To be wound up by this "gift"

[DieAntword]

MIL visits, along with the usual assortment of charity shop toys and t-shirts which have slogans on (which are not my taste but hey, something to wear when doing messy stuff) she always brings she brought her friend's decades old (must be, her kids are adults) mouldy (so lets put this into perspective... it must not have been cleaned in those decades!) potty. A second hand, dirty, potty.

We have a potty. My son is now potty trained and using the toilets. We have no need for a disgusting dirty decades old potty.
I am not sure how I can express how much I don't want this.

I told her we don't need it and she said she had no room for it in the car. This morning I go downstairs and notice she has dumped it in my bottle box. Where the baby bottles live. A decades old mouldy potty.

When I took it to throw it out I made sure she could see what I was doing. She passed no comment whatsoever.

pachiano1 that’s a nice attitude but I think honesty is the best policy, also what if you have a really small house and don’t want extras all the time?
Why should you have to deal with someone’s unwanted gifts - that’s wasting my time taking back to charity shops, then potentially explaining why you haven’t got said item.

if my dm doesnt get any joy from me, she asks my DH who always says yes!

It seems a really aggressive act by MIL to put a dirty potty in with the baby's bottles. She didn't have to do that. Not surprised OP flipped

I'm not convinced its always well meant. Putting a dirty potty in with a babies bottles isn't a normal thing to do.

I don't think she knew the box was full of bottles, it was on a high shelf in the utility room (which has no windows so is dark unless you put the light on), I imagine she just saw the box and thought it was a place she could dump it and didn't actually look in.

I've never sensed any malice from her. She is very insecure about the fact her family are "poor" vs my family and always gets a bit defensive about not being able to afford "nice" things for us like my parents can and on that account I am usually quite happy to be polite about toys from charity shops etc (even though we have far too many toys as it is) but a dirty potty really is too far.

bobstersmum She must mean well? A mouldy potty that the OP neither wants nor needs is defined as meaning well? I'd hate to hazard a guess at what the mil would bring if she didn't mean well.

Yes that was one step too far and I think you were right to dispose of it.

marcipex sadly not, if it was I don't think I would ever have moved, if only to make the postman smile every morning!

Only trying to help by shoving a dirty, mouldy potty in with the baby bottles? Only trying to help by bringing a dirty, mouldy potty that actually isn't needed?

Forgive me, but exactly how is that being kind and 'only trying to help'?

OP, I think you handled it in the only way you could. I mean, you could have waited until she left I suppose but I don't know anyone who would choose to leave something filthy and mouldy lying around the house, simply to save the feelings of someone who seems happy to use the OP as a dumping ground for their rubbish.

It’s really rude to stash an item someone has said they don’t want in their house, whether it’s dirty old potty or a faberge egg

She offered, op kindly declined

That should have been the end

Why do people do this? Seriously why? I kind of get that they might buy all sorts of crap, second hand or new, but why do they then try to foist it onto people who haven't asked for it and don't want it and THEN act hurt when the giftee chucks it out. It drives me nuts. Buy whatever crappy shit you want but don't bring it to my house .

ON THE BABY BOTTLES

Even leaving this aside... the OP did right to throw it out openly. OP already refused it politely and explained why. MIL then basically tried to force it on her anyway by claiming there was "no room" in the car (how big is this potty anyway?!) and then hiding it away in a dark corner.

That would not have been polite or normal behaviour by MIL even if the "gift" had been less repulsive. It's not generosity or kindness, it's controlling behaviour.

MIL may or may not be being deliberately insulting, but she definitely has boundary issues and is not responding to OP's politeness. The only two real options for OP here are to chuck the stuff in front of her or to accept that an increasing tide of manky tat is going to be foisted on her in the future.

