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

[Awkwardusername]

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!

MIL was doing ok and I thought we got on great but the last two years she hasn't got me a birthday present for no reason at all. That may sound odd, but everyone else gets one, just not me.
Step MIL has said a lot of hurtful things over the years. The ones that stick out are I make DH have no relationship with his father, and my job isn't a real one and I just titivate (self employed and she has asked me several times if I plan to give it up when I've been doing it ten years and last year I earned considerably more than DH but I'm a kept woman).

My in-laws are lovely. I “joke” (I’m not really joking) that if partner and I ever split up I want shared custody of his parents.

My ex in-laws are cunts. ExFIL amongst other things, stalked me. Opened my mail, hacked my emails and social media. He’s scarily controlling. ExMIL is homophobic, racist, disablist, spiteful and a fucking idiot. They are both insufferable snobs and I’m so relieved to be rid of them. My poor kids still have to put up with them several times a year and according to them focus on ignoring granny and grandad as much as possible.

@tootiredtobother

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

But if your husband is the only one paying the mortgage then it's his home, surely?

@BabyPotato

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

Please tell me you didn't just ignore that? You did say something, didn't you???

@LetHimHaveIt

When I first met my DIL (13 years ago), she told me she was on Twitter. I am not on Twitter but you can still look up someone's tweets if you know their username. I looked her up and she had criticised our house and my cooking and described our meeting as a waste of a day. I never mentioned it to my son or to her but I am so nervous of cooking for her now. She also asked at our first meeting if we wanted her to take control of our financial affairs and give her financial power of attorney. We were in our early fifties and both working full time in professional jobs. She is not from the UK and she requested repeatedly that we contribute to her parent's flights over her to see her. We didn't actually spend time with her parents because she wouldn't let us, unless they wanted to go out for a meal, in which case we were invited along to pay. Six months after meeting her my son was buying his first flat. We gifted him the deposit. She phoned up to shout at us because we had gifted it to him only. It had to be done through a solicitor. We had to do it again including her name in the gift. We paid for the wedding at her request. We were never thanked. The guests lined up to thank her parents at the end. This one is incredibly common. Lots of my friends with sons have paid for weddings and, apparently, it is wife work to say thank you so they never mention large financial gifts. Ditto buying presents for DILs from wish lists. Thanking a MIl for a gift is apparently wife work. No acknowledgement is usual. She is very direct and we are all quite scared of her including my son. He is not allowed to buy me a present at Christmas or on my Birthday because that makes him a Mummy's Boy. And no, she doesn't buy me anything because its wifework. Loads more but actually I am fond of her

Are you? Why, pray? I can't stand the rude, money-grabbing brat and I've never met her.

I hope if you're ever bed-bound you clear your room of all soft furnishings because it sounds like she'd stick a pillow over your face given the chance . . .

Pray? You're that scared of her you have to pray? Jesus

MIL made a huge thing of wanting to see and buy copies of our wedding photos (in the days of actual printed proofs) and then chose the one with my veil over my face.

Actually that's far from the worst thing she did, but it's the only one that's a little bit funny.

I see someone on here has started on the cooking sherry early . . .

@Hellocatshome

My DH is lovely my PIL are awful, at one point they wrote us a letter threatening that if we didn't go NC with another family member they would kill us and take the children and raise them as their own.

PLEASE take that letter to the police. It doesn't matter how long ago it was, it's a direct threat to kill.....

My mil was soo excited to have her first gc my dd1. I was about 8 weeks and she started buying things, I asked her to please stop until I'm further into the pregnancy has it was early days. She told me "well if you lose this one, you'll just have to get pregnant again". Really upset me, she was soo blasé about it, I was already attached to dd1.

