My son is driving me crazy. He's a tRumper.

[TigressDem]

I was thinking we were beginning to have some halfway civilized conversations and then he blew up over something today and I just want to write him off, but that means I write off the grand kids too.

My sister has older kids that are having issues. One daughter "S" is a off and on meth addict. So when "S" is clean, my sister lets "S" see her own daughter who my sister is the guardian for due to "S" is not a healthy parent.

My sister had the "audacity" (my son's words) to hurt his kids feelings. She bought tickets to a water park so that my son's 3 kids could attend a B-Day party with the daughter of "S". The water park is like 5 cities away from my sister's house, but she drove everyone out there (because it was really close to my DIL's parents house where they are house sitting) and called my DIL to say they were picking up the cupcakes and would like to meet at the water park.

Everything was fine until my DIL found out that "S" would be there at her daughter's birthday party. She often leaves these events early but her daughter was having so much fun "S" stayed a bit longer.

My son is blowing up about it (because it cut down the time his kids could be there by 4 hours) and doesn't want anything to do with that side of the family any more because he wants to support my DIL's sobriety - "S" got DIL the meth and DIL fought the issue for 3 years and is finally keeping it together.

Now if he said this calmly, it would be one thing, but he is screaming at me and my sister for wrecking his children's lives.

I told him he is over reacting and he says, "No" I have am tired of bending over and not being heard about this."

As I see it my sister bent over backwards to accommodate them and it was a free water park invite that he chose to pass by for reasons that we can support.

In fact, my sister said she will make a special trip to pick up the grand kids on another day to take them without the involvement of "S".

My son rejects this as any kind of solution.

He is so unreasonable. One thing he said is that if "S" shows up at his house, she will get a shotgun in her face and my son doesn't care if he goes to prison for it. He will "probably" give her the chance to just leave, but not certain about that. He is off the wall on this issue and many others.

What do people do in this kind of situation?

I can't just ignore it, normally my son and his family live with me (rent free - but he blames me because they had a chance at section 8 but I wouldn't sign saying they paid rent for a year because they haven't and I refuse to lie in that manner and wind up in prison for welfare fraud.)

[leftieNanner]

1. I'm so sorry you are going through this

[TigressDem]

6. Thank you.

This is my last weekend with them away from the house and I need to go up and cook a bunch of stuff for the week.

But I've been depressed about long term living with them and just wanting to move into a tiny home, and sell this place so they HAVE to go somewhere else.

[Prof. Toru Tanaka]

10. Do it and don't feel guilty about it.

you have raised them to adulthood and now it is time for them to take care of themselves and their families.

You deserve to take care OF YOURSELF FIRST. Good luck with everything and all the best to you!

[TigressDem]

13. Thanks

Just another reason that tRumpism is a plague on our nation.

It's driving families apart.

[MOMFUDSKI]

18. Great advice

and take care of yourself. Years ago I told a therapist my daughter was driving uninsured and I was aghast. Therapist said she got all the values you brought her up with and does know better but to realize she is now grown up and has to make her own decisions. Ok then.

[TigressDem]

32. They say insanity is hereditary... you get it from your kids.

That is an exaggeration and somewhat of a cop out, but.....

The love we invest and when we see it turn out like this... just boggles the mind and cranks on the heart.

I've been telling him, I don't want to talk to you about guns. I did not raise you to use them and even though I am fine with you hunting and using them for self defense, I just don't want to hear (other applications that border on crazy) any more about them at all. You know how I feel and we just have to agree to disagree.

So we actually have ratcheted down those conversations. He says he's not looking for reasons to go use his gun... but he did enjoy shooting squirrels that were attacking his lumber business at one point. Apparently red squirrels are really pests in that situation.

My segue from him not looking for reasons to use his gun became... Yeah, you could always find some squirrels to shoot if you got really bored. It defuses the conversation.

Dang, I feel like I'm in a mine field, constantly defusing the conversational bombs around me trying to get out of this in one piece.

[XanaDUer2]

2. Sounds awful

I'm so sorry.