My DD's grandmother (not my MIL) used to do things like this. When DD was 7, she sent her home with her birthday present which was a size 14 lime green Primark jumper with a hole in it. She got it at a jumble sale. She told DD she'd "grow into it". DD is now 20 and a size 6 so she would never have grown into it, let alone worn it! It annoyed me because she is extremely wealthy yet bought DD the most horrendous old, smelly tat and once begrudged her a £3 hair slide from Claire's Accessories on the grounds she "wasn't made of money" . To be fair, I think it was probably a MH issue as she was a terrible hoarder and once painted her kitchen with an old box of paint samples in varying shades of grey which she bought because it was "only a pound". Oh I could go on and on about it. I did what you did OP, just graciously accepted and the binned. I would, however, have drawn the line at a dirty potty. It's just weird!

OMG - all the doormats expecting you to just lie down and be grateful for the tat that your MIL brings you!

No, you are not a rubbish disposal unit. No you do not have to be "grateful", or even appear grateful, for some ancient tat that is a positive health hazard, especially when she puts it in with your baby's bottles!!

Fuck off with all the "oh you shouldn't be so mean/rude/ungrateful" - these people will never learn while you just smile and accept shit!

"Hide the grotty potty", thanks for that Francis

I'm probably around the same age as MiL and think this is absolutely gross. I'm delighted you disposed of it in front of her and hope you continue to do it with any future "gifts".

YANBU OP.

My FIL is a hoarder, and years ago when DH and I bought our house FIL tried hoarding things at ours as he had run out of room at his house.

I realised what he was doing after he brought a dining table from his garage (That he had had for years and had apparently found in a skip and never subsequently used) We already had a dining table of our own and both DH and I told him thank you but no thank you. DH seemed resigned almost to it, for me it was the first time I had come across hoarding by proxy. FIL refused to take the table back and insisted we kept it, we literally had no room for it (V small house). We decided against trying to pass it on to someone who needed one as it was falling apart so we broke it down and squeezed it into our car and took it to the tip.

FIL went mental, absolutely bloody mental! Which is the point that both DH and I put our foot down. We explained to FIL that if he wants to bring us 'gifts' that we n either need or asked for, let alone are unable to fit in the house, that we would dispose of that item however we see fit, if he doesn't want that to happen then he shouldn't bring things to hoard at our house.

He has tried it since and seen his arse many a time over what we decide to do with whatever he has brought but it's tough and he gets it now, we no longer get any of his hoarded crap.

My ex-MIL once presented me with two Avent bottles with teats in a matching Avent bottle carrier when dd was 6m old.

I thanked her profusely and she mentioned that I should change the teats. I said oh no, they're the right ones and she squirmed a bit, looked a bit shamefaced and said "Well, I suppose I'll have to tell you - they're from a charity shop."

Bottles with old teats in them from a charity shop?!? Who does that?!
If I hadn't mentioned anything, she would have gone ahead and let me use secondhand teats from God knows where

how big is this potty anyway?!

It was actually pretty huge and elaborate with a lid and bits and pieces I didn't inspect to see what they were all about on account of them being gross and mouldy.

Well this giant mouldy megapotty is just sounding more and more desirable. I can't imagine why anyone wouldn't want it in their house.

"why is the mil rude?"

How is giving someone a dirty, mouldy potty anything BUT rude, @Slartybartfast? A dirty mouldy anything is not a thoughtful gift, but a dirty, mouldy potty is disgusting, and binning it is a perfectly sensible reaction, imo.

I think it's the result of a different approach to life - my family have a fairly laid back attitude to mould e.g. DD left her lunch box in her bag all summer so of course it was full of mould. I didn't throw it out, I gave it a good clean. It's likely she forgot your son is now using the full sized loo, was impressed that her potty was all bells and whistles but then was too stubborn to change her outlook when you made it clear you didn't want it.

And the bad eyesight thing that a PP mentioned - I gave to wash up after DH sometimes because he hasn't seen blobs of food, smears of oil etc. His eyesight is seriously blurry and I imagine black mould would look more like a grey shadow without his glasses on!

Bit rude OP. You should have planted it up with some nice bulbs and returned it to her.

If MiL hasn't much money she'd be better off saving it up for one good thing (albeit from a charity shop) rather than tat.

Although I also hate the fact that charity shops get given tat and then pass it on.