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Original poster

What are the worst things your in laws have done or said to you?

243 replies

Awkwardusername · 31/12/2021 09:16

Struggling a bit as my future in laws can’t stand me (or my husband to be it would seem!) but everyone around me has a great relationship with their in laws.
Anyone else got an amazing partner with awful parents and/or siblings?

Hoping this is vaguely light hearted!

My favourite: I told them I got my wedding dress from a high street shop for £200 and they told me the wedding would be “cheap and disgusting”, and that the dried flowers we’re having will be “stinking, dull and boring”. They haven’t seen the dress or the flowers!

OP posts:
Rrrob · 31/12/2021 11:41

That DH and I were genetically incompatible after dd1 was born with (unexpectedly) a severe genetic condition. I will never forgive them.

Stiffcondomhat · 31/12/2021 11:41

Ex fil hung up without a word when ex dh rang to tell them I was pregnant.

Stormsy · 31/12/2021 11:45

My mil and fil are lovely. My sil however goes out of her way to humiliate me to the point that both her own husband and my mil have in the past apologised to me because they've been so embarrassed by her behaviour.

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vodkaginwine · 31/12/2021 11:45

My MIL told me that my eldests illness (it’s chronic and has kept her in hospital for weeks at a time) is a direct result of me not bothering to breastfeed. I physically didn’t have enough milk but it was all my fault.
When we announced we expecting our first to then over Sunday lunch, her reaction was ‘oh. I thought SIL and DIL would have the next one. She’d make such a good mummy, sigh’.

LetHimHaveIt · 31/12/2021 11:50

'3rd trimester of pregnancy. Told in laws the baby was very tiny, dropping down percentiles, and the pregnancy was being managed on a week by week basis.

MIL said ‘that sounds very positive’.

Now we tell them nothing.'

Baffled by this one. She clearly meant the fact that the pregnancy was being so closely monitored, was a good thing. Poor woman.

ancientgran · 31/12/2021 11:50

@TyrannosaurusRights

3rd trimester of pregnancy. Told in laws the baby was very tiny, dropping down percentiles, and the pregnancy was being managed on a week by week basis.

MIL said ‘that sounds very positive’.

Now we tell them nothing.

Did she actually understand? Sounds really odd unless she thought it was positive that you were getting good care.

I can't quite get my head round that one.

princessleha · 31/12/2021 11:54

Don't worry if you and your partner are in love and happy you do what you want. My partner and I are sort of in the same boat. We are thinking of going and getting married in secret.

BlondeDogLady · 31/12/2021 11:54

My ExH parents were usually lovely, but when I left ExH because he had cheated with several women, they said :

"ExH was just having a bit of fun, whereas you are breaking up a family"

And then, after being close for 20 years, they never spoke to me again. Neither did his 3 sisters. Shock

WowIlikereallyhateyou · 31/12/2021 11:55

NC for me and DH after many,many evil comments.
Some of the best were…
Pulled me to one side, very sternly on our wedding day to say, “ if i ever did anything to upset her son she would kill me”.
After the wedding when photos were put out, told me she “ didnt want any photos featuring me”. So she got none at all.
Too many nasty things to mention, so toxic, so much better now NC.
I still think 12 yrs down the line she will be angry, as she was convinced we wouldn’t last! Old fucking witch.

Santahatesbraisedcabbage · 31/12/2021 11:56

When I had an emcs with a premature dc I had a suspected heart attack and was wired up... Mil was excited dh would be able to go on a pre planned trip away with her now. Dc was due just after the trip and dh wasn't going to go.. Dh sad he wasn't leaving his dw and dc. Mil never forgave either of us.

MeMumI · 31/12/2021 11:57

Some of these are terrible and I'm lucky I don't have an awful MIL - just an uninterested one.

When DH and I bought our first house, MIL told me that she wasn't going to mediate her relationship with her son through me. She wanted to keep her relationship with her son independent, and so wouldn't be phoning the house... but would phone him at work etc (back in the days before mobiles). Fine I thought and took a back step and let them get on with it.

I did think that they would be more interested when we had kids, but no. When we had our first child a few years later, mil told me that as far as she was concerned her family ends with her son. I wasn't hurt that I wasn't included, but I was hurt that she didn't think of her granddaughter as her family.

So I very much let them get on with it, and DH is a typical bloke... so he has virtually no relationship with his parents. He never pops in to see them, despite the fact he used to work in the next village across and one of his routes home from work practically drives past their house! But apparently it's my fault, and I keep him away from them.

Ironically, mil still refuses to use the house phone, and will only call dh on his mobile. But that means that she has no relationship and no interest in her grandchildren at all. She was over (her annual Christmas visit) the other day and didn't ask my daughter any questions at all. Not where she's applied to uni, what she's going to study, or shown an interest in her new car that my daughter saved so much for... nothing. No interest at all.

