Me (33F) and my husband (35M) have been together for 8 years and married for 5. Husband has always been a great son to shitty parents, FIL being a terrible dad and worse husband, alcoholic and overall a bad person. MIL has a good heart in general but she is kind of ignorant and emotiobally impaired. My husband being the oldest was given the “head of the family” role, always being protective of his sisters and mother to the point of driving them everywhere and them constantly being dependent on him. I’ve always struggled to communicate my feelings about his family to him because he blindly adores them and has never acknowledged anything negative about their dymanic. I’ve never liked this situation but I accepted it out of love for him I guess, and as long as they didn’t interfere with us I let them be. I’ve always been respectful of them and even though, I don’t particularly fit in with his family or like them for that matter, I’ve always tried my best to be kind and even made my efforts to enjoy my time with them for my husband’s sake and peace.
As an important point for context, in our culture family is a really big deal and particularly my ILs love to celebrate and make big parties and events for almost everything. That said, whenever my husband is celebrating something or just need their support most of the time they are never there thwy coincidentally always have something else going on. I don’t think they do it conciously but it definitely a pattern. He always justifies them and I just find it very odd.
On March this year I gave birth to our baby boy, I didn’t have a birth plan or hospital rules I even mentioned that direct family was welcome to visit. It ended up being a C-section, so we were in the hospital for 3 days in which no one from my husband’s family visited or showed interest in meeting the baby husband was obviously devastated but once again they all had excuses none of them valid in my opinion but once again he brushed it of and justified them. In that moment I was heartbroken for him, so it was my idea to go straight out from the hospital to his parents’ house so they could see the baby, that’s right 3 days after my c-section fresh out of the hospital, he was very pleased with me for this. When we arrived it was awkward as everyone behaved as if it wasn’t a big deal. Now 3 months later I’m having trouble letting my ILs care for my baby I can’t brush off the feeling that they do not care enough, also I can’t stop thinking back to that visit, at the time I did it out of love for my husband but now I can’t stop feeling like I failed my son, I failed to set boundaries and establish his worth and dignity within the first days of his life.
I know it is my husband’s place to fix this and to protect me and our baby. I’m aware it is a long overdue conversation, but as he gets very defensive when talking about his parents, I don’t feel prepared for it and it scares me. I don’t know how to approach him. At the same time I’m starting to resent him for it and now I simply can’t deal with my ILs now as I’m really starting to hate them.
I don’t know what to do about this. My husband is a very loving dad and partner but I can’t keep pretending like everything is ok.
Sorry for the long post, thanks a lot if you read to this point. Advise would be appreciated.
Also sorry if this reads weird or if I made mistakes, english is not my first language.
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Backup of the post’s body: Me (33F) and my husband (35M) have been together for 8 years and married for 5. Husband has always been a great son to shitty parents, FIL being a terrible dad and worse husband, alcoholic and overall a bad person. MIL has a good heart in general but she is kind of ignorant and emotiobally impaired. My husband being the oldest was given the “head of the family” role, always being protective of his sisters and mother to the point of driving them everywhere and them constantly being dependent on him. I’ve always struggled to communicate my feelings about his family to him because he blindly adores them and has never acknowledged anything negative about their dymanic. I’ve never liked this situation but I accepted it out of love for him I guess, and as long as they didn’t interfere with us I let them be. I’ve always been respectful of them and even though, I don’t particularly fit in with his family or like them for that matter, I’ve always tried my best to be kind and even made my efforts to enjoy my time with them for my husband’s sake and peace.
As an important point for context, in our culture family is a really big deal and particularly my ILs love to celebrate and make big parties and events for almost everything. That said, whenever my husband is celebrating something or just need their support most of the time they are never there thwy coincidentally always have something else going on. I don’t think they do it conciously but it definitely a pattern. He always justifies them and I just find it very odd.
On March this year I gave birth to our baby boy, I didn’t have a birth plan or hospital rules I even mentioned that direct family was welcome to visit. It ended up being a C-section, so we were in the hospital for 3 days in which no one from my husband’s family visited or showed interest in meeting the baby husband was obviously devastated but once again they all had excuses none of them valid in my opinion but once again he brushed it of and justified them. In that moment I was heartbroken for him, so it was my idea to go straight out from the hospital to his parents’ house so they could see the baby, that’s right 3 days after my c-section fresh out of the hospital, he was very pleased with me for this. When we arrived it was awkward as everyone behaved as if it wasn’t a big deal. Now 3 months later I’m having trouble letting my ILs care for my baby I can’t brush off the feeling that they do not care enough, also I can’t stop thinking back to that visit, at the time I did it out of love for my husband but now I can’t stop feeling like I failed my son, I failed to set boundaries and establish his worth and dignity within the first days of his life.
I know it is my husband’s place to fix this and to protect me and our baby. I’m aware it is a long overdue conversation, but as he gets very defensive when talking about his parents, I don’t feel prepared for it and it scares me. I don’t know how to approach him. At the same time I’m starting to resent him for it and now I simply can’t deal with my ILs now as I’m really starting to hate them.
I don’t know what to do about this. My husband is a very loving dad and partner but I can’t keep pretending like everything is ok.
Sorry for the long post, thanks a lot if you read to this point. Advise would be appreciated.
Also sorry if this reads weird or if I made mistakes, english is not my first language.
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.