My mother in law purchased an above ground pool last year and it got recalled. It presents a drowning risk because children have been known to climb the straps on its sides which attach to the metal frame and fall in.
I brought this up to my wife before we went to visit my mother in law (who lives in another state) and she refused to acknowledge my concerns. My wife tends to ignore issues hoping they’ll go away instead of addressing them directly and while she has no issue being confrontational to me or other people, she will let her mother walk all over her with impunity.
My mother in law was supposed to be watching the children on thanksgiving while I cooked and I took a break to notice both of my kids by her pool completely unattended. I asked them to come inside and I continued to cook. Then my mother in law starts screaming that she lost my oldest son and I run out to the pool to look for him and he’s not there. Turns out he was hiding in her room. It’s a small house and I’m busy cooking in the kitchen.
My wife heads to the store with my youngest and finally I get a break to take a shower. I ask my oldest not to go outside (because I’m worried about the pool or him running off or letting the dogs out while I take a shower)
When my wife returns from the store with my youngest son, my mother in law is crying in her room. I get out of the shower and ask what went wrong and her mom who rarely shows any emotion starts sobbing about how I don’t trust her with my kids because she heard me tell my oldest not to go outside. I hugged her and reassured her, but ever since this occurred I’ve been feeling gaslight. I brought it up to my wife tonight and she got visibly upset and started lashing out at me. AITAH? It worries me that she can’t have an honest conversation with her mother about legitimate concerns. She’ll even fight with me or threaten divorce if I press the issue like tonight.
I admit I’m not perfect and I have my issues. I love margaritas and I smoke weed but am I so wrong here?
So she’d rather put your children’s lives at risk than to enforce a boundary with her mother? She’d rather get a divorce than have a discussion with you about her mother’s issues? Obviously she needs lots of therapy. Her mother did a number on her.
Is the pool not drained or covered? Is it still warm enough for using the pool that you think your kids would be trying to get in it? How old are the kids?
Covering a pool doesn’t make it safer! If a kid climbs up and puts any weight on the cover, it goes under with them, or worse, the cover stays floating on top while the kid slips underneath. It only makes it harder for a kid who has gotten under it to be seen and rescued
Unless it’s a safety cover rated to fully take the load off person falling on it and stop them entering at all and other cover makes the pool drastically more dangerous.
I would strongly recommend couples counseling as a way to try and figure out how to work around her super weird behavior with her mom. And hopefully it will lead to your wife getting actual therapy. Because she needs it.
Either way, couples counseling will help you help your relationship and hopefully help her too.
NTA This is one of those situations where you trust your wife to handle her unstable mother. Your job is to suss out the situation and set some boundaries. Recalled pool? No worries but there will be no trips to MIL’s place until the pool is gone. This goes for anything dangerous.
PS MIL is crying so that you reassure her that you overstated the danger and she can feel good about herself again. I don’t know why you would play that game.
ESH / that recall is a bit wonky, it would take some very specific circumstances for it to cause an issue, I have one of those pools.
1. Kids need to be educated about water/pool safety. My kids have been around a pool their entire life and learned to swim by age 3 at our YMCA. They have always known our pool safety rules. Get your kids signed up for lessons right now.
2. MIL needs to ensure her pool is safe with a removable/lockable ladder, a cover, no items that could vve used to give a kid a leg up to climb in etc. Every pool owner has this responsibility.
Just because your kids can’t climb that particular pool doesn’t mean that kids can’t climb it.
I had a mom tell me that kids can’t climb out of the crib until they’re over two years old, because hers never did, and so therefore it can’t happen.
I also had three kids, two of whom were able to climb out of the crib by the time they were 10 months old.
Little shits couldn’t walk, but they could sure as hell get out of that crib.
That bit in part 2 about no items that could be used to give the kid a leg up to get in?
That’s the whole point of the complaint here.
Kids can, in fact, climb up that pool.
Even if yours cannot.
When my 28 yo was about 1 1/2 I found him asleep in the top drawer of a dresser. 4 feet up with the drawer pulled all the way out. He had climbed the drawer pulls . I was very glad I had bolted it to the wall! Very little kids have more grip strength than sense.
“more grip strength than sense”
Damn, that is exactly right!
I read this for a second as you found your 28 y/o asleep in the top drawer, and I had many questions 🤣
Your children’s lives matter more than anyone’s feelings. nta.
You’re under reacting.
Your mother in law is either clueless about safety or manipulative as fuck or both. If she’s watching the kids around the pool that is her job and she doesn’t walk off. You can’t trust her. You should say this bluntly. Your wife’s priorities are stuffed if she’s taking her mother’s side.
Pool safety is the hill to die on.
NTA
It’s a small house and she lost track of them twice while she was on duty, she refuses to deal with a recalled for safety reasons pool, and somehow you’re the bad guy? You wife doesn’t deal with her mother’s emotions because her mother taught her from a young age to tiptoe around mom’s emotions because the worst thing she could do is make her mom upset. And she’s still doing it now. Mom cried at her and now your the bad guy.