MiL has been here 60mins...

[whatatod0]

Oh god. parents-in-law have been here 1 hour into a 7 day visit. They are already annoying me.
MIL likes to help/take over my kitchen and she doesn't listen when I tell her to go and sit down (nicely). If I give her a job to do she just gets in my way and takes forever to do it.
I want to run away for the week.

Don't have my mother or mother in law..sadly both passed away when I was 40.....make the most of them…..

why?

Other posters MILs aren't your MIL or mother, they may be nothing like them in any way

Anybody can be a MIL or mother, yours may have been worth cherishing but other people's are arseholes worth avoiding

For the person who said upthread her own mum died when she was 8 so that made it easier. Well for me its the opposite. My own mum died when I was a child but MIL is no substitute.

I feel oppressed by her thinking that she can step in when I have no one else. She tries to be kind but can only see things from her point of view - its very wearing being told "you look so tired" "have a rest" when in fact I feel perfectly fine and rather insulted to be told I "look tired".

if you try and have a 2 way conversation she just shouts over you, buts in or changes the subject.

I think I'd prefer this to my MIL who during any attempt to converse, looks away until the person has finished their sentence and continues on where she left off, completely ignoring what anyone might have said.

When she visits, DH hurries around the house, hiding any paperwork upstairs. He has been known to empty downstairs drawers of anything confidential as he knows his mother snoops. SIL has also told me not to say or tell MIL anything as it will be amended, repeated and judged. How envious you must all be..........

I would say that my relationship with my Mil used to be good for the first 10 yrs but has gradually deteriorated over the last 10 yrs. it is no coincidence that I have grown a backbone and have called her out on hypocrisy, favouritism or simply saying no to some of her demands. We see her less (probably every 2 months or so) so distance helps me to tolerate her when she does visit and stay for the weekend.

DH told me once that he couldn't be in the same room as his mum for more than 5 mins without wanting to kill her. I felt such relief, as I found her equally trying; more so in fact, as once we were married he left her to me, and would wander off and hide at his friend's house whenever she appeared.

You are very brave to be facing 7 days of MIL OP, I'd be screaming and tearing my hair out after 24 hours. Luckily, that will never happen as my DH can barely be in the same room as her for 5 minutes and only still speaks to out of duty.
I am well aware that I could be someone's MIL one day and with that in mind, I've been making an effort with her and trying to stick up for her for years but since we've had our DC, she's gone into overdrive and I've lost all patience with her. I fantasise about moving far away from her or sending her on a never-ending cruise.
It's a shame, I loved my ex's mum, she'd have been a great granny.

Once, she was insisting on helping, so I said okay do you mind peeling some potatoes?.
She says "how many" and I say "enough for the 5 of us^
She peels 2 very small ones.
Might need a few more MIL
"but I've never cooked potatos in a steamer so I don't know how many to do"
at this point DH says "mum, it's the same amount per person no matter how you cook them.. however many you're going to put on each person's plate, times 5 of us, that's how many we need to peel"
MIL starts to get annoyed with him "well I don't know how many that is in that thing, I always boil mine!"
DH: "well, however many you'ld peel if you were boiling enough for 5 people, that's how many you peel to steam them for 5 people"
MIL now very annoyed at DH "LOVE" ("love" in an angry way grin ) "I DON'T HAVE ONE OF THOSE THINGS" (she can't even SAY the word steamer now it's just too exotic and scary and strange) "I HAVEN'T USED ONE BEFORE SO HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO KNOW WHAT TO DO WITH IT"
DH: "MUM, YOU DON'T HAVE TO US IT, I'll turn it on, we just need 5 PEOPLE worth of potatoes"
MIL " well, I don't know how much that is, I can't do it"

Aargh! I feel your pain!

I would honestly wonder if she was developing a form of dementia.

Or just being deliberately awkward.

Or has just found a ham-fisted way of making sure all the attention stays on HER no matter what.

Unbelievable.

How difficult is the instruction to "peel 5 potatoes"?

Aargh. Oh, and AAARGH again!!!!

Mine is visiting soon. I may need to be back on here at that time to vent.

It's difficult having the right food in for her as there are lots of things she doesn't like. She didn't know what a sweet potato was and didn't like them when I cooked them for her. Doesn't like fish (unless it's deep fried). Veg has to be very over cooked and soft. We'll probably have to stick with fish and chip takeaways.

She doesn't play with my DCs, just makes comments about what they are doing whilst sat on the sofa. If we go to the park she finds a seat and sits down rather than playing with them. She's always keen to see them but that's all she wants to do. See them. I think so that she can text her friends about them and show off when she gets home.

Like someone said above, I also got on really well with my ex's mum, she'd have probably been a wonderful mil/gran.

My mum does that same thing of "well I don't know how to do xyz, how am I supposed to know?" and getting all petulant and sorry for herself. Things she can't do include finding her way to a place she has been before, when given a map, street address and detailed instructions, looking after a 2yo for 5 minutes without them running away, finding out where to catch a bus, etc.

Yet she prides herself on being highly intelligent and gets huffy and righteous if anyone questions why she can't do these things. (Which she actually can, she's spent her life doing them, she's not unable to cope, mentally disabled or anything.)

I think it's a deliberate (though maybe subconscious) way to get "looked after" and cast herself in a kind of child role with me as the parent. If I get annoyed, that just reinforces the whole dynamic and then she cries and says I'm being mean to her.

I think part of the problem is that in many cases our MILs aren't necessarily the sort of person we'd choose to spend large amounts of time with. And when you add long stays, things are bound to get tense.