Ex mil was ok, very hands off with dc so ideal . Her dh (not exh's dad) however was tricky to say the least can't have it all. She told exh he was stupid for leaving me and reminded him this Christmas that it was his fault the kids were with me having a lovely Christmas, harsh but true (she knows I have a dp now and ex sil has met him)

This is very outing but I don’t care anymore. When I met DH I didn’t meet the in laws at first. I then fell pregnant. They refused to meet me and his DM told him that because my contraceptive failed there was no reason for him to feel obligated. They fell out. His DB asked him round and when he said we would go he had the response of “no we meant just you” so he didn’t go. Then his DSis wanted to meet me so we went round and had a nice afternoon. Just hours later she had been on the phone to MIL stabbing me in the back and set her off again. I didn’t want to meet PIL after all this but MIL decided she did want to meet so I agreed. It was fine.
DB then asked both of us round so along we went. They had a relative there when we arrived. DH says “relative this is Notanymorenoway” Relative looks me up and down and says “yes I gathered” I couldn’t believe how rude!
When we had DC1 we had a photo of the 3 of us done and gave a framed copy as a gift to PIL. It was never seen again. Later MIL in a separate conversation mentioned her DSis had said she didn’t have to display a photo she didn’t want to in her own home. Enough said! There was a photo of DH with ex on wall and the siblings weddings. DH then had his removed so there was just a mark where it had been. When we were about to marry his DM tried again to get him to leave me. We had a 2 year old by this point. After we married we gave them a wedding photo. They then removed all the photos and redecorated. None went back up.
When introducing us to friends it was “Oh this is our DS and his DC” I’d just stand there like a nobody feeling awkward. Some people I met would have a knowing look when they saw me. I was excluded from photos wherever possible. There have been many passive aggressive comments made over the years but I’m past caring.
They favour the other DGC over ours. I’ve never fitted in. Now I don’t really see them apart from at big family birthdays etc. They phone and I let DH answer. I’ve never let my DC realise I don’t like them as it’s still their family but they’re not mine!

Oh yes. FIL told DH that he should be the man of the house and tell me what to do!
DH said no and we've had no contact since- coming up on 8 years now!!

My MIL brought a known convicted child sex offender (who went to prison) around our dc and lied to us about it for years. We are fortunate that we don’t have any reason to believe that harm came to our dc, but the depths of the deception have been awful.

That said, pales in comparison to how awful my family has been (if you can believe it could get worse!).

@GrannytoaUnicorn Oh my DH and MIL went mental at him and we have gone NC, so there were consequences. He turned out to be a really nasty peace of work and his gaslighting game was and still is strong.

We're all just very pleased that he's DH's stepdad and they're not related by blood. My other FIL is nice and normal.

@notacooldad

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’.
Forgive me with this but I dont understand what is wrong and it sounds like something I'd say. By saying 'it sounds positive' I would mean it's a good thing they are keeping a close eye on you and managing the pregnancy to make sure they (professionals) can step in and help.

I interpreted it this way too.

MIL was weirdly interested in mine and DH's sex life.
Multiple attempts at catching us in the act.
Walked in on DH in the shower and told me what a 'lucky girl 'I was.
Asked me Infront of her friends whether DH kept his glasses on during sex.
Told me in detail about her husband's wanking habits (into lingerie) then gave me some underwear that had clearly been balled up in a bag.
I put it straight in the bin without looking any closer.

She is dead and I thank my lucky stars every day.

MIL was a snooper and it drove me insane!
Before DH and I had even moved in, she was snooping in his office and found a sealed envelope which contained the bill for a hotel for our first weekend away, and she asked him why he'd spent so much!

When we went on our first holiday abroad, she emptied our laundry basket and took it to her house to wash - this included my underwear and a bathmat out of the rarely used en suite! She then complained to BIL and his wife (my now best friend) about how I had "too much stuff" and DH had "barely any room for clothes" in our wardrobes! BIL asked how she knew, and she claimed she had been "looking for dirty laundry"

When we got engaged, she tried to tell me that she would keep a budget spreadsheet so I didn't get carried away with spending!

