Renovations and Repayments.

kelpie35

This is unacceptable behavior from your parents.

You are a grown up, married man with a son. They are your priority, not your parents.

Your parents have enough money to hire a chef to do their cooking if they feel it is too much for them to do themselves.

Their behavior is bordering on abuse and needs to be STOPPED now.

Your wife is quite right to be very, very angry if you give up your teaching course. She can probably see, as many of us on here too, that you would make a first class teacher. Please don't allow anyone to stand in your way.

Also I can see that when you become involved with your parents that it does affect your mental health. Your son is a very bright lad for his age and he can see it is affecting how you function. Please don't allow this to happen.

Your wife and son are the most important people in your life.

Is there anyone who can intervene, on your behalf, to let your parents know just how their behavior is affecting you all as a family. If there is no one then the only thing you can do is withdraw from any communication for a while.

I do understand you have been brought up completely differently to most people on here but you need to "man up" and now is the right time to take a stand on this front. Sorry if this is a bit harsh and causes you any upset, but I really feel for you Alex and can't stand anyone bullying someone else.

Take care

littlegreenparrot

You get to decide to whether or not you do teacher training, not them.

I suggest you adopt a professional positive behaviour management technique.
So in the first instance you don't engage in the conversations you don't want to have. "I don't want to discuss that/ I don't agree with that Shall we talk about x, or really I need to go?"
You don't need to apologise or explain. Be very clear ahead of time so they know what to expect. "I've been looking at the the schedule for next week, I can come over twice on X & Z." Batch cook for them, as you know soup will happily sit in the fridge for a couple of days and its easy enough to make a sandwich to have with it.
If they don't like it, I'm sure they can manage the phone to order in, or go to the local pub!

If you are there and they talk out of turn, just tell them so and leave. Put the phone on voicemail so you can judge if you have to go over or not.
In the same way you know you cannot give in to your son when he throws a tantrum you cannot give in to them.

Apologies, this may sound harsh. But they need you more than you need them. As you have now realised you have a perfectly decent salary coming in. They have not cultivated friends and are relying on you. You get to set the terms. It doesn't mean you don't love them, (whatever they may say. It'll be the same in a few years when littleK says he hates you, because you've done something really unreasonable like ask him to pick his coat up!)

A_Frayed_Knot

AlexLK wrote: »

Because my father knows my 'phone number and won't stop calling me.

I know someone who owns a dual sim card mobile phone - that way they have a personal no. and a business no, and two different ringtones, that way they know if its personal or business calling.

Give your parents one number and everyone else the other

Might be worth an investment

AlexLK

May Targets:
Days getting longer and summer only around the corner, May is the month to sell a no longer wanted classic, I think.

Organise trip to Rutland Water with in-laws. Now have a day.
Organise Whitsun holiday. 1. Trip to R.W.
Start work on the bathroom Not today. Actually ended up having a laugh with father-in-law over it rather than being insulted.
Total Grocery Spend: £45 / £400.
Surplus Money: £70 / £1,000.
11.30pm bedtime: 0 / 31. Not going to happen tonight.
Meditation: 1 / 31. Just before father-in-law arrived I was feeling like I was going to have another panic attack. Meditation helped me put it into perspective and we had a really good evening.
Schedule / Spreadsheets: 1 / 31.
De-clutter and Sell: / 5 items.
New Recipes: / 4.
Books read for pleasure: / 3.
Learn something new or refine a skill: 1. Continue learning and applying new knowledge to create more sophisticated and streamlined spreadsheets. 2. Learn a new piece of repertoire (violin) started today. 3. Demolishing a bathroom apparently I cannot do this unless Mrs K is here to help as she can't wait to do the job :rotfl: Probably sounds a bit strange but I do love the fact she's not a "princess".

AlexLK

maman wrote: »

Nonsense!!

I'm not surprised your son prefers his own home especially as he has some unhappy memories of the way your parents have behaved towards him. I'm also 100% sure he's picked up on the fact that they make you unhappy and generally cause friction. They've only been back from Spain for a metaphorical 5 minutes and caused trouble already:mad:. Stick to your guns Alex. Let your phone switch to voicemail and answer when it suits you.
Do they have Deliveroo in the wilds of Derbyshire?;)

Of course you want him to feel welcome but he's family and you want him to relax. LittleK has made a special effort with the bread (as I'm sure you'll point out to him) but otherwise you've invited him for his company and to share your family meal. Bolognese is good.:)

I had to look up Deliveroo to find out you cannot get them here.

I'm starting to see my son sees here as home, so does my wife. I only see my childhood home as "home" because I prefer the property and the sad memories are mainly from a long time ago whereas here a lot of the sad memories are not so long ago. However, we've a lot of happy memories too. More so here than my childhood home. For a while I was estranged from my parents, I don't really want that to happen again because I think it affected their mental health.

Had a really good evening and father-in-law was really proud of my son and encouraging of the bread he'd made. When he arrived, my son ran up to him. I reacted because I didn't want father-in-law to tell him off. He picked son up and spun him around. I stood in the hall wishing my parents treated him like that rather than telling him not to run around. Father-in-law said to me that "they" made me react as I did. He's right. I don't want my son to grow up trying to please others that cannot be pleased.

My wife told me this evening she's really enjoying being a Mum now she's "chilled out a bit", took her MD's advice and stopped listening to the bitter, divorced work colleague. Think that's made my year.

Tilly_MFW_in_6_YRS wrote: »

Alex - although I'm sure this is too big a step, you really need some way of switching the relationship with your parents around.

