Mother in law thinks I’m ugly

[DazedNotConfused1]

My mother in law has never outright said I am ugly, but she has never paid me any compliment on my appearance either. Conversely, she will constantly say how handsome her son (my DH) is and how beautiful her daughter is. I’m starting to believe she thinks I am not attractive at all and not good enough for her son.

Whenever I see MIL, I make sure to give her a compliment eg. “you look nice”, “I like your hair!”, “lovely bag” etc you get the gist as I genuinely do feel she looks good, and if she puts herself down I will say “no you always look good!” So she has plenty of opportunity to say something nice about me in return but NEVER has. I don’t want it to bother me but it does. She has complimented my DD saying how pretty they are, but whenever someone says my DS looks like me she looks uncomfortable and doesn’t comment. People say my DD looks like her father.

Is this just normal MIL behaviour? Has your MIL ever said anything nice about your appearance?

And yes before anyone says I know there are more important things than looks, but personally I would like to be thought of positively and not as someone who is bringing down their family’s attractiveness!

Am I being unreasonable in thinking my MIL must think I’m ugly?

My Mil does exactly this. I'm pretty sure it's just because he's 'her baby boy' (at 47yrs old). I've been with him 20 years. She likes me and we have a fairly friendly relationship. If anyone compliments me in front of her she also churps 'and my handsome boy'. Or they say to me (I have 4 daughters) 'your girls are lovely/smart/talented'.... My mil says 'because of my boy'! Like I'm not even in the room lol! I let it slide, try not to get offended and remember that you never stop being a mum.

Big can of worms. My brother had two extremely glamorous wives, models in fact and he was not a looker. But they were dreadful mothers and my mum was very dismayed. My very beautiful son has married a strange looking woman who I am always flattering because she is aggressively not confident. My mother in law thought I had crawled out from under a rock. She was teetering on her stilettos I tended to be in boots. No ne is really good enough for our sons or sons are such hard work we are just grateysomeone has taken them on. OP you will have to take it on the chin. You know your attractiveness does not depend on her. At the end of the day girls these women birthed the one you love you should eternally be grateful for that. And let them know it.

I think it might be good for you to discover that about yourself that is needing validation about your looks from anyone...period...The emphasis on looks is obvious since you seem to pay a lot of attention to comments about looks, whether coming from her or others and you comment on looks. I do not comment on looks because I prefer not to because of my thinking about how we seem to place a value on that as a society, a value that is causing so much stress, financial loss, anger, upset, jealousy, suffering... On one hand you say you are not concerned about looks or getting compliments from her yet your asking for advice tells us you are lying to yourself about that. You are also setting yourself up for disappointment and justifying MIL hatred and ensuing alienation of her by having unfair expectations of her and picking a fight, even if just one within yourself.

Your MIL is not you. She will never respond to life and others like you would because she is not you, she wasn't raised by your parent(s) or in your circumstances, she may not even share the same cultural background. Her life experiences are different. Find something in common to have in common and enjoy that. Going on about how handsome your husband, her son is, indicates to me a cultural difference and/or a familiarity that is a given between them with mom bolstering his self esteem and he lapping it up when younger and now probably tolerating it as part of their history..

I have known few women who rant on about how attractive their son's are but who love to go on about how beautiful their grandchildren are. Accept her for who she is and not what you need. I would not say that if she flat out told you she thought you were ugly or unattractive. Any MIL who would do that deserves to be firmly told "What a cruel thing to say. I did not peg you as cruel. Are you a cruel human?" and then just shut up until an answer is given, even if that is a decade from now.

You seem bent on making this into an issue and i would ask that you examine your heart and soul for the true reason. If someone mentions your DD looks like you and your immediate response is to scan your MIL's face for some unpleasant sign that she finds that repulsive then you've got a mental head wound there to figure out. No DIL has to love her MIL or hang out with her. In the absence of outright cruelty, be civil to her as you would anyone who is actively in your life. Stop focusing on her looks and instead ask if she's read any good books lately and then read it yourself, ask her about your favorite parts and tell her what you enjoyed, leaving out any hatred of the book if you disliked it. We don't have to put anything about others down. Ask her for her favorite childhood recipe and if she has one, ask if she knows how to prepare it and invite her for a cook over where you all cook grandma's favorite meal together (not your hubs but hers- she was a human before she became a mother- Ha! ha!). Your focus on what she might think about your looks is based on your own mindset and insecurities, none of which are her fault so don't take it out on her in an underhanded attempt to make her wrong, bad and needing to be avoided to get you off the hook for working on yourself.

Very strange u would be expecting her to say u r beautiful, sounds like u r very needy and trying to get likes where they won’t happen.

Your MIL is just ignorant. Grow a thicker skin and ignore her.

There is no typical MiL behaviour OP. MiLs are just women with varying tastes and character types. They don't get handed the special MiL personality while you're away signing the register. Perhaps yours is a woman who admires a different type of look and style to yours. If she is kind, treats you with respect and is nice to you in other ways, it really doesn't matter.

My MiL never paid me a compliment in the 30+ years I knew her and I certainly didn't need any from her. Ask your husband to compliment you in front of her!

From your post, she has never expressly said you are not attractive so you are probably worrying unnecessarily. In any case why are you bothered what she thinks and needing validation. Sounds like a weird insecurity to me.

I don’t need my MIL complimenting me and it would probably make me want to roll my eyes when saying her offspring are beautiful but I wouldn’t be complimenting her I’m afraid she loves herself enough

So maybe she does think you're kicked...

Or maybe she's has an emotionally **sestous relationship with your spouse...