[TigressDem]

5. It is.

Thanks

[XanaDUer2]

7. I'm a believer of not keeping toxic relatives in my life

I don't have children, so it's easier for me.

[TigressDem]

9. I am close to putting down some serious boundries.

If it were just him, I'd let him go live on his own, figure it out.

It's more the grand kids at this point.

[Prof. Toru Tanaka]

11. What sucks is they can hold your emotions hostage by using their children as pawns.

[TigressDem]

14. True. nt

[wryter2000]

3. K&R

Can't help, but I can give you a kick.

The one thing I will say is you were absolutely right about not signing that document. You might have been breaking the law if you'd signed it. You don't owe him rent free rooming. You can do it if you want, but you don't owe him.

[TigressDem]

4. Thanks.

Yeah, I just don't want the grand kids to be homeless.

I love my son, but I don't recognize him any more.

[TigressDem]

8. My parents used to joke about "Moving and leaving no forwarding address for us kids"

Once we became teens, this was the humorous way of telling us we were getting on their nerves.

It happens to all families. Kids grow up and they are their own people. Doesn't make them easy to live with though.

[Skittles]

17. does NOT happen in all families

when I was a teenager it was my parents who went off the rails

[TigressDem]

30. Yeah, my son has a good friend whose family is horrible.

Kid is aces, though.

Course, it isn't someone he speaks with much any more.

Ironic.

[MOMFUDSKI]

19. My mom always told us kids

that "You made your bed; now lay in it". Worked great.

[TigressDem]

33. He's been getting personal responsibility lessons since age 2.

I gave him choices that were acceptable and he got to make decisions, but told him what those choices meant in age appropriate terms (we were in therapy, what can I say?).

When he was young, I put him on time out, but as a hyperactive kid it was hard on both of us for him to sit while upset. So I bought a mini trampoline that people use to exercise and that was his time out spot. He had to bounce on it for the whole 5 minutes. It was such a different mind set for him, he asked, "Can I keep jumping on it?" after the 5 minutes were up. "Yeah," I said and it was a new era in our discipline scenarios. Previously, he would get another 5 minutes of time out when he would blow up or go off the rails during time out. Having the trampoline got his energy out even during the "cabin fever" months. So less time outs in general.

BUT he got used to that and so I started taking him on "laps" around the apartment complex where his number of laps began as something like 2 and would go up to 20 or 30 because he would resist and fight over it. Then he got the option of cooperating to bring down his laps and usually would work it down to somewhere around 5 or so by the time he became calm enough for the actual conversation of You did X, I need you to do Y and apologize for your behavior.

As a teen my best talks with him were on road trips.

[Maraya1969]

23. I remember sitting near my uncle one Thanksgiving and hearing him say that if they

had to do it over they'd have, "Three cats and no kids"

So there you go.

I do not talk to my brother or his family because of their nutty Trump/white Christian evangelical craziness. We started getting along better when my mom was dying but shortly after her death he was back to being the same old bastard I had remembered. And I'm sure I have not been the nicest to them either.

I don't have any kids. I just know that where cults are involved there is no making sense of people. Just take care of yourself and don't bathe in guilt!

[TigressDem]

29. Thanks.

Ironically, maybe the people who decide they shouldn't have kids because of the drama they grew up in, might actually make good parents. But then subjecting them to the rest of the family... ewwww.

He wasn't always this bad. He likes to go hunting and is on the 2nd amendment band wagon. We are also living in Minneapolis and though he initially was stepping up to keep the minorities safe by videoing cops stopping some Latinos during the curfew, when they had let about a dozen white carloads pass... son was on our own porch and even stepped into the house with the door open and the cop had a rifle scope aimed at his chest. He stood UP for their rights, but doesn't believe if anyone pulls a gun on a cop that they have any rights at that point.

That tiny bit got him onto the OAnan and TikTok videos telling him everything else was FAKE NEWS so he thinks I am the misguided one.

[niyad]

12. just sending huggggggs. It is a very unhappy and stressful situation. I agree, sell and get

a tiny house.

Your DU family is here for you,

[TigressDem]

15. hugggggs appreciated.

[zuul]

20. I'm so sorry you're going through this.

I can’t tell you what to do but i can send you . . .

