Hi Ladies, I wrote this post in another thread, but it is continuing to get more complicated so I am reprinting it here (help Pen or Pooh, is this OK?) because I need some more feedback. here is my original post about the issue:
Hello, WW. I've missed you all so much! I have been unable to be here for a while due to being worked too death, but I am in need of some wise input and didn't know how to start a topic. ... I'm very troubled about an incident that happened with my g/c and I don't know if I have been wrong about the way I responded.
I am not clear any more as to what is the role of a grandparent. When I grew up, grandparents were important. Grandmother was respected and even revered, she did not buy our affection with lavish gifts and money. My grandmothers were strong and dependable and kind and wise. We went to their house, they weren't expected to drive to ours. When we visited, we entertained ourselves and left feeling like it was so great to go to Grandma's. We knew if we ever back talked Grandma (which we never did) that we'd sure get it when we got home. I loved my grandmothers and they were such a special part of my life. I deeply respected them, and learned so many of my values from my grandmothers. I wanted to be a wonderful Grandma, I have always thought that I was, and it has been the one thing in my life I have felt I did well. I've worked very hard at it and given a lot. But now I'm not sure at all.
The incident seems silly to write about. It isn't an isolated incident. Its actually happened a couple of other times, that I make special arrangements with the g/sons in advance to drive over and take them for an outing, and when I get to their house I wait and wait outside, and they never come out of the house. This is what happened again. I later found out they were still sleeping. It was 10:00 a.m. My g/s are 14 and 18, they aren't little kids. I have always just given hugs and said not to worry, we'll do it again another time. This time I told them that I was ashamed of them, and that they needed to learn good manners. I told them that if my Grandmother and planned her day (which I did) to take me someplace special, that I would have been watching at the door for her!
No one is speaking to me now, DD doesn't take my calls and I'm sure she's mad about my saying this to the boys. Maybe I've overstepped a boundary. Maybe I was wrong to say anything to the g/sons, I don't know. I just don't have any history to go on to figure this out, as it would never have happened with my grandmothers growing up. I believe my issue is really more with DD for not teaching responsibility and just plain good manners to the boys. I'm not sure if I should apologize to her for interfering with her authority. Now I also don't even know if I should address it in the future with her (when she finally decides to talk to me again).
Reading over this, it sounds really stupid, still I'm going to post it because I'm just so distressed over it that I need some feedback and I need to get back on track. Things just seem fundamentally wrong to me, that's all.
UPDATE: G/sons apologized me to on their own, very sincerely and sweetly. We are fine now, but DD is continuing to heat up. Two nights ago, she telephoned me, livid, screaming accusations at me because I had not picked up the boys at school that day. I attempted to explain to her that I had not picked up the boys because the previous day I had made two attempts to phone her, and she didn't take my calls, and I had waited for a call from her (watching my answering machine) the entire day on the pick up day, finally concluding that as angry as she was at me, the last thing in the world she would want from me was a 'favor' in the form of picking up the boys. I can assure all of you, I was confident that she did not want me to go to the school and get the boys, and if I had I was sure she would have been there.
DD said she didn't return my calls because she was too mad about the way I had talked to y/gs and she didn't want to get into a heated discussion with me. She said I was very wrong to talk to y/gs that way, and he was very upset. She proceeded to say I thought I was perfect, and of course never did anything wrong. This was all said in the form of shouting and hissing. I said, it is best we stop this conversation because it is not being productive, and I said goodbye and hung up.
Today an email from her, still very angry and curt. She said she relied on me to pick up the boys on my day and did not regard it as a 'favor', the same as she expected her ex/dh on his day to pick up the boys, and that I had let her down in not picking them up. I did tell her that the g/sons were not my responsibility, I did not say this in a mean or vindictive way, I said that whatever I do for and with them, is done out of love, not out of responsibility, the same as my a/c. They aren't my responsibility. Dd was almost speechless with rage when I said this, and continued to lash out at me about how I had let her down and about how out of line I was for the way I 'treated' the g/sons.
Ladies, this is the same dd that only a few short months ago I was going to 100% finance a business for her to buy. I feel I have had one too many temper tantrums at this point. I have just finished shutting down my retail store, and I have worked myself almost to the grave in doing this almost entirely by myself. I can't possibly relate to you what the work load has been, and what a toll mentally and physically it has taken on me. DD mentions this not at all. It is all about her.
The odd thing is the g/sons couldn't have been more loving and sweet. Yesterday I took them ice cream and they both came out and gave me big hugs. I don't feel they even remember the incident, and they treat me the same as always. I think its more of DD drama, and lashing out at me. Honestly, I can't imagine a 35 year old talking to her dm this way, it is so inconceivable to think of my EVER addressing my mother in this tone of voice, for any infraction or any insult I believed she had committed against me. I am disgusted by this behavior, and I frankly don't know where to go from here.
