MIL only one not to say my baby looks like me

I think it's completely natural that families look for resemblances to their own family. My DD had ringlets as a toddler, just like I had at that age. However, according to the in-laws she took after some distant cousin with curly hair!
Your MIL said she looks like you both. That's fine, isn't it?
Also I think many people don't see family resemblance until the child is much older.

You have phrased this so beautifully.

I think it’s very natural to see resemblance to your own son or daughter as a young child or family members and comment on that. Most children look like a mix of both parents. I have never got offended that MIL said my sons look like my DH, but I was a bit offended when she said DS1 first word was “grandma” 😂

Mine was the opposite. Their side all have absolutely terrible hair. DS looked like a potato Botticelli Angel with thick blonde ringlets, now has the kind of hair that only ever looks good. Sorry, rest of Fam, but facts are facts and DMIL had the balls to say it

Gosh a lot of this sounds like it was posted by 12 year olds.

I found different sides of the family see similarities in " their side" of the family anyway and especially when newborn they all look similar so please don't worry that she hasn't commented.
I have 3 Sons who look similar to me imo but ex mil saw resemblance to their Dad!
Congratulations on your DC

Everyone said my DS looked like his aunt, my DPs sister. To the point where if we were all out together, complete strangers thought he was her child! It never bothered me, maybe because I can absolutely see me in many of his personality traits.

And did your own parents find resemblances to you? And if so did you take that amiss as well, and claim they were 'taking ownership'?

For the 99th time of posting this, I'm SO glad to only be a MIL to young men. I don't think I could cope with my every word and action being spun into something negative.

I'm also very glad that the DD who is the mother of my grandchildren is kind and empathetic with her MIL, even though they're quite different people. She knows how much she loves our DGCs and that they love us both.

Not really because
A/ I am not a mother in law
B/ I don't spend time getting hung up on irrelevant issues like who my MIL or anybody else think my children look like.

FFS. Maybe she she's just acting like all grandmother's do, and connecting with her grandchild in the instinctive way that you will too, if you become a GP.

It's absolutely pathetic to go looking for a way to label a grandmother toxic, just because she happens to be the paternal one.

When my eldest was born my MIL constantly said how much she looked like my DP. She even brought round his baby photo album to prove it. I just eye rolled internally and put the photo album on the side to never be looked through. I think it's a weird thing of trying to take ownership. Now both DC have grown up to look like me nothing gets said.

Sounds like you're projecting here. 😆

As has been said before, women in the child's father's family ALWAYS say 'he looks just like his dad/her dad!' to convince themselves he is the father. It smacks of trying to take ownership of the baby too. (Probably borne out of fear that the baby's mother's family will end up seeing more of the baby/be in their life more.) MIL said mine and DH's 2 kids looked just like him, and DH's aunt even said they look just like their paternal great grandmother (DH's mother's mother.)

Fact was/is, they look nothing like DH's family members - and don't even look like him much. They just have DH's family's height. (Thankfully as mine are shortarses including me!) They have his skin tone too - quite pale. I am not. Apart from this, they both look like me. Everyone we have ever met (especially when they were children) were stunned at how much they looked like me as a child of the same age (when they saw old photos of me...)

Sometimes I feel really sorry for mother in law's. Their son's don't half inflict some bonkers divas on them.

I haven't read through the replies here and I'm sure there's the usual rude one-liners and patronising responses but OP I can understand what you're saying, it's like she's not prepared to pay you that compliment because quite possibly this goes back to her feelings when her DS originally got with you, and what she lost; so now the baby, her grandchild is here, she doesn't want to give you anything in that sense.
Basically it's a her problem, not a you problem.

No I don’t think so either. I also do t think that sort of comment is necessarily passive aggressive ( I think the term is totally overused). But I nevertheless think plenty of Dils would manage to take it amiss.

I think new mums need all the encouragement they can get. I certainly don't think you need to avoid all compliments to the mother of your grandchild incase she thinks you're passive aggressive 🙄

Exactly this.

OP, why this need for everyone to see you in your baby? Do you think your mother in law is trying to ‘even up’ the conversation about who the baby looks like ?

100%.

I do think "oh the baby looks nothing like our family, just like you dear DIL" would be taken as rejecting the baby as not part of the family

For perspective. my friend was devastated to come home after her mum had been babysitting to find it hadn’t gone well. Dc had cried and cried, dm couldn’t get on top of the situation and said “ I’m just not sure how to approach things . Your Dc are entirely unlike any of mine were.” My friend cried for hours after that.
The problem is we want family to relate to them and feel a connection, but only to the point we don’t feel threatened as the Numero Uno relative of the child. As DILs we can be touchy creatures. Might as well admit it.

But truthfully the comment “ oh he’s got your eyes! You’re a great mum” is a bit OTT and non sequitur-ish.

I’m sure that could kickstart a dil thread: “ Aibu to think this was pass agg and taking the piss?”

My MIL did this. Even said she looked like a family friend and would consistently say "she doesn't look like you". I don't know why, but it annoyed me so much 😂.

It doesn't matter 😁But I go through something similar despite the fact that MIL isn't fond of either DH or me. My twin daughters are literally the spitting image of me and everybody says it and you'd have to be blind not to see it!! Neither of their personalities are anything like me though. MIL loved to say that they looked like her 🙄And while they definitely have quite a few of their dad's features, I don't see anything from her. She doesn't make much of an effort now anyway but because these girls were twins and her first grandchildren, she tried to be present

Then with DS was born, he was honestly always a mixture of both DH and I but again, because this was her first grandson, she was all over how it looked like her and her husband who sadly died very young! Again not a big deal but you could tell she was trying to show some sort of possession over the children.

My younger 2 daughters - one of them looks very similar to DH to be honest and the youngest is pretty similar to me. At this point, MIL had gotten bored and her favourite child had had a granddaughter so these two were irrelevant to her. But with DS (her only grandson) it is always about her.

It just always comes across as so snarky. She knows what she's doing. Oh DD started walking early! Yes she gets that from me. It just isn't hard to be nice and pay some respect to the parents. But we have learned to always just ignore it tbh. The kids have a much better grandmother on their other side anyway and realistically, it doesn't affect us. So while I get your pain, just grit your teeth and move on

The thing I find puzzling is - and I am honestly not trying to be facetious here - I rather like my husband, that's kinda why I chose to have children with him. So I actually like seeing him in my kids too - I don't see people commenting on that offensive to me at all.

My MIL is the same and it used to upset me to
she would say all my sons looked like there dad one of my sons is the spitting image of my brother
She would say that my daughter who strongly resembles me looked nothing like me but Dh elder daughter my stepdaughter.
Then as my children got older I realised that some of the facial expressions and looks that my children would make would make them look more like the certain family members that she used to say they looked like so I think we see things differently in different people.