A son is a son until he finds a wife, a daughter is a daughter for life

[Eminemmilkshake]

AIBU to find this comment offensive, sexist and untrue?
Its something DH family say often, suggesting I have ‘taken’ him from them and that my son will be taken one day too. Apparently my DDs will never leave.
My eldest DD is a teen and spends a lot of time with her boyfriend. I rarely spent time at home as a teen and I eventually went NC with my parents for various reasons. I know plenty of men who spend more time with their parents than their sisters do. Outdated comments like this need to stop being spouted, have any of you been the focus of this statement?

The rule might not apply to all but it certainly applies to most.
You don't have to look far to find threads of woman writing about how they don't want to see their MIL more than once a month or once a week or how they don't want to visit their MIL on Christmas day. There's alot of nasty woman in this world that want it to be them and their husband and babies and their own mother.

What an odd way to interpret the saying.

It comes from men’s lack of interest in the domestic/family element of life. Hence, once a man has a new woman to rely on (his wife), he doesn’t bother to stay in contact with his mother.

Obviously it is less the case than it was historically due to social change.

But it’s not about ‘nasty women’ at all 🙄For one thing, what makes you think that a wife being close to her own parents precludes the husband being close to his parents? Presumably he has free will?

Yes, yes because everyone knows men have no power or autonomy and only do as commanded.

It's got nothing to do with the fact that seeing their family involves future planning, balancing family time, social planning and many men either fail to do this at all for their own families, or fail to be realistic or leave it to their fenale partner who, surprise, surprise is unlikely to priortise seeing people not her relatives.

No, no, it's because we are all bitches. Until we become mil. Then saints who no one needs ever drawn a boundary with.

@5128gap · Today 08:33

Its interesting how often the people claiming the saying is complete BS, and how fabulous the mother and son relationships are in their family, go on to describe various self policing measures they employ or intend to use to ensure it's that way.

The conclusion seems to be that the mother/married son relationship will be excellent provided the mother in question stays within certain behavioural guidelines. Always please your DiL, never assume you will be a priority for your son.

Never expect any more of his time than he and your DDil believe to be your due, accept you won't do certain things together anymore...which is great, and I'm sure does help with harmony.

What it doesn't do is discredit the saying.

Because I have never known of a woman apply all this to a married daughter, to worry about not displeasing their son-law, find the things they do with their adult child curtailed, and accept they have a new place in the daughter's affections that is lower than their son-in-Law. It's just not a thing that occurs to mothers of daughters in the same way. And that's what the saying means.

Yes to this. 100%!* *👏

This kind of attitude is insane! Why do you feel like you're in competition with his mum? It's this kind of attitude that damages relationships.

You're completely missing my point 🙄 - she's competitive, I just sort of put up with it/push back if she crosses a line with her pushiness/rudeness. For someone who is constantly swerving into my lane we get on pretty ok. I'm kind to her and put up with her BS (up to a point), but part of the reason I do that is because I've presumed she feels threatened so I'm trying to be reassuring that she has no need to feel that way. If I thought it was coming from a place of spite I wouldn't entertain it at all. I don't agree that DILs should just roll over, we're both grown ups and while I'll be good natured I'm not going to pretend to go along with her pushing me around/ignoring my boundaries - that's dumb.

@PBJsandwich123, I'm not sure that @Bigearringsbigsmile is missing the point at all. Your attitude towards your MIL sounds horrible... being "smug" because her son is besotted with you and she knows it?

Your MIL may well be competitive but you clearly are as well. Two grown women competing for attention from a man. How depressing.

All I'm saying is I don't feel like MILs would take random pops at us if our husbands didn't care about us. Nothing wrong in seeing the silver lining 💁

Yes I thought it sounded really awful too - and basically made the point of the old saying even more luridly than the saying itself.

Also I've never completed for his male attention or the attention of any other male, I've always had too many other things going on for that. This doesn't stop my MILs coming after me, as she's clearly decided it's a competition in her mind. Your response is a little presumptuous, I don't know where your idea of me as some sort of a pick-me girl has come from. Feel like you completely missed the jokiness in my original post. My MIL is pain in the buttocks and when I tell my friends they're surprised I'm not harsh in response to her harshness tbh. Most of the time I encourage him to see her without me as she seems to prefer that - does that sound like someone who's competing for attention or am I just working with the situation in front of me as pragmatically as possible? Of course I roll my eyes from time to time, but I don't feel bad about that because I'm being more understanding than most

You shouldn't need to prove to yourself that your husband loves you more than his mum, or imagine his mum is jealous of you, because the two of you should occupy entirely different roles in his life. To frame yourself as her competitor is a really unhealthy attitude, as is weaponising his feelings towards you against her. If your husband is genuinely besotted with you, surely you're so secure and happy in your relationship you dont need to gloat over his mum about who he loves more?

