Sunday 30 December 2018

My daughter (2) misses her terrible Aunt.


(Really long. Sorry. TL-DR: My SIL keeps throwing away my daughter's shoes. Tired of the disrespect for my parenting, I've cut contact. But my 2 year old misses her and is breaking my heart.)My sister-in-law is really self absorbed and narcissistic and really just a chore for me to be around. She constantly says hurtful things without having a clue as to how she sounds to the person she's taking to. The example that sticks out most for me is when she called me panicking because my mom didn't answer the phone. I told her I had just spoken to Mom an hour before, she was packing for a trip and likely too busy to answer the phone. SIL responded, "But it's me. She doesn't ignore my calls." As if SIL is more important to my mom than any of her biological children or anyone else she knows! I've never had a conversation with SIL where she didn't drop some minor but hurtful line like that. But she's good with small children and my daughter loves her, so I bit my tongue and let it go.In October, SIL decided I don't know how to buy shoes for my child. After a visit with SIL, my daughter came home in a new pair of shoes a size and a half too big. The next time I saw SIL I asked where the old shoes were and she said she'd thrown them away. I explained that the shoes she had bought were to big and asked her to consult me in the future about such things. Then I let it go because we were at my mom's birthday party.A few weeks later, SIL was picking my daughter up to babysit her. She wanted the shoes she had bought. I told her again that those shoes were too big. She snapped at me that she's taken a parenting class and knows about shoes so just go get them. Since I was already ten minutes late for work by the time she'd even showed up to pick up my child, I gave her the shoes and avoided an argument.The day before Thanksgiving, SIL picked my daughter up from daycare and kept her overnight. When I went to take her home, she once again had new shoes. And when I asked for the old ones, once again, she'd thrown my child's shoes in the trash. At that point I'd had enough. In less than polite terms, I explained how I'd had my daughter's feet professionally measured in real shoe stores three times since this started, and every time she's been a 5 1/2. That SIL clearly didn't know as much as she thinks she does. And that she wouldn't be spending any more time around my daughter. She stood in front of her door refusing to let me leave until I apologized and yelling at me to put my daughter down so she could fight me. My brother had to pull her away so I could get out of there.Needless to say, I haven't gone back there and she hasn't babysat my daughter. But for the last week, little girl has been periodically crying and begging, "I wanna go to auntie's house." It breaks my heart and I have no idea what to say to her. I don't want to tell my daughter something bad about someone she loves so much. But I cannot let SIL be around my daughter unsupervised. And I cannot be around SIL without it getting ugly. Two days ago I finally cracked and told my daughter, "We can't go to auntie's house because auntie is mean to mommy." She hasn't asked to go since then, but I'm really not sure if I did the right thing.I don't know if I need advice, or just ranting. But this has been eating me up. via /r/Parenting http://bit.ly/2EVR5vE

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