If you are a MIL who overstepped boundaries

[crikey456]

I've seen so many posts on Mumsnet about MIL's upsetting their DIL's. A lot of the posts are about MIL's overstepping the boundaries with newborns. I am trying to find MIL's who realise maybe years later that they did overstep boundaries and maybe the reasons why.

When I had my first baby my MIL suddenly had no respect for me. She turned up unannounced on a daily basis, often with friends. We would be mid dinner and she would apologise but make no attempt to leave. She would criticise me parenting. She would book us in to go and see her family members of a weekend to essentially show off the baby. It was almost like she was trying to be in control of our lives. She bought a xmas outfit for my Daughter and told me that's what she should wear for Xmas day. When around family members, she would just grab my baby off me and act as if she was hers. She ignored anything I asked her to do e.g milk at certain times and she would make a point of telling me she had done it differently. I once recall her telling me I was very good to let her look after her as I don't know the way she does things. Anyway, with my 2nd child, she was the absolute opposite. She is an absolutely lovely woman and would go to the ends of the earth to help anyone, so I just couldn't work it out.

If you are a MIL who realises now that you overstepped certain boundaries when your DIL first had a baby, what do you think the reasons were looking back?

I just had to go back and re-read the thread title and OP because I thought it was asking for comments from MILs and yet 95% of posts are from DILs who loathe their MIL.
I should avoid reading these threads as mother of two boys. One brought his first serious gf home last week and I was utterly terrified of doing or saying the wrong thing.

What a shame this really interesting thread was shat all over with people wilfully misinterpreting comments and going on the offensive.

Maybe post it outside of AIBU?

I am a grandparent and a MIL and really dont understand these crazy ones I read about. As far as i know, none of my friends behave like that either.

@Wroxie

My mother-in-law passed a few years ago but when my first was about six months old, we flew to the UK (we were living in the states at the time) and while my husband was out doing something sporty with his old friends, MIL and I went out together to a village fete with all her friends in attendance. She introduced us to the first set of her friends who cooed over the baby and MIL said "oh and you can already tell she's going to be fair and have lovely soft hair, no one will even know she's coloured" (I'm mixed race but fairly dark-skinned, most people just see me as Black). I said excuse me and quietly took myself and my daughter back to the hotel where we were staying (MIL's house was too filthy and full of her hoard for us to stay). My husband was the one who had it out with her, she apparently called me a n-word bitch and that was that, neither I nor my child ever saw her again, and we didn't move back to the UK until after she passed away.

So yeah not many of your MILs can live up to that, I imagine 😹

Omg you win the thread! That's absolutely disgusting. I don't know how you kept your temper.

@BareGrylls

I just had to go back and re-read the thread title and OP because I thought it was asking for comments from MILs and yet 95% of posts are from DILs who loathe their MIL. I should avoid reading these threads as mother of two boys. One brought his first serious gf home last week and I was utterly terrified of doing or saying the wrong thing.

I think the problem is that MIL's who are overbearing don't realise it, so I can't see many coming out of the woodwork to confess their sins.

This thread has demonstrated that DIL's right to privacy and recovery over the MIL's "right" to cuddles seems to hit a nerve with some posters. My suspicion would be that those posters who get offended by the idea of the mother of the baby being a higher priority are in fact the problem MIL's, but they're so entitled they just can't see their behaviour as problematic.

I'm a MIL and a grandmother. I don't know my DIL as well as my own daughters, obviously, but she's the love of my son's life, and the mother of his child. They live fairly locally, and while she is on mat leave I am making gentle efforts to get to know her better. She's an excellent mum and is doing perfectly well without any advice from me (so much has changed since I had babies that I wouldn't dream of offering advice, though occasionally we discuss those changes)
I see my role as being there for her if she needs anything, keeping an eye out for her (sort of female solidarity) and generally just letting them know I love them.
They are finding their feet as new parents, and while they do so, I'm offerering the odd meal , either shared with us or one of us will drop it round.
I think there's much to be said for building up trust on all sides. DIL is less keen than I was at similar stage to leave the baby with anyone, but that's for her to decide.
I certainly don't feel I have any rights to my grandchild, instead I feel that it's a privilege that I want to deserve.
I think it will be different if my daughters have babies, as the trust is already there, but I still won't be forcing my advice onto them.

