What? You Don’t Love Your Mother-In-Law?

My almost mil, does hurtful things to my kids.
I have been in a relationship for 5 years,they have been the best 5 yrs of mine and my childrens life. WE have custody of his kids,due to the fact their mother choose to use drugs around them,sell all their belongings,she has supervised visits,that she doesn't come to.The boys have not seen or heard from her in 6 mo. My children and I live in a very abusive home for the better part of 4 yrs....We all get along well for being a blended family. We have the same views on very aspect of rearing the children.......We as adults seat down and talk about any differences and we compermise.
Our problem is his Mother, At first I wanted greatly to be acepted,be apart of a family to which I never had as a child. Now, I don't want to even hear her voice. She has done so many things,And bf is standing up for us on every level,with no hope of anything changing.His mother has bought his boys and herself a shake in front of my kids,drank it in front of them,not offering them one(she has enough money)One year, She openly gave bf kids special Halloween treat bags with their name on them,and my kids got one tiny candy bar. So, I told bf how upset I was that she would do such a thing, He told her she needed be fair. So next Halloween she made bags for all of them,but as soon as bf walk into the kitchen out of site,she looked right at me and reached into the bowl of candy and added a big handful of candy to bf kids bag.Our kids B-days are days apart, My kids 9 yr. is first,he may get a card with $5 in it,or he may not get anything. Then it's bf 9yr. and she gets him 5 shirts,5 pants, socks.ect. 3-4 toys and money in his card......Repeat for the next my 2nd child, Then its bf 2 child, he get the same as the first,however the 9yr. always gets just as much as the 12yr. So, I tell bf 9yr old shouldn't get things on his brothers b-day,thats his special day..........So he tells her,bf 12yr next b-day she trys to sneek it to the 9 yr. I'm in the hallway of our home,coming out of my bedroom as the 9yr old is climbing our stairs with a bag in his hands,Me thinking its the 12yr olds b-day present,I say you can wrap that in my room. The 9 yr old looks at me,then at her. So I say,It's not a b-day present She shakes her head.But the worst part of it is she was moving side way as the 9 yr was going up the stairs to hide my view of him...... I am so over trying to be accepted and so tired of telling my kids that some people are just like that,that we can't change them,the only thing we can do is to make sure we never treat anyone in this way.

My mother in law has tried for 16 years to keep my husband and I apart. She succeeded one time, after he proposed to me the first time, she managed to split us up. She ran up a $4000 phone bill for me and told tons of lies to both of us. He was in Japan in the navy and it made it difficult to decipher the truth because I trusted her; we had been very close. After five years and many things between us, we got back together. In the last 11 years, she has tried everything from accusing me of an affair to dieing to split us up. She is truly the monster-in-law. Through it all, I still care and wish we could have her as a more positive part of our life and the lives of our five children.

IThe situation is different with my "mother-in-law". She is actually trying to come between her son and me. She invites him, but not me, on vacations. When there is a family reunion, she watches our every move and prevents us from having time alone together. She literally stands between us when one of us approaches the other. She calls on Saturday nights at 8:30 or 9 or 10 PM. Just as the article said, her son does not see what's going on and allows her manipulations to succeed. We are working on setting boundaries, but he's a "people pleaser" and I have little tolerance for manipulation.

I solved the problem by marrying someone who's family lived thousands of miles away and could not afford to "visit." My second husband's mother died years before I met him. Never had a problem with the mother-in-law as a result (although I suspect I would have adored my second husband's mother since she was an intellectual free spirit and had a high powered career in the 1950's, which was uncommon.)
My advice to anyone looking to marry is to look at the intended's family dynamics, especially the marital dynamics between his parents. If you like what you see and are comfortable with that model, you will probably be happy with your marital choice. If you feel uncomfortable with the marital dynamics of your future in-laws for whatever reason, think again: your fiance was raised by those people and that's the behavior patterns that he/she knows. You will not change those behavior patterns or expectations. For instance, if a woman's career was not perceived as valuable by the fiance's parents, it's likely that the fiance will not value that as much as yourself. Ditto for raising children, spending, sex, cultural choices, running of the household, etc. You cannot expect a person to reject how they were raised to meet your expectations.

I thoroughly enjoyed this article. It was good for more than just the laugh I got from it. I will forward this on to my daughter who desprately needs to see the humor in the strain she feels with her mom-in-law.

I would love to share it with her mom-in-law too but I'm not too sure how well it will be received. Thank you for a great article!

Barb in Iowa.

