LIVID! Another event hijacked.

[Seven]

DH has been NC for 6 wonderfully silent months since the HVAC issue in April. And to recap the type of people they are...The ILs are what most people would consider uneducated.  Neither finished high school, limited vocabulary, can't articulate words, comprehension is non-existent.   if you say the sky is blue, they would immediately turn around and say it's red because that's their truth, even if it's not fact.  conspiracy theorists regardless of topic, sit inside and watch YouTube videos of gamblers in casinos all day. I wish I was kidding.

Yesterday was my nieces wedding 90 minutes away.  We had made the last minute decision to find a hotel the night before, spend Friday night on our own for a while, meet up with out of town family later on in the evening, check out of our hotel day-of, dress at the host hotel with rest of the family and then head to the venue.

No sooner does my DH get in the shower at our hotel but a call from his father comes in.  He doesn't answer.  Calls back.  "UBPDmil is in the hospital, she might not make it until tomorrow, you need to come right now". DH tells him we're not in town...actually he said we were out of state to see what kind of reaction he would get and that he doesn't know if he could get back "today".  I don't know what FIL said on the other end other than "it's not looking good"

So of course, I'm literally trembling from being triggered.  See, it seems like any time there is an important event in my life, someone has to throw a monkey wrench in it.  My mother has a history of this and now this.   Hijacked events.

So he gets off the phone.  I ask...well what's wrong with her?  Is it covid (they are both unvaxxed and she has COPD from decades of smoking. FIL is T2D)  Will the hospital even let you in? DH had asked no questions before hanging up with FIL, he just jumped.

I told him "I'm not going.  I'm not dropping everything for a last minute phone call without knowing wtf is going on.  I'm here for a wedding and not going to leave for someone who only holds contempt for me and everyone else.  The (adult) kids are coming down separately, so I have a way back home, so do what you have to do, but I'm not going"

Getting all seven siblings together for an event that is not a funeral is pretty unprecedented and I'm not going to be the one to fuck that up.  I straight up told DH, I'm being selfish.  I want my husband with me. And I understand hospitalizations such as this are not "planned".  It's an emergency.  I get it, but these people have treated us so poorly.  What can you do?  Will they let you in? What's the point of waiting in the parking lot?  She's being taken care of.  He said if he has to wait in the parking lot, at least he's there and won't feel guilty not making the effort.  No regrets. Totally understandable.

So, DH calls me mid-reception with an update.  No covid. 104-fever but it finally broke, they don't know what's wrong. Don't know what kind of tests she's already had.  Canceled a spinal tap. MIL hates her doctor and the staff is horrible...you know, the usual.   And AND... you ready for this kicker of an update?  Come to find out she's been in the hospital 3 fucking days (this was originally "freaking days" but I'm just sooo pissed that "freaking" was just not strong-enough a word)!  3 days!  But FIL has to wait until his "wife is dying" to call his son.  Couldn't have called him 3 days ago so that my DH could make an informed decision, found out info from docs or RNs BEFORE we left . Lord, if I had dropped everything and went with him, left the wedding before it started only to find out she'd been in the hospital 3 days and FIL withheld that information on purpose there would be hell on earth to pay. 

This is what they do.  They did it 4 years ago when they initiated their silent treatment..., made my uNPDm a flying monkey literally 8pm the night before MIL was going in for knee surgery.  Couldn't make the phone call themself, but "made" my mother do it (that's a whole other previous post) Purposely left out information so that DH would jump.  He didn't jump then. He was angry.  He had plans the next day and stuck to them, but made himself available when he was done.  We still had to figure out where and why she was in the hospital, what room, etc.  they purposely withhold information so that he'll jump.  And Unfortunately when it comes to medicine, DH depends on me more since that's my field. He needs me to "translate" med-speak to lay-terms and depends on me to ask the right questions. This is one of the few things he doesn't know and he can't depend on FIL for the truth (see 1st paragraph above)

Manipulation must  be such a power trip for them.

I don't regret staying for the wedding and I missed my husband terribly.

[bloomie]

Seven - Oh, the end of life medical hoover maneuver! Know it well and I am so sorry your lovely event was hijacked this way!!

Your decision to stay with your family and celebrate your niece wasn't selfish imv. It was healthy and what love looks like. For yourself and others.

