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Sabotaging DIL

Started by karleigh, October 13, 2013, 07:31:10 PM

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Love Me Love Me Not

I understand what you are saying Dixie Darlin', but the influence of this woman and the great need she has or makes him think she has, seem to override everything else in his life. We brought him up well. If anything we gave him too much. He was taught to do chores, however, from the time he was young. He worked summers in school when he was old enough. If he broke the rules as all teenagers do, he was disciplined fairly. We had a lot of fun together. We took him on some great vacations. We loved him. We rewarded good behavior. We even taught him how to cook and clean, etc. He was never the best student in school. He was just more mechanically talented rather than academically interested. He was so smart, he could learn almost anything very fast. We recognized early on that his talents and the work he enjoyed lay elsewhere than a life behind a desk. We accepted that and taught him to live up to his responsibilities whether they were his favorite things to do or not, meet the requirements that he needed to and do the work that suited him. He has a great job. We tried to talk to him many times, but he simply hung up the phone. All mail, calls,texts, etc. are now intercepted and or monitored by her. It became clear to us that she monitors everything that he does. In the interest of the children and him, we do not want to make things more difficult with our needs. I' :)ve read about people just like her and how they manipulate others who are unsuspecting for a long time. it often takes years for a person to figure out what is going on, but they must figure it out for themselves. If a person contributes to a position where their child feels he has to choose between his spouse and his parents, he will always choose his spouse I believe, unless he is already discovering the depth of her problems.

Pen

Quote from: DixieDarling on November 17, 2013, 09:38:38 AM
LoveMe & getting O&C, I'm sorry for each of your pain. I can only imagine how much it must hurt.
What I don't understand is your "sons"?  How come they need a wife to tell them about their Mothers? They've known you since birth. THEY KNOW you best.
A dear friend of mine starting going thru some of the "she said you said" crap with her son about 9 months after he married. The first few times my friend said "I'm sorry that's not what I meant. Etc"
But about the 3rd time she whirled around and told her son, "ENOUGH!" The next time your wife goes to telling you what I meant by something I said or done why not use your own brain? She told him, "you've been around me all your life. You know me! You know what I mean when I say so & so. You don't need anyone to explain ME to you. So from here on out if you know I wouldn't do or say something open your mouth and say so. Don't come to me again telling me your wife said nothing." You know what? It stopped.

Wow! I have a feeling my DIL has misinterpreted me to DS as well. I'm impressed by your friend for speaking up for herself.
Respect ... is appreciation of the separateness of the other person, of the ways in which he or she is unique.
-- Annie Gottlieb

Hopeful2

Quote from: Love Me Love Me Not on November 17, 2013, 04:18:28 PM
I understand what you are saying Dixie Darlin', but the influence of this woman and the great need she has or makes him think she has, seem to override everything else in his life. We brought him up well. If anything we gave him too much. He was taught to do chores, however, from the time he was young. He worked summers in school when he was old enough. If he broke the rules as all teenagers do, he was disciplined fairly. We had a lot of fun together. We took him on some great vacations. We loved him. We rewarded good behavior. We even taught him how to cook and clean, etc. He was never the best student in school. He was just more mechanically talented rather than academically interested. He was so smart, he could learn almost anything very fast. We recognized early on that his talents and the work he enjoyed lay elsewhere than a life behind a desk. We accepted that and taught him to live up to his responsibilities whether they were his favorite things to do or not, meet the requirements that he needed to and do the work that suited him. He has a great job. We tried to talk to him many times, but he simply hung up the phone. All mail, calls,texts, etc. are now intercepted and or monitored by her. It became clear to us that she monitors everything that he does. In the interest of the children and him, we do not want to make things more difficult with our needs. I' :)ve read about people just like her and how they manipulate others who are unsuspecting for a long time. it often takes years for a person to figure out what is going on, but they must figure it out for themselves. If a person contributes to a position where their child feels he has to choose between his spouse and his parents, he will always choose his spouse I believe, unless he is already discovering the depth of her problems.


I have a similar situation too with my son and dil. It wasn't until my son started to realized that the way he was living with her unreasonable demands that things began to change. It took me telling him to do what he felt was right, and that I loved him and wanted him to have a good, loving life with his family and I didn't want to cause him any trouble before he started coming to see us again and making sure we saw the grandchildren. It took time, maybe 6 months or so and then every couple of months of seeing them. But you are so right, backing off, waiting, accepting that maybe we would never really see them and letting them come to me was the only thing that it was possible to do. Jumping through hoops, turning myself inside out, worrying myself sick, didn't help at all.  I hope you can find peace with the way things are, knowing that you tried.