to wonder why some MILs go a bit haywire when a grandchild arrives?

[seoladair]

That's been my experience, and to judge by the AIBU and Relationships boards, it's not uncommon. Why?

my mil went haywire over the wedding... she was ok when the children were born.

My mum seemed to go completely mental when I had her first grandchild. DH was ready to throttle her. My MIL was completely fine as ds was her 7th grandchild so she was very chilled about everything.

I think some women get jealous when their children have children. Mil told me that she was sad because she loves her grandchildren as if they were her own children but she is sad because her grandchildren will never have the happy life that her own children had. I was supposed to feel sympathetic after that statement, I don't think so.

Haziedoll - ouch!

I actually discussed this with my MIL the other day. Not in this exact context but she did tell me that as a Grandma she worries just as much if not more than when she became a mum because she worries about DP and I as well as worrying about DGC. Not worrying in a, we aren't capable, way more of a worry that she wants things to go smoothly for us and she wants DGC to be healthy and happy.

She's a great mum to DP and has worked mostly in childcare including teaching about it so she intimidates me quiet a lot. If it wasn't for the fact that she's pretty brilliant and not overbearing I'd find her being so great would make me feel a lot more inadequate than it does.

I also discussed this with a friend and realised we are probably going to be nightmare MIL's. We aren't close to our own mums so our MIL's have played a big role. When our sons become fathers this maybe different and we'll possibly get paranoid and a bit controlling so that we get a look in.

I often think it would be really interesting to read a post from the MIL as well as the person complaining about them to get the complete picture of whats going on!

I think very often the dynamics are a two way street.

I think as well that with your own mother you can be blunt and tell her what you really think, whereas in most cases you wouldn't be able to do this with your MIL without causing offence.

So if my own mother was annoying me, it would go something like this 'Mum, please don't do/ say that, it's really annoying me' and hopefully the annoying behaviour would stop, no hard feelings all round.....If it was my MIL, I would say nothing and be polite and it would just fester.

I agree alittlesurprise. My MIL is lovely but sometimes drives me mad but I'm too polite to say anything. Although getting better this time around with dc2. MIL is very keen to help so trying to direct her more.

there is a certain amount of separation that happens when a kid leaves home and lives the single life.

my DH used to see his DM a few times a year and that was no problem. Then i got pregnant, and the pressure for visits started: MIL didn't mind having a distant relationship with her adult son, but she wanted a close relationship with the GCs..

problem being that the presumed on a relationship with her son that just wasn't that close. and a relationship with me that is pretty non-existent. Hence the possibility for trouble. This can happen with Dm relationships too for similar reasons, i suppose.

If I thought for a second I will act like my MIL when I am in the position, I would be appalled at myself.
When I'm a MIL I will have respect and love for my DIL as the woman my son loves. I will go out of my way to get on with her and will respect boundaries without question. Why? Because I have had none of that from my MIL, only the total opposite and it makes like hell.
I put the problems down to jealousy in my MILs case. But she is and extremely controlling, insecure woman.
And yes, my MIL went bonkers with possessiveness and all sorts of negatives when my DS was born.

I agree with alittlesurprise - I can be 100% honest with my mum so if she pisses me off I'll tell her why. One example is she kept telling me DS had done 'firsts' with her. "Hasn't he done that for you? He does it when he's with me all the time..." GRRR. She's stopped that now thank God.

MIL just tries to take him away into other rooms or the garden, anywhere out of my sight (or wrestle the pushchair off me!) so there's a lot annoyance on my part but I can't say anything directly.

I expect she does feel envious of my mum's relationship with him though, mum lives near us and has him for about 1 and a half days a week - she sees him for a weekend once a month (and on Skype weekly).

I just wish BIL and SIL who live near the PILs would hurry up and have kids and take some of the attention away from ours.

I'm not sure exactly what you mean by haywire but I know that I got terribly excited and did have to keep reminding myself not to tread on any toes and not to tell my DIL what to do offer helpful advice. I think because having a child does change the family dynamic in such an enormous way it sometimes acts as a trigger for other feelings that may have been held down before. I'm not really sure what I'm talking about because I'm pretty sure that my DIL and I haven't had any major issues.

It would be interesting to see the other side of some of the MIL/DIL problems because my DIL could quite legitimately say that I never called her in the last few days of her pregnancy and never telephoned her in the first few days after she had her baby purely because I remembered how annoying it could be to be interrupted. Maybe that could be perceived as lack of interest. I did email demanding to know when she was planning to actually give birth to my grandchild. (JOKE)

Can I say, as a MIL and grandmother, that it often occurs to me that the issues are more about personality and far less about being a MIL, per se. I didn't get on terribly well with my former MIL but this state of affairs existed from the outset. She was a great interferer and a great complainer. Ex-dh's family dynamics were totally different from mine and I had to accept this.

I also think that while there are a lot of MIL threads on MN, it's worth recognising that this is a microcosm of the real world. But I do know that I was so determined not to interfere that when dgd was born, ds2 sat me down and assured me that I was not a guest in their home but the grandmother of a beautiful little girl who was going to want me as a constant loving presence in her life. That said, I am careful to only provide advice when asked and not burden my ddil with all sorts of ancient, unsolicited, "wisdom" that might have applied 30 years ago but which is not relevant now.

I love my ddil. She's given me the greatest gift. And if there's anything I can do to support her and ds2 I will. But I don't feel I am entitled to take over their lives any more than I was prepared to allow my former Mil to do.

Probably for the same reasons some mothers (and fathers go haywire) excitement, anxiousness and overwhelming newness of the situation.

