A son is a son untill he takes a wife, a daughter is a daughter for life?

[Anxiousally]

Aibu to ask if this is true in your experience?

It makes me feel quite sad

DS is only 18 months old so I've a while yet and DHs mum passed away when he was young so I've not really experienced/witnessed an adult male and mother bond?
Just curious?

Not true in my experience. My DH and my DB are much closer to their mum's then both me and my sil. To be honest, your example of the woman who's son went to Australia. Surely his wife is someone's daughter and she went too? To be honest, we're meant to be raising independent adults. Id be quite annoyed if my kids were on the phone to me every day when they had their own family. I'd like a good relationship and for them to see me and speak to me whenever we needed each other but they will still be my son's, wife or no wife!

I think this is generally true, because DIL’s traditionally hate their MIL’s.
I think to avoid it you will have to be a very nice MIL.

This saying is probably ancient and I supposed it used to be true, because adult men were out and about living their lives, having been brought up to please themselves, whereas women were confined to their homes and therefore more involved in family relationships.

It doesn't seem true nowadays, at least not in my experience. I can think of a long list of men who live within 5 minutes' walk of their parents, and who are very involved in their parents' lives. For every DIL who thinks the relationship with her MIL is a competition, I can think of a woman who tries to improve her DH's relationship with his parents. I know just as many women who aren't close to their parents as I know men.
It seems pretty equal to me.

Not in our experience. DH is close with his DM as am I.
We love having her visit. My mum said she feels differently about my DD compared to DB's child though. it doesn't make sense to me!

Both my husbands were/are crap at keeping in contact with their family.

Why? Well i guess their mothers (one lovely, one not) taught them (by their own actions) that that was women's work.

Not wanting your sons to gleefully hand over the reins of doing the donkey work of family connections to his future partner means showing them the way while they're young. I would guess that present buying, celebration organisation, child care and regular family get togethers are still mostly being done by the female partner. Kids pick up on this and will carry on the model.

Meh, I have two sons and not worried about this.

I am female and haven't seen or spoken to my parents since 2013, they don't know my phone number or where I live or that I have children. My DH is male and talks to his mum practically every day, we see his parents at least once a week.

It's about the relationship, not the gender.

My mum is a narcissist and my brother and I both equally think she's an arsehole

I never see my mum. From as soon as I was old enough to understand she made me feel like I wasn’t good enough for her. She already had my older sister, she desperately wanted a boy and as soon as she got one I was pushed out. She sees my brother every day, she couldn’t cope if she didn’t. She’ll never cut the apron strings. My MIL has been more of a mother to me than her.

We’ve got 2 adult sons (21&23). I’m incredibly close to both of them. They keep in contact, they come home regularly and text/WhatsApp everyday. I don’t see it changing once they settle down tbh.

I would have liked to have been close with in-laws - they had no rivals as my parents were dead - but they were not kind or generous people. The mum vacancy was there but mil did not want to fill it.

I feel sorry for people whose dc marry into "fun" families, or quite dominating ones. Ds's friend spends all his time at his intended' s family as they have a big country house (as opposed to his parents' 3-bed suburban place) and places abroad.

I have told ds he has to marry an orphan!

I think there is an element of truth in it because mothers back off when their sons marry for fear of annoying their DIL's. DH is still very close to his parents and I wouldn't dream of driving a wedge between them. Some DIL's act as if they have taken 'ownership' of their husbands when they marry and want to have total control. You see it on here all the time. DIL's complaining about their MIL's doing something they wouldn't have a problem with if it had been their own mother.

I know several men that have never had LTR or married and still live with their mum, but on the main, I do think it’s true. A lot (not all obviously) of men just aren’t as close, not sure why that is... I’m sure my own mil does blame me, but it’s not my job to remind him to stay in touch etc-he’s an adult!

I have 3 boys. Im not fussed. I want to be adisney gran and leave the grunt work to the other side of the family

Definitely true, though I would say the severity depends on the wife!

There is an element of truth in this. When they were very young ds was so loving and when his dad died ,when ds was 17, my lovely boy went out of his way to be kind and helpful. We are still close and he is my pfb forever.
He married a lovely woman whose home was in a different country. He moved there in 1993 and we only see them once a year now. His dw is better at keeping in touch than he is. However, when I had my cancer surgery, he flew out at once, was at the hospital with dh etc.
My dd is, honestly, one of my closest friends. She lives about 8 miles away and I have always done 3 sessions of childcare a week. However I know they both love me and I am grateful for them. Ironically ds has just one dc, a daughter, whereas dd has two boys.

OP I think a lot of this depends on the attitude of the MIL/FIL as well tbh.

When my DD was born I was DESPERATE for my MIL to step in with help, I remember one day early on when I was feeling crap about myself and asked her to come and look after DD while I went to a rare post-natal yoga class around the corner. MIL was so incredibly panicked about every little thing that it ended up being too stressful for me to go. A few months after that I asked her if she'd like to use her retirement time to set a regular day every week to come over and hang out (I wasn't looking for free childcare, just general time together and for me to maybe dash to the shops or make a quick work call while she was in the house with us) and she was panicked all over again, said she wouldn't feel comfortable left with DD as she was too worried.

Cue a few years later she is constantly raging at DH that my mum gets more time with DD than she does.

She keeps herself at a deliberate distance, isn't remotely hands-on, seems to want the role of a grandparent who descends occaisonally to take DGD to a nice day out... all fine with me (though I would have LOVED more from her in the early days) but then I don't know that she has the right to spitting rage and upset because she feels that my family are more hands-on.

