I need help with a dilemma as I don't know if I'm going the right or wrong thing.
Been with DP 4 years and since day 1, mil has not liked me at all. I may even go as far as hate.
I'm 8 years older than DP and he had only ever had 1 previous relationship. He's very shy and nerdy, I am outgoing and nerdy so very good fit.
Bit of background:
For his 30th birthday when we were together 3 months, I asked him if he'd like to go to Tenerife for the week, 6 months later on his birthday to celebrate and we decided to do it.
DP then told me that when his mum found out, she hit the roof saying that I was trying to trap him because I would "owe" him and the relationship would be unequal. They argued for hours and resolved it.
Then came 4 years of arguments and horribleness. Whenever I would visit, I would get shouted at.
Things like, I spend too much time with him when we are together (we saw each other every other weekend as it was a ldr). I need to lose weight, I drink too much and turning DP into an alcoholic (we have a few glasses of wine at the weekend!)
He moved in last May so that's 2 years or so of seeing each other long distance first. It could have been sooner, but mil was doing a drama course and he had agreed to help her with her website, learning lines and finances etc.
She is OBSESSED and I mean obsessed with food. She manages to make every conversation about nutrients and vitamins. She tells DP he needs to go to the gym and used to control what he eats. She even used to tell him what to wear when going out and do his hair for him like a child.
We had a huge argument when her and her brand new Jamaican boyfriend came to visit for 3 days because she said she would buy everyone a steak for dinner. I was fine with it despite never having the audacity to suggest meal ideas at her house. At the supermarket her bf said he didn't want steak and he wanted chicken. I mention he's Jamaican bc he will only eat Caribbean dishes usually. They ended up rowing bc she thought everyone should have beef bc chicken is bland.
Ended up him cooking a chicken stew and her cooking steak. In our house. We just sat there dumbfounded. We had planned the meals we were going to cook and ended up being guests in our own house while they cooked separate meals.
It got worse the next day when she complained that the buffet we had planned was not enough food and she refused to eat it, but wanted to go bowling and have a roast dinner (cooked by me) within the space of 4 hours before she and bf had to leave for her coach. When I tried to compromise with either bowling or dinner, she wouldn't budge and stood in the kitchen with her arms folded and her bottom lip hanging out saying she wanted to do both.
I admit I called her a petulant child and she can't have both, she must choose one or the other. I was just exhausted and exasperated with it all. It had been such hard work. I was also reeling from mil accusing her bf for talking to me too much.
She called me manipulative and controlling. It was just horrible.
I left the house and said i would return when she had gone.
That is the short, short version.
DP can't believe how much of a bitch she is (his words) to me but still speaks to her on the phone to deal with her latest crisis. There's always a crisis for him to resolve.
Now she has asked him to go to Holland for a week to visit relatives and I'm obviously not invited.
He wants to go and obviously I wouldn't want to go and spend one hour let alone one week with her.
We have often talked about going together to visit his family and go to Amsterdam. But is this what it's going to be like forever?
Should he go and appease her? Or should she go alone and we go together another time? I don't want to begrudge him at all. He doesn't speak any Dutch and not all the family can speak English so we would be limited to visiting English speaking family when we go.
I don't know if I would be in the wrong to say he doesn't go. I feel very torn on the issue. Thanks for reading.