And your gut... that told you this is another round of drama and chaos manufacture was SPOT ON!!!

Releasing your DH to do what he believed was best and right for him (as hard as that is, I do so understand) was an example of healthy boundaries and knowing where you end and he begins. Bravo for that!

But, it is incredibly frustrating and we have to work through the feelings that arise when once again, our happy life is hijacked. I am really glad you shared!

[Cat of the Canals]

I'm with Bloomie. You trusted your gut, and your gut *SURPRISE* was right. Good job!

I think one of the most frustrating things about dealing with PDs is that even if we handle everything right, we end up triggered in some way or pissed off. There's just no emotional "win" with a PD. 

[Seven]

Cat, you are right.  And I’m still triggered.

And another kicker I just found out.  It’s not been 3 days.  It’s been 3 WEEKS!  She’s been in the hospital 3 freaking weeks!  But FIL has to call on the day she thinks she’s going to die, which just happens to fall on my nieces wedding.

I mean, I get that he didn’t know that, but come the  freak on, man! 

But this is what I’m dealing with.  There’s absolutely no comprehension of any information and then it gets lost in translation.

I mean seriously.  What a way to manipulate DH.  Hide all the info for 3 weeks and only call because she might die.

And after 3 weeks still no diagnosis. Not even a little something?  Fever, then it broke, then this morning it’s her heart, and now a fever again. 

This goes to show how little respect they have for their son.

[Leonor]

Hello Seven,

Just jumping in to say I'm living the same soap opera. I'm probably in the next tv set over.

It's funny how the set is ALWAYS the freaking hospital. Oh, but it's the HOSPITAL. After a while, it's like, maybe you should just leave your toothbrush there, like Carrie at Big's apartment in Sex and the City.

Robert Frost said, Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to let you in. Not in my ILs family! That's the hospital, and since we're in a society with public health care, they always do let you in and you can stay for weeks!

The medical hoover maneuver (thank you, wise Bloomie, that made me laugh out loud!) is the ultimate loyalty test for my ILs and DH. After all, he can't say no to his parent in the ... HOSPITAL.

I literally have no fucks left to give for parents who put themselves in the hospital. My dad was in the hospital for liver failure due to his alcoholism and his wife got herself checked in for dehydration. My ILs are in the hospital for everything from heart failure to sinus surgery. They will not make any sensible plans for elder care, and his 104 yr old grandmother was only admitted to assisted living once she was released from the hospital after burning herself in the shower when left alone. Now my FIL is in late stage CHF, and there's still no plan except ... Last minute rushes to the HOSPITAL. Since he's called the ambulance on himself since I've known him, I don't respond.

Our spouses are so frustrating about this! I'm tired of  rushing to support my dh as he freaks out about another heart attack that was or was not. I am solid NC and so are my kids. If dh wants to join the run-around-like-a-headless-chicken dance, that's on him.

Good for you, for showing you and your dh what healthy looks like. And since mil was there for weeks before and is still with us, then there really wasn't a need to rush to her side.

I just think of the National Weather Service bulletin:

"This is a test of the National Weather Service Alert System. This is only a test."

Beeeeeeeeep.

[Andeza]

Anybody familiar with the "Nope" meme? I think it's extremely applicable here. Pd family member in the hospital? Nope!

Just gonna nope right out of that melodramatic nightmare worthy of soap opera status. Or Jerry Springer... 

I'm glad you stayed for the wedding seven. I'm sorry your dh dropped everything to jump as you say. I suppose he may be the type to carry guilt if he missed saying goodbye on her deathbed. Not me!

[Leonor]

Andeza, that is so awesome, I did not know about the nope meme and now I am scrolling through them, laughing out loud.

There's one of Julie Andrews with her arms spread wide over the Alps twirling in her dirndl with the text "Look at all the nope!" It reminds me of Bloomie, who has the most gracious way of saying NOPE to the nonsense living her boundaries.

[Seven]

Now the phone call this morning is FIL needs to deposit a check and he doesn't know how to do it.  Doesn't know he can find his checking account number ON the checks.  Literally this is the kind of intelligence we're dealing with.  The man is only 74.  They know only what they need to in order to survive.  Everything else they are ignorant to.

