Dear Amy: Why, yes. Yes, you are.

[cereta]

Dear Amy: My wife and I don't see eye to eye about what it means to have your spouse's back.

Our son is 21. He just had a baby with his girlfriend, who just turned 18. They live with her parents.

He left our house because he didn't want to live under our rules once he turned 18.

I spoke to the girlfriend's father, telling him not to let our son stay there. I wanted him to learn what it means to be out in the real world in order to humble him. Yet he let my son move in anyway, since he does whatever his wife and daughter tell him to do.

My wife and I both hate his girlfriend and the way she treats our son, but my wife plays along and is fake in her interactions with them just so she can stay in her son's life. I choose not to speak to them or set foot in their home.

My wife has now done both of those things, and I feel she's not showing loyalty to me. Is it too much to ask that she not set foot in their house? The other parents and I do not get along, and it has almost come to blows, yet my wife thinks it is OK to spend time in their home to see her son and grandson. The day of the baby's birth they were talking about me, but I just ignored it for my wife and son's sake. It was hard. My wife can't understand why I am upset about her being over there.

Am I right to feel like this — or am I being a jerk?
— Furious

Dear Furious: Because you asked, I will say that, yes, you are being a jerk. Yes, spouses should have each other's back. But here's the rub: You don't control the people in this drama. Your wife wants to have a relationship with her son and grandson. And because they evidently are not welcome in your home, she is doing what she needs to do to have that relationship.

You aren't willing to support her efforts, but you should understand her desire and "have her back" while she tries.

You cannot influence other people if you don't ever spend time with them. You say your son's girlfriend mistreats him, but she is there and you are not.

I don't believe that parents should let their children walk all over them, but the walls you have put up are too high to breach. I hope you will rethink your non-negotiables.

Comments

[recessional]

I wanted him to learn what it means to be out in the real world in order to humble him.

Yeah fuck you dude. This sentence literally erased any sympathy I might have had for you at all, whatsoever, in any way. That is a shitty motivation for a parent to have, and a shitty think for a parent to want, and strongly indicates to me that you are HUGELY the problem here.

Which is to say: I MIGHT otherwise have tried to ponder things from the lw's pov and see his perspective. But with that sentence? NOPE. YOUR PERSPECTIVE IS THAT OF A JERK, JERKFACE.

[cereta]

Yup.

[recessional]

I kind of want to buy his wife and the other parents a drink. Like no wonder the other parents were talking about him - at the point that you're telling someone not to let the father of their young daughter's child be around and thus dumping all the work on her/you, these people are not going to like you!

[xenacryst]

Let's see if I can rephrase that for LW:

I wanted him to go out into the world and be crushed so he can come crawling back to me, sobbing that I was right all along.

Is that a little clearer?

You know what, LW? You don't have a monopoly on "right" in this situation. Could be that nobody has a whole lot of "right," but what you need to do is let go of the notion that your "right" is any better than anybody else's. What I see is a whole lot of "not so great" thrown in with a bit of "wrong" here and there, and there's maybe one person who's really going out of her way to address it, and you're shitting on her. So get down off your high horse and learn to live in a world where you have to turn some not-so-greats into something you can live with.

[recessional]

Actually it didn't need translating: it was fully clear from the original wording.

[xenacryst]

Yeah, I was more translating for the LW's benefit than ours, since LW apparently can't see what a jerk he's being.

[cereta]

There are so, so many things to address in this, but I'll stick to this:

Not only does this man think Being Right is more important than having a relationship with his son and grandson (who can't possibly have offended him yet except by existing), not only does he think him being right is more important than his wife having that relationship, but he thinks him Being Right is more important than his son participating in the daily care of his child. By demanding telling the girl's father to kick the son out of their house, he is attempting to deny his grandson the daily presence of his (the grandson's) father.

And he needs to ask if he's being a jerk?

[xenacryst]

I really can't add much to that.

[deird1]

"My son didn't want to obey me, so he left. So I told these people to shun him, and they didn't obey me. So I told my wife to shun them, and she didn't obey me. What is up with the universe????"

[ysobel]

It's almost like the LW isn't Grand High Poobah of the Universe.

Odd, that.

[rymenhild]

This is a case for thatbadadvice on Tumblr. A response might look something like this:

Dear Furious,

Obviously you are right. The best way for your wife to show loyalty to you, and you alone, is for her to completely ignore your son and grandson. She must choose you over them.

Also, Furious, I am surprised to hear that your son's girlfriend's parents do not like you. This can have nothing to do with the fact that you refused to house your own son and that you then expected the girlfriend's father not to house him either. But because they don't like you, your wife should not talk to them, ever.

You're not a jerk, Furious. Everyone else is a jerk. Your wife is a jerk. Your son is a jerk. Your son's girlfriend is a jerk. Her parents are jerks. You are the one righteous human in a world of jerks. I feel for you.

[cereta]

Don't forget: his son's son* is also a jerk. I bet he even cries when he's hungry.

*Upon reflection, I don't think the LW deserves to be called the child's grandfather, and the child doesn't deserve to be called this jerk's grandson.