To ask how often you speak to your MIL?

[CakePigeon4]

MIL and I get on fine, they live a way away so we don’t see them that often, but generally have a nice time when we go to stay. However MIL is always making little digs that I should contact her more - despite the fact that she has never rung me in the 12 years DH & I have been married. I’m not sure what I would say if I did ring her - we have very little in common, and she’s not exactly a talker at the best of times, and I find conversation quite hard work when I’m with her.

So am I a crap daughter-in-law?! How often do you speak to your MILs? Is it not normal to just get news updates from DH, rather than expecting me to ring her?

@Helendee I have a son myself and I can totally sympathise how tough it must be when they’re older! I should mention this is DH’s stepmum, I’m actually much closer to his mum (in part because she actually makes an effort!)

Btw dh’s family arecpretty much in constant contact with each other, but I wouldn’t say they are very close. It’s just all ‘duty’. When we first went on holiday together I thought it odd he rang home as I just sent a postcard (early 90s).

Well, she doesn’t speak English, I don’t speak enough of her language beyond the basic pleasantries and she lives abroad. So very rarely. DH passes on messages

I speak loads to mil. I’ve just got off the phone to her as we’ve booked a little weekend away to Nice. I invited her. I’m not the norm on MN

I speak to her weekly, and tell dh to call her. But, dh has stuff around the evenings and weekends so is busy even out of work. He needs a poke now and then.

Every six weeks or so when we see them. They live an hour away. I would never ring her, DH does and they've nothing really to say. Ignore the digs. If she's that in need of your conversation she can ring you (or does she think that it's your 'duty') red flag for future expectations

I'll chat if I pick up the phone to her but actually it's FiL that does the ringing in their relationship. He writes cards, etc. I don't ring people and she's always been civil but has definite boundaries...so I don't ring to chit chat or anything.

I’m not the norm on MN grin

We have family holidays as well and my children share some mutual friends so they socialize together quite a bit. We’re all very independent people though who’re not joined at the hip.

I think there are way more posters on MN who are happy with their in-laws than these kind of threads illustrate.

Quite often. My MIL is lovely and we get along well. I like to speak to her and see how she is. She's good with advice if I need it for anything else too.
Even little things like recipes or family traditions we have
I didn't get on with my own mum much so...

I’ve been with my fiancé 8 years and I don’t even have her phone number. They don’t text or anything and only call my fiancé on his mobile. I occasionally say oh maybe you should call your mum it’s been a while but they usually call him.

I speak to them when I see them in person which is every couple of months.

Never.

It’s fab.

We visit twice a year, she never visits us.

I never ring her but then why should I? Dh doesn't ring my mum for a chat, why should I ring his? He tries to ring her every fortnight, but quite often she refuses to answer the phone because she's watching TV. She phones us maybe twice a year.

I want Harrysowl MIL, she sounds great!

I never ring my MIL any more and I don't ring my own mum much either. I do if there's something I have to let her know, but ringing just to chat? Never. In both cases I would struggle to find much to talk about.

MIL is hard work, she often says something that is monumentally difficult to answer - not offensive, just very strange and it leaves me floundering for a response. She doesn't understand how the world works and can only see anything from her own POV - anyone else's is to be ignored - or else maybe she can't process it? (I told her too much salt is bad for you, she was openly dismissive about it until she read an article about salt in the Daily Mail and was astonished that I was actually correct about something! Tbf she did acknowledge it, rather than just pretended it hadn't happened.) She doesn't get on easily with people, can be very prickly to deal with so has lots of fall-outs with the neighbours - but thinks they're always in the wrong, not her.

I am polite to her when we meet, will chat a little when she rings up for DH (and fend her off a lot of the time, she will go on and on about something until you lose the will to live - which she's oblivious to) and she often wants advice to ignore and for DH to come and spend any spare time he has doing jobs for her.

I feel sorry for her as a lot of her relatives have died in the last few years and she feels their loss, but she's not friendly, doesn't have hobbies, won't do anything like join clubs/do activities. So she's isolated herself but we don't want to fill the void. She doesn't text/WhatsApp as technology is difficult for her, she had the internet briefly but got rid. Her mobile is always switched off and in a drawer I think...

