lack of seeing my grandchildren

You aren’t entitled to anything. You get a weekly visit. You are in their lives and yet you keep drudging things up and getting people like the pastor involved. She lost her husband. Her mil lost a son. Be grateful you didn’t lose anyone and appreciate what you have.

I do think you need to think about the entire situation - how close to your daughter were you before ? Reading what you've said, it's "all about you" and what you want. Did you previously spend time with your daughter ? Most mothers who are close to their daughters already, just naturally spend time with her children . If you were not close to her before you can't just expect that you'll get time with her children as a natural thing.

Have you thought of offering to do something for your daughter - in my case I go to her place on Fridays and do her ironing. Then I pick up the children from school and take them to the park. I don't wait for an invitation, I offer to actually help out. Maybe you could do something like that, rather than complaining about the lack of contact.

I think you need to manage your own expectations. How often do you expect to see them? For many families, both parents work and they cherish the time they are able to spend as a family. For many families, seeing GPs several times a month isn't reasonable.

You were not required to know the godparents of your GC. That was the parents' decision. If you kicked off I don't think it's unreasonable for your DD to ask you to control yourself before you see their children.

Hi- I have 2 grandchildren- Close in age- I'm having a lot of difficulty with my daughter whose children they are- feeling very excluded since they were both born
So decided to
Message both my daughter and son in law and air my hurt
Saying I felt left out? Saying I didn't know who the godparents were at my first grandchilds christening-
I think
My son in law is stuck in the middle- I offered to go and see them over 3 weekends ago/ but my daughter said before I did that I needed to sort my outburst out first??
As you can imagine I'm so very hurt and just don't know what to do?
I have not been invited over since? I'm single just trying to start my own business ??
Please help I'm
At a total loss

only half hour after the service in church...if they dont go to church i dont see them .if i'm ill then i dont see them. this sunday they got dedication for sil brothers child at their local church . all are going except me.so i wont see gc at church this week. i did ask to see them on tuesday as its half term but theres always an excuse,and i end up not seeing them at all except at church. and the word BIT UPSET was meant to say BIG UPSET.. all of us are grieving.esp my d and gc and inlaws family. it affects us all

Realistically, if it's your son-in-law's brother's child, it doesn't surprise me that you would not be invited. You're not the grandmother. It would be lovely if they had invited you, but you're not a close family member.

have tried talking to my pastor ,hes also talked to mil and my daugher. but it still goes on, the more i protest the more upset i get so i say nothing. take this sunday its sil brothers childs dedication. all invited except me..but am still giving a gift and birthday gift.am a really nice person i would rather give than receieve, but would like to be invited once in a while. yes we all go to same church..and maybe things are getting slightly better as i went to tea on tuesday but had to buy tea fish and chips etc. for everyone.

Did you have a close relationship with your daughter before she got pregnant?

I've never been close with my mom. She's quiet and doesn't like socializing. We don't hang out or chat on the phone. She doesn't call just to check in and I don't call her to tell her about my day. We have nothing in common.

And now that I have a ten-month-old, it's very weird to see her small attempts at trying to see him. She doesn't respond to half the photos I send her. And then she'll randomly text, "can GS come over and play?" I can't even tell if that's a real invitation. Not to mention she's never once asked me to come over just to hang out. It's hurtful.

Meanwhile I see my MIL and all of hubby's family weekly for dinner. We've had our issues, but she dotes on my son. She's outgoing and I get along with his siblings really well. We have a good time. His family is just big and close and actually act like they like each other and our friends.

And then we see my parents maybe once a month, usually just to celebrate a birthday or holiday. There was no relationship to begin with. It can be hard and hurtful to only want to see your grandchild and not have put that effort in with your child. I'm not saying it applies to you, but it's just an idea.

You have put it in a nutshell Old Meg.
Moggie I hope you can start to see things differently, trust me, YOU will be happier for it.

I understand that you feel excluded moggie because you hardly see your grandchildren.

Have you tried to put yourself in the other grandmother’s position? She has lost her son. There is no worse pain than losing your child, but losing your husband, the father of your children must run a close second.

So we had two people here, desperately grieving, holding on to each other for mutual support.

It’s not that you are being deliberately excluded. It’s simply that they are trying to cope the best way they know how.

How much support have you given to the other grandmother yourself? I’d suggest that if you can arrange to meet up with her now and then, and really listen to the poor woman, without withering on, about how you feel then you might start making some headway.

It’s very early days in this grieving process. You can either make yourself into a stepping stone or a stumbling block.

Your choice.

Sorry Norah have to disagree ‘after church’ sounds as if it’s just a matter of ‘seeing’ them with others around so not special time and the other times says ‘if I m lucky’ which implies it’s very as hoc but of course you can put a slant on it if you wish to back up your harsh original post

I wasn’t clear if church going was a whole family experience do you and daughter both attend the same church? If so I would start by having a chat with the Vicar/Priest in charge/Pastor in a confidential setting, they will know the situation and presumably the family as a whole he or she maybe able to help you work through how this catastrophe has upturned the whole family and if there were any pre existing issues with your daughter they maybe could help mediate these?
SpanielNanny Has given a beautiful and heart moving explanation of the effect of grief, something which we all hope never to have to suffer in the way your DD and DGC have. I can only imagine?
The whole of three family units have been turned upside down, that’s your household (you describe yourself as a lonely single woman) the other grans household (also sounds lonely and alone and has lost an adult child?)and finally your daughter who as well as coping with her own grief has to manage the feelings of two very small children who have lost their father.
Please ask for some help for yourself and cut your daughter a bit of slack as she tries to find her feet.
BTW I don’t think the reference to New mum was meant to hurt you (although I can well understand why it did!) I think it’s probably how she was encouraged by MIL to feel when she married her son and was meant to feel warm and including

Bluebelle, I think after church to be a nice visit. She also see some tuesday and school holiday, that is really often.

