Ticked

I am ticked off, seriously ticked off.  We are going to my husband's home town next weekend and he called to talk to his oldest friend.  He got a very definite cold shoulder and was pretty upset about it.  He called back to ask what the problem was and his friend wouldn't tell him what was wrong.  This friend (and his wife) are not the most positive of people and they have not been able to have children which has been a burden to them.  They live in a small town and both are working blue collar jobs and everyone around them has children so they don't have an easy time. It was hard telling them when we were pregnant with Pk and we felt terrible about it but we knew that there would probably be a definite cooling off in the relationship after Pk was born but really, we had no idea how difficult it would actually be.  My husband talked to his mother tonight who seems to have been aware that this friend, let's call him Jeff, was angry and the reason for it.  I gather he is upset because he called us a few weeks ago and asked to come down for a visit - coming down on a Sunday night and staying until Tuesday.  He expected that we would just take the day off from work to go with them to the mall.  For anyone who doesn't know, we are teachers and can't exactly take off work whenever we feel like it to go to the mall.  If we had done that and then run into a parent from school, we could have gotten in big trouble.  Huff, I am just so frustrated on Dh's behalf.  I think the thing that hurts the most is that my MIL laid a guilt trip on dh for not doing what his friend wanted.  She has so little loyalty and is so quick to believe the worst of dh.

For you pray-ers out there, say a prayer for me that next weekend goes well.  When I am home and sane and not steeped in that dysfunctional family culture, I can objectively tell myself that it doesn't matter, they are his parents and I will love and respect them no matter how poorly they treat him but when I am up there, no matter how ridiculous they are, it really hurts.