Made MIL cry?!

Yep. Weird, possessive, Oedipal, and shows the apron strings have not been cut.

DH should have put in appropriate boundaries by now but it may suit him to have 2 women running round after him and fighting over him.

Exactly this! ^

The MIL making the packed lunch is NOT the issue. She fired the first shot with her 'well I love my son' comment. Such a blatant dig a dig at OP, that she clearly can't love him if she questions why he can't make his own bloody sandwich. If my MIL said that to me, I'd be peeved too, so I can imagine OP's annoyance if she's put up with eight years of snide comments like that.

No the dig was “he can make his own lunch”. No need for it.

I think you just need to take out this exchange from the equation

MIL: I make my sons packed lunch

DIL: he can make his own lunch

Because if MIL had said: well I know but I like to do it....Then that would be a perfectly normal type of exchange.

The dig came from the 'well I love my son.....' so it was MIL who fired the first shot because that was unnecessary.

After that all gloves were off and to follow it up with 'I'm the first woman in his life' - I mean come on.... MIL got what she deserved.

Of course not. Because you’re a woman and we all know different standards apply.

“It’s a bit OTT…”
🤣
Classic British understatement

No wonder so many women end up in dire relationships on MN with a man wholly enmeshed with his mother.

OP I get where you are coming from. When I was a kid my BFF mom use to say never marry a mama's boy. My mama's boy has been gone for 3 years now....best 3 years of my life not dealing with that crazy family. So however this goes for you I wish you all the best

I haven't read the whole thread but I'm guessing there's more to it than just the packed lunch because I honestly can't see anything wrong with it.

My Mum has my DD on a Friday while I work and when I dropped her off Friday she gave me a bacon butty that she'd made and wrapped up for me take to work as a Friday treat 🤣. Does that make me a laughing stock like the OPs DH? (according to some posters).

She does love him more. It's not a competition but she does. A mother's love is far stronger than the love you have for a partner.

I come from a European culture where it’s very normal for mothers /MILs to cook (and do washing) for their adult children/partners. It’s also very normal for adult children to visit their parents a least a couple of times a week, but some do go nearly every day.

Normal but also very overbearing for everyone involved.

My Italian friend left Italy and married an Englishman as she just couldn’t stand that aspect of the culture. The result is that Italian men are often neurotic and spoilt and overly dependent on their mothers.

Now you've said about the kissing thing my advice is run, run for the hills. She sounds demented and he is... well, it's unhealthy.

Find a man who does not have a codependency with his mother like this.

MILs benefitting from a lot of the doubt here. Let’s imagine up a load of “contributing factors we’re not privy to” whilst assassinating OPs character and conveniently ignore things we are privy to. Such as this lovely blameless widowed saintly mum being considerate enough to give him a nice kiss and cuddle to comfort her son, upset after a row. A 40 year old man. Such healthy and normal behaviour.

Then leave him if his relationship is so weird

I don’t think universally - I’d be mortified if someone described me so! I love my dad - - but It feels infantilising and would deffo give me the ick for someone to identify me like that.

It's a bit OTT to do that to an adult yes, but that's her style and doesn't mean you get to be nasty to her. If it gives you the ick and you want to leave then fine, but you chose to tell her about your argument (strange, I would never involve her like that) her kissing her son doesn't mean she's trying to annoy you or undermine you, you've taken it that way

She sounds a bit overbearing, but why shouldn't she make his lunch if she and he like it that way. My DS is 22, you know what - I sometimes make him lunch and dinner too, especially if he's done long hours. But I have said YABU because what you said was nasty and whether you were referring to her death deliberately or not is irrelevant - it sounds like you were much were.

No I disagree. I'm close to my mum and my sister, in fact we practically all live in the same street. Despite that, none of us would EVER use tears to manipulate the other into siding with them.
Yes of course mothers and daughters are close but so are many mothers and sons without acting this way. I don't care how close you are, it's not normal for a mother to try and make it seem like she loves her son more than his wife loves him and it's certainly not normal for her to be sending him off to work with a packed lunch like he's 6.
Also her husband's response that he would never be able to ask his mother to apologize and then still went and had dinner shows where he is in the relationship.

Maybe SHE should be grateful she has a DIL who doesn't "mind" the man going to see his mother every day

I’ve never read anything as gross as two grown women fighting over who gets to be ‘mum’ to a man.

@Didntmeanto6 A different perspective for you to consider-

I come from a European culture where it’s very normal for mothers /MILs to cook (and do washing) for their adult children/partners. It’s also very normal for adult children to visit their parents a least a couple of times a week, but some do go nearly every day.

This used to drive my (non-European) mum mental - and I totally understand why it would!

When my mum had children and then suddenly realised that she was incredibly lucky to have a MIL who got so much joy from cooking/looking after grandchildren. It gave my mum a break & gave my grandmother joy/purpose.

It might be possible that your MIL is not intentionally overstepping boundaries. Perhaps, this is the cultural norm for her & she genuinely is trying to show her love.

From the response of your DP, it doesn’t seem like this is something he will change.

If I were you, I would consider if this is a dealbreaker in your relationship. If it is, then that will be have to be the end & if not, then is consider reframing it as positive!

Nope, but neither is your behaviour normal, which came first?

What’s the situation with the home? Do you both have names on mortgage or tenancy?

You sound as bad as each other.

She is way overly enmeshed and it’s all very bizarre. Even more bizarre are the bonkers-MIL enabling comments. She’s nuts. Anyone here says she’s not needs a word.

But this is DH’s problem to solve not yours. She now has no-one but him and if he doesn’t address now it will simply get worse as time goes on.