It's not my fault my sons misbehaved.

I don't think you need to advise her at all. You mainly need to keep her onside to safeguard your relationship with your grandchildren. They need to sort the marriage out themselves. In this particular instance your son is in the wrong. No point in denying that. So listen to her and give her your sympathy. You can only deal with the present situation.

Kiora your son is an adult and responsible for his own decisions and behaviour. You are not responsible for what he does.
Obviously, you love him and his children but I can understand the emotions of anger, frustration and probably disappointment about what he has apparently done to let his partner down.

It's important to try and make sure children and their feelings remain top of the agenda in situations like this. Their mum is hurt and wants to lash out. Whilst I can understand why she wants to tell them how 'awful' their dad is it might come back to hurt her as they will love both their dad and mum . Avoiding arguing in front of them may be hard but should be the aim!

If she can go to Relate or another source of counselling she should. It will give her a safe space to voice her raw feelngs. (it helped me to know, properly, what I wanted to do)

Good luck in a tough situation

The first time I went to Relate I realised the man I was speaking to worked at the same place as my husband so I felt quite awkward [that's when I had the enmbarrassment about paying as well]. The second time, several years later, we were interviewed separately and then together; that latter being when we were told 'your marriage is over, go and get divorced' . I left the building and had to stop on the way home as I was so upset I couldn't drive properly. I'm not saying it doesn't work for some people but it didn't for us.

The counsellor at my doctors was very good [especially as she tended to 'think outside of the box' as well] but I believe she no longer has a job there. The powers that be in this country are very short sighted, I fear .

Solicitors provide mediation Tegan, also at a cost. Too little public money is spent on services for families in this kind of stressful situation. I believe it would be cost effective to invest in providing well trained individuals to work with parents

As long as she realises that Relate are quite expensive. I thought they were a sort of public service and had such a shock when asked for more money than I could afford at the time . I know it's worth it to save a marriage. They also seem to prefer it if both parties can converse with them as well.

I think that's a good idea, Kiora, to suggest your DiL speaks to Relate.
You clearly have your DGCs' interests at heart and I hope you will be able to ensure that any discussions are done out of their hearing, so that they enjoy their visit.

Kiora .

Your DiL quite rightly needs to know that you and your DH feel that what your son did was wrong and you all agree to trash his behaviour.

What I hope she realises is that she is not however, allowed into your home to personally trash your son to his parents. His actions, which have hurt you too were not of your doing and I hope she respects this fact.

None of us are privy to anyone else's marriage so it is unfair to expect us to jump in and take sides.

I certainly don't think it's your fault Kiora, your son is a grown up and should take responsibility for his own actions.

I think you are going to have to have a serious talk with your DH if he is likely to argue with your DiL. There is no denying that your son has done wrong and your home should be a safe place for your DiL to let rip and get it out of her system if she wants to without your DH being too partisan.

My brother parted from his wife for another woman (although we did not know that bit at the time!) and wife turned up out of the blue at our house to try and persuade my Mum to get him to take her back - it was very awkward indeed. I can understand the difficult position you are in Kiora - wanting to keep everything together and to keep your contact with GC, but not wanting to tread on anyone's toes - a real minefield for you.

Kiora; you are between a rock and a hard place aren't you . As with most things there's always so much that people don't know; you can never see inside someone elses marriage and sometimes it's well nigh impossible to understand your own either. When my marriage was on the rocks I asked my SIL to speak to my husband to reason with him and was just told that 'it's always been an unhappy marriage anyway'. The lack of support still hurts me to this day as I wasn't asking for her to 'take sides'; I had no family of my own and my husbands family were the only family I had. I feel that, if my ex's mum had still been alive we would have worked through our problems and would still be together now. I understand men more now I'm in my 60's; wish I'd understood them more when I was younger. Maybe Kioras DIL wanted a higher standard of living than wages in this country could provide which is why her son is working abroad and is feeling lonely and isolated. I'm not saying that is the case, but it might be.

Of course you are not to blame Kiora, no one is saying you are. Because you said you didn't answer her email it sounded as though you are letting her get on with it. If my son did something like this to his wife I would feel very upset, I wouldn't abandon him either but he would be told what I thought. You have a lot to lose so you have to tread carefully.

I remember the reactions of my inlaws when my ex husband and I broke up. As long as he was okay they were happy. They had known me since I was sixteen but they didn't care, they always made that very obvious.

We are all on your side and I don't suppose any of us have the perfect child.

