Pregnant and abusive daughter

pammie I’d be devastated in OPs shoes. But I’d hope that I’d remember that what daughter was going through was hers to go through and that my job was support. Daughter put up boundaries. My job would be to respect that, not call around looking for information.

What we get here is the after story. My advice is meant to help see through the emotions.

I’m still shocked how so much of the after affects are blamed on FIL, when it was OP and her husband who put him in the middle.

I hope OP gets this resolved, but that can’t be done without realising that she made mistakes.

I can’t speak to Daughers actions, I don’t have her side. Perhaps she needs to apologise too. Though, putting all the blame on her for not making sure her mothers emotional needs were met is not the way to go forward.

I've said more or less the same Pammiel, a simple text message telling her mum everything was OK would have sufficed. I do agree that "the OP didn't this out of malicious intent, she did it because she was worried".

So much focus on the 'phone call seems to have detracted from the OP being falsely accused of things that happened 22 years ago and being told she "must apologise for everything or that will be that". IMO these issues are just as, if not more significant than the 'phone call and the f.i.l.'s actions.

Of course in any relationship, apologies are needed for mistakes made and there'll have been mistakes on both sides but, demanding an apology for "everything"!!!.

I agree about the text message Pammie. It would have stopped the problem at source.

I am proud of my own daughter who in the midst of a dreadful situation that she was dealing with over a couple of years, never ever didn't keep in touch, touch base, let me know she was OK. At the very least it stopped me worrying quite so much about her, which in the circumstances that she was in, says so much about her as a person! I do accept that we didn't and don't have the types of relationship problems that perhaps this family are dealing with but even so, in terms of the pressure she was under it would have been easy for her to drop the "contact baton!"

I am saying all this because although stress and pain and worry and upset can make everything seem just too much, it doesn't mean that everything can just be "excused" or be "understandable"! I have sympathy for tge OPS daughter for what she has been through but struggle with what we have heard is her way forward with whatever her problems with her parents are!

The "Apologise for everything .." really doesn't allow any sort of dialogue to be opened up, which just seems so strange after baby sitting has been "allowed" even recently and financial input accepted apparently happily.

I do understand that the FIL may have had fears about being embroiled in the problems, but as I said previously I believe he should have at the very least said openly to the OP that he was unwilling to keep the "secret". And to be honest asking how one's daughter is in these circumstances having not heard, really does seem pretty human!!

I still hope the OP can find a way through this but that can only happen if some sort of dialogue is "allowed" at some point and all parties want that.

I can't help thinking that a 30 second text saying something like " stressed out and don't want to talk at the moment, but all fine physically with me and the baby", would have stopped all this drama before it started.

I don't, and never do get the concept of apologising for unknown offences, or for "everything" - a meaningless demand.

Whatever happened 22 years ago didn't appear to have affected acceptance of financial help or babysitting up until recently, which is strange.

At some point, an honest talk between OP and DD is obviously needed.

Do we actually know that before she went that the daughter didn’t say something along the lines of “I’m ok, give me space?”

So much focus on what the daughter did wrong in not responding to her mother is not going to help.

If someone doesn’t respond, worried or not, people need to take a hint. To turn that around to “my daughter didn’t answer me so I was forced to use other routes” is dangerous and will not help OP revive the relationship.

As far as “apologise for everything or be cut out”, not enough information was given for me to make a judgement, so I’ve let it go. With more information I’d be able to advise. Otherwise it’s conjecture.

We can only advise on what was said.

Starting your own parenting journey can really highlight things. When situations happen and we react differently it can be easy to then wonder why our parents reacted differently.

Things can also happen in childhood that may seem nothing to us but that caused issues for our children.

Whatever the something was 22 years ago or however it was handled or whose fault it was or wasn't, it's going to need a discussion when daughters life is more settled because its obviously impacted negatively and needs to be dealt with. Daughter can't do that alone so even if it's hard for OP they need to do it together

I am new here but have been reading for several months. Forgive me for joining in with my opinion. I concur with Violetsky and Summerlove . My read on the original complaint is that the OP has a rocky relationship with her daughter (for more than two years) and has had unpleasant conflict over it (something happened 22 years ago) which she either doesn’t accept (never happened/wasn’t important) or know was important/did happen but is unable to apologize for or accept the negative consequences for.

During the current crisis she was asked to help with childcare but her daughter and son-in-law, having received the bad news, retreated for comfort and support to his family home.

Since she knew her daughter was with the son in law, and with the son in law’s family, there should have been no fantasizing that something was “wrong” with the daughter that required maternal intervention. In the unlikely event that daughter got injured or sick OP would have been informed in due time. Not, perhaps, on her timeline but the daughter’s timeline is the only one that matters.

The split in the board comments is interesting since some commenters react most strongly toFIL, as they see it, letting the side down by narking out OP to his son. In their view mother love/anxiety and fellow grandparent/elder status trumps all other relationships and principles (such as father love, respect for autonomy, and respect for daughter’s privacy).