If I were you I'd be seriously thinking of telling them to stuff their house, cash and portfolio. Live your life for you, make memories and laughter with your family unit and frankly tell your parents to 'booger' off.

You're a grown man with a family and if your parents want to be in your lives then they can fit in with you, not vice versa.

Dangling your inheritance as a carrot, whether verbally or by insinuation in order to control you, is totally unacceptable. I feel that they believe they can control you because you need their money, whether now or in the future. By telling them you're not interested removes their power completely.

Bit of a gamble 😉

Tilly

My parents have always been controlling. They go through phases of not being, especially when my father is being reminiscent and getting upset about not being a good person but generally they are controlling. I do think they seem to think they can use money to control others.

Sometimes I think about my wife and I finding work somewhere where we could buy a house with 5-6 acres, sell this house to fund it with a mortgage (can't seem to get rid of it ) and move away. Keep looking on rightmove around the Lincolnshire Wolds area currently.

kelpie35 wrote: »

This is unacceptable behavior from your parents.

You are a grown up, married man with a son. They are your priority, not your parents.

Your parents have enough money to hire a chef to do their cooking if they feel it is too much for them to do themselves.

Their behavior is bordering on abuse and needs to be STOPPED now.

Your wife is quite right to be very, very angry if you give up your teaching course. She can probably see, as many of us on here too, that you would make a first class teacher. Please don't allow anyone to stand in your way.

Also I can see that when you become involved with your parents that it does affect your mental health. Your son is a very bright lad for his age and he can see it is affecting how you function. Please don't allow this to happen.

Your wife and son are the most important people in your life.

Is there anyone who can intervene, on your behalf, to let your parents know just how their behavior is affecting you all as a family. If there is no one then the only thing you can do is withdraw from any communication for a while.

I do understand you have been brought up completely differently to most people on here but you need to "man up" and now is the right time to take a stand on this front. Sorry if this is a bit harsh and causes you any upset, but I really feel for you Alex and can't stand anyone bullying someone else.

Take care

My parents are capable of cooking. They are using it as an excuse to have me there. My wife has been a bit wary about me doing the teaching course but has seen I am committed to wanting to do it now. She wants me to have something other than my son to live for as she's concerned I'll become very ill again as he starts to become more independent. I suppose I am too. We will have been married for 11 years next month and for the vast majority of that time things haven't been easy. I don't want my parents stopping this next decade from being better for my wife and I. Probably sounds selfish but I think we deserve for things to get a bit easier.

AlexLK

littlegreenparrot wrote: »

You get to decide to whether or not you do teacher training, not them.

I suggest you adopt a professional positive behaviour management technique.
So in the first instance you don't engage in the conversations you don't want to have. "I don't want to discuss that/ I don't agree with that Shall we talk about x, or really I need to go?"
You don't need to apologise or explain. Be very clear ahead of time so they know what to expect. "I've been looking at the the schedule for next week, I can come over twice on X & Z." Batch cook for them, as you know soup will happily sit in the fridge for a couple of days and its easy enough to make a sandwich to have with it.
If they don't like it, I'm sure they can manage the phone to order in, or go to the local pub!

If you are there and they talk out of turn, just tell them so and leave. Put the phone on voicemail so you can judge if you have to go over or not.
In the same way you know you cannot give in to your son when he throws a tantrum you cannot give in to them.

Apologies, this may sound harsh. But they need you more than you need them. As you have now realised you have a perfectly decent salary coming in. They have not cultivated friends and are relying on you. You get to set the terms. It doesn't mean you don't love them, (whatever they may say. It'll be the same in a few years when littleK says he hates you, because you've done something really unreasonable like ask him to pick his coat up!)

I know this is not about the food. It's about them getting me to go there. I suppose I'm giving in to their "tantrums". I get drawn into it because they are not always like this and when they aren't like this, I hope they will stay that way but be a bit happier. They rely on me for company. When mother fell, I tried to get father involved in the local community to meet people their own age. He did and she joined him for a few months but they stopped being involved.

:rotfl: Dreading the teenage years!

A_Frayed_Knot wrote: »

I know someone who owns a dual sim card mobile phone - that way they have a personal no. and a business no, and two different ringtones, that way they know if its personal or business calling.

Give your parents one number and everyone else the other

Might be worth an investment

Didn't realise these existed. Mind, they'd only call the landline! :rotfl:

Red-Squirrel_2

AlexLK wrote: »

Didn't realise these existed. Mind, they'd only call the landline! :rotfl:

You can call screen really easily with an old fashioned answering machine.

A_Frayed_Knot

AlexLK wrote: »

Didn't realise these existed. Mind, they'd only call the landline! :rotfl:

Even better, get a caller id phone, that way, you weren't in when they phoned, you were out in the garden, or tinkering with the car, or taking a walk with your son - weren't you? "Nobody is in, they must have went out" I hear them say

cazmanian_minx

Alex, are you on Mumsnet by any chance? (Not such a strange question as it sounds, there are plenty of guys on there!) They have an ongoing thread on the Relationships forum called "But we took you to Stately Homes!" where you'll find a lot of other people dealing with difficult relationships with their parents where the parents refuse to acknowledge that anything's wrong. Some of the links and recommended books in the first post might be a help. https://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/relationships/2749701-But-we-took-you-to-Stately-Homes-survivors-of-dysfunctional-and-toxic-families

maman

AlexLK wrote: »

Mind, they'd only call the landline! :rotfl:

If that's the case then you'll be safe at school.:)