Or maybe she's trying to buoy her mental view of herself up in her minds eye by believing that her family and in particular her genes were the reason for her grandchild's good looks..

Maybe all of these things or none..

Either way, it's really none of your business what she thinks.. you NEED to GET OUT of her head !!!

I'm sure you're a good mother and partner and a decent human being with all sorts of gifts, talents and qualities.

You are enough as you are.

There's no need to placate anyone. You don't need anyone's approval on your looks or how you live.

You are doing a mighty job of keeping your kid alive and well, and you have much, much more worthwhile qualities to offer than any external aesthetic quality.

With all that said, you are well within your rights in your own home and in your personal company to assert boundaries and remind her of what you expect with regard to good manners and respect towards you.
This is especially if it's in earshot of your children.
It might be no harm at all to ask her -directly- to abstain from bringing attention to the physical appearance of your children altogether as too much focus on this can be very unhealthy.

As well as that, consider trying not to compliment her on her appearance- at all.
If it's good to see her, say that instead. We are much more than our outward appearance, change the focus.

Dont let it bother you, as long as she’s nice and doesn’t come between you and hubby.

Why are you competing with your MIL? Is it a control thing? Do women just set out to marry or partner so they can control another human, their partner for the sole purpose of having them support them, or any family they might create? Most woman complaining about a mother in law have mothers who also might be MIL's. Do they think their own moms are trying to be mean to their DIL or SIL? Or jealous, or controlling or whatever complaint they have. A MIL is a person who has had a life before you came on the scene and so many rarely want to get to know their MIL's and do everything they can to alienate them along with most of a partner's friends so they can control every aspect of their partner's life. If you become a MIL do you want to be automatically assigned to the "need to hate your guts status" possibly because your DIL is a paranoid control freak and knows her MIL can see through manipulative need to control their son or daughter?' I know few MIL's who are the pains spoken about on this forum and I have enjoyed a fabulous relationship with mine because I didn't cut her out of our lives and our children's because that would of been the most convenient thing to do. You are either a family or you are not. A lot can be said at the wedding when the bride insists that the grooms side of the family, parent's in particular, not be in the 'family' photo. When that happens the bride and possibly her gleeful mother are only too happy to be the center of the universe and demand that from the new partner. He or she will start to see the manipulation and the marriage will die a slow, awful death, caused by a DIL's need to control through manipulation. of course she will have plenty of other women who are her emotional and immature twins to support her along the way which will only serve to feed her self righteousness. Yes, some MIL's are a pain, especially if from a culture that demands DIL be second or even third place to elders and parents, but other than that, or an addict MIL, most just want to be treated with love and kindness and inclusion.

You sound like a narcissist to me, expecting her to tell you you're attractive.

You definitely are a narcissist if contact with her family has been stopped because you're so obsessed that she should tell you you're attractive. Maybe you're not physically attractive. Do you want her to lie?
Narcissistic personality disorder is a mental health condition in which people have an unreasonably high sense of their own importance. They need and seek too much attention and want people to admire them.

Reminds me of the phrase "so &so has a face only a mother could love".

I understand how you would feel hurt as this is about being accepted. And I am sure we have all felt insecure about how we look. Obviously you are capable of making beautiful children and your genes are there so you must be beautiful! Anyway as you say, who cares? Don’t allow her to have power over you, but I don’t think you are being unreasonable.

I’d forgotten I’d started this thread! It’s fine, thanks for the comments, I was feeling insecure but I know I’m not ugly - I was scouted as a model in my younger years fgs! Motherhood makes me crazy sometimes.

You should drop that into conversation with your MIL!

Thank you for reading my comment but I think you missed the point; my contact stopped when my MIL physically assaulted me to prevent me collecting my DC from her house, not for something as trivial as her not vocalising my physical attractiveness. I’d never expect her ( or anyone else) to do that. Or would you rather I’d punched her back than run away?
As I m said, I’m content that my DH and children think I’m ‘beautiful’. It isn’t just about looks & I don’t need any other validation besides that. FWAW I’m pretty low maintenance looks wise (no salon treatments, basic haircut and minimal make up) and have low esteem from childhood abuse; I’m a chronic people pleaser. I’d be almost happy to be a narcissist if it gave me an iota of confidence!
MILs behaviour towards me was unhinged to the extent that even her own DH was embarrassed by it and apologised repeatedly- no need, he’s a good chap and we get on very well. I also see DH maternal relatives regularly and have close relationship with SIL, cousins etc. Frankly, the problem isn’t me. You might want to bone up on your diagnostic skills.

Apparently my DH was betrothed to a Chinese Model. Her picture came out quite a bit during our engagement and at the start of our marriage.

Unfortunately DH prefers his women to have Celtic features of the curvy, pale hair and blue/green eyes type...

I don't think my MIL will ever find me attractive. She doesn't understand boobs bigger than a B cup although she does concede that I have very small feet. I think he ended up having a word with her about the pictures as it was quite upsetting to have it suggested to everyone that visited that I stole another woman's husband and that I was far uglier than his intended.

BTW DH knew nothing about this girl - I think it was just one of those jokes made when kids are toddlers - he wasn't properly engaged to her. And MIL gave me a Baby Book for Pregnant Women when we announced our engagement as she thought I'd trapped DH by getting pregnant... Spoiler: I wasn't.

The thing is: What your MIL thinks doesn't matter. It's whether your DH thinks you're attractive and finds you beautiful that matters. MIL want sons who marry someone who looks like them as a compliment to their looks so get offended when their son marries who they find attractive!

Sorry... Just seen the date on this thread but Mumsnet offered it to me. At least know you're not alone x