Also, my DiL speaks to me!
She text me yesterday and we meet for lunch etc. Weird eh 😂

Never . I last spoke to her about 22 yrs ago and it’s bliss . I sometimes wonder how such a miserable person had such a lovely son .

I speak when I see her but I do WhatsApp her pictures of the kids (so does dh. It depends who is out with them) and sometimes we just chat on there and catch up. She's awesome though. I don't ring but am not keen on phone anyway

How often does your DH ring your parents for a chat?

Never. Neither does dh.

I would never phone my mil for a chat. I only speak to her by text, maybe twice a month we’ll have a ‘chat’ that way. And I obviously speak to her when I see her in person, which is not terribly often. Dh calls her every week or so. I would call my dad at least once a week, one sibling every day usually and another once in a blue moon.

Never. Sometimes if my husband is skyping them when I'm at home I'll jump in and say hi to show them the baby bump.

I would never think to contact them unless there was a specific reason, and even then I don't see why my DH wouldn't do it himself. I wouldn't call just to chat. I'm sure if my MIL saw it was me calling unexpectedly she might panick and think DH was in the hospital or something!

As little as possible - DH is crap with keeping in touch and for a good while I tried to prompt and facilitate it but she still kept up with the snide digs, judgemental comments and refusal to accept DD2's special needs... so fuck it - I'm civil and communicate when required but we are never going to have a lovely close relationship.

Only in person, so very occasionally. Yell hello from the background when DH rings her but it has never occurred to me to ring her unless something was wrong. We get on perfectly well in person.

Only in person here - we get on well enough. She made countless PA little comments to me that I need to text / call more but I (eventually) pointed out I'm not her child and her son is perfectly capable of using the phone himself. Also pointed out that phones work both ways and she can call him if she wants to speak to him more often. She doesn't make a peep to me now 😂

My MIL lives abroad and we Skype her once a week so she can see the kids. I usually just say a few words like "Hi, is everything OK?". My kids do the rest of the talking and then pass the ipad to my husband so he can have a quick chat. It's nice to keep in touch. She lives alone and I think it's important family communicate and let her know we care.

My Mum and my Gran (her MIL) were very close and Mum would call her a couple of times a week, once a week my Dad would talk to her too (usually after my Mum and Gran were finished their natter). My Gran was lovely and my Mum grieved awfully for her when she passed a few years ago, saying it was like losing her Mum (who had passed when she was in her twenties) all over again.

I would love to have a MIL like my Gran, unfortunately my MIL is a toxic narcissist with emotional incest issues regarding dh. We have been no contact for over seven years now. It is all very sad, I tried, tried and tried to build a positive relationship with my MIL, unfortunately she was too determined to destroy my marriage for it to work. As it is, dh and I only ever argued over his parents and their treatment of him (emotionally and psychologically abusive) and their treatment of me (blatant nastiness and hatred) so the last seven years have been bliss and we are so happy together.

In a way I miss my MIL, not the nastiness but the way things could have been if she hadn’t been toxic. I think of the bond my Mum had with my Gran and it hurts that I will never have that with my MIL. Mostly though, I am sad for my dh, (who is the sweetest, kindest man in the world and still adores his family despite their awful treatment of us. I hurt for him as with time growing further between when he last saw his family, he has realised that they are actually awful people with cruel opinions and he is shocked that he hadn’t seen that before.) and our two dc who are so loving and would adore their grandparents if they were nicer/ less abusive.

When we were in contact with our in-laws they rarely phoned us, it was usually dh who called then. If they did call it was usually FIL who called. Actually their complete lack of interest really hurt dh, he would deliberately not phone to see how long they would leave it if he didn’t call (If I remember right it was around 7 weeks when dh gave in and called them himself).

Last time i saw my MIL I punched her off my front door step. That was 5 4 years ago.
My husband is very friendly with my family though, and will call them or hangout with them all the time.