I'd be more surprised if they didn't.

My relationship with my MIL was pretty strained when DD was in her first year - DD was the first grandchild, DH is an only child and MIL is single so we had all her attention focused on us. But some of the strain was down to me being a bit PFB - I should have leapt at the chance for some rest and let MIL do more (she was desperate for as much time with DD as possible). Also when I was on maternity leave I saw a LOT of my MIL (without DH) and because she isn't my mum I can't / don't really tell her when she is annoying me - and vice versa.

Things have settled down a lot now - helped by me being back at work and so she gets more time babysitting DD (without me telling her how to do it!) and I'm grateful (which I wasn't before as too focussed on me and DD) for all the time and love she lavishes on DD - especially as as I can see how much DD loves her and how good it is for her to have such a lovely grandma.

I think one of the reasons there are so many threads is that people want to let of steam here, rather than at their actual MIL (or DH!)

I think the DiL-MiL relationship is fraught with complications, and can get much more fraught when a baby is born. My baby hasn't come yet, but I am fully aware that the only reason I haven't come into direct conflict yet with my somewhat domineering, tactless (de facto) MiL (who also has a lot of good qualities if I scrunch my eyes up and try to see them - and who of course bore and raised my lovely partner) is that I've never married her son, we've lived mostly in a different country, and didn't plan to have children until very recently.

She thus never needed to think of me as part of the large, geographically-close family of which she is matriarch, or as subject to her rule in the way her other DiLs and Sils are, and I think she's slightly wary of me, because I've never fitted into her idea of what a DiL is (I have a demanding professional job, am not particularly family-oriented, and she cannot understand why we do not give them a Big Day Out, with me in a white dress and veil etc). But I think she imagines that will change with the birth of our baby, so I foresee ructions over marriage, baptism, breast-feeding (disgusting and traveller-ish according to her), highly-gendered toys and clothings etc etc.

As a MIL I was terrified even before the birth of GC that if my DIL took against us I could lose my son. Therefore I have been very careful not to interfere. Since the birth of GC I feel I have stood back as I don't want to get my heart broken if we were ever to put a foot wrong.
We live quite near to them but don't see them very often as we leave it to them to steer contact.
We have told them if there is anything we can do just to ask.
DIL has started to ask for help with babysitting after 6 months so I feel our strategy has paid off.

It would be wonderful to have a warm loving relationship with DIL but unfortunately life isn't perfect and one has to deal with what we are presented with! I am just always on my guard to watch my tongue, so as not to cause offence, and although this is stressful for us it is worth it as we get to see them occasionally and that is all we can hope for.

As a MIL I also try very hard to do everything correctly and not upset anyone, (I don't always succeed (blush)) however one of the things that never struck me before it happened was that when my DILs were pregnant I was concerned for the babys health, when it was my daughter I was terrified something would happen to her!!!
I am sorry if this offends anyone but I am being very honest here, I am fond of my daughters in law and we get along fine but it just didn't occur to me to worry about them.

"breast-feeding (disgusting and traveller-ish according to her"..irony here being BF in the UK is prevalently a M/C activity....

that did occur to me veryyounggrandma...MIL = unconcerned about me, greatly concerned with GCs....now that is fine in a way (as a reflection of true feelings), but not when it manifests itself in out-of-order behaviour, from a person who doesn't really do 'sensitive'..and constant implications that i was 'damaging' my first baby (by a series of trivial things....)

As I seem to make only boys I will be the MIL to the DIL and I'm dreading it. Not because I have a bad relationship with my MIL (she's lovely, albeit a bit controlling) but because I just won't know where to put myself.

I have found similar problems with mum and mil. Both express horrorat my way of doing things, the difference being mil does it far more politely and tries to praise 'what a wonderful mother's I am and then adds in the thing she would like me to do differently. The only real difference in how I deal with the two grandmothers is that I can be a lot more blunt with my own mum.

And the reason you don't hear the views fro. The son in law - mother side is that not many blokes post on mumsnet.

Mil threads always make me
My DH was only child born after 17 years of despair. Everyone said MIL would be scary. I was such an anxious 1st time mum and the first time Mil babysat for DD1 (for two hours she was a colicky cluster feeder) she was so determind to to do things my way that she misunderstood the feet to foot cot positioning and had her upside down at the wrong end of the cot. Was hilarious! Once we realised that whilst I wanted to be the best mum possible to DD and she the best gran we could both easily acheive this. She was amazing and by the DD4 came along- on her birthday I treasured every ounce of "interference".

In my Mil I had a friend and a supporter who I knew loved DH and DDs as fiercely as I did and I miss her every day. The reason my DH is as amazing is down to her and DFils parenting and to them I will be eternally grateful.

As I never had any DS's I'll not be able to use her good example of how to act toward DILs but hopefully my SILS won't suffer too badly.

Maybe the darling sons should take more responsibility over their own relationships with their parents when they settle down and the mil wouldn't feel so threatened that they will loose out. My dh is very good but I still am the one saying have you rang your mum, suggesting he visits when I work on a Saturday, etc. I am the one who organises baby sitting etc
I think "most" men are rubbish at this so puts more pressure on wives and gf
If the wife doesn't step up to the job as well as mil expects she will get the blame. Not darling son.

I completely agree with Madeyemoodysmum. The DIL is often blamed when actually the son should take responsibility for large parts of this relationship. Too often, men sit back and let their wives deal with everything, knowing the DIL will be the one who gets into trouble if anything goes wrong. My MIL wants me to organise my DH as though he is a child or I am his PA; I really resent the insinuations that I am somehow failing if he doesn't call her or organise things.