[mikevet]

this may take a while , but I want to paint an unbias picture.

met wife in college. Parents married and she was oldest of 4 kids... 11 year gap b/n wife and next sibling. Dw never met any g parents, they all died early on. Mother is a cat hoarder (spelling). She has around 80 cats. I am a vet... think this relationship was arranged? :)

FIL and wife and youngest sibling always had strained relationship with him. He is a number and math freak... they could not understand math etc, so therefore they were always being fussed at for not understanding things and not seeing things as he did. They learned over time to just say things to make him feel good, and everything would be good. If they voiced opinion, he would belittle them and go as far as calling dumb a$$ etc... my wife had a low self esteem because of this, and my SIL still does, but she (SIL) now still only 24 years old. I knew he had a temper, and he would show it on occasion. Dw never would stand up to him as she thought this was disrespectful. She would take his verbal abuse, and then after he leaves, she cries her eyes out.
my FIL is an electrical engineer. I have know my wife for 14 years, and of this time my FIL has only lived at home for maybe 1.5 years sporadically. He has lived as far as kuwait for work. (he is lebanese by the way.) he has been working like this for the past 16 years. So my MIL was left to raise 3 children as my wife was grown and in college, but she lived at home to help mother.
I went to vet school and my wife, to please her father, went to optometry school and now owns her own clinic. I think she thought this would make him accept her. Well, after 5 years of long distance relationship we got married in '03.
we had twins in '06. They are the first grandkids on both sides of the family. So, we do our best to divide time b/n both families at xmas etc...
I never try to get involved when FIL has a blow up moment. I just quietly watch, and then begin to figure out how to console wife.
this is leading up to 3 instances recently that has/is causing real problems... now that dw is a dr and gained confidence, she is able to see what he has done to her and doing to SIL. Here are 3 big problem blow ups...
1)xmas '06-we had xmas eve for dw family at our house. Xmas lunch we spent at my mothers (father past away). We spent 5 hours there (at my mothers house) plus used this time to see my g parents. The twins were only 9 months at the time so we had to coordinate around naps. We left to spend the rest of the day/night with dw family(which we did the night b/f also). On the way, I had a call from a vet tech that a boarding dog had just died while closed on xmas day. So, we had to stop at the hospital, and I had to locate dog's family in mexico. This took a little while, but I felt it was important. Because it was taking a while, dw fed kids. Well, MIL/FIL called and cussed out dw for not being there on time. They felt that since my father had died, they should be getting more time because they are 2 and my mom is one. They did not understand about the dog, and made dw cry and belittled her more. We went , but I was so upset about the dog, I didn't care what they were saying.

2)this xmas... FIL comes home from trinidad to visit from work for xmas holiday. He brings a dog with him from trinidad. Xmas day, this dog bit 12 people b/f we showed up to their house. FIL was p.o'ed because he thought everyone was provoking bites. Being a vet, I watched and the dog was not mean, but it did not know how to act with multiple people around and would react by charging and biting. He was upset that I didn't want my 1.5 y.o.'s near the dog. He would not put the dog outside because it was dark. He became so inraged about this that he hid in his room half the night and did not tell his g kids or us bye at the end of the evening and stayed in his room in the dark. I made it a point to bring g kids back there to tell their grand parent merry xmas. I was upset about this because they will never get to see my father and tell him merry xmas etc. and he was taking it for granted. I was not rude, but I felt it important for them to see grandparent. I knocked said good bye and we were off.

3) 2/24/08-MIL/FIL came to our house to watch g kids while we went out for dinner. I am currently building a new hospital and excited about it. So, I showed FIL plans. His 1st comment was, " well you are a bigger dumb a$$ than my daughter!" this was from a 4 second review of a survey of land. It was as though it was a jealousy issue. He continued to belittle me, and he became raged when I said that an 18 wheeler could not fit through a drive way on the picture. MIL came over and told him to cool it. She did it discretely. He then raised his voice and told me to stick the paper up my a$$ and dropped the f work and used every slang word in the matter of 1 minute. He then said he would never step foot in our house again. He said he was going to do us this favor and watch the kids then never come back again. I calmy explained that we do not talk this way in front of our children. He told me that I don't tell him what to do with my f'ing children. So, I asked him to leave. Dw came over and stood up to him like I have never seen before and defended me as well. I was very proud. It was definitely the mother hen syndrome. At this point, I raised my voice and told him to get out now. The kids were upset, so I scooped them up and went in their room, turned on sound machine and started reading a book to them. He told dw that he was very mad at her for changing her last name, because now they feel like she disowned them after all he did for her growing up. This went on for about 2 minutes then they left.

today, dw goes and speaks to her mother about all of this. Mother will not confront her husband on issue and says he was right. She is doing so that that he won't blow up at her. Dw went through issue by issue and at this point and MIL agreed that he has a problem. He claims that he does not remember ever saying any of the things he said. He claims the only thing he remembers is that I got mad and threw him out of my house. At no point did I appear angry and thought I handled the belittling well trying to ignore it mostly.

my dilemma is that I want my kids to have a relationship with their gp's. However, my FIL expects me to apologize as he feels like he did nothing wrong. My argument is this... if anyone comes into someone else's house and starts hollering obscenities, who should leave? Whose house is it? We asked him to leave as he was upsetting our kids. Dw and I never said one bad word or belittled him during entire ordeal. I even tried to explain why I showed him my plans which was because I valued his opinion, as my father was dead. He would only continue to tell me to shove that f ing paper up my a$$e etc etc etc...

I know no one reading this knows me, but I am a very compasionate person with a level head. I was raised as an only child with 2 great parents who instilled excellent values in me. Depsite his anger, I stayed as calm as I could, but as I looked down and saw my ds quietly crying next to the couch, my heart sank to the lowest spot ever. I then got upset and told him to get out now, then I left with the 2 kids into their room and shut the door.

from knowing him, if I try to confront him and try to explain everything. It will boil over again. Dw and MIL agree. MIL thinks I should act like it was all my fault and take the blame which I am not willing to do. Not because I am above that, but because I know this will happen over and over again. Any suggestions on how to handle this!? One problem is that twins birthday is in 3 weeks. I don't want them to suffer and miss out on there paw paw not being there. However, he missed 1st birthday and their birth due to out of country. I told dw that I would pay for counseling sessions for all 4 of us to attend. Dw does not think he would go for that. I agree, but what else can I do?

I know there is more than one side to every story, but I really tried to be as unbias as I could.

thanks for listening, and I await suggestions.

[oneguyinohio]

I think you are right in that you thought of your kids first.

Congratulations to both of you on such nice career success as well!!

I've been through the humbling myself trying to appologize to a father in law... before... and to this day I think I was right... he was overstepping the boundaries... but in order to keep peace I told him it was just too much stress for us to deal with at the time... I'm not telling you to give in to him by any means.

You can tell him that you would like your children to get to know him, but there are certain ground rules that you expect to be followed. You house is your castle, and your kids are your treasures. He needs to respect that or stay out of your kingdom.

You and your wife should discuss those rules ahead of time. Such as the language, no put downs of any of your family, etc... that you are in full agreement with.

I'm still trying to figure out what was the importance of the large truck getting in the driveway... Is that something you are going to need for your business? Another thought is that he may need to do the put down stuff due to some inferiority issues he is dealing with... or not dealing with very well personally...