MIL a nightmare

[SwordToFlamethrower]

Been married 3 years, together 9 years. MIL been a nightmare since day one.

There have been stints of NC or greyrocking but now she is back in our lives because we have a baby.

It is hard to describe what she is like so I'll give you recent examples.

She came to visit a few weeks ago and I was making a meat pie from scratch for dinner. She stood over my shoulder and demanded to know what I was doing. I was confused and said I was rubbing fat into flour to make pastry. She is very shrill naturally and shreaked that in her country NO ONE makes pies or pastries because they're not as good as the professionally made ones. She then started going on about how the Nazis would shoot people in the street when her parents were younger. It was horrible. She was rude, judgmental and said "why not just leave it to the professionals?" DH was furious at her and told her she was insensitive. Her childhood stories and what she likes or doesn't like or thinks dominates any conversation.

We were watching a comedy show on tv and every time I laughed, she craned her neck, scowling at me in confusion. Making me self conscious for finding comedy funny, in my own home. (She didn't find it funny)

Had a go at ME for not tidying up enough for her visit then laughed and said she was joking when DH said "you're not a guest, you're family, so we don't stand on ceremony for you".

She's just gone home after another visit and this time she sat staring at me nursing my 13 month old. I knew what was coming because 9 years ago she said that women who breastfeed for more than 12 months are getting a sick sexual pleasure from it. I never forgot what she said and I was so tense as she stared at me. "When are you planning to finish breastfeeding?" I knew it! But I tried not to bite. "No plans."

She questioned me, very concerned that she thought it would stunt DD growth, cause weight issues. That it isn't as nutricious as cows milk and surely I want to stop??? At least she didn't accuse me of being a pedo.

I tried laughing it off and DH told her again she was rude. But by the end of the three day visit, we'd been forced to listen to her talking about babies being murdered, wars, her views on politics, on religion (she is a devout Christian and we are atheists) and the best one - a three hour lecture about why we are wrong to not watch TV every evening and instead read, do crafts and play games or whatever. She thinks WE are rigid and unimaginative.

I'm absolutely fed up of her. DH is an only child and she lives alone in London, She is early 70s, fit and healthy.

Yes she might be autistic but honestly, that doesn't excuse her shitty behaviour. She doesn't take no for an answer and her way is the only way, the right way and she doesn't stop when we ask her to.

I don't see this situation improving really!

Anyone else got a MIL like this?

Yes mil is obsessed with food. Protein is her big thing. She has something to say about food, food groups, nutrients etc, all the time.

She wants greens/cabbage with every evening meal. She is particular drinks and hates water.

She has just been diagnosed with high cholesterol and fatty liver disease too so it's even worse now. She is slim and judgmental about weight and height. Looks very badly upon overweight or short people.

Yes she seems to have inherited war trauma despite being born after the war.

Dh says she never used to repeat war stories, this is a new thing.

It's so baffling to be judged for scratch cooking! She buys everything pre made and thinks it's superior. Maybe it is, but she has to bring it up over and over again.

It sounds like she's from the I AM RIGHT UNDER ALL CIRCUMSTANCES brigade.

1. play MiL Bingo "oh there we go with that repeated comment/theme".

2. challenge her every time (she's unlikely to back down mind you)

3. don't let her in your house (hopefully your husband will get it)|

4. invest in a new patio.

Yes, she is the Director General of the Always Right Brigade.

No, she is the Supreme Commander!

She is also the leader of the "If I am phoning you, it is always an emergency and you must always answer, or else! Brigade"

The best one was when we were waiting to see if my egg collection for IVF had been at all successful, (we were in abroad for IVF) and she phoned DH on repeat for an "emergency" and the "emergency" was help filling out a form. It was also our anniversary that day, and it caused a huge argument between
us and her.

She got no contact for 6 months after that. Never apologised though!

This is what I would do.

If your DH wants her to stay again, she is welcome to visit during the day (for an hour or two) if she decides to come again, it is a hotel or AirBnB that she will be staying in.

Any sign of her dropping into her usual topics of conversation, get in there and use your voice to say "Ah hear now Maude - I'm really not interesting in hearing about the Nazi's or Germans again. Can you please pick a different topic of conversation?" or jump in before she gets started and start your own topic of conversation. Cut her off at the chase.

Good luck!

How far is your husband mired in the FoG?

No matter what Mumsnet says, removing oneself from a parent is bloody hard and not to be done lightly. But if you have a Maternal Tyrant, it's okay to keep some distance. Very hard to do if the Maternal Tyrant has brought you up though - I hope he can see clearly and has your back.

Well from all I've read about the Nazi occupation of NL in WW2 she's talking bollocks about not having ovens to cook pubs etc.

There wasn't anything to cook apart from tulips and "roof rabbits" (cats).

Led to Audrey Hepburn suffering anorexia all her life.

This has put my own mil niggles into perspective, yours sounds like a shocker 😱

I've deleted the rest of my post because you've had some really good advice. But to summarise I agree, you need to be tolerant of her "quirks" but only to a point and after that be absolutely firm on your boundaries. Four day visits..?! 😱 I've just had a four day visit from my pil who are lovely but the path of 'chill' is very winding and there are always niggles. Mil came out with some corkers this time, but not on your level - four days is too much. Find a level you, you are comfortable with and have the confidence to stick to it.

but f she lived through Nazi occupation and survived she had to find an inner tough strength most people don't possess. As a result probably lost her softer side. If she was very young that's the time of her primary socialisation

If she's in her mid 70s she didn't live through the Nazi occupation. Her parents did and she might well have had a tough upbringing because of that, but to have lived through the war she'd be in her 90s.

