u/No_Mathematician1359

Currently me and my husband have the only grandchildren on his side of the family. MIL and FIL are your stereotypical boomers and cross boundaries, give outdated advice, have baby rabies and in general are kind of self centered and don’t think about how their actions affect us as parents.

For example: bringing 20+ cheapo plasticy toys with small parts for a toddler, constantly trying to pull up cocomelon videos on YouTube to show them, gifting loud or messy toys.

More examples: always make lunch reservations for the middle of nap time then complain when we decline, ask us to make long car trips with little ones regularly and act like we’re insane to invite them to our house instead, constantly try to overstimulate or oversugar our kids (who are under 3, by the way).

My husband’s sister is now expecting her first child. We’re hoping this takes some of the pressure off of us as the only parents.

If you had a similar situation, did things get better? Did grandparents start behaving better (or backing off)?

**ETA: added a few more examples above

Before I accuse him of being a narcissist to my husband, I want to make sure I’m not reaching. I’m wondering if there’s a better fitting term or way to describe his behavior.

Some important context: I don’t think he meets the full definition of narcissist. He doesn’t talk about himself a lot, doesn’t have a huge ego (that he shows, at least). He doesn’t turn every conversation back to him. All of which I feel like are your typical narcissist traits.

However, some examples of his behavior that I feel like are very manipulative:

1. anytime myself or husband has put up a normal boundary (we didn’t want hospital visitors with our first) he immediately makes it a very dramatic decision and uses FOG to start a guilt trip. In this example, he called my husband to explain how I was driving a wedge through the family, called me vicious, kept saying how disappointing my husband was for “doing this to his own parents”
2. FIL and BIL are very close. BIL is golden child because he is single, and spends every free minute with his parents. FIL has absolutely complained about us to BIL and sent him as a flying monkey. Had BIL go to my husband talking about how disappointed they are in how their grandparent experience has gone, how it’s “f***ing weird” that we don’t go spend the weekend with them more often or let them babysit - to the point where BIL gives my husband the silent treatment unless he appeases his parents requests
3. FIL assumes all boundaries come from me (not the joint decision between husband and I) so he just doesn’t speak to or acknowledge me during visits.

I’m trying to help my husband see how manipulative and toxic these behaviors are and trying to point him to some resources/books or things to encourage him to talk to a therapist about managing a manipulative parent. Everything I search points to narcissist but I feel like that’s an extreme term in this case. Is there a better one? Is it just “toxic parent”? It’s not enmeshment (for husband, at least) because we don’t involve them that much anymore.

ETA: Thank you for all the helpful responses! Maybe I’m not looking for a label, per-se, but just a direction of where I can find more specialized/targeted resources and therapists that specialize in this kind of behavior. I’m going to look more into toxic family systems and emotionally immature parents, rather than narcissist. Exactly why I came here looking for help, thank you!

I posted about this before in comments of other posts, but wanted to open it up to a thread

Does birth order of your in laws affect their demeanor/attitude/behavior towards you?

Example: my MIL is the youngest of 5, 4 girls and 1 boy. She still acts like a youngest child. Loves to make everything about her, expects to be babied in any situation. Love to be the center of attention. Very dependent on her husband/sons for anything.

Wondering if other intolerable in laws share any commonalities with birth order trends?

Hey to the other very similar post about a very similar situation. Figured I’d share mine.

My husband and I have the only grandchildren on both sides. To keep it short, we see my side a lot because 1) they’re in closer proximity, 2) they have always been respectful of boundaries and 3) it’s a two way relationship- they are constantly checking in on US (parents, not just kids) and putting in effort to see and catch up with us. They also will see us if it doesn’t involve grandkids and treat us like we’re people, not just incubators.

We do not see my husbands family as much. They also are in close proximity, but stomp on boundaries, shit talked me postpartum when I was having a hard time with PPA, and they make zero effort. No calls or texts on birthdays (for me or the kids), no checking in postpartum, my BIL hasn’t even met our second child despite living 20 minutes away.

SIL is actually really sweet and I like her. She’s lived across the country, so I’ll give her a pass at not really knowing the kids. She’s coming back to my in laws for her bridal shower and has invited our whole family.

Why I don’t want to go:

- baby hates the car and driving 2 hours each way is incredibly inconvenient

- timing of the shower is awful and will throw off nap and evening schedule due to drive and timing

- staying there is not an option because it will be a loud, rowdy house until late at night (1am+)

- I don’t particularly feel like going out of our way to inconvenience ourselves for people who have never once gone out of the way for us

- MIL really just wants to show off her grandkids to all of her friends and siblings and could care less if me and husband actually were there

- it’s going to be like 40 people trying to pinch babies cheeks and me having to push them all back. My kids will likely be the only young kids, other relatives kids are like 10-14 years old

Why I’m trying to give grace:

- we have never once gone back to visit his family at their home (again, for reasons) but I know he misses going home

- we could finally get all of the guilt of making a visit off our back during a time where we’d really have to interact very little with his family (now, we’d still have to interact with a lot of people)

- literally only for the sake of my husband because I feel bad that he knows how shitty his family has been towards us, and I know he’s trying to maintain a connection, even though it’s so one sided and falling on him

It’s such a tough spot to be in. Advice? Thoughts? Where would you land?