Mil and I had lunch today!
I intentionally began our conversation spending a lot of time talking to her about the trip itself - the food, the entertainment, the hotel and the play in London, what they did in Greenwich, etc.
Eventually I turned to talking about Bob. I think I have a huge advantage over sil in that I am not nearly as emotionally invested as she. The long and the short of it is that they are clearly continuing to talk about her moving up here. She said Bob would have her move in tomorrow/doesn’t want her to go back home on Friday. I think he is giving a hard sales pitch on the benefits of the CCRC.
I tried to only point out facts - I said nothing negative about Bob. She is the one who would be making all the sacrifices - the financial impact plus leaving her town of 65 years, selling her home, leaving her friends, neighbors, card groups, and her church (should have thrown in docs and hairdresser!). She got angry at one point in the convo and said, “Daughter is totally against this!” I didn’t address that directly - she’s not wrong; my sil is totally against this. Instead I replied, “Mil, if after only spending a month face-to-face with a girl ds decided to completely uproot his life and move to a different town and get married, I would be very concerned.” I acknowledged that she isn’t 28 years old as ds is, but this was moving very fast. That’s when she said she wouldn’t do anything until the end of the year. Something Friend D had already reported.
I then asked her directly, “If you moved up here, would you marry him?” and she said, “Yes.” I asked why she would feel a need to do that and she said because of her upbringing. I find this completely silly given what they are clearly doing now, but I didn’t point that out.
She has NOT liked dealing with Bob being sick. She has NOT liked taking care of him. She said he has been grumpy and unpleasant. I pointed out that many people are that way when sick. Her response was, “He needs to be healthy!” Ummmmm, okay. I simply told her that wasn’t guaranteed - for anybody. I said you could move up here, and he could have a stroke two days later.
You could have a stroke two days later! All that to say, I think his sickness has been a good reality check for her.
She has also said he likes spending all their time together. She has told him she needs friends. I do think she sees some, “cons,” related to Bob and making a move.
Anyway, I felt good about our conversation. I think things are awfully tense between her and sil. And between her and some of her friends. They ALL tend to sort of overreact and, “attack,” her judgment and tell her reasons why she shouldn’t move forward with this. I suppose I sort of did that, too, but I stayed calm and acknowledged that she gets to make her own decisions.
@blossom - on the communication. I do not disagree that an adjustment in expectations on communicating frequency may be warranted. However, I think most of our frustrations have been with mil not following through with what she has said she would do. As an example, Mil and I had previously talked about lunch. I didn’t throw this offer up 15 minutes before noon and expect an immediate reply. We talked about it days ago. Had previously decided on Wednesday. Then with the sickness, she said she would touch base after Bob’s MD appointment about whether we should go. She didn’t. I had to reach out to her. She said she would message sil and me after the play in London. She didn’t. She said she, “hoped to be texting us from Atlanta.” She didn’t. They had a five hour layover. We waited 2.5 hours after they landed before we texted her. So, the main frustration is her claiming she will communicate and then not. Perhaps she is forgetting, but it just feels inconsiderate.
