Letters to the Editor
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My Policy
For a couple of years in my 30s, my brother, sister, my husband and I shared a house, and it was a disaster! It seemed like it would be fun, but those go down as a couple of the worst years of my life. All the growing up I'd done, my entire adult self, seemed to vanish completely as the three of us slid right back into the roles we had while growing up, leaving us acting like moody teeagers, living in different parts of the house, while my poor husband playing peacemaker.
Okay, it was a mistake, and it's over, because I learned an important lesson: don't put yourself in the position of keeping old family cliches alive. Just don't feed it. Don't behave the way they expect you to behave. Stay off each other's turf. Be like neighbors, visiting occasionally, catching up on chit-chat and being on your best behavior. We all put on our company manners in certain situations - just extend those manners to family.
I have a lot of friends who idealize the idea of treating friends like family, and I think that can be a mistake. That policy seems to introduce low expectations, grudges that never die, and worst of all, the idea that "you love me so you have to accept me the way I am." No. I think, contrarily, that we'd be better off treating family as friends, connected only out of choice and who must, therefore, treat each other well.
It's impossible to tell in the LW's account how much blame goes where; I can easily imagine a letter from the sister and brother to Cary that would begin "We have this sister who lives in Europe and every time she and her family come to visit they're rude, demanding, and a terrible trial for our poor, elderly father." But I don't know, and it doesn't matter.
Company manners, that's the way to go, and since they see each other so rarely, it shouldn't be too difficult to keep it together during the visits.
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Critcism is a form of pursuit
That is a therapy-ism that helps me deal with attacks by family members and others. Wouldn't it be nice if your family could just say, "We miss you and we wish you lived closer!"? Yeah, it would be nice, but knowing that their attacks actually MEAN "we miss you and we wish you lived closer" will help you de-escalate the situation. Try to write/call/send stuff more, be appreciative and complimentary, and follow the old "if you can't say something nice, don't say anything" adage. Is this fair? Nah, but following this plan can help you gain valuable skills in dealing with quote-unquote difficult people.
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Separate lodgings and shorter stays.
The idea of having separate lodgings is a good idea. That way the baby can be up all night and the husband sleep in antisocially. Plus you don't need to interact if and when you don't feel like it.
Rent a car, too, if that makes it easier to maintain some distance from these people.
Also the old saying is that relatives and fish smell after 3 days. Three weeks is a really long time. Maybe go for 3 weeks and spend the middle 10 days somewhere nice, without the family.
This is all expensive. That's a good reason to only go every other year.
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A quote
Friends are God's apology for family.
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bah
ay, ay, ay, what a can of worms!
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Carey missed out entirely on what is going on
Brother and sister (who curiously but irrelevantly seem not to be married) have unconsciously hatched a plan to get you written out of mom and dad's estate. Everyone is getting old and on in years and B & S resent that you do not have old folks duty due to distance. So they resent you and your husband pretending to be real family. So they pick a fight with you and your husband, in the unconscious hope of you giving them ammunition to prove that you and H are traitors to the family whereupon they will point out to M & D that you two don't really get along with the rest of the "real" family, that you've said all these awful things (either orally or in email) and that they will take care of the old folks, and their papers should be arranged accordingly, particularly the decisions on their health, and by the way, your share should be reduced while they are at it, etc.
This is not, mind you, a conscious scheme on their part. At least not in the sense that they sat down together and planned it out, but natural resentments are going to take this course.
You did not rise to the bait! You did not give them the nasty email, nor the nasty comeback. The oral conversation will, however, be reported back to M & D in an entirely different light than you intended it. H's "F you" to your sniveling, manipulative charismatic brother will be much enhanced. H is not terribly social with B & S because he can see that they are big phoney losers.
So what to do? How about this email:
Dear Sid and Nancy: I noticed that during our last visit that you picked a fight with H and tried to pick one with me. I'm sorry this happened. I gather that as a result, we are not as welcome in your lives as we used to be. That is most unfortunate. I hope that we are all too adult to make an incident of "cabin fever" (or the European idiom of the equivalent) into a wedge to drive our close family apart. Love you all lots. Etc
On the plus side, in my experience M & D, if they are not too old, probably see right through this crap for exactly what it is. Most parents really do know their children's weaknesses. The problem is that if they have become so old and slow as to not to truly understand that the old sibling rivalries are still in play, it will encourage this sort of thing.
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Get your own space when you visit
We also have in-laws who come from Europe to the US for a yearly visit, loads of kids in tow. My advice is to get your own place. Hock the car, whatever you have to do... get your own efficiency apartment for the duration. Around the corner from Mom and Dad if you have to.
My husband is an introvert. He's a well-behaved, well-socialized introvert, but being a guest in someone's house (especially my parents') sends him over the edge. Yet if he takes a magazine and disappears off to bed early, it's perceived as a slight. No... he's just OVERLOADED and needs a break. I completely understand.
Being around a cranky small baby, for anyone but that baby's immediate household, is very difficult for all.
I would... let your sister and brother's comments go. You've already done what you can (move to another country), you don't see them often, and focus on your relationship with your parents. And get your own place when you visit.
Good luck.