My daughter notices, and as a result has no interest in having a relationship with her grandparents.... but this is still my fault. You really can't win!

CharityDingle · 31/12/2021 12:04

@blissfulllife

Mil Posting a fb post about todays children being snowflakes two weeks after our child who was 11 tried to take her life.
Shock

I hope you never allow her near your children again. I hope your little girl is okay.

cleanasawhistle · 31/12/2021 12:05

Answered the phone to MIL.....where have you been I've been phoning all day. I replied took young son shopping for lots of summer clothes as nothing from last year fit. Her reply oh Tom will go mad (her son,my husband).I said I beg your pardon and she changed the subject.

Fluffycloudland77 · 31/12/2021 12:05

@OublietteBravo

MIL is convinced I’m a gold digger. In the (very nearly) 20 years I’ve known DH I’ve earned more than him for 12 of them, and the same as him for a further 4. I’m obviously not a very successful gold digger.
People said I was after dh for his money despite the fact I earned 3 x his salary.

I’m a rubbish gold digger too.

jamandmarmaladethesecondcoming · 31/12/2021 12:05

@darumafan Flowers i am so sorry for your loss and her hurtful lies

in fact Flowers to everyone on this thread xx

sessell · 31/12/2021 12:08

I love my MIL and talk to her every week. But my DIL... Oh my. I tried. Our relationship is now bare minimum polite. My DS visits on his own and it is so much better that way. A few details:
Learning they were engaged last as she posted it on FB before he had a chance to tell us.
Breaking into our house when we were on holiday, without our permission. She stayed days after him and left an unread newspaper to let us know how long, as well as a lot of mess and personal items from my and DDs rooms scattered around. Told us we were ungenerous and toxic when were upset about this. Never apologised.
There is much more. I guess my point is that this relationship goes both ways and relies on mutual respect. And if the other party is wildly disrespectful, put your boundaries back in place until they earn your respect back. If you can't have mutual respect have self-respect.

tootiredtobother · 31/12/2021 12:10

smug FIL sat at my kitchen table in the house we bought together, saying, oh how well husband had done to buy this house etc..
I had to borrow the last 3K from my widowed mother (husband would NOT ask his dad ) I have bought just about every soft furnishing in the house from beds to sofas, bath towels curtains, etc, paid kids school bus fare the list goes on
I very coldly and precisely put him straight, husband paid the mortgage I made it a home

RosesAndHellebores · 31/12/2021 12:11

Oh where to start

After two late miscarriages and the death of ds2 at 27 weeks due to a congenital heart problem, incompatible with life, "such a shame you can't perform".

"It's amazing how well you have done for someone so practical - my children are all very academic."

"I think you are very extravagant" for buying a pair of Boden cotton trousers for £50.

When DS had chronic asthma as a baby "it's a weakness that will come from your side".

"Monied people like your family think differently" coupled with telling DH not to be a "Jew" when he was being parsimonious about something. My father was Jewish.

Did I mention both her dd's left home at 18 and were living on different continents by the time they were 25. One doesn't call her mother on Christmas day. Neither have visited for more than 7 years.

But she's 85 now and has Parkinsons and early dementia. I had the ILs every single Christmas and just MIL since FIL died, except for Covid and the year my father wad doing about which she showed off 30 years!

ememem84 · 31/12/2021 12:12

Refuse point blank to speak to me. So I reciprocate. Life is much simpler.

Fil doesn’t like me because I am a) woman b) working woman c) independent woman d) woman with her own thoughts and opinions and e) woman who doesn’t pander to him.

Cakeandcardio · 31/12/2021 12:13

My MIL is far from the worst and we get on well but she makes really strange comments which would actually be quite nasty if I cared 😂 when we told her I was pregnant, the first thing she said was: "you'll get fat". I think she maybe just projects a lot as she was very overweight when DH was young. For context, I was a size 8-10 when I got pregnant 🤷🏻‍♀️

BabyPotato · 31/12/2021 12:14

My FIL was spying on me in the shower when we lived with them earlier this year. Things have been... interesting since.

GucciBear · 31/12/2021 12:14

My mother in law sat down to dinner and, on looking at the main course, said "Oh, another one of Gucci's messes".

Lacedwithgrace · 31/12/2021 12:16

After my third miscarriage MIL said "Why do you keep trying when you know they'll all die?" Since then she's changed and understands it better but it still stings.

Groovee · 31/12/2021 12:17

My sister in law called me conniving and deceiving. I had a get together that I invited her to. But she had a better offer. Then when the better offer wasn't as great as she had hoped it would be, she said I hadn't told her about the get together and that I was conniving and deceiving.

She tried to tell my friend about it but she called her out on it.

If I ever have an issue it's my SIL who causes it 😂😂 usually projecting on her own shitty behaviour.

GoodnightGrandma · 31/12/2021 12:18

They said that I shouldn’t be having another baby, and they had more than me !
That was the straw that broke the camels back 🐫