To ask those that get on with their mil...

[ILoveHumanity]

Did you go through a phase where you tried to “make it work” against the grain ?

Have you forgiven her for something major before and has it come back to bite you ?

How do you communicate boundaries ?

How do you rebuild trust once it’s broken ?

She drives me mental. She’s old fashioned, twee, doesn’t listen, tries too hard, false-nice at times and horrendously un-feminist, and she cannot cook.

But I’d never tell her, have a row, call her out on stuff or anything ‘unkind’- she’s a kind person with good intentions, I see her regularly, she’s become a friend of mine over 10 years. She treats me like her own daughter and confides in me, I trust her with my children, and my secrets. What more can I expect?

Although I wish she hadn’t spent 18 years pandering to my Dh’s every whim.

And before I get flamed for my first paragraph, I love her in spite of all these things which says a lot. She probably thinks I’m bohemian, gobby, unladylike, outspoken, I drink too much and swear.... and she loves me in spite of all this too!

“I admire her in a lot of ways but I also dislike her for other things and that's sad to me.”

But that’s true of all relationships!

My MIL has done some horrific things in her past. She throws a tantrum - blames someone else - then everything goes back to normal and whatever it is she has done is never mentioned again. We brushed over one too many things with her and now have very little contact with her (only when he absolutely need to) despite her living very close by. We haven't had a falling out we just stopped calling - she had never made any effort with us either. DH and I much happier this way.

My husband has his own careful boundaries with his mum. We are involved with them plenty, but he knows that she is MASSIVELY family and friends orientated - provided they're her friends and her family. FIL sees almost nothing of his own family, and he doesn't want that for us. If it were up to her, we would only see her parents, her brother, and her two best friends, and we'd drop around to see each other al the time.

He didn't want that and neither do I. We have a lovely warm relationship, made possble by the face he insisted on living the opposite side of town 40m away, so we're not on top of each other all the time.

My parents don't need boundaries. They are incredibly odd in their own way, but if anything it's hard to pin them down to visiting and there's no pressure to visit them whatsoever. No worry about them showing up or bossing us around.

My mil is lovely. She got on really well with her mil too.

Reading this with interest. Mine was great until I got pregnant with my 2yo. Then she turned nasty for no reason. Before getting pregnant she went on and on about how she couldn't wait to retire so that she could see her future grandchild all of the time and provide us with free childcare (very kind but wouldn't need it as I planned to set up as a childminder!) and babysitting to give us a break. We got along really well too and I could happily have a coffee with her without dh there.

Then I got pregnant and each time we saw her during my pregnancy (about 8/9 times I think?) she would say "I'm not looking after it! I expect to be paid for babysitting!" etc. She also made many little comments every time dh was out of the room or talking to somebody else, I genuinely felt like I was going insane, that I'd done something massively wrong or offended her in some way, dh thought I was being silly and oversensitive as I had my own family issues and it caused many arguments between us and to this day she is the only thing we argue over. It was only when she started getting sloppy and doing it in front of him that he realised that I wasn't being oversensitive!

She did seem to get better after that but then made the week following dds birth horrific (the birth wasn't great and we were stuck in hospital too, she knew we'd planned a birth at the local mlu so would have realised that something was going on!)

We eventually forgave her, started trusting her, I started having her come round for tea a couple of afternoons a week to see DD, then she cocked up with DD. I have seen her once since on dds birthday and that's it. She can hurt me and not apologise for it, she can hurt dh and not apologise, but potentially harming my daughter, not telling me immediately (gave DD her allergen) then downplaying it and only apologising 4 months later because she thought it would make her get her own way? No. She can fottfsof. She had two chances and the third was enough. Dh can deal with her from now on, she only welcome round when he is here and I'll be polite but I will not trust her with my children until they can speak well enough to tell me everything (currently pregnant with no2).

*I do think a lot of people go into relationships expecting to hate their MIL and it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy.

It does sound like you might not be the easiest person for a MIL to get along with - you seem to be working from the assumption all MILs are horrible.*

Augusta the first is a true statement and that’s my brothers wife.
However the second statement is far from the truth. I’ve been married for 4 years, first 3 years I treated her like a queen and not in tryinf ti figure out how to forgive her after I found out she was the one behind my relationship almost breaking down.

