A touch of history on SATAN....

Alright, now that I've blogged a few times about HER (here and here for example), I feel I should explain a little history. I will attempt to make a VERY long story short.

Satan (the mother inlaw) is such a #$%^&ing control freak. She likes to be the puppeteer. If she can't control you, she looks to poke at you with a stick to see if she can get you to blow up. The idiot. The further she pushes me, the more she pushes me away. The more she pushes me away, the less I want to allow my kids around her unsupervised. You'd think that she'd behave herself after the big talk with Wonderful Husband. Ugh. I could kick her.

The history here is that Wonderful Husband was conned once upon a time by Satan and my mute father inlaw. The big idea was that he joins in the family business and someday inherits it. They (Satan and the mute man) milked the business and used profits to build their new house. They convinced Wonderful Husband to have salary vs. hourly pay so that he'd have a paycheck in the winter time. A winter paycheck is a rarity in construction. It never happened.

This scheme meant that he no longer pulled in big overtime checks for his sunrise to sunset days. Working 6 days a week was the norm, but at least he'd get paid through the winter. Funny, it just didn't happen. He ended up on unemployment in the winter because the business couldn't afford to pay him. This was the 13 years ago. Things never changed.

I've written all of this off long ago, but when it comes to her whining to me about her lack of money I just want to scream. WE wouldn't be in debt if Wonderful Husband hadn't stuck by them and stayed with a dying business. He would be a stay at home dad and I would have advance my career if it were not for his commitment to keeping his parents afloat. I put my career on hold and chose to go back for teaching certification since hubby's construction career equaled long hours and he could not walk away. That was fine -- I was happy to walk away from corporate America. Going into the family friendly field of teaching had great appeal to me.

The thing is, Wonderful Husband would not be pulling his hair out trying to keep the company afloat if it were not his parents that he was trying to keep from going under (the father inlaw personally signed on all the business loans). So, Wonderful Husband is killing himself standing by them and keeping them afloat.

WE would have been better off if he'd walked away from THEM years ago. He stayed and I stood by him. You don't abandon your parents. I get it. But she wants to whine to me about money? Wonderful husband is trying to make this stupid business last until his Dad can get Medicare -- 2 more years. Wonderful Husband has gone back to school because he isn't going to inherit a business. That is just fine. He has to take one class at a time in order to be available for the failing business. I can't wait for US to be free of THEM and that business!

So SATAN makes this offer to watch the kids thinking that she'd never have to actually do it. This is my best guess for our present situation. The men now have a job to do this week and my kids are with her. And she'd complaining. Why make an offer if you are going to complain when someone takes you up on it? I was against her watching them to begin with, but let our summer sitter go thinking Wonderful Husband would be watching them these last few weeks (NOT Satan!).

Lesson learned. I'd rather pay through the @$$ than have her watch my kids again. I wish I didn't have to learn the hard way!