@Skybluepinkgiraffe

You sound like a lovely MIL, if only more could be like you!

Ah Blossomtoes so we had a different experience of the 70s in my family in the north - boundarylessness was just something we saw on tv…. So we all generalise from our experiences or what we have seen. My sister was born in 1975 and perhaps the family (presumably on both sides) was more influential then as there was less support for new mums elsewhere? her mother is soon to be a great-GP

For me the best thing was being able to compare notes with someone from ante-natal classes so we could be sure our babies were doing okay. My mum had died & MIL was in another country so I did not have any negative experiences with GPs but no support either.

This thread has demonstrated that DIL's right to privacy and recovery over the MIL's "right" to cuddles seems to hit a nerve with some posters. My suspicion would be that those posters who get offended by the idea of the mother of the baby being a higher priority are in fact the problem MIL's, but they're so entitled they just can't see their behaviour as problematic

I agree...you can see the posters who think that as the DIL mum is involved and supporting her daughter, then the MIL should be involved too. They’re the ones who clearly overstep boundaries and what’s sad, they don’t even see it. They’re the ones who this thread is aimed at!

Ah Blossomtoes so we had a different experience of the 70s

Well we would, wouldn’t we? I was a parent then and you weren’t. 🙄

I didn’t claim to have been a parent then - just living in household/family with babies and all those dynamics…
But you win 🏆

I think the interesting thing in this thread is that no one mentioned anything about the dads. My own mother is overbearing so frankly i let DH deal with her around DCs. However, the biggest issue for us when it comes to my MIL was that she didnt really offer sufficient support to DH after DCs were born. It was DH who found the newborn particularly hard but MIL didnt want to hear it and kept saying how lovely it all was. Well not for DH it wasnt and he found the adjustement period really hard. This was clearly a time when DH needed his mum but she wasnt there. Years later - he still hasnt recovered from that.

I think boundaries important. My mil great. My mother is quite forward. Seems to resent my sister get on well with her mil. Its hard work. My mother could take over if u allowed it. My mil is very respectful

Thank you @Flamglimglubberty it's a learning curve for us all!

The closest I ever got to a MIL was my XBF's mum, my DC were 4 and 6, she told me I was starving them and they were too thin (DS1 has cystic fibrosis and has only started recently to look chubby because of a new med at the age of 30), and I was a clatty (dirty) bitch.

What I notice around me a lot is that new mothers facilitate the baby's relationship with their own mum but expect their DH to manage the relationship between the baby and his mum/parents. The husbands never/rarely seem to do this and it inevitably leads to the MIL and FIL trying to be involved somehow and overstepping/feeling left out/unappreciated/... and lashing out.

At least that is my working theory - of course, some are also just crazy.

@TheBestPlansAlwaysFail i think you are right but why are so many dads unwilling to facilitate their children's relationship with their side of the family? in our case, my husband deals with both sides of the family instead of me

Fuck me im glad my daughters in law are all sane rational women.

Honestly, I think it just doesn't occur to them and/or they feel pulled in too many directions and choose to do nothing rather than 'the wrong thing'. Quite human, also quite unhelpful.

My DM is much worse than my MIL when it comes to attempting to take over. She’s now 81 and just can’t help herself. I’m not all that close to my MIL, but I’ve always been very happy for her to develop a close bond with my DDs, who are adopted and now aged 12 and 9. They’re much closer to her than to my DM, despite her living much further away.

