I am currently living at my late Brother’s place whilst looking after his family (his Wife and two children). My Sister in Law is 45 and the relationship we have is purely a Brother-Sister relationship. We spend family time together but other than that I cook my own meals and she cooks for the Kids etc. She is welcome to share my things and vice versa but since I only got to know her well after my Brother’s death (a few months ago) we have always kept that distance as a necessity. She has been a bit of control freak and have had control over just about every little eye flicker that I can think of ever since I can remember. So I once told her politely and it didn’t do me much good. Then as the months went by my approach became more aggressive and I literally told her that if she doesn’t change, her children will be victims and will turn out just the way she is now and I then pointed out her faults in the process. My brother died of an alcohol problem and this has been an issue for just about all of us in the family. My Parents blame her for not looking after my Brother and letting him literally drink to death and she blamed them. Alcohol made my bro lose his job and literally drive the whole house insane (or so I’ve been told). Christmas was good and we had really swell time. I surprised everyone with my overnight last minute decorations. But the day after that she started pointing out my ‘little’ mistakes again. So I told her that I have had enough and that I will be leaving in a few months time. Without even asking why she just said OK. This shook me up so much that I wrote to her next day and told her the real reason why I was leaving. I also told her that my Brother’s death was a blame shared by all of us. Sure she was angry (and for a good while) but we made up just in time for the New Year. Yesterday however things went through the roof. It was a petty issue. We have a small rodent problem and we both agreed to set up some mouse traps to remedy the situation and without poisoning them. But she had a few poison traps set up out of sight without my knowledge. She never told me that she had done this nor did she say otherwise. When I saw this, I attacked her verbally also indirectly accused her of being responsible for my Brother’s death for letting him drink that much. But she did take care of him the best way she could and she worked hard to keep the family together regardless of the setbacks even through my Brother’s unemployment (which was literally years). Before this I used to praise her so much for the brave efforts she had made in the past for keeping the family together no matter what. But yesterday I did the very opposite. This morning she asked me to leave the house. But after an apology she told me she will let me stay if it were to never happen again. I love the Children very much and I would like to be part of this family. I would like to be a good Uncle and at the same time be the best Brother-in-law I can possibly be. My Sister-in-law is suffering from a few medical conditions; high blood pressure and arthritis; both of which I forgot during the heat of the argument. She did have her share of bitterness during the argument but this is irrelevant as I shouldn’t have reacted so intensely to her remarks in the first place. I have taken a good deal of DB advise over the phone and read a few of the books etc for many other issues but I think the community here is in a better position to offer me some advise.
I'm sorry to hear of your brothers passing. However, no one is responsible for his death. No one held the bottle to his mouth and made him drink. BLAME gets us no where. Read what Michele has to say about the blame game. It does put the person being blamed on the defense, it doesn't work and only makes things worse.
If you learn how to DB it will make a huge difference in your relationship with your SIL. It will even change her reactions towards you.
Regarding the poison traps...SIL. I thought we decided to not poison the rodents, is there a reason you changed your mind?
Actually she changed her mind. It's no longer an issue for me. But the fact that I wasn't asked really bothered me. Can you give me some immediate pointers to get me back on track? From the book, which specific chapters do you think I should read first?
