Woman bans MIL from seeing her kids after she shames her in front of her 8-year-old. AITA?
"AITA for refusing to let my MIL see my kids after she called me a wh^%e?"
I (26F) met my husband (27M) in high school. In senior year, I fell pregnant. I decided to keep my baby and we had a daughter together just as we were graduating. When our daughter turned 1, we decided that our relationship was no longer working and decided to go our separate ways.
During our separation, we BOTH started seeing other people and BOTH were in serious relationships. I fell pregnant again at 22 with my ex’s baby and gave birth to a beautiful daughter. This relationship ended due to infidelity (not on my part) and in the following few months my husband's relationship that he had during our separation fell apart and they ended things.
Two years ago my husband and I rekindled our relationship and eloped shortly after. The daughter I had with my Ex has no contact with her biological father (his wishes) and refers to my husband as dad.
When my husband and I announced that we were back together, and I introduced MIL to my second daughter (that is not biologically my husband's) She would not look at my daughter directly. I thought this was weird, but brushed it off and didn’t want to make a fuss.
For the last two years she has continuously treated our second daughter differently to our first. For example always buying bigger birthday and Christmas presents for our eldest, surprising our eldest with activities just for them two and excluding the youngest etc etc.
I have brought this up with my husband, who also thought it was strange. We both have brought it up with MIL on several occasions but she claims that she didn’t mean to exclude our youngest daughter and just “feels more connected” to our eldest. Which hurt me for my youngest daughter, but then again, some people have stronger relationships than others, and my husband seemed to accept this answer. So I didn’t push the subject.
I have started a new job recently, in the last month. With my old job, I was able to work from home and could look after our daughters at the same time. However, this new job has a longer commute and requires me to be in office during the week. Therefore, MIL has stepped in looking after our daughters before and after school until my husband or I picks them up from her house.
Whenever I am the one to pick up the girls, they are often angry and snappy with me, particularly my eldest. I’ve chalked this down to a long day at school, feeling exhausted and have tried not to take this to heart.
Three days ago however, whenever I had gotten the girls home from their grandma’s and had made them a snack, I gave my eldest toast and apparently used too much butter and she went into hysterics screaming at me “useless wh**e.” My daughter is 8 years old.
No 8 year old should know that word, or yet use it towards their mother. I knew that she had to have learnt that from somewhere. I told my husband about this whenever we were in bed that night and he suddenly went quiet, and got defensive about the subject shutting down the conversation quickly.
At first, I assumed from this reaction it was him who had said this to our daughter, so I asked my daughter where she heard those new words she used yesterday when mommy didn’t butter her toast evenly.
To my surprise, she told me that it was MIL who has used these words to describe me, Often, to our daughters. I was livid. I took an early leave from work that day to be there to collect my daughters from school to ensure they were going no where near MIL.
When my husband arrived home from work that night, I confronted him about what our daughter had told me and he confirmed that his mom has called me a “Useless Wh**e” to him before, after she found out I had a daughter with another man during our seperation. He said, that she believes that our youngest daughter is not part of her family, and that I am a “wh**e” for getting myself pregnant with someone that was not her son.
The useless part, comes from not being on birth control whenever I was a senior to stop myself getting pregnant in my teenage years. I have never been more angry and upset. It all makes sense to me now, the exclusion and the big gifts for our eldest. The anger displayed towards me when I collect them has all stemmed from how this woman has spoke about me to my own children.
I told my husband that the children are never seeing his mom again, and I will gladly make other arrangements for our daughters. My MIL has called and texted a lot to attempt to apologize to me, then it turned to outright denial, and then defensive opinions about our youngest daughter's conception after I refused to acknowledge her texts.
My husband says to give her another chance, and I can not be certain that she has been saying this about me to our children, which I think is bullsh!t, because he has admitted she has used those words. He says I’m a major as%hole for refusing his mother any contact with her granddaughters, even if it is supervised.
Maybe he is right with supervised visitation, but I never want to see this woman again. Maybe it is just the anger talking, and I will feel differently if I hear MIL out. Am I the ahole?
Here's what top commenters had to say about this one:
she_who_knits said:
NTA. MIL has burnt he grandma card. Don't reinstate easily or too soon. You need time to cool off and to undo the damage she's done to your daughters. When they ask why they can't see het be honest and upfront about grandma's language and attitude. I'd take at least 6 months to year to let the lessons to sink into grandma's thick head.
PuddleLilacAgain said:
NTA. MIL is not sorry. She just wants things her way. Always double standards with these people. They blame OP but not their precious son. MIL is misogynistic and needs to be kept away from your children.
ApocalypticStarGazer said:
Your husband is enabling your MIL's behaviour, my question to you is until when are you going to put up with this blatant disrespect and disregard from both your husband and his mom. NTA obviously. Keep your children far away from MIL.
The_Bad_Agent said:
NTA. It's time to kick him to the curb. The fact that he allowed this at all, and had the audacity to become defensive about it is entirely unacceptable. Send his sorry rear end back to his useless mom. They can both go to Hell.
EmperorMrKitty said:
NTA. Big problems with your husband taking her side. Huge problems. Does he agree with her? Even if he doesn’t… he’s cool with his kids being taught to think about you that way? How does he treat your second daughter?
SteampunkHarley said:
NTA. You also have a husband problem if he isn't standing up to her and shuttering her down.