It took me 15+ years to realize that I did not deserve to be treated the way my MIL treats me, and that as a wife, mother, and professional, I did not have to tolerate being degraded--I could go shopping, visit a museum, or stay home. It has made my marriage better and reduced my stress level. I wish I'd done this years ago--

Wow, and I thought my MIL was evil. We have not spoken with her in years now, she started with her oldest son and his wife, then she did the same thing to my husband and I. When we went through a rough spot a few years into our marriage she told him to get his son and divorce me, she would raise the child. I am glad my husband did not listen to her, we worked our problems out and are now married 26 years. When her oldest son lost his son due to an accident we called her and told her and her reply was "I did not know he had a son" Well if she would have stayed in contact with her sons and treated them like she does her daughters she would have known. When her son's father in law passed away and I called her and told her about that her remarks was "i only met them once" No Sympathy towards her daughter in law or anything. I finally wrote her a letter and called her the most uncaring person in the world and that she should consider herself lucky that she was and is able to control her daughters who have children and grandchildren and that she missed out on 7 other grandchildren and great grand children because she was such a mean spirited person. I am sorry that my children grew up without their biological grandparents in their lifes, but they had adopted grandparents that more than made up for it. When my son got married I promised that I would not interfere in their marriage, I tried very hard, we helped when we could, but we never made any bad remarks about my daughter in law. I told my son a few times what I thought but I never bad mouthed his wife because I know how hurtful that can be and I did not want to alienate my son just because I don't agree with my DIL. It is his life, I will be gone one day and I want to be remembered by them as a positive influence in my children and grandchildren life.

Wow, the majority of these responses seem to indicate that there is a huge problem between the generations, different families, whatever.

The problems that I have with my MIL is that she is passive-aggressive, OCD, and a micro-manager. Fortunately for me, my husband, an only child, also sees this in her. Needless to say, he did NOT "marry his mother"! My MIL and I are two extremely different personality types. She irritates the crap out of me, personally.

She and my husband have been having a power struggle since I met him in 1986. He, naturally enough, went to college across the country from home. The two of them fought like cats and dogs during summer vacations when he came home. He would come over to my house and hang out with me and my Mom instead. My Mom finally offered to have him stay with us, telling my then boyfriend that he was welcome any time, day or night, for any reason. He actually burst into tears, as he was so frustrated with his relationship with his own Mom. He wound up going home and smoothing out whatever the fight had been about that day, but he has been a big fan of my Mom since. Don't get me wrong-she's not perfect (who is?). She has eccentricities all her own which we complain about. But, ultimately, she is sane and well-adjusted, and respects boundaries.

We finally wound up moving about 1500 miles away from my husband's Mom and Dad. They torture us about twice a year by visiting for 2-3 weeks at a time, but it sure beats seeing my husband emotionall torn apart on a daily basis. I regret not being physically closer to my Mom, since I get along great with her, but overall our move has been for the best.

We have been married for 14 years now, and look forward to another 14!

I don't want to brag but reading these comments makes me feel very lucky. I have a wonderful MIL. She always treats me with love and respect. I have a son from a previous marriage, she treats him as if he really were her grandson. Honestly she treats him better than my ex-husbands mother. I wish everyone on here the best of luck with their relationships.

My am a mother in law to a daughter in law & son in law. I have 6 grandbabies that I love very much. My daughter in law keeps a not so clean house....but I figure that is none of my business. My son knew when they married that she was messy....what she lacks in cooking & cleaning skills she MORE than makes up for in being an awesome mom to my grandbabies. I make it a point to stay out of their business...I do not drop in without calling 1st to make sure it is OK. I also stay out of any disagreements they have. I told them up front not to bring their marriage problems to me because obviously I will take the sides of my kids which is not fair. I will admit it is harder to be a good mother in law to my son in law...because I don't think he treats my daughter with as much respect as I think he should...they have 3 little ones under the age of 2 1/2 but he thinks because she is a stay at home mom that means a do nothing mom...BUT.....I keep my mouth shut because it is not my place. I hope my in law kids do not have such poor opinions of me that most of you all seem to have.

My MIL was an expert at interferring in our lives -- she did it in subtle ways that drove me nuts; but, which my husband could not understand. -- rearranged the cupboards, brought her own dishtowels ( she didn't like mine) , etc. When I received a very large promotion at work, she mentioned that she thought women should not be paid as much as men becuase we might need hel with things like opening stuck window. However, I realized that the real problem was not my MIL but my husband.

IIf I had set boundaries immediately, we would have had a much better relationship -- once the boundaries were set after some 20 years we giot along. When I suggested it early in my marriage, my husband was adamently opposed. He said his mother was too sensitive and would only cry and be hurt. I let it go for years and listened to her digs and complaints about me to him.

Finally I told him you have to settle this -- after he did we managed a detente for another 15 years.