You must have lots of e-mail but thank you for being there. It actually helps to read other people's problems and think, well at least I don't have such and such to worry about.
My issue is that my husband is going in for surgery next week. I have not got on well with his parents for years. He kept saying it was his father who was so difficult to get on with, and I said that if his father was being unreasonable why did his mother have to go along with it (in my family a wife might break ranks to apologize for unfair treatment, but my husband said the older generation are more loyal than that). It has caused a lot of pain. I tried to put things right by inviting her to come over before and during his surgery and started making travel arrangements which was
charged to my husband's credit card. After talking nicely, I was later criticized for failing to respond to her e-mail which came to me completely out of the blue. It did not seem to need responding to and I did not understand the message except the part thanking me for the Mother's Day cards from the children which I had sent. My husband having shouted at me agreed it was inconsequential when I sent a copy over to him. Ruffled feathers all around.
Anyway, we now learn that she had checked into the local Holiday Inn but says she cannot afford to stay there for the entire ten days booked and will see what happens when she gets here. Our children barely know their grandparents and I had hoped she would stay with us, but it was so cold when she spoke today, telling us she would use the shuttle bus over to the hospital. My husband was crying about it all, and he is a big man. I hate to see him so upset with the major surgery on the horizon. How do I handle this without using firearms? I have three children and had hoped she
would help me to help him and still do right by the little ones. A few friends had offered to help and I had accepted that so she and I could be at the hospital together for part of the time and I was not trying to use her as an unpaid
baby-sitter, but this is worse than ever. Some of the people who write to you would probably think it is a dream come true that their MIL books in at a hotel, and so perhaps I should see it that way, but I am from a different culture where that is saying I do not want to be with you. After about twelve years of being ignored, I wanted to bury the past, but it
seems to be getting worse.
Thank you for reading my letter.
Yes, I guess you are, but then this world is peopled by different cultures and it's our responsibility, all of us, to try to understand each other.
Staying in a hotel instead of in the home of a daughter-in-law with three children, in a crisis situation, does not seem
unreasonable to me, in fact, since you two have never been close friends, it seems very sensible.
As for gathering around and making your husband's surgery into a family affair, well, that sounds ominous. If indeed this operation is that serious, his mother would of course want to be by his side, with no question of baby-sitting his children. If you are afraid he might not survive, perhaps the children would want to be with their father too.
But all the above does not address your question about how to cope with the differences between you and your mother-in-law. It doesn't surprise me one bit that she supports her own husband even if she isn't entirely in agreement with him. This is convention. They are of a generation who stick together through thick and thin. Sometimes it means living through difficult times which in today's context would indicate divorce. But most people in that generation believe in "'til death do us part."
As for the email, when you didn't respond, that was a mistake. When you open an email account it is your responsibility to answer the mail that arrives there. That's protocol. This has nothing to do with generations - we old people who use the Internet are just as aware of common courtesy as the youngsters, and acknowledging receipt of email is paramount. Answer her note, even at this late date, and apologize for being late, refer to what she said, and conclude with something nice. Do it. Email is never inconsequential, no matter how much your husband chooses to "shout at you" about it.
If she wants to use the bus to the hospital, what is wrong with that? If you want to pick her up at the hotel and drive her
over, you could offer but it looks to me as if she wants to make her own plans. The last thing in the world that she wants is for you to make decisions for her.
One thing that seems clear is that you must somehow get on speaking terms with your mother-in-law for the sake of your husband, the children, and your own too, eventually. If your inability to bridge that gap is making your husband cry, I would think you'd make every possible effort to resolve the difference no matter what it takes.
Probably his crying has to do with his weakened condition, and worry about his family and his health and dear knows what else, but still, at this time in his life it would be great if you could take one burden off his shoulders - and that burden would be this rift between the two women most important in his life, his wife and his mother.
I believe that things just SEEM worse to you because you are under great stress with your husband's surgery, and the
children, and your friends all being solicitous. Everyone is expressing sympathy and they are all sorry for you which doesn't help the mood, does it! So you have to turn all this around and try to smooth things out between you and his mother. That's the major problem at the moment.
Could you play the part? Pretend you have never had differences. Pretend you are both concerned about one thing, your husband's well-being. Pretend she is a nice person (which she probably is, after all she did raise that man you love). And play the part of a friend with her. Forget every past experience you've had with her, or her husband. Start fresh today.
I know this is no easy task but for the moment it's the only thing that will work.
And for goodness sake don't even mention her to your husband. He has enough on his plate. Lying there in the hospital with all the inconvenience that entails, he doesn't need to have your problems piled ontop of everything else.
What I'm suggesting here is for you to remove "yourself" from the equation for the moment and be somebody else. I hope you can do that.
Yours truly,
GG
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