DIL problems that I don't get

Grannygranby -I'm not keen on my husband's son's girlfriend. We are all supposed to be bringing a dish so all the mish mash of different families can spend Christmas dinner together. Already my husband and I are planning when we can escape.....she has made a list of dishes to bring even. eg carrots.

There will be no dogs unfortunately to brighten up the occasion. So Grannygranby you can come if you like and be very welcome !!!!

? what an utterly horrific dilemma! I had daughters who I am quite close to. I know how lucky I am to see my grandkids with no problem. I feel for you. i really do. I joined gransnet just to give you some support! I can tell you this. Grandparents are special and kids are lucky to have them. They add value to a childs life. Your dil should consider that if she cant care enough to respect her husbands mum. I wouldnt put my best friend in the garden to please her! Maybe another room ? Its great that you are making so much effort to keep in touch with the kids but consider yourself too. Your daughter is right. Maybe meet for a pub lunch halfway on a regular basis and get skype so you can keep in touch that way too. Look after yourself ❤️?

Ahh well you ve hit the nail on the head Susie2 .... ' I wouldn't put my best friend in the garden'
The family should be the best friends not the dog
No harm in loving a dog but it's place in life should not be to the detriment of family
Perhaps you would prefer the original poster to put the family in the garden and she/he has dinner with the dog

Exactly Bluebelle

I do not think this is about dog lovers/haters. Even if you were the greatest dog lover in the world you might still be advising this OP to put family first, as indeed many dog lovers on this thread are doing - and suggesting practical solutions.

I don't like dogs but have friends who do - when I am there they make sure that the dogs cannot make themselves a nuisance, and I am not even family. It is just good manners. They make no attempt to "convert" me - bit of a lost cause that!

They respect how I feel and I respect how they feel - I ask after their animals and take an interest because I know they mean a lot to them.

I am more concerned about the dogs being out in the cold and damp whilst you are all at DD's house. Couldn't daughter bring her dog to your house, either early in the morning or the night before the visit, and then you leave the three dogs with plenty of nice food and drink at yours, while you all enjoy the humans only visit at your daughter's?

No point trying to change dil's preference to not have dogs in the house with her young children. That is up to her.

Why would the dogs need to be outside if everyone was at another house? It all seems hypothetical now anyway as there has not been any response to our comments. My final word as a confirmed dog lover - family comes first and you need to address your daughter in law's concerns and try to compromise.

Last Xmas I went to my son and daughter in laws. I took my dog with me. They had a nine month old son. He was fascinated with my dog,who has always been good with children. I kept them apart all day as I knew my grandson wanted to grab her as she was just a toy to him. I just left the room for a minute thinking my dils oldest daughter who is in her early twenties would watch him. Next thing I know he had crawled into the hallway after my dog and grabbed and pulled her hair,she snapped but did not bite him.His mother saw wht happened and went nuts. My son had a row with her and she told him to take me home and not come back. So he drove me 150 miles back home and stayed here for a week. They made up in the end,but I most certainly wont be going there for xmas again. My son has been to visit me since and brought his son with him,there was no problem between him and the dog at all. The sad thing is I like my DIL very much.Maybe just being a protective mum as we all are even when they are adults.

Sorry, if you had to take your dog with you I think you should have shut her in a room separate from the baby for the duration of the visit.

A dog and a strange (to her) baby crawling around is a recipe for disaster.

I have a lot of sympathy with that poor DIL. Fancy not understanding how she felt and feels - that is a very blinkered attitude. I am sure that most of the dog-lovers on this thread would have sympathy with the DIL.

Nobody has mentioned 'smell'! Let's face it love them or hate them dogs generally smell. Maybe your DIL just can't stand the smell?

But you can speculate til the cows come home, talking is the best way forward and if you want a relationship with your Granddaughters I think keeping the DIL happy is the best way forward. What's the saying?

HAPPY WIFE HAPPY LIFE.
Good luck

I mentioned smell!

However, the potential for small children to aggravate dogs, especially ones which they do not know, however unintentional, is not worth the risk.
And with three dogs together, the pack instinct could kick in.

How sad and difficult for you. Would your DIL allow you to set the ground rules in her home? I suspect not so she does not have the right to do so to you or your daughter in yours. How close to her brother is your daughter? Perhaps the siblings can get together and find a compromise or at least, if you can't all sit down together, they can air yours and DIL's views and find the root of the problem. I think this could take give and take by all parties to resolve.
I live off the M62 in Castleford and have to drive 250 miles to see my Grandaughters - my last visit was horrendous due to my daughter's bipolar and I had to leave early so you are not alone and have good support here.
It sounds as if you have a good relationship with your daughter - focus on that and enjoy what time you can get with your little grandughters. Here's hoping your Christmas will be a better one this year.

My son, now 28, had severe asthma when he was little. Whenever we visited my MIL who was a dog breeder with around 8 dogs in the house, his asthma flared up instantly. The dogs had perfectly good kennels in the garden which she often used but would not use them during our visits. I tried to speak nicely to her about this but she became offended I believed that her dogs were making my son ill. Even when he had allergy tests which confirmed that he was allergic to dog hair (amongst other things), she still wouldn't believe it. Her answer was to stop visiting. She did not visit us because she had trouble getting in and out of a car due to a painful hip, also, in her words, "we are not sociable people". It broke my heart. I'm not being prescriptive here, just describing my experience. Hope it works out for you. x

Grannygranby, if you are still reading here, it seems to me there are a lot of issues going on here all at once. The fact that DS (dear son) and family weren't there when you went to visit says to me that there is a conflict between DS and DIL or perhaps between you and DS (after all, why would he "forget to tell her?"). Or, as some have suggested, maybe you insisted on bringing your dogs and that created a problem?