This is literally the first time I’ve heard this & I'm in my 40s. But then again in our family the boys/men are just as close to their families post marriage/settling down than pre. It’s never been a thing where the girls stick around but the boys don’t, nor are the boys/girls treated differently

Dude! You don't have to explain to me that a wife and a mum are different things - I KNOW. Jesus, you must think I'm a total simpleton. The fact is that my partner meeting me has meant he has ended up moving further away from her than she'd like, she is not a fan of this and she let's me know it. Going back to OP, there is no guarantee that kids will stick around geographically speaking, regardless of gender, but it is unfair when MILs blame this on their kids partners and are passive aggressive - this just creates awkwardness for everyone. No one has to accept that. That is the point I was making. I've said my piece and now I'm unwatching that s thread as the mumsnet mob is piling on 🙄

I’ve also always been mindful of the advice to observe how a man treats his mum if you want to know how he’ll treat you in 30 years time. If he’s the type to adore someone because he’s loyal and appreciates you as a person and not superficial/ driven by his sexual attraction, he’s probably pretty devoted to his old mum. It’s the besotted with the young wife type who get newer models … If he’s prepared to push aside his own mum, he’ll push aside his wife once her boobs drop and her face starts to hang.

Hmmm I can only speak from my own experience but I’ve found my MiL has struggled to adjust to DH being an adult so sometimes comes across as trying to baby him (for example, still referring to herself as mummy, still trying to parent / get the final say, insisting she gets priority over his birthday as she gave birth to him) whereas my parents have embraced that I’m an adult now and our relationship is different (but not in a bad way!).

So she does feel like she’s ‘lost’ her son but really he’s just grown up and she hasn’t moved with the times. Relationships evolve and I think men & women can stay close with their parents but everyone has to accept that the way you are with your parents when you’re 5 is different to when you’re 35!

I think there is some truth to it. It doesn’t relate to how close you are.

it’s relative to the fact women are naturally more likely to organise and schedule and whip the family into shape. When a woman has kids they’ll likely engage their mum for advice on the more personal matters and so relationships develop and strengthen in a different way.

Men more often go with the flow or take a back seat in this regard.

No doubt everyone will say ‘not my husband it’s 50/50’ yet the MiL threads and the school admin threads would suggest this to be true.

I’d say it is a generalised truth, but it’s more about when they get married and have kids the DIL will tend to go more to her family. Assuming they get on well that is! If you treat the DIL like your own daughter, be kind and respectful then it doesn’t need to be like that.

My MIL was very nasty and jealous, made it clear she didn’t like me, then started being rude to our children so we went NC, haven’t seen her for 7 years now, phew. It all depends on how you treat others. If you start off biased against their partners then, yes, you can expect that to happen as they will not want to visit and have much contact.

Wow, someone's projecting. Got a daughter-in-law you don't get on with by any chance @Lupuswarriors ? The bitterness and anger is dripping from your post.

Hardly a projection, there's a lot of truth in that post. Mn has seen plenty posts over the years where the DIL only wants her family after the birth/visiting the new house/ on Xmas day etc etc.

YABU to get offended by an old saying, yes.

If you are getting offended by it, it's probably touched a nerve!

I have heard that saying a few times and found it interesting but not very accurate.... then I forgot about it and got on with my life.

I would just lump it in with the outdated, misogynistic traditions of getting married, having your father ‘give you away’, and taking the man’s name, and ignore it.

Assuming close and healthy family relationships…

If a man marries a woman, she’s (rightly) supposed to surpass his mother as the most important woman in his life. If a woman marries a man, her husband is (rightly) supposed to surpass her father as the most important man in her life. Her mother’s position, though, is unchanged. I think this saying primarily comes from women. I’ve never heard a man say it.

I think it really depends on his relationship with his mother. My MIL has her good qualities, but she’s not emotionally close to her kids and I don’t think she ever has been. (I started dating my husband when he was seventeen and his sister was four.) I’m the one who he’s been open and emotionally vulnerable with for over half his life, not her, so of course he’s not as close to her.

Over 80pc of men leave their wives or partners in the few months after the women are diagnosed with a serious illness. But keep believing men and women are exactly the same in the loyalty they feel (as a generalisation) to family relationships. Men can compartmentalise in a way women find very difficult. Hence why they also find it easier to leave their children and not look back.

It honestly doesn’t do anyone any good to pretend the emperor has no clothes on.

That’s not at all what that saying means at all. It means that (supposedly) your daughter will always be a close part of your family, but once your son gets married, he’ll prioritize his wife and their family/her family over yours.

How is a biological role women maintain for their entire adult lives “childlike”?