And "everyone in the hospital is a trainee!  No one knows what they're doing.  Everyone here is horrible.  No one will feed her.  I can take better care of her at home". You know the spiel.  I mean, dude, you're there.  Fucking feed her.

Oh, when she was first being treated he took her to a stand-alone emergency center (not an urgent care, but a straight up emergency center) affiliated with a hospital system "A".  Nothing wrong with the hospital system "A", it's just the home-base hospital is farther away than the religious-based other hospital system "B".  When the emergency center sent her for admission they ambulanced her over to their home hospital, right? This is not new to the ILs.  They've done this before.

So DH asked FIL why he didn't have her ambulanced the 5 miles to  hospital "B". Know why he didn't?  Cause it would cost $800 (these people have more money than they are capable of spending)  Can't transfer her care now because there are no beds available.  Then I get a story about how she's literally in a "storage room".  That they had to wait 12 hours to find her a room and it was a "storage room".   Her care is by a hospitalist since she wasn't admitted by an attending physician, but by the emergency room.  Her usual cardiologist came by and said nothing wrong with her heart.

These people make really poor decisions and I believe none of his embellishments.  That's what made DH go NC this time around.  Photographic evidence that whatever FIL was saying was absolutely false.  The constant victim.

[bloomie]

Seven - I think of this kind of faux helplessness as willful or deliberate ignorance to avoid responsibility and tether others to them. Helplessness is powerful and kicks up so much FOG.

Making a mess of your mil's admittance to the hospital, not communicating or asking for support in the moment or even within a few hours of whatever is going on medically, showing poor judgement time and again and then... what do ya know now your in laws are miserable and terribly unhappy and it is the hospital's fault!

Seeing the solution to their problems as outside of themselves - from figuring out how to deposit a stinkin' check... is the definition of immaturity and a refusal to take full responsibility for the aspects of their life they don't want to deal with.

Your in laws might have have to clean up their own messes and deposit their own checks if no one steps in to rescue them in their self orchestrated emergency that is still going on though the initial issue happened several weeks ago. 

It seems like they make a mess, twist it further into a snarly guilt producing, shame inducing, dysfunctional knot and then drop it helplessly at your DH's feet.

There are medical social workers that can figure out mil's placement if she indeed needs to be transferred and your fil/mil are the ones who can ask for help with that. A hospitalist is a highly trained and perfectly acceptable health care provider for your mil. Clearly she is in a bed, in a room, and even getting specialized (Cardiac eval) care.

Seven... I have lived this. My own mil visited - because it is the highlight of her life - the ER/Urgent Care 8 times in about 15 months. Sometimes by ambulance, sometimes by DH dropping everything and taking her, sometimes by having a random person take her and us finding out mid route or after she was ensconced in a hospital bed (ironically, given your mil's storage room claims, once she was in an alcove because they did not have a bed for her).

Each time it somehow coincided with events in our life. Celebrations, holidays, our anniversary or travel plans. Each time her symptoms were vague and unwitnessed. Each time extensive tests were run, often she was admitted and nothing was found and the issues simply somehow resolved when enough of a flurry had been stirred up never to be spoken of again.

I stopped keeping track of all of it, because it truly is impossible to, and I stepped back from being involved at all beyond kind, benign supportive comments for the sake of my own peace of mind and because all of this for me, can be fertile ground for bitterness and resentment to spring up and I just don't want that in my life. I do this so imperfectly, but that is what my goal is - to disengage and be diligent about uprooting any potential for harm from it.

I know that the medical hoover and deliberate ignorance you describe are just pieces of a dysfunctional puzzle that is maddening as our DH's sort through what is truly theirs to do with all of this. Time and again our lives are upended by this and in our humanity and good character we struggle with how/when/if to disengage.

I hope the validation and sharing of these deep frustrations that come from no-win, entrenched relational dynamics in your in law's functioning is a help right now. We get it and wish these were edifying and loving familial bonds and this were not so soul sucking and energy draining.

[Leonor]

"It seems like they make a mess, twist it further into a snarly guilt producing, shame inducing, dysfunctional knot and then drop it helplessly at your DH's feet."



And all crises that are not emergencies at all, but things that are a part of life and that halfway decent people would communicate about. Makes me 

... But thank you, Seven and Bloomie, for creating this space for us healthier spouses to share.

Bloomie, can I ask how you navigated the medical maneuver hoovers with your dh?