It also sounds as if DS/DIL has an issue with your home, whether it's cuz of "doggieness" or whatever. And there's now a conflict between them and DD over the fact that DIL "won't tolerate (your) dogs in" DD's house during visits. Of course, DIL can't dictate where the dogs will be, so I take it you mean that DS,DIL and family refuse to come for Xmas, etc. if the dogs are in the house.

I also take it that you tried to strike a compromise between DS/DIL and DD/(yourself?) by suggesting the walk in the park. I know you meant well, but I don't think it was your place to do it. If DD has decided not to keep the dogs in the garden, this time around, then that's her right. And if DS and DIL choose not to come for that reason, that's their right. Sure, you'd like to have them all together on Xmas, but these things don't always work out. I don't know what ended up happening this Xmas, but from now on, you might have to arrange to see DS and family separately from DD on an alternate date, even if it just means going to a restaurant together and exchanging your Xmas gifts there.

I totally understand that your dogs are important to you. But I agree with those who say spending time with your DGC should mean more. If it doesn't, then, sad to say, IMO, you'll have to accept lowered contact with your DGC.

But you tell us your DIL has been hostile and outright "rude" to you from the beginning. I'm so sorry to hear that. Chances are, the "dog issue" is just a ruse to push you away then. Or, as some have said, it might be making a bad situation worse. Also, is it possible you were unintentionally insensitive to some issue of DIL's at the start, the way you seem to be regarding her concerns about dogs? I'm NOT saying you were, but if you can think of something, that may be your key to ending the animosity. Maybe not - just throwing out ideas, hoping something will be helpful.

Corncob, so sorry about what happened! Groan! Glad the little guy didn't get bitten though, TG!

I'm not sure why you're so certain you won't go there for Xmas again though? Is it cuz you can't/won't leave your dog at home/in a kennel? Or cuz you don't think DIL will have you? Since she hasn't objected to DS bringing GS to your home, despite the dog, could it be she has calmed down about the incident?

I take it you weren't invited for this past Xmas. However, please don't be surprised if you are in the future? Would you go? Would you agree not to bring dog if such a request was made?

OP has not been back since November do we need to use this thread as yet another "DIL/MIL from hell" debating area?
Wendysue seems to relish giving the benefit of her advice but this also seems to fuelling the fire of poor in-law relationship behaviour.
Tolerance, consideration, good manners would all go a long way towards improving some lives.
An insistence on entitlement does not.

Daphne, I seem to have touched a nerve with you! Most of what I did here is identify a number of possible conflicts, not all involving the MIL and ask a number of questions. How is it "fueling the fire of poor in-law relationship behavior" to ask people to think about what could be going on? But maybe it's all hitting too close to home?

Happily wendysue for me at any rate, I enjoy a warm relationship with all 3 SILS and their parents, so no, your relationship advice is a long way from home.
However you seem to take a close interest in the majority of Relationship threads, not only the current ones and I question the value of raking things up when OP has departed.
I also question the validity of some of your thinking and wonder whether you are merely speaking from your own experience rather than any sort of professional background.
Perhaps it is "close to home" for you, but proximity does not always make for clarity of perspective.

Glad your relationships with your SILs and their parents are good, Daphne. Same here! But I know people in less fortunate situations where that's concerned. A lot of my opinions are based on what I've seen in those cases plus on what I've read online on both GP and parent boards. But they are just opinions, of course, as with most other posters here.

P.S. I should have also said, Daphne, that some of my opinions are based on what works with my DDs/SILs and me. But, of course, that doesn't necessarily mean it will work for everyone else. And again, in the end, they're just opinions.

It wasn't Wendysue who re ignited this thread Daphnebroon, emptynester posted on Jan. 1st, the last one having been on Nov. 25th and what's wrong with someone adding to a thread that's been quiet for 6 weeks anyway, if they want too.

Perhaps a little "tolerance, compassion (and) good manners" could have been extended to emptynester whose post seems to have been ignored.

What a shame emptynester that a situation which could have been so easily sorted by your m.i.l. putting her dogs in kennels when you visited, got so out of hand. It's very sad that relationships can be destroyed over something so simple.

Thank you, Smileless. And you're right - it's not as if this thread is that old. It was written less than 2 months ago. The OP could still be reading replies even though not posting.

Emptynester, I meant to reply to you earlier. Looks like your MIL chose her dogs over her GS! How sad! I really can't get over that!

Can't get over, either, how she later twisted the story to say that you, DH and DS "aren't sociable." Whst s distorted woman!

Thanks Smileless and Wendy Sue. I was busy in December with Christmas, birthdays and a holiday. Sorry, the "we are not sociable" people did not refer to me, my husband and kids but to her and FIL when I invited them to our house instead or to meet on neutral ground, eg a resturant. She loved her home comforts and rarely went out except to church or touring holidays. Also, as a dog breeder, she often couldn't leave the house as her dog/s were either in heat, pregnant or she had new puppies to rear. She came to my kids' birthday parties in resturants 3 or 4 times over the years but that's all. My husband and I divorced in early 1993 and she declined my suggestion that she could meet the kids at his house also. She had a bad hip then. The last time I saw her was at my daughter's 18th in 2003. She sadly died a couple of years ago and I will always regret the time my kids missed with her when they were small. Dogs were MIL's way of life, unfortunately; they were not just family pets as she bred them for a living.

Sorry, accidentally posted whilst previewing. It's hard work on a mobile phone (laptop acting up). Tried to edit the post but it's gone now. MIL was not a bad person and there was no hostility between us but she did put her dog breeding first, without a doubt. xx