She could have been (and still could be) as hands-on as she likes, she just needs to DO IT! I couldn't make it more easy for her, I have always been very fond of her and she is in most ways a great MIL, DD is her only grandchild and she doesn't live far, she is quite lonely and no longer works but is fairly mobile and robust so I honestly don't know why she won't be more proactive in joining in our family life. I would love her to, she loves it when she does, she just hangs back as if she is waiting for some self-fulfilling prophecy of The Man's Mother Not Getting So Much to come true.

Does that make any sense?

I'd say it depends on the mother, the son and the daughter in law involved.
My relationship with my MIL is difficult but she's an unusual woman. I've never had a problem with any previous partner's mothers whereas MIL has taken great issue with me, all of DH's previous girlfriends and all of BIL's girlfriends so I try to not take offence. She seems to really dislike sharing her sons with other women so non of us ever stand a chance.
I had a great relationship with an ex boyfriends mother though. So much so that we are still friends 10 years later.
I hope (as a mum of a boy) that if you're welcoming to the girlfriend then the relationship will be at least a pleasant one. Despite my MIL telling me several times that she doesn't like me, that she thinks I'm the wrong person for her son and worse I still facilitate a relationship between her and her grandchildren and often times her and her son who has struggled with her reaction toward me.

It's true. Yes it is circumstantial and there will be many that don't fit this mould but by and large it is true.

Its true.

I don't believe daughters love their mums more than sons do though. I also believe sons can be equally close with their mums as daughters. I think the issue comes that women generally have more in common with women. My own mother is dead but all my friends spend time shopping with their mums, going for lunch, coffee, nail appointments and going on holidays etc. So I think often daughters end up doing more day to day stuff with their mothers.

It's the same as sisters. I have a sister and we do lots together...same as my friends who have sisters. I've been on holiday with my sister as have all my friends...my friends with brothers wouldn't dream of going on holiday with them! I'd meet up with my sister and go shopping but I couldn't see a brother and sister doing that.

In rl I only know 1 person who does not have a good relationship with her mil (imho there is fault on both sides). I also know a couple of people with very overbearing mils who are bloody saints but generally I think for most women we are able to put aside our differences for the sake of our dh/ds and dc/dgc.

I am always shocked and sad by all 'go nc immediately' responses to the Mil threads on here. No mil or dil is perfect, I have had a few run-ins with my Mil as has my sil with my own dm. We work it through though, surely that's what families do. It's not always easy but I hope I am raising my kids to know that relationships aren't easy but need work and that's what we do for the people we love.

Wise words, ChilliMum, but ones that fall on deaf ears on MN.

Every year I am at the posters who are cross and upset - nay, outraged , that their mil has dared to buy a chocolate advent calendar for their dcs when they buy the advent calendar. And I'm equally by the number of posters who pile in with the phrase, "She's had her turn, she should back off." So nasty.

You’re more likely to stay close to a son if he lives near you. If they’re more than an hour’s travel time away you’re going to be the one making the effort to keep in touch.
DDs make a bit more effort whatever the distance.

My DS lives 2 hours away and I’m the one who initiates phone calls and visits. I’m very lucky he’s married to a lovely woman who always makes me feel welcome.

I agree with most of what has been posted. I also think you should try to forget you ever heard this saying as by buying into it even a tiny bit, you run the risk of it influencing your impact on your son's future relationships.

I strongly suspect my MIL is a firm believer in this saying. As a result, she treated me like shit from the first day that I met her, and when my DH told her he was going to propose (after 5 years together), she tried to talk him out of it - while I was sat in the same room. I can honestly, hand-on-heart, say that I did nothing to deserve her hostility; I tried so hard with her for a good few years, and badly wanted her to like me or at least tolerate me.

Funnily enough, once we had our first child, she started to make a real effort with me - almost like she suddenly realised that I wasn't going anywhere and her hostility towards the mother of her sons child could lead to her potentially losing him and her grandchildren. By this point it was too late for me, and while we have a good relationship on the surface, I really don't like her and it's all for show and to make DH's life easier.

DH obviously loves his Mum but years of her hostility towards me, PA behavior and guilt tripping have led to him making less effort and it's actually me now that reminds him weekly to contact her/organize visits etc

I think if you have a good relationship with your son and don't interfere with his relationships there is no reason at all why you would "lose him" to a wife. Making an effort to welcome his future girlfriends into your family would also help, I'm sure.

But the mother-son bond is just weird in a lot of cases, with the son kept closer and expected to be more dependent than any daughter, and all kinds of fear, obligation and guilt practised to keep things that way.

This is definitely true in DH's case; his Dad passed away years ago so MIL relied heavily upon DH to be "man of the house" from a young age. DH wasn't ever the type to rebel because he's very much a people pleaser and MIL never taught him independence so the first year or so of living together was a bit of a baptism of fire for him.

He's still close to her and I think always will be (and she's quite good at the guilt/obligation/tears thing to keep him in line), while I've always been quite independent and see my parents often but don't rely on them. MIL is lovely and a nice part of our lives but there's definitely an unconscious effort on my part to ensure our DC don't grow up to be so reliant on me because as a woman meeting a man, it's incredibly hard when they're so entirely helpless.

My MIL has 2 sons and they adore her.

We have 1 son 18 now and I can't see anyone driving a wedge between us.

whooo - that is such an interesting and thoughtful post. I wonder how much of that gendered taught behaviour is about the bad role modelling that existed back then (boys as little princes who were simply above domestic work, girls as needing discipline to make them worthy wives). Inbuilt in that modelling is a gender divide that is slightly stranger: the girl will grow up and will up and leave, and is being prepared for that independence (albeit in an unequal way), the boy is not, and is not being allowed to grow and develop, which then creates this strange and slightly Freudian bond.

I therefore agree with a PP who says that modelling gender roles better for future generations must be a part of solving intergenerational problems. Men must be brought up to be independent and to do their share of the domestic and childcare labour, just as women are.