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What to do about a mean sister-in-law?
I apologize if this is too long winded. I just want to provide the big picture so I can get some advice on what to do.
My husband has 3 brothers, all of whom are married. Two of his brothers & their wives live fairly close to us & we see them on a semi-regular basis (usually once or twice a month). His oldest brother lives almost an hour away & we don't get to see them as often. There has always been some tension between his oldest brother's wife & the rest of the family. When I started dating my husband (8+ yrs ago) she was not speaking to his parents over them not giving her all the money she wanted for her wedding, which they couldn't afford it. She had not been speaking to them for a few years when I met my husband. I found out she went quite a while not speaking to her father & now she no longer speaks to her cousin who used to be her best friend.
As time went on, she and my brother-in-law had a baby and went through some incredibly difficult financial times. My in-laws were very supportive, despite my sister-in-laws previous behavior, and eventually it seemed she started to come around. She started showing up to family gatherings & being much more tolerable to be around, although she still treated my brother-in-law rather poorly & was a bit temperamental. This lasted for about 4 years or so, until recently. I have always gone out of my way to be nice her in an attempt to ensure the peace & that we keep being able to seeing her daughter (they now have two! who are our god-daughters). Issues began with my youngest brother-in-laws wedding. She didn't come to the shower & claimed she had no babysitter to come to the wedding (we found out later she simply didn't want to come). She started making other excuses to not come to family gatherings & I could feel something was up.
Our most recent issues arose when we were trying to schedule a family cabin weekend which we hold once a year. We scheduled it only to find out she was holding my nieces birthday party on the same day. We all went down to her birthday party from the cabin & stayed for what we thought was the duration of the party (5 hours). She didn't come out to the cabin after the party, but her husband & my nieces joined us later that evening. They ended up staying two nights instead of their initially planned one night. I guess my brother-in-law didn't tell her he was staying an extra night & we had no phone service at the cabin so when she tried to call all of us none of us answered. She took this personally, leaving the entire family a nasty facebook message that we were keeping her children and her husband & she didn't know what was going on. She blamed us for her husband's lack of communication. When we started a facebook message that included all the family to see what a good date to hold next year's cabin weekend was her reply was quite nasty. Proposing we purposely scheduled the cabin the same day as my niece's party, we left the party early (we were the last to leave, even after her family) & was overall very mean.
We all ignored her nasty facebook messages thinking it would all blow over. We bought our first house & had a TON of work to do before moving in. We ended up missing my other niece's birthday because we had a lot of work to do at the house & didn't have much time in our schedule to work on it. We always go to everything they have so I didn't think missing one event would be a huge deal. I was wrong. When I RSVPed & explained the situation my sister-in-law was extremely curt & ended the conversation quickly.Most recently I had been trying to get in touch with them to see if they were still up for our family secret santa. They have never had a reputation for being easy to get in touch with. I left several messages, left a facebook message & ended up tracking down my brother-in-laws work number to finally get in touch. I guess my brother-in-law didn't tell her I spoke with him already so when she checked her facebook later the next week & saw our message she responded with the nastiest message yet. She accused us (the rest of the family) of being cliquish, of purposely excluding them, of never calling them & threatened that she didn't even know if she wanted to participate in the secret santa or Christmas with the family. I was completely taken aback & finally responded to her nastiness. I said I was sorry she felt that way, that we never intentionally excluded them, emphasized the importance of felt family, etc.
I don't think calling her would be a good idea. I hate conflict & I think that talking to her directly would only make her madder. The rest of the family shares my hurt & we don't understand her. It seems no matter what we do she finds a reason to get mad & wants to separate herself from everyone. I am mad that she thinks it is okay to treat us this way after we really do go out of our way to be nice & continue our relationship with her family. I don't want to be a push over & give into her because her actions are not right but we are family and we can't really just can't really just cut her out of our lives.
Any advice is appreciated! Thank you!!
Re: What to do about a mean sister-in-law?
She has, as you can see, a history of doing what she does.
She also might have a bit of a mental problem -- you were keeping her kids from her? That's ridiculous.
If it's not also a mental issue, it most definitely is petty jealousy and immaturity.
It's exceedigly clear her behavior will continue; unless she can get herself to a therapist (and possibly a mental health professional for an evaluation) what you see will continue and my guess is it might possibly worsen.
Wishing you luck with this one. It's a sticky one.