I don’t share that view. I try to be respectful of my adult daughter’s right to privacy and autonomy and I would hope their significant other’s parents would return the favor. I would never ask the other parents to keep a secret—a surprise, of course, is another matter.

OP knew her intrusive pursuit of contact/information would be unwelcome, that is why she asked FIL to keep it a secret. I don’t think she is helped at all to be coddled and told that the conflict is everyone else’s fault but her own. That is because OP is the only one whose behavior she can control. So she is the only player who can make a move to make things better—or worse.

Her daughter and father in law might be awful people but slagging them off won’t get OPmwhat she wants which is a warmer relationship.

I'm sorry that your D went through a difficult and protracted time Madgran and all credit to her for doing what she could to let you know that she was OK, so at the very least easing your own natural and understandable concern.

It's such a shame when what evolves into a big issue with needless repercussions can be so easily avoided DiamondLily. Already a mother herself, it's a pity that the OP's D was unable to see her mother's actions as being the natural ones of a concerned mother.

I agree that whatever happened 22 years ago was not sufficient for the OP's D to accept the financial and practical support she's received, or to prevent the OP from developing a relationship with her GC.

To threaten to take that away unless the demand for an apology "for everything" IMO is rather strange and cruel.

We don't know that was the case Summerlove and TBF to the OP no doubt if that had been said, her mother wouldn't have been concerned enough to contact her D's f.i.l. when she'd failed to make contact with her for 4 days.

I agree that we can only advise on what has been said and that there is nothing to be gained by conjecture, especially for the OP.

If a discussion is to be had about events from the past, it needs to be carried out calmly and with maturity. Understandably the OP's D has been through an extremely stressful time, so not the best time for her and her H to raise the matter.

I’m a therapist in real life—I can assure you that family relations are quite complex and often horrifically dark. No one, not Smileless or anyone else, can state a priori that whatever happened 22 years ago was not important to the OP’s daughter or that the vaunted money or support wasn’t well understood in the family to be just an attempted pay off for the harm. Just because OP shied away from accountability by discreetly avoiding naming the issue—while broadcasting her daughter’s private personal medical issues and trauma online—doesn’t mean we all have to pretend that this isn’t an obvious case of Issendai’s “the missing missing reasons.”

While smileless argues that the OP’s daughter should have realized that a mother’s love trumps a child’s privacy perhaps the daughter, as violetsky proposed, learned from motherhood that her own mothering had been problematic and is now wanting a reset?

Also the OP is asking for help—she asked the FIL and she asked the board. It’s not helpful to support her in the fantasy that she is the victim here of cruel/selfish people.

I think you may have mis read some of the OP. Oldladynewlife.

The OP had been providing care for her GC for 3 years so long before the unfortunate worries over her unborn child. I think it is unfair to suggest that she felt the issues raised about events 22 years ago aren't important, knows they're important but refuses to see them as such or knew they happened but wont apologise for them. She clearly states "which I had not done".

I don't agree that she was "fantasising" that there may have been something wrong. Again in the OP she says that she knows "how she feels about some of the family, and was very worried about her mental state". This must have been due to information supplied by her D at some point.

I think it's a shame to suggest that posters who are supporting the OP because they feel it's her D's and f.i.l.'s behaviour that is wrong are coddling her.

Clearly we are not all in agreement here but that doesn't make an opposing point of view which results in different advice, any less valid. It certainly doesn't equate with "slagging off" the D and/or the f.i.l.

Strange kind of therapist is all I can say...

I see we have crossed posts Oldladynewlife. Neither I or anyone else has suggested that what might have happened 22 years ago is not important to the OP's D.

I think don't think it is at all helpful to the OP to suggest that financial and practical support given and received was done so as an attempt "to pay off for the harm". TBH I find that rather shocking.

I have never argued that "that the OP's daughter should have realised that a mother's love trumps a child's privacy" and find that accusation outlandish.

We clearly have very different views and interpretations on not just what is contained in the OP, but what has been posted on this thread.

So not to cause any disruption by continuing to disagree, I wont respond to any more of your posts.

No, I didn’t misread the OP, she did say she had done quite a bit of babysitting previously, for the older child, but also that the relationship had become strained two years before this current time. Adults are permitted to change their mind about relationships with parents, or anyone, and whatever activities or monies that have changed hands previously are not some kind of lawful down payment or moral mortgage that permits the OP or anyone else to demand reciprocity or permanent contact.

In addition the OP’s assertion that her daughter’s mental health might be adversely affected by staying with her in laws sorts oddly with calling the FIL as an ally.

Again, I don’t see that the OP is helped by the commenters here all supporting her in her fantasy that she was right to contact FIL, to ask for secrecy, and then to be shocked that her daughter/son in law are not happy with her. She should know them well by now and have been able to anticipate their reaction to her intrusion. In fact she DID expect that her call would be poorly received. So what is the point of encouraging her to persist in reoffending (which is what these continued “attagirl!” Like comments are. They support OP in feeling hard done by when it’s nothing of the sort.