It clearly isn’t just MILs who can be overbearing. (Although obviously my DM is my DH’s MIL and she stresses him out no end at times.)

@TheBestPlansAlwaysFail

What I notice around me a lot is that new mothers facilitate the baby's relationship with their own mum but expect their DH to manage the relationship between the baby and his mum/parents. The husbands never/rarely seem to do this and it inevitably leads to the MIL and FIL trying to be involved somehow and overstepping/feeling left out/unappreciated/... and lashing out.

At least that is my working theory - of course, some are also just crazy.

I think there's a lot of truth to this. And in our case, DH was (and is) always very good about how he interacts with his family while simultaneouslymaking it clear that he was a unit with me. Which has helped.

One thing I do find is that a lot of women have boundaries I consider slightly too rigid. A friend who has always had a good relationship with her MIL, was absolutely outraged and upset because after her first DC, MIL came round to help and as part of that, cleaned the bathroom and emptied the bathroom bin. My friend felt it was too intrusive and that she didn't want her MIL emptying a bin with her used pads in it. That same friend, 12 years into motherhood, I suspect wouldn't blink an eye at that sort of thing now. But she was sensitive and overwhelmed and i think it was all just a bit much.

How many thread of MIL demanding to see the baby, demanding the "cuddle" many MIL seem to think they are entitled to, demanding a cup of tea.... Who does that!

I suspect many grandmothers do it but women may be prepared to accept/overlook it from their own mothers.

I’ll be a total hands off grandmother myself!

@Palava57

When was the era of no boundaries Blossomtoes? I don’t remember it from when I had DC in 1990 and if you mean the 70s that was mainly a myth…

I feel like I don’t recognise any of these women from RL, don’t know any matriarch types who think they’ve been displaced or people who demand to visit within hours of the birth… many people live so far away it’s not possible - 5 hours in our case. We were invited after about a week to meet DPs first GC. I was honoured to be called grandma & hadn’t expected it 😊 I only shared some of my experiences (in conversation) after the birth and we didn’t suggest anything at all re baby care except reassurance (having had quite a lot of children between us!). I can see how eg midwife advice has changed quite a lot in the last 30 years…

I have generally been dismayed about the rage towards MILs and SMs on Mumsnet which has made me a bit uneasy, being both… I can see some poor relationships between DILs and MILs described here predate any GCs. Some DILs have recognised that they have some part in it due to how they were feeling in the period after the birth and go on the have great relationships with ILs and great GP/GC interactions.

When your children marry or partner-up things do change and everyone becomes accustomed to the new family setup over time. I had never had a DIL before and was anxious to not do the wrong thing in uncharted territory. DIL is definitely family and we have become closer over time 😊

In my case it's my aunts. I was bullied into so much when DD was little. Not so much now. Now I see it happening to DD, but she just lets it happen. She's coming up to 14. When she said she had a friend group who were mostly boys, my aunt said to me "We'll have to keep an eye on that." No we won't.

I could not agree more! My MIL lost the plot when she wasn’t told the moment I was in labour, I had a four day labour and finally gave birth after a very traumatic surgery in the afternoon, we wanted to rest for the evening and get some sleep before notifying our families of the birth the following morning, when she was told our worlds came crashing down, we were bombarded with abusive messages for months after the birth! I have subsequently been branded as controlling and on several occasion there has been family intervention with DH telling him to leave me!!! She has also told my partner on several occasions that she doesn’t want to see me again!! All because she wasn’t told the moment I was in labour, talk about ruining a relationship!!!

@alltheemptyfields in response to a post suggesting a new dad might want privacy from his mother in law you said…

the husband is not the one who just popped a baby out, naturally or via invasive surgery. It's the one occasion where he's got no voice on the subject.

Then in response to a pp with a gay son you said…

a gay couple is allowed just as much privacy and respect than any other couple when they have a baby. Even if by definition, there's no recovery from birth needed, before a smart ass comments

So which is it?