this but it's extremely long). *Remember that phone call I told you to remember... He said he went through MIL's work phone and found out that one of her male co-workers had called her the day we came into town. FIL called the guy and went off on him for calling MIL! The man called MIL because he didn't know what to do on the 4th of July. He is an intern from Africa and he called 3 way with another intern (who is female) to get ideas since they had never celebrated this holiday before. FIL confronted MIL about it and now things between them are crazy again. After hearing all of that drama DH was conflicted about even letting them come down for LO's birthday but I told him it was okay since they will be in a hotel and not our home.
So we've had about two weeks to sort everything out and set appropriate boundaries until today...
Laila calls me and we are talking about her relationship with my DH's cousin and she brings up that FIL called her to tell her about MIL and asked her how to track people, phone calls, etc. She spills that he had told her everything that had been going on with MIL and himself and how she was weirded out by it. I sat quietly on the phone as so many things ran through my mind. DH does not know about any of these things as far as I know, some have triggers so I will not post unless asked, and I don't know how to bring this up to him or what to do about any of this mess myself. I am starting not to like my IL's and I don't know what to do about it. I don't deal well with drama especially since having PPD and it seems to me that’s all they have to offer. I also don't want anything to do with their marriage problems. I feel like if they keep trying to tell us all of their problems it will cause us to have problems as well.
I'm sorry if this seems all over the place, I'm mentally sorting this out as I type because I guess I let too much pile up at once.