Really? You must have led a very sheltered life. I have a practice that handles dissociative disorders, child abuse, depression/anxiety, OCD etc…

No one, not Smileless or anyone else, can state a priori that whatever happened 22 years ago was not important to the OP’s daughter or that the vaunted money or support wasn’t well understood in the family to be just an attempted pay off for the harm. Just because OP shied away from accountability by discreetly avoiding naming the issue

I don't think anyone HAS suggested that!

Also the OP is asking for help—she asked the FIL and she asked the board. It’s not helpful to support her in the fantasy that she is the victim here of cruel/selfish people

I don't think anyone is supporting any "fantasy" either! People ARE pointing out POSSIBLE other perspectives, her daughter's, the FILs, to the information that the OP has given. Exactly as you are doing!

While smileless argues that the OP’s daughter should have realized that a mother’s love trumps a child’s privacy perhaps the daughter, as violetsky proposed, learned from motherhood that her own mothering had been problematic and is now wanting a reset?

Noone is saying that anyone's love trumps privacy! That is just your interpretation of a viewpoint that if things had been dealt with in a different way, the problem would not have arisen re FIL contact anyway!

Like you I agree with Violetsky that the daughter may be wanting a reset, but again that is just another viewpoint/suggested perspective for consideration if the OP wishes to consider it!! We don't know, including you, we can only suggest and let the OP, if she is still reading take what she finds helpful, or not!

I actually like that term "reset"

I think that some see apologising for things as some sort of admission of guilt that will mean forever being the guilty one, that admitting to faults means being faulty forever... That that makes them less to the other person forever.

I do see apologising as a reset, I don't think people are guilty forever, the only way they continue to be guilty forever is to carry on those same behaviours.

People who apologise and are accountable aren't less, they are strong. It takes more to be the bugger person because that's growth.

All my autocorrects are ridiculous lately

It depends if they have actually done anything, as far as I'm concerned.
What does "everything" even mean?

MissA it probably doesn't make sense to us reading that sentence, it might not make sense to OP either...

To daughter it might be loaded when she said it... It might mean she has explained what everything is previously so that's a quick way to encompass it. Or it might mean OPs daughter just thinks her mum should or does know what everything is...

I don't think it means everything in a be very literal sense, just the things she is hurt about

So you think it might be an idea for her to tell her mum, then?

MissAdventure

It depends if they have actually done anything, as far as I'm concerned.
What does "everything" even mean?

That’s a fair point. I don’t think we have an accurate enough read on what was actually said to know what was meant or understood by the word “everything”—but presumably OP does since she knows what the daughter meant by 22 years ago even if she denies, to us, that it has a real world referent.

Look: where we all stand on this depends absolutely on where we sit—as mothers, daughters, in laws, grandparents. I’ve known plenty of borderline/erratic/delusional people—not all of them clients!—whose word is not to be taken as literal fact. But OP does not assert that her daughter is one of them. I’ve also known a lot of people who can’t admit fault at all and who “forget” or never register some pretty horrific behavior on their own part or on the part of others .

It’s practically a cliche of dysfunctional families for parents to deny knowing what their partners or relatives did to the young children in their control. So OP may legitimately “not know” of an incident between her daughter and her husband, sibling, partner that the daughter remembers as quite serious.

That isn’t the same as s the statement the incident never happened. And I’m leery of assigning all the blame for the 22 years ago discussion to the daughter.

It would be ridiculous to lay all of the blame on either party, as outsiders.

whatever activities or monies that have changed hands previously are not some kind of lawful down payment or moral mortgage that permits the OP or anyone else to demand reciprocity or permanent contact

Again, that is not being suggested by anyone. People are saying that as those things were accepted despite other difficulties, then they are inevitably going to be factored into the OPs thinking, ....and different people, including yourself are presenting different perspectives on that.

I'm not going to bother detailing to my professional experience to validate my comments or otherwise. What I will say is that if referring to others expressed views then paraphrasing into one's own particular viewpoint is less than helpful.

MissAdventure

So you think it might be an idea for her to tell her mum, then?

I don't know if you mean me but, you know I had to explain or at least try... I don't think that's appropriate in all cases...

But it does look like OPs daughter did try to tell her something and it didn't go well

MissAdventure

So you think it might be an idea for her to tell her mum, then?

But she did tell her mom—OP told us that her daughter told her what was wrong. OP doesn’t agree with what her daughter told her but the daughter has told her what she thinks happened, what matters to her, and how she thinks the relationship can be mended. OP told us that herself. She doesn’t agree/won’t or can’t comply with the daughter’s request and in your opinion, perhaps, it’s too global (“everything” being too big or too vague for you) but the daughter has told her mother the problem as she sees it.