Grandparent Favoritism

[va32h]

Thank God my mother in law is leaving in 36 hours because I swear I am going to kill her.

My oldest daughter is her favorite. Blatantly and ridiculously her favorite. It's just ridiculous.

I could give you a hundred examples of her pettiness and what I consider cruelty toward my son and younger daughter. But this incident about sums it up:

We went to Peter Piper Pizza tonight. My husband left this morning for his deployment and I wanted to cheer the kids up. We played games, etc and won tickets. Our family tradition is that we pool all the tickets at the end of the night and all three kids get to pick something from the little prize booth. Oldest dd is 12, she doesn't really care about the prizes anymore anyway.

So we're getting ready to leave and I gather up all the tickets. I say "I thought we had more than this." Then I look at MIL, who has something in her fist. "The kids all share their tickets." I explain. MIL says "Oh, that's a good idea," in this innocent voice. I hold out my hand. "We share our tickets," I repeat. And finally, she hands them over.

She had been hiding oldest dd's tickets! Stupid tickets from a pizza place for heaven's sake but God forbid her favorite not get more or better than anyone else.

I freaking HATE this woman.

 

[HelenePA]

This is exactly why we dont have anything to do with our inlaws. Once his sister had a child our kids were dirt. Actually only our girls. They still adore our son (or at least try too) and buy HIM presents for birthday's and christmas while the girls get "Ooooh I'm sorry I forgot"" I dont actually have your present yet" . next time they see our kids is when its a very cold day in a very warm place. I hate those *******s.

 

[Grumpy's Gal]

I can relate. In our "family", you only get grandparent attention if you are male. If you are a grand "daughter"................................you don't even exist.

It makes me so sad.

 

[Nynaeve]

OMG, I'm so sorry for you both! How could anyone treat their grandkids like that?

Have you said anything to them? Would they even care or would it make a difference?

 

[va32h]

OMG, I'm so sorry for you both! How could anyone treat their grandkids like that?

Have you said anything to them? Would they even care or would it make a difference?

I have had my husband talk to her (of course he's the favorite in his generation too).

I've made some comments - and when MIL didn't give my son a gift for his birthday, I mailed back the present she sent to oldest dd12 and said you give to all or you give to none.

 

[Nancyg56]

My heart is breaking over these stories. I have one DGD but would love to be blessed with more. How can any GP choose one child over another?

I have heard that people love the children of their daughter more than any of their sons, but I know that if either of my sons choose to have children there is so much room in my heart for them and my lovely child of my daughter will never mean less because there are more children.

 

[4nana]

I'm so sorry your children are exposed to such heartbreaking behavior . I love all our sweet grands dearly, incl our 2 steps like our own, so really try to be fair and treat them equally, as I know how easily feelings can get hurt. I can't imagine any DGP intentionally playing cruel games like this . I don't blame you for not tolerating this behavior at all. Obiviously she needs to have firm rules in place or risk taking the
chance of not seeing them.

 

[Biscuitsmom31]

My grandparents are like that. They pay very little attention to my kids and talk constantly about my sister's children.

I think I've said this before but when my grandma was visiting us with a friend, her friend commented on how beautiful my daughter is. My grandma responds with, "You should see my other granddaughters. They all have blonde hair and blue eyes." She said this with my dark haired, dark eyed daughter standing right there.

 

[barkley]

i think the whole 'favorites' thing is awful, but i also don't nesc. with my own kids go 'even steven' just based on their ages and interests gift wise-i mean up until a couple of years ago when ds got into game stations, his favs for toys were very inexpensive (actualy cheap o junk) so if i spent dollar for dollar buying him the same amont i spent on the couple of higher dollar items i bought for dd, his xmas gifts would have taken up the entire living room. it's more 'perception' for me in that case.

my mom is probably viewed by my sil as playing favorites with my kids. but i also know that in the back of my mother's minds she knows that the holidays (now several years past) that WE held together (incl my db, sil and her children), were the only 'whole family' events our kids attended (dh's parents attended). her kids/my brother's steps went on to a 2nd at her mom's, and a third at their birth fathers/birth paternal grandparents. my mother's way of thinking was that ours was just a a portion of thier gift receving holiday tradion where for my kids it was their's in total (and still she never overprovided in any attempt to commpensate for what she felt they missed out on).

i dunno-i just find the whole favorite dynamic in families odd. when i was first married to dh i immdiatly knew which of his sibs (actualy half sibs) was the favorit. he/his kids was constantly gifted with things. while other members of the family may have resented it i saw it as the father's way of keeping his adult son beholding to him-as though he couldn't provide for himself. and that may have been largly true. after my fil died it was a tremendous jolt of reality that every holdiay, every celbration, every actual instance of need was'nt met or moreso exceeded. those grandkids had no basis in reality of how much their parents were not providing by virtue of all the grandparents were/and their adult parent did'nt realize how my of those 'gifts' on his father's part were in reality his fathers way of providing items of need that the family WERE in need of but did'nt have to awareness to realized (if those items are already a common gift you don't realize how the rest of 'us' save to afford them therefore your basis of what a normal household budget consists of is very squwed).