I'm not making excuses for my son. I've haven't said that in any of my posts What I was saying is I'm not to blame. I probably shouldn't have posted on here. I know he was stupid, I know he's to blame. I know what I've got to loose. I've supported her and taken her side through out their relationship even when the shoe was on the other foot. What I understand now that I didn't before is how easy it is to be drawn into things online. I've been thinking throughout the night and my advice to her will probably be that she needs to perhaps go to relate. She needs to be able to vent her feelings and decide if their relationship is worth saving. If I was such a shitty MIL I doubt she'd be coming to visit me. I'm not siding with my son but I'm not going to abandon him either. He may have to pay for this with the loss of his marriage and his children and he will have to take that on the chin but right or wrong we are his family and we will help both him and his family as best as we can. Thank you to those of you who have understood my need for support. To those of you who thought I was justifying the unjustifiable I'm sorry I've been misunderstood. I'm not going to post again because believe me I am going to have years of hearing what a shit he is.

I thought the same as Harrigran and agree with jingle.

I don't believe you should make excuses for you son, of course you love him but surely you have some feelings for you DIL and how she feels. If she wants to vent her anger, let her and tell her she has your sympathy. I hope she comes to visit too.

If you side with your son, your DIL will end up being angry with you and your OH, whether they separate or stay together.

Yes they do have contact mainly through letters and limited email but I acctually think this type of communication makes things worse not better because there's no way of airing feelings as you feel them. So they get bottled up and explode hence her email to me. I was probably the nearest person to strike out at. That was what my post was about really.

I can't help but wonder if he perhaps wanted the emails to be found?

I can't understand why it's impossible to communicate with your son in any way. I realise that you don't want to say what he does for a living but it seems odd that he is so incommunicado - surely your dil and dgc have some sort of contact with him ( or did before this blew up).

This visit to you is badly timed. She is angry and will find it hard to control her comments. The only way you can handle it is in the moat impersonal way you can muster. Sympathise with her hurt, but don't say anything that implies that you are n her side against your son.

Has he spoken to you about it?

Actually I don't think the issue of a physical relationship is really relevant - affectionate emails to another woman are a betrayal are they not? Your dil is feeling very raw and your DH needs to be careful - as someone said ^^ if she ends up feeling that his behaviour is supported by your DH or by you, you both run the risk of losing the dgc. Perhaps your DH needs to understand the difference between 'trashing' your ds and trashing his behaviour.

No there's no chance of him coming home it's just not possible. He's the other side of the world so there's no chance of him meeting the other women or indeed any women. I think the emails are very affectionate but there is no accusations from anyone that there was a sexual relationship. It still a betrayal though. petallus we were in the position you describe about 10 years ago before they were married but they were a living together with their first child. I have asked if I should go and collect the children but she'd rather come here. So I'll be guided by her. My husband has his own take on things. I just hope he keeps his opnions to himself but he's told me that he will not sit in his own house and listen to his son being trashed without defending him. I think we will all just have to sit tight and let this play itself out and hope the flack doesn't hurt the children too much. In my husbands defence he can see I'm upset and is making allowances for my grouchiness.

I see from your profile that you describe yourself as a wife - is your OH around and what are his thoughts on it all?

It is indeed strange that she should have been hacking into his emails, so it may be that there were some cracks in the relationship anyway - sustaining a relationship across the miles can be extremely difficult.

I can understand her feeling hurt and angry - do you know what the content of these emails was? I am assuming that it was in some was compromising and inappropriate. Are you completely sure that there has been no physical relationship? The degree of her anger would imply that she thinks there has been.

Since you will be walking a bit of a tightrope and not wishing to alienate anyone, especially at this stage when the facts are not fully clear, it may be best to reply that you can understand her feeling upset and angry and that it would be best to try and get a conversation with her OH to sort out what is really going on before talking to the children. It would be worth saying that you would be concerned that the children might be upset at this stage when no-one quite knows how things might be worked out between them; and that it might be better to talk to the children later when the situation is clearer.

How hard it is when we feel our children have not behaved as we might wish and we feel disappointed in them. But I do feel that the facts need to be fully established before anyone jumps to conclusions, for everyone's sake, and for the children first and foremost.

I am so sorry that you are having to face all this.

Not wishing to make excuses but men find it very hard to be alone and it's very lonely working away from home. And you do tend to bare your soul in emails [at least,I know I tend to].

Kiora I really feel for you don't you just want to shake our off springs into reality sometime's a bit of female attention and they go all daft if the children come to you at half-term is there anyway your DIL can visit your son for a few days or is that out of the question ? I know he must be away to earn a living but sometimes things are far more important aren't they.He will no doubt be hung drawn and quartered by her friends and family so as little input from you would be the best I think then at least you can be truely impartial.

Alarm bells rang for me when you said "his wife hacked into his e-mail account". DIL clearly was suspicious otherwise she would not feel the need to invade his privacy.