Led to Audrey Hepburn suffering anorexia all her life

I saw a programme called World War Weird, and it was talking about the teenage Hepburn running errands for the Dutch resistance. She gave an interview once in which she said 'All those things you've read and heard about the occupation? it was much worse than anything you've heard.' So I can believe that MIL has severe generational trauma.

She moved to England when she was 18 in the swinging 60s. She said NL was boring. She prides herself on always being "strong" but DH said she was soft and kind when he was young. This harsh side has only appeared in the last decade.

Funnily enough, when I came on the scene!

Reading about the behaviour of your Mil, I can’t believe that you allow her to visit. She sounds like an absolute nightmare and quite unhinged.
I could not put up with someone like her in my house, for one minute, I don’t care who she is.
Put your foot down and tell Dh if he wants to see his “D”M he will have to take a trip to London.

Four days too long for anyone to visit. Two days max. Not from NL but I can be quite direct. I think if people are so rude and pride themselves on such , they deserve the same back. My MIL was going on and on about breastfeeding, child rearing . I finally said that I didn't really care what her opinions were , they were irrelevant to me . That shut her up . Very very harsh of me but I had enough . From then on she watched herself, God knows what she said to others about me but as I had no need of her approval or cared about her opinions, I really really didn't care.

I've been chatting to dh about this on and off today.

We both agree "ignoring" her outbursts, rants and judgmental behaviour is not going to keep working and we need to go back to calling it out.

I suppose we feel sorry for her as she has just retired and she is totally alone in London and DH is her life line. She refuses to consider living anywhere else because she likes the pace and the west end etc.

We live on the Dorset coast and she thinks it's boring here.

God knows what she will do if she becomes infirm. Care home I suppose.

I digress. Anyway, to reply to you, yes we have both agreed to tell her when she is being rude AF. If it results in a tantrum from her, then she will be asked to leave. She really has no clue as she always says she had a great time and can't wait to see us again soon!

@SwordToFlamethrower - you wrote "I suppose we feel sorry for her as she has just retired and she is totally alone in London and DH is her life line. She refuses to consider living anywhere else because she likes the pace and the west end etc."

Please don't feel sorry for her. The location that she lives in is entirely her choice. She literally could live anywhere. She wants to live in London. She must have at some point in the past expressed her enjoyment of living there for the pace and the West End as you mentioned that. She has also mentioned that she finds where you and your DH have set up home as boring.

You are under NO obligation to have her stay under your roof if a visit is on the cards in the future. None. If she wants to visit in the future, I'd recommend cutting her off at the chase and saying "Maude, we really think that it would be best if you stayed in a local B&B or AirBnB on your next visit. We've decided that we're actually not going to be having any guests stay with us in 2024."

This is passed down trauma. Many of the children of holocaust survivors suffer from this . Your mil sounds deeply traumatised by her parent’s experience of the war. She may have grown up sitting on her mother’s knee listening and absorbing trauma with her milk.
How you decide how you want to cope with this is entirely up to you, there’s no need for your child to hear of man’s inhumanity to man. You can do what is best for you and be compassionate as well.

I think you should say “Did I ask for your opinion? No? Well that’s because I don’t want it.”

actually "you have a right to your opinion, but not on my time and not around my child" might work? It really is direct enough if delivered in a quiet tone.

Ive heard from quite a few Dutch people that the 60's were boring here, specially in the very religious West of the country.

She said it happened when her parents were younger and they would have been around during WWII.

I'm a similar age to your MIL. I know it must seem confusing if your husband says she didn't do the war stories when he was young but I can understand it to some extent, obviously she should try to control it. I think we hear things when we are young but don't always process it as we don't have the life experience, then we are busy with career/marriage/children. We retire and suddenly these things come up.

My example is my granny who was a wonderful woman. As a child I remember my mother talking about how tough things were in the 30s and the days when granny would serve a meal but have a slice of bread herself as she had eaten her meal earlier. Obviously she went without to feed her kids. I thought it was sad, it was a passing thought. Now when I see things like Ukraine and Gaza I think of old ladies and parents going without so children can eat and truly I could cry for them and my granny. I don't talk about it though! I just thought it might help to understand that particular bit of the puzzle.

I had a crazy MIL who would say the most inappropriate things (a classic example was asking me if my husband being circumcised had affected our sex life, this was in front of two teenage sons who didn't know whether they should laugh, throw up or run away. They ran away.)

I adopted the same tactics with my late MIL. She never learned my name and would refer to me as "That girl" and "It" as in "Does it want a cup of tea?" I was in my 50s when she died so wasn't a girl.

I also took to laughing at some of the stuff she came out with, one occasion was when she told me husband, in front of me, that she knew I was having an affair with my boss. We both laughed at that one as the "evidence" she had was so ridiculous.

Yeah I agree, she is batshit, so laughing is best!

She has the uncanny ability to reel you in sometimes and I really need to work on ignoring or laughing. Preferably laughing at her.

Laughing is actually a great weapon. Irate drivers hate it if you laugh at them when they are ranting. I hope it works for you.

Oh gosh my mil is the same. In fairness to yours I think culturally people from the Netherlands are a lot more direct than brits. But I think you can make that to your advantage and just be direct back - oh I wasn’t looking for anyone else’s input, or I’ll ask your opinion if I need it, or even ok mil I think we’ve heard enough about the nazis for one day thank you.
But the directness doesn’t excuse a lot of the behaviour and comments so I do feel for you. its so draining , I can only manage 4 hours maximum with mine and then I need a few weeks to decompress so you have my sympathies!
the absolute best thing though is to not justify yourself. It reinforces that her opinion and approval matters, and it doesn’t.

That's interesting

Is that why some South Africans are also like this because their ancestors were Dutch

Brilliant and kind advice!!! Thank you so much. Does that approach work with your mil? Does she get the message?