 

[mom2taylorandemily]

In my mother's eyes my sisters kids are most needy so they therefore, always receive more than any of the other grand-daughters. There are 5 in all, my brother has one, and he is independently wealthy and his DD is 26 so she isn't really in need of Grandma's attention. I have 2 DDs and my girls are 8 & 11 and they don't need for anything, but they do like to have grandma come over and see them. My sister has 2 kids and quite frankly those kids according to sister, need everything and they don't have money to get it. So, out comes mom's wallet every time. My kids are starting to notice the difference and that is what really stinks, because they want to know why they don't rate with grandma.

 

[Stacerita]

Its not that easy being on the other side as a parent either. My DD is my parents favorite. I have three nephews who they love, but its obvious my DD is their favorite. Its hard to try to keep from my brother all they buy her and all the places they take her to. I try to remind them to do the same for my nephews, but they don't. I feel bad that my DD gets so much more than they do. They don't treat my nephews bad, they just treat my DD better.

 

[paigevz]

I have one favored and one less favored child. It's strange. My mother seems to go for the "oldests". My son was the golden boy. Then my brother had a son, and suddenly grandma was visiting there more often because "he's younger and might forget" her. But when I had my second son, the visits didn't switch back over. My son wasn't "younger and might forget". My brother's son still needed to see her more often for some reason. She is careful to buy them all the same, but her time and attention is what she bestows most of on the oldests.

 

[mselly13]

My DH comes from a family of divorce and put his kids through a divorce also.

DH's dad and step mom favored really weird. Step MIL favored her grandkids over FIL's grandkids. And my kids were the only grandkids on FIL's side for a long time. Her grandkids never opened gifts in front of my kids, but my kids always opened their gifts in front of her grandkids.
So there was almost like an order, step MIL grandkids, then FIL's grandkids, then my child (who was their step).
They also were weird with genders. FIL catered to the boys, so they would go to car shows and come home with $70 die cast model cars. Step MIL was in charge of the girls so my SD always came home with dollar store toys if any.
They also went to all the sporting events and stuff for her kids and never came to my kids, and even tried to get us to attend her grandkids events...she could never get it that we were busy with our own kids and she was missing out.

My mother however always treated my step kids as total equals. She even quit doing certain traditions because she could no longer afford to do for so many kids.
She does tend to do more for my brothers kids but only because my brother can't afford it and his wife is a total idiot. She never buys more toys for them but often has to buy them clothes, I even help her shop for them and I often buy them clothes also. I don’t have a problem with that, I understand why she does it and my older kids are now old enough to understand why also. I also know that if any of my kids ever truly had a need that she would be there for them in a instant without question.

 

[Briarmom]

That sucks. I think you're a saint for having your MIL around right before a deployment. There is no way in hell I could stand being with mine for a whole day alone!

Hope the deployment goes smoothly.

 

[HappyLawyer]

this is sad,
my family would not operate that way nor would we allow it.

 

[The Mystery Machine]

this is sad,
my family would not operate that way nor would we allow it.

Same here.
We are pretty outspoken and don't tolerate it. Of course our families know this and would never try such foolishness.

Op you are a saint. I would not allow the MIL to stay in my home. It would be hotel city for her.

 

[Disney Ron]

This whole DIL topic saddens me, because I am in an awful situation. My DIL have never wanted to meet me or my DS (18 months). DH was divorced and they expected him to devote himself to my DSS (16) and DSD (19). Instead of being happy. He was never suppose to date again even though his ex left him and cheated on him. They get angry at my stepchildren when the come for dinner or holidays. My DP are very loving in-laws and grandparents and fill in where they lack. I feel it is my in-laws who are missing seeing their beautiful grandson, and they missed our beautiful wedding.

I grew up with loving parents and this whole thing just baffles me. It bothers me more than DH because he is used to their wacky behavior.

** So based on the original topic, my DIL favor their other 4 grandchildren over my DS. **

Mrs. Disney Ron

 

[NikiM20]

As far as inlaws go , we dont speak to my inlaws because there is BLATENT favortism to DH brothers children, and our daughter isnt good enough.

For my mom, my sisters kids are her favorite, but my grandmother favors my DD. In my family it all evens out in the end

 

[Teacher03]

My mom died a little over a year ago, and my dad has not given any of my children birthday or Christmas gifts since. Not a card, nothing. My kids are good kids. We have been (or have always tried to be) good parents. We work hard to put them through college. My sister, who has not led a perfect life, has a son who gets $100 dollar bills handed to him regularly. He is flunking out of school. Oh, did I mention my dad paid off her house and all of her credit cards to the tune of over $50,000. Needless to say, I don't see or talk to my dad much anymore.

 

[mom2rb]

My grandparents gave my brother and I more attention in a way. We had teenage parents that divorced when they were 18. So my grandparents gave us what our parents couldn't. We even lived with them for a while. So gift wise we always received more. They also treated us more like their own children than their grandchildren. All the other grandkids got a lot of attention, it was just different. My brother just got a divorce. He worked part time and took care of his son full time. Now he is struggling, starting a new job and taking care of his son. My dad and step-mom are the same as my grandparents. My nephew gets more things but it is because he needs it. Before the divorce everything was equal. In my opinion this is not favoritism, because it is based on need.

Now if it was blatant and unjustified, my kids would stop being around that grandparent. It almost seems like a form of mental abuse.