To not want to call MIL Mum?

[sunshinelolipops]

My MIL wants me to call her Mum and gets upset if I call her by her first name. I talked to Dh about it and he doesn't get the problem and thinks this is a normal thing to do. He is very defensive of his Mum.
I don't feel close to MIL and it feels awkward and weird to call her Mum. I am very close to my actual Mum. At the same time I don't want to upset her and have been humouring it but don't know how long I can keep it up for. I am also worried it might offend my actual mum if she heard me call her this.
My mum doesn't expect Dh to call her Mum, just by first name. I had never even heard of calling MILs Mum before.
Is this normal? What should I do?

Mine wanted mine to call me Mum2.
No. She's not my mum.

She is being silly and will (probably) get over it.

It's not an unusual thing to do, but it's also not unusual or insulting to NOT do it.

I had this situation too! The actual word used was slightly different (my MIL is from a different country to me) which helped a bit, but I also found it awkward and embarrassing, and the word seemed to stick in my throat so for some time I didn't really call her anything. I think it's kindly meant, though, and I made myself do it. Now it feels a lot easier but I still can't bring myself to use the "M-word" in front of my actual mum.

My pillow suggested I call them Mum and Dad when I married dh. (not offered during the 10years we were dating though) I politely declined. Can't remember the exact wording but I think I brought up my deceased DDad.
They seemed to accept it and I call them by first names. They are very British (racist even) so not a cultural thing.

My mil always signs cards to me from ‘Mum and Dad’ and calls fil ‘your dad’ when she’s talking to me, but she always calls me by her friend’s name (her friend is my age) and generally gets names wrong and gets people confused, so I’m not sure if she knows she’s doing it or if she’s just getting muddled.

*pil not pillow!

You're definitely not being unreasonable. My mother in law wanted the same and I managed 16 years of marriage without calling her anything. She'd also grab my face and kiss me on the lips- bleurgh, was horrible!

I call mil Mum. I felt really odd being the only person who called her by her first name. She was Mum or granny to everyone else

So I asked dh to ask her if I could and she said she would be delighted.

It does feel weird tho I’m not used to it yet

I don't understand her thinking.

Do whatever you're comfortable with.

Nope.. your Mum is Mum.... nobody else

Mine asked my this years ago, I had an involuntary laugh/snort before saying “but your not my mum?” She never asked again.

I agree it's an older generation thing. Both my parents called their ILs Mum and Dad. I think they invited my husband to do so too, but he declined.

We all call my Nan Nan, but she's in her 90s, it would be weird for him to just use her first name.

Ugh, I have this. Hate it. My in-laws want to be mum and dad. I have never been allowed to use their first names. When dating and engaged I had to call them Mr & Mrs X, then they expect me to switch to mum and dad?!!

I now either only speak to them when making direct eye contact (so no need to use a name to get their attention!), or use Granny/Grandpa.

Can't do "mum and dad", won't do it, they've just made it awkward... As I say, ugh.

I call my MIL 'Nanny' at her request. If you have kids this might be a good way to sidestep the issue. Or could you call her Mum-his surname ie Mum-Smith? YANBU to say no if it makes you uncomfortable.

What would your dh say if you said that he needed to call your mum 'mum' too?

Obviously you don't want him to do this - he has his own mum just as you have yours but it would be interesting to see if 'I don't see what the problem is' would translate to him being actually happy to do this when asked...

Does your mil call her mil mum too or does she use her name?

Sometimes if she gets upset by things that upset you then you just have to show that you are more upset that she is - every time she suggests it, just have a few stock phrases to keep repeating until it sinks in - 'I thought we had discussed this. I already have a mum. You are not my mum, you are my mother in law, in my family it would be incredibly disrespectful to my mother to call anybody else mum. I can't believe that you are pressuring me to be so horrible. You're not respecting me or my mother when you ask this'.

My mother used to call her mil 'mum' which she didn't really like but sort of got guilted into it from what I can understand.