My MIL means well, but she is exceedingly stuck in her ways, and appears to have forgotten that DH isn't still the 17 year old who moved out of home. She also lives on the other side of the world, so when she comes to visit, it's for a long time.

She had rearranged my kitchen when I was at work. Rearranged my really nice put away until I can fit into it again underwear box. She sent my dairy allergic daughter chocolate "because I thought she'd like the box", has absolutely no filter (once told a grieving widow at the funeral that her husband wasn't in a better place because he hadn't welcomed god into his life) and is not capable of a positive conversation.

I spend her visits biting my tongue, telling the DC "no, I'm not sure why Nanna said/did that, maybe she meant...", and trying to find ways to keep the peace. But she does mostly mean well, she is my DH's mum (although she drives him equally crazy), and my DC's grandmother. So I do my best to get through it, vent on her or to my DM and try to remember the good bits.

I wish I could have a better relationship with her, but if she wasn't my MIL I still wouldn't get on with her.

My mil probably lives the perfect distance. 15 minutes drive, so her visits are a couple of hours.

And I love her to bits but I do find her talking difficult, particularly when I'm making and serving dinner or one of my own kids (also with add) need some immediate attention while she's telling me all about the cousin of the mum of the kid who was 2 years below dh, at school, who she bumped into in wilko...

Asd, , stupid phone.

The food ones remind me of when MIL came to stay after I'd had DC1. She wanted to make me a special recipe that I would love and contained all kinds of perfect ingredients for my health as a breastfeeding new mum. So far, so lovely and kind.

First it involved a faffy, flappy and time consuming trip to the shops to get all the stuff. Then flapping and faffing about in the kitchen for hours and repeatedly getting me in to show her where things were. By this time I was ready to faint from hunger but couldn't grab a snack as she was in the kitchen and would have seen me spoiling my appetite for her special recipe. Eventually she brought through a fancy looking salad - on a small plate. It was delicious, but it was about 1/20 of the calories I needed. I had to go on and on about how fabulous it was and she kept asking again and again if I liked it. I was desperate to get to the kitchen and eat 14 slices of bread before I collapsed. But she would have been really offended.

If someone doesn't bother giving a thought to how they could actually be helpful, they are just meeting their own needs really. It might seem nice, that's the idea – but it comes at a cost to the person they are helping. I think this happens so often with MILs/DILs.

How about this then! When we were still in the delivery room after having my DD1, my husband excitedly rang his M to tell her the news. When she heard the name (pretty and not too unusual) the first thing she said is that it's the name of someone's dog.

Mind you that's still not as bad as what my sil did but i daren't say on here as might out myself.

My IL's live abroad which is a shame. We'd love to have them closer as they're lovely.

It's 7 days out of your life.
It's your partners parents.

Satsunday my lovely FIL died a few months before our youngest was born and my MIL is convinced he's the reincarnation of him, she even tried to push us into naming him after his Grandfather.
She's fucking batshit.

And she'll be here in an hour.

I banned my own mum from kitchen(She's a chef) as its my space/domain. Do something similar?

My MIL stayed with us for two weeks last year. I thought the visit went fairly well, mil constantly finding something to clean, fix, tidy,cook or prepare. Nothing that urgently required doing but I let her get on with it because she wanted to do it. I smiled politely when she offered small criticism about how my cupboards were organised etc. When she left she had cried to my dh about my lack of housekeeping skills and not caring about the state of our house. 'you don't have to live like this! ' ffs I'm not even a messy person.

SatSunday my uninvited MIL turned up in my delivery room whilst I was still being treated.
She also refused to call DD2 by her name for the first few months because she didn't like it.

I've got one who needs to be looked after as well. She repeatedly, even when it's something she has done before, asks how things work, when things need doing, where things are, how to turn my oven on etc etc. Yet if you dared to suggest she needs help or is in any way not the intelligent, independent, all wonderful bossy, controlling, domineering, loud woman she purports to be there is hell to pay

She also runs an excellent line in asking me something, only to ask DH minutes later. He has taken to asking "What did Toria say?" before answering.

This thread is akin to picking a scab in that it will never heal. You complain but have no solution.
You young women and I say women as likely your DPs don't notice, should tell us mothers and mils how you want us to be.

You have much criticism of us so just shout it out. How may we correct our bad behaviour? How should we behave?

I thought remaining in the background until needed was right, but apparently not.

Just what is required of us?

How would you feel, if I came on a Friday night with everything for a great supper and told you to sit down, pour the wine and I'd cook.
I daresay I'd be taking over.

Or plonked myself on your sofa and expected food to come to me.

I did the in laws staying for two weeks whilst we slept on the floor on a blow up bed in the sitting room every year for years.
I bit my tongue at my late mil opening cans of stew and tinned potatoes when I cooked good food. I was horrified that she herself only ever ate scones and buns, but I kept my nose out.

It was for two weeks, gave them great pleasure and now they've both gone.

My grief is that my ex husband now claims on FB that I hated his family. So not true.
I loved both his parents, but as not a FB user, I can't reply.

You sound very bitter Hee, maybe you should stop assuming that Dil's want money and babysitting from their Mil's and they will in return stop assuming that Mil's are bitter judgemental women who have nothing nice to say.

I personally would like Mil to behave like I would expect a friend to. No judgement, nasty comments, rearranging my possessions or all the other things mentioned up thread.

Surely, if you are confident in yourself, remarks or criticism from a mil would not bother you?
My mils comments didn't bother me at all. Some were useful and some were quite mean and many I found amusing, but I wasn't that interested in her opinion.
I would love to hear what all these mothers in law had to say after they have visited some if you.