On finding out I was expecting DD1 she said she would pay for DD's bookshelf and changing unit as it was around the same as they'd spent on DN1, rather than just give us the money towards stuff, so she could tell people "if they asked!" (Who asks?!)

SIL is just awful.
The first Christmas after my DM died, DH and I stayed at home for lunch together but still visited the rest of the family in the afternoon - she refused to speak to me because she couldn't have lunch with her brother!
She wanted to override every decision made around the church service for the wedding (she was the Vicar) such as me following the bridesmaids in ("we'll decide on the day")
not walking down the aisle to a traditional piece of music ("I'll have the organist on standby, just in case")
Choosing a dress to match the bridesmaids ("I'll blend in" - you're the Vicar!!)
She complained to MIL that I hadn't invited her to go dress shopping (only my DM and maid of honour came with me)

[quote RuinedReindeer]@StrandedStarfish hope you were able to still go ahead 😱[/quote]
Yes. The venue rang to let us know that we would forfeit the deposit and were surprised that the cancellation hadn’t come from us as she had told them she was my mother.

After that we never mentioned the reception at all to anyone. We thought it was her, but couldn’t prove it. I didn’t tell her son anything either. The angry look on her face was a joy to behold when the venue were ready for us. She then turned to my husband and said “ I cannot believe you have brought us to this day and have married that slapper.”

She sat with a face like a well smacked for the rest of the day, and couldn’t bring herself to speak to me at all. That was 28 years ago.

I wouldn't know where to start

Mine are utter Toxic and I take nothing to do with them

My husband works a dangerous job and when I was pregnant with their 2nd grandchild they told me if my husband died they had decided they wouldn't see the grand kids again

Ie my kids and their sons 2 kids

They are vile humans, and were abusive to my husband when he was growing up bd I can't stand them.

@LadyCleathStuart

I get on alright with my inlaws but when we told them we were expecting our first child MIL turned to me and said "well that will be you happy then you will have an excuse to quit work"

I was so shocked, I've always worked and had no intentions of quitting (we have 2 DC now and I'm still working!), it really made me realise just what she thought of me.

She was talking about herself probably. Projecting.

Not as bad as some here but my FIL is a horrible man. Racist, narcissistic and cruel.

He told me he hates the English, I'm English (he's scottish). He would verbally abuse me, but only when there was no witnesses. Luckily DH believes me.

Now DH is a successful adult, with a loving wife, 3 great kids, big house etc and FIL is clearly becoming a weirdo recluse, fil will openly set up situations where he will try to argue and fight with DH. Almost like he is trying to prove that he is still the "man" of the family except DH doesnt rise to it which seems to annoy him even more.

“But if your husband is the only one paying the mortgage then it's his home, surely?”

It must be different over there. I’m American and property acquired during a a marriage is joint. Being a SAHM has a value, too. When I was a SAHM, my then-DH would tell people “I only work for the money. She earns it”.

@Madbadandusuallysad

When we announced we were expecting a baby girl- "oh well never mind maybe next time you will have a boy"

Yep, when I had twin boys after ds1(bil and sil had two boys) FIL said “oh MORE boys” (funnily enough he wasn’t too enthusiastic when we both had girls years later)

I caused my husband's cancer which killed him, because he'd had to look after me some months previously after I'd had surgery, and because he went to John Lewis to buy my birthday presents that year before he became ill.

MIL whose v overweight herself - 'Oh I told SIL she could use that wedding dress after you but sure by the time she got it taken in enough it would be a different dress haha'. 'How much weight have you put on in pregnancy? Oh really, hop up on the scales so we can see' - at Christmas Day dinner.

About my PFB - 'You should break the bond with him now, after all its childminder will be raising him not you'. 'God he is always smiling at his uncles, did you notice? I really think he is 'Gay Slur'' x 1,000,000 times his first year of life

About my DH/her son - 'Is he still taking medication for that 'life long life threatening disease'? I forget he still goes on with that'.