I feel incredibly sorry for the sadness felt by the op. it’s a very sad situation for her, and in her situation I would feel equally upset.

However, i found your post very unsettling bluebell. I don’t think you’re understanding the all consuming grief of losing a spouse or partner at such a young age. The poor woman has lost everything, her husband, her children’s father and the future that she thought she was going to have. Her ‘hurtful’ behaviour sounds to me like a woman desperately trying to cling to the routine that she and her children had before they lost one of the most precious and important people in their lives.

I lost a partner, and for TWO years, I couldn’t bear anybody to be sitting in his chair once the clock turned 515, because that was when he was usually home. I asked people to move. Including my young son.
6 months after I’d lost my partner I got a call from my sons school. I was 30 minutes late picking him up, I’d got back into the bed that I shared with my partner, and had completely lost track of time. I have never felt so ashamed. It was a very kind school secretary who hugged me and said that if we weren't allowed to be selfish when we were suffering the worst grief imaginable, then when could we.

Now think of Mother’s day. The first mother’s day without your husband. The first mother’s day when perhaps, nobody had encouraged your young children to make you a card. Another morning where you wake up and realise that now, you’re alone, it really is just you who’s responsible for those children. You can’t help but wonder how they’re going to cope in a few months when Fathers Day comes around. And in that moment, when you believe that those children are all you have, you remember that your mil won’t be getting a card either, because she has just buried her son. Of course they gravitated together.
Yes in an ideal world she would have visited her mother too, but in a ideal world people in their 30s don’t lose their partners, and young children aren’t left without fathers.

This is a woman doing her best to not only cope with her own grief, but to help her children through it too.

My advice to the op, is to keep up contact, but gently. Send your daughter a text saying you love her, that you’re thinking of her. Pop a couple of colouring books through the door for the children to keep them busy. Maybe do the same for her mil, nip round with a bunch of flowers, let her know that you care. Maybe suggest to mil a day when you can all take the children to a park or something, it’ll do you all good.

While part of me is thinking What a considerate young woman to think of how her MIL must have been feeling on Mother’s Day, so soon after the death of her son, I also think it might have been a nice gesture for all three “mothers” to spend that day together.
It brings us back to asking what the role of Granny is on Mother’s Day? And I think we have to be prepared to take a step back.
But this sounds like a very rigid routine and TBH not a great relationship.

Agnurse the poster is not saying she spends her life expecting her grandkids to be her entertainment she works and I m sure she has her own life but she is just expressing the fact that she would like to see them for one visit a week
She is not being like some other posters on here pestering demanding, calling round and expecting a lot I think your post is unfair and hard
Half an hour if she’s lucky after church is not a visit or qualitity time
I think the daughter must have bad feeling that pre dates the husband dying why else would she be so hurtful
Can you imagine your daughter not even visiting you on mother’s day if she’s nearby but preferring to be with her ‘new mum’ something wrong there

It's not the grandchildren's job to give her a reason to live or to stop her being lonely. Once a week is frankly a lot of time. MIL has just lost her son. Moreover I'm sure they are wanting to spend time as a family. On top of that, how much time they spend with MIL is none of OP's business.

Norah that’s harsh this lady sees her grand kids for half an hour a week with others presumable around ( if it’s a church setting) she’s alone in life and as they all live near she was hoping to see them perhaps for tea or a weekly visit I don’t think that she’s asking too much I d be mortified if I didn’t see my nearby grandkids, for at least one visit in a week

You see gc weekly? Sorry, what is the problem?

It's really good that your daughter is continuing to build a strong relationship with her late husband's parents. I am sure they were worried that they might lose touch with her and their GC after their son's death. The children will benefit from their continued involvement and support.

It is still very early days since she lost her husband and maybe his parents are helping her through it.

I am awful sorry for your family’s loss. What a hard blow for your daughter and her children to bear.

Was it your son in law who made efforts to include you; you said you have seen less of them, since his death?

Perhaps it would help you to talk to someone outside the situation. A bereavement can make relationships very difficult for a while. It might help to have someone to talk through your feelings with.

Moggie says that she sees her grandchildren every Sunday for church and half an hour afterwards. On Mother's Day she did see them, therefore.

If you are worried about remaining anonymous please ask GN to delete this thread. In future don't give names perhaps

moggie this forum is shared on FB and Twitter, when you joined it will have told you. The permission is given by you when you join . If you look at this page the FB, Twitter ,Pinterest and You Tube icons are all over the place.

Well this is a bit harsh as poster says she only sees the grandkids for half an hour on Sundays and if they all live in the same area it doesn’t seem very much and if course it’s hurtful if your daughter is calling her mother in law her new mother I d be mortified if that was said to me
It does sound as if your relationship with your daughter wasn’t too good before she got married as normally on losing a husband or partner a daughter would turn to her own mum for succour but she seems to have turned away Can you think of anything that has injured your relationship with her in the past?
If my grandkids lived near me but I only saw them half an hour a week I d be upset
I completely disagree with Agnurse about Mother’s Day of course it was a nice gesture to spend time with the in law but Maggie should have had a visit too, put yourself in that situation she is her Mum and sounds as if she’s brought her up single handed
Is this your only child Maggie ?