I wonder whether it was better to expect it.

myselfandme that’s exacelt what makes me scared to start trying to let her in my life (again). I used to call her and we used to have chats about everything, but she used to go to my DH questioning our decisions on anything .. haircuts and outings and everything !!.

It does get suffocating. It’s sad because I really did try brush aside a lot of things so I can get on. But her intervention really meant I never had my opinion heard because she bullied DH it he didn’t follow her opinions

It makes me sad but if I was to ever be the same as I was with her before it would just be me pretending and the relatiinship wouldn’t be genuine any more.

That’s me right now :(. It’s hard to go back from being on really good terms to adjusting to someone who has been very spiteful to u.

I wish I had a mil I was close to. I feel like I’ve missed out.

I hear you :(

Thanks everyone that posted.

I’m slightly jealous of all of your stories.

Sometimes I wonder whether I’ve done the wrong thing by withdrawing from my friendship with mil, to just respect and pleasantries.. instead of just calling her up and having a discussion about how her behavior is hurting me.

But part of me thinks maybe she should’ve figured it out by herself if she values me enough like I valued her...

I love my MIL, she is amazing. Never had a problem with her even when we lived with them for a few months a couple of years ago. I regularly go round to see her without DH to catch up and watch our favourite programmes together. DH jokes that his parents prefer me to him.

If we ever had an issue (no children yet so not sure if that may throw up conflict) I know I could talk to her frankly about boundaries or concerns and she would listen and respect me as I would her.

I’ve just always got on with mine. She’s a lovely lady and is always incredibly respectful of space / boundaries etc. I honestly wouldn’t change a thing about her.

I’m going through a phase of completely self-loathing over why I bit my tongue and allowed her to be in my space for 2 years (when I loved her)... I used to value our relationship and so didn’t want to make an issue out of things even though to many on Mn they would think it’s the crime of this century.

But I found out few years down that she was bitching about me all along and grew to know her to be very two faced with everyone!

I was particularly revolted when after 2 years of phone calls and chats, we were staying at their house (she lives abroad) and so she took me to see her neighbour friends.. and literally everyone she hanged around with would think she loves them and as soon as she leaves the room she would say the most vile things about them..

I then questioned our relationship and quizzed DH, and found out she was behind all the vile things sil has been saying/doing to me .. I also got really emotional and snooped on husbands phone and found her saying vile things to him about me while pretending to be my friend... she was inciting him against me basically.

So I dramatically withdrew my affection and told DH to tell them that I am upset. Which caused a huge backlash. Haven’t said a word to her about anything but she knows I’m hurt.

Off to go visit them and I think DH is hoping for a resolution... I’m just pleasant and limited contact (once a month I call with DH), but DH whole family have been very clear about their disapproval of my stance to the point of turning extremely disrespectful with passive aggressive behavior.

Now I am sure she was extremely unreasonable with all her behaviour.. but what I’m trying to see if whether it was coming from a good place or not and whether if I find a resolution she will find a way to respect me..

I got on well with MIL over the first 8 or 9 years mainly because I let things go and bit my tongue often, understanding that she was very different to me. We spent time together away from DH and she was a huge part of the DCs lives, in a lovely way.

Earlier this year MIL's DP hurt one of the DC, though, and rather than acknowledge it, MIL lied and tantrummed her way through it. I cut myself off - emotionally and physically - because I simply couldn't tolerate anyone hurting DC and she resents me enormously for this. DH and MIL were very close until this point and I know she resents me for the difficult relationship they now have, as she thinks I've overplayed the situation and injury. I'm ok with her disliking me, though, because I know it's not me her hatred is really about.

Wow reading all you guys story I’m feeling like I’m such a crap dil.

Wish things could’ve turned out differently

my MIL is normal and I am normal so it works well. She respects I'm his wife, I respect she's his mother. Neither of us expect to be the only adult human female in his life and don't see the roles as in competition with each other.

My mother in law used to drive me up the wall but her behavior worsened after my FIL passed away-god knows my husband didn't have the balls to enforce boundaries with her. I just decided to accept who for who she is (portraying herself to others as grandmother of the year) while rarely seeing my son vs her other grandkids. She was absolutely ridiculous when my SIL was getting married to the point the MINISTER (our personal one) made a remark to me in private about her which really validated my views of her. I would never allow my family to treat my DH the way she's treated me. My own mother has been speechless at times when I tell her the latest behavior from her.