[TigressDem]

27. Thank you.

are good.

[multigraincracker]

21. Sorry to hear this.

I'm an old man now and when ever drama starts, I look at my watch and say "sorry, I have to leave now" and then head for the hills. Seems to work for me.

[TigressDem]

28. Yeah, I learned to hang up the phone when people get abusive.

Ironically, you would understand my original reasoning.

I called my son's dad on a pay phone to keep my location secret. We'd left him because he started drinking again and becomes Dr Hyde (tried to kill me at least once) and I was done with that.

So part way into the call I realized I was PAYING to get verbal abuse over the phone. Told him if he didn't stop being abusive I was going to hang up and when he ranted on, I did. Kept that up for the remainder of dealing with him. He'd get a warning and then the phone went dead.

I guess it took the concept of I AM PAYING TO GET VERBAL ABUSE ON THE PHONE LINE to set a firm line in my mental sand that was not going to be crossed again.

[multigraincracker]

31. I've packed up and moved

Many miles away, even to a new state to get away from drama. Then not giving out address or phone number. Has worked great. Met lots of new folks too.

Good luck.

[TigressDem]

34. It's a thought.

[questionseverything]

22. Your son needs to understand his wife's sobriety is on his wife and no one else

It was his nieces birthday, her day not his or his kids

Bless both you and your sister for trying so hard to keep the children’s lives “normal “ as can be

[TigressDem]

26. Yeah, his kind of "support" of her sobriety wouldn't pass 12 Step smell test.

Ironically, the mother of said niece who is someone hard to trust and may have even threatened to have people kill his whole family during a heated argument..... again we support him keeping his kids away from her.... but she has a new boyfriend who seems to be a decent person. This guy was taking the niece on the water slide and it was giving her a great birthday experience. (Minus missing her cousins.)

The niece gets financial support from her biological father, but not much more. He's never mean, but he's not there.

This was one of those rare occasions where my great niece was having a positive "daddy figure" day and no one wanted to crash on that and ruin her day telling "S" that she had to go so the cousins could have some time, because it meant that she'd be taking that positive "daddy figure" away as well.

No one's life is perfect and we are all perfectly within our rights to set personal boundaries, but enforcing our boundaries on other people and acting like EVERY minor infraction is a life threatening scenario is a kind of crazy all of it's own. I worry about my son and his kids, but also think if I share this part of the story he might understand why the situation went on longer than it usually would.

"S" usually lasts about 10-30 minutes on one of these supervised visitations with her daughter. Maybe she really is trying to turn her life around and this guy is part of that. Hard to say. But it isn't our place to judge that one way or another either. It would be nice, though.

[left-of-center2012]

24. Your son was screaming at you?

That alone would end any interaction I had with a son.

[TigressDem]

25. Yeah, I did hang up the phone.

But mostly he was "venting" about how unfair it all was at a high volume.

It was when he told me we weren't being "accommodating" that I replied, "I'm sorry free rent for how many years? I think I've been VERY accommodating."

Then he told me, "That would have been over long ago if you had just signed the papers."

So I said, "NO, it's not up to ME to lie for you. If you wanted a paper saying you paid rent, then you should have paid rent."

AND I hung up. Knowing this is a cyclic argument that neither of us ever "wins" I simply refused to keep engaging.


I think the best analogy I can give him is that it's like my sister built in handicap access to her home and invited him to visit, but another relative also came who was toxic in his viewpoint, so sister offered to let them know when she left or offered another day.

There is accommodation in everything my sister did and we support his right to keep his kids away from someone he considers toxic, but can only do so much.

All the "accommodations" are still in place. My sister still has tickets to the water park for his kids. She is still willing to make a long trip (about 5 cities away) to meet them and spend time with them without her grown daughter there so the kids can have a full day of fun on my sister's dime.

If he doesn't think that is enough, if he decides to push that side of his family away, it's his own loss.

My sister is among the best people I know. Kind and caring and thoughtful. He wants to push that away, he's an idiot. He's an adult and free to make his own choices, but in my opinion it's a self defeating choice.