My dad - don't remember him calling his PIL mum and dad - but when I was a baby I couldn't say their names properly so they had nicknames that stuck - and he used those. As did my other cousins and aunts that married into the family, as did family friends that knew them through our family, or if my friends were there at the same time...

I managed to get away without calling my mil anything in particular - didn't really speak to her a lot, definitely didn't want to call her mum (although some of the other siblings' partners did) and felt odd using her first name too.

So it's one of those things that's not unheard of but not normal either. Suspect there's more regional or cultural or family influences that come into play than being a definitely right or wrong thing.

But if you don't feel comfortable calling her mum, then don't. And just keep on reminding her with the 'we've discussed this. I'm not calling you mum, it's incredibly disrespectful etc etc'. If she doesn't want you calling her by her first name, then maybe there's a different word that you could settle upon that is a compromise - maybe mum/mil/granny in a different language that one of you has ties to, (if there's any welsh in you there's a word for nanny or granny that when I was little I could have sworn was monkey - I think it's something like mamghi - but maybe offering to call her monkey would help!), or a made up word or something else that you could agree on? Then at least you would be keeping mum for your mum.

DP and I are not close to each others' mums - in fact sometimes the relationships are quite strained - but we slipped into saying 'mum' and both of other mothers tend to sign things as 'mum' to both of us. Just saying, not because it should influence what you do, but just to demonstrate it needn't be about how emotionally close you are.

I already have a mum, and she is mum. It wouldn't matter if I loved my MIL to bits, she's still not my mum.

My mil gets upset if my DD calls her grandma, she wants to be called mum and would correct my 3year every time.

My parents are from Northern Ireland and called each other’s parents Mum and dad.
It’s weird though, I call my own PIL by their names and DH calls my parents by their names too.

I call my MiL by her first name. She’s not my mother! The boys call her Nana, DH sometimes calls her mum and sometimes calls her by her first name. They’re not brilliantly close. She signs cards to us from “Mum/Name/Nana”.

It’s normal in some relationships, not in others. YANBU at all to want to use her name. Just say you don’t wish to call her Mum as she isn’t your Mum and that you would feel more comfortable using her name.

Its weird.
My df called my mums parents mum and dad but his were long dead..
When he died when we were in our 20s my dsis suddenly called her fil Dad. Proper freaked me out

I think it may be a British thing to do. My GM told my DM to call her Mum when she first got married. Given my GM had done nothing but be a bitch towards my DM (who isn't British) up to this point, it didn't go down well.

My MIL asked me to call her Mum just after I'd got married. Again, we didn't get on, I had a Mum and to make matters worse my Dad had just died so I was no where near calling someone else Dad. I thought it was unbelievably insensitive while I think she probably thought it was very caring and 'the done thing'.

I think she meant well but it set our relationship back years as I was so cross with her. If she'd left us to make friends at our own pace, it would have been so much better.

We get on OK now and I know she's actually a v nice person but I still couldn't call her Mum.

Nope i wouldn’t do it, it would feel disrespectful towards my own mother in some way.
Interestingly the first Mother’s Day after I moved in with dh (dp at the time) my own mother got really offended because her card was only signed from me and not dp too. I pointed out to her that she’s my mum, not dp’s, still offended. I then pointed out that dp’s own mother is dead so did she not feel it a bit insensitive. Apparently not, still offended. I then just outright told her she had odd expectations on account that she wasn’t his mum.
Nothing as weird as folk

My mil has started signing cards as - mum (sue). I find it quite weird as I've happily called her sue for 4 years. I'm taking it as a compliment though as we are a rare mumsnet breed of mil/dil as we get on like a house on fire. Infact I often go over for a natter whilst DH is at work

It used to be normal (where I am) for your own mother to be mum, and for MIL to be "mother".

Nowadays it's much more usual for people to call their ILs by their first name, although I did call my MIL mum, as I called my own mother by her first name (usual in our family) so "mum" didn't have any special connotations for me, and mum liked it, so shrug.