Honestly, I'd stop "trying" so hard. As Tarpon said, your SIL has a history of this behavior. I'm sure she LOOKS for things to find fault w/ all of you and how you've "wronged" her.
Unless your BIL starts telling her to cut it out, nothing will ever change. So - stop expecting it to.
Go about your lives. Plan things as you want. Reach out to them once or twice around certain events (secret santa, the trip). If you don't hear from them in a reasonable time, then assume they aren't interested. And if she calls you out on that, that's all you say "We tried to contact you a few times and you never responded.". Put it back on her. You shouldn't have to be calling over and over and hunting down your BIL's work #!
I just feel you're really hung up on this "but we're family!". Eh- she's still who she is. Family or not. Being "family" doesn't magically change people.
Again, I'd stop trying so hard. Somewhere in all of this, she probably gets some enjoyment out of making you all squirm. So, I'd stop squirming. She makes accusations about how you try to exclude her? Don't get caught up in it. Stick to the facts - "We reached out, you didn't respond".
~Benjamin Franklin
DS dx with celiac disease 5/28/10
With what actually happened - I would have responded "I left a couple mssages for you and, actually, I talked to BIL about it. We definitely reached out and weren't excluding you.". WITHOUT an apology! Like I said before- stick to the facts! She's screaming all this crap at you - don't get caught up.
Again - this isn't about ignoring her. Be nice, be civil. But put some of the onus back on her. There's an aspect of this where you're giving her a lot of power!
~Benjamin Franklin
DS dx with celiac disease 5/28/10
There's a fine line between "killing with kindness" and "being a doormat." You seem to have crossed that line without even knowing it.
Like ECB said, stop giving her all of this power over you!
I get that she is a cold (b)itch and all that, but let us be really honest here...your BIL kept the kids overnight without letting her know what they were doing and NONE OF YOU seem to think that this might have been a bad idea.
Was she blaming you for the lack of communication or was she saying that, you too (as other adults) should have pushed her asss of a husband into communicating with his wife.
Because while I understand that ultimately, HE needed to call his wife, I would also be pissy with people who keep pushing me to be "FAAAAMMMIIILLLYYY", but couldnt be bothered to treat me like faaaaaammmmiiiillllyyy.
Now, as for the rest of it. She isnt into you people so stop trying. All you need to do is try to communicate with them once. Give them a date to reply to you with any requisite information OR they will not be included and let it.
This. stop appologizing for things you haven't done.
I get that you want to be apart of her children's lives and know them. But the reality is that your SIL is those girls mother and she isn't going to let that happen unless you and the rest of the family take her abuse. To me it isn't worth the fight or stress to put up with her behavior. God only knows what she is saying in front of or to the kids anyways. They will one day realize she is unstable and will be able to do what they want.
Maybe if you and the rest of the family call her out each time she will stop or go away. Don't let her hold you hostage because of the kids, all it's doing is allowing her to keep doing it.
I would also be pissed if my husband and children did not come home one night, and I couldn't get a hold of anyone. 99% of that anger would be at my H though some would be directed at the people he was with. Is there not a single phone, internet connection, car with access to communication anywhere in sight? I would be calling hospitals and thinking they were all dead on the side of the road somewhere.
Stop the cycle of nasty e-mails. Stop reaching out, let her calm down and cool off. You've done your part, and there is nothing more you can do.
why are YOU trying so hard? are you the only one in the family?
next time you want to do a secret santa send everyone a group message on FB and give a reply date. if she doesn't reply-oh well. there you go.
That really stuck out to me too.
So much so that I really, truly wonder what the real story is here. I mean, OP is painting a picture of a mean, self-centered SIL.......but I'm wondering how much of this is a clueless, idiot BIL and an in-your-face family of inlaws that has pushed the SIL to behave the way that she does.
Not that it was anyone else's responsibiity to contact her to let her know that her husband and children were staying an extra night, but I would have been LIVID had my husband done that. I understand her being pissed, and wonder what transpired between her and her husband that made her take it out on all of you (because remember, you have no idea what goes on behind their closed door).
Bottom line is that you can't have a relationship with her daughters without having one with her. Mom is the gatekeeper. Reach out, and if she doesn't reach back then let it drop. Maybe she's not interested, maybe there's something else going on. Stop falling over yourself to include her, but continue extending the invite when appropriate.