Mums and daughters and mums and sons

[autumngirl714]

My friend just shared a lovely poem on Instagram, about how a daughter never stops needing her mum.
It was really lovely and sweet and definitely made me think of my own relationship with my mum.
But then it got me thinking, why is it ok... or should I say more accepted for daughters to post stuff like this, about their bond with their mums etc... but not for sons?
I don't have any friends who are particularly positive about their in-laws , and it's almost social norm for DIL to have some sort of animosity their PIL.
So where does it go wrong? Why do mum of sons almost have to dim it down?

I'm obviously not speaking on behalf of all!

I have a great relationship with my kids (boys and girls). I would never post something like that publicly on SM but I may see something that resonates that I send privately. My children are all very different people and so my relationship with each of them is naturally different. For example one of my kids loves sitting with me to watch a good horror but the others wouldn't. Another likes musicals, so we regularly go to shows together but the others wouldn't want to come.
Personally, I haven't spoken to my own mother since I was a child, so that's another reason I would never post anything about special bonds. I know first hand that there's no such thing and I would never say I needed my mother!
I have a great relationship with my dad but rarely see anything about father/child relationships.

My mil once said to my husband and I…

“A daughter is a daughter all of your life,
A son is a son until he takes a wife”.

Nothing to do with the awful neglect he went through as a child then.

I have a son and I adore him. He’s a young adult now. He’s at uni. When I see him I get a big cuddle. We talk daily on the phone and I tell him I love him every time, and he says it back. He’s got a gf and I just back off and let them get on with it. If she’s good enough for my son, then she’s good enough for me.

But I wouldn’t post about it on my SM either.

The difference is that women can talk about their love and closeness to their mum, and people think 'how lovely!'.

A man shows any affection and closeness to his mum, and most people here will call him a mummy's boy.

ETA I'm not talking about social media sentimentality. Just in general life

Absolutely. I get on with both my sons. I like my daughters-in-law, and apparently they also like me.

My mum’s been dead 25 years, and I barely noticed, tbh.

My PILs are lovely but they seem to think my husband and I were put on the surface of the earth for the sole purpose of financing whatever it is they need done , including my husband’s siblings’ expenses , too.
For us, however , it’s the norm in our culture
for parents to go on to depend on their children : retirement plan, if you will. I totally hate it & that’ll certainly not be our case with our children by God’s grace.

I miss my MIL terribly, she was a wonderful lady. Her sons remained close to her as much as her daughters and she loved all of their partners as much as her own. I'm a mother of a son and I'll model my MIL skills on hers.
It's dependent on the relationship I think.

My mum is fine and we get on fine mainly. See each other once every 2-3 weeks maybe. No big bad stories of abuse or anything.

BUT at 38 I haven't 'needed' my mum for decades. Since at least 18 tbh. I can think of several people I'd go to for support or good sound advice before her.

Twee social media posts are a load of bollocks and don't apply for many imo.

Some people are overly invested in the mother/daughter relationship. Plenty of us had awful relationships with our mothers. This is not a universal truth.

My mother is a hateful conniving jealous liar who hates anyone being happy so no.

My DS is the most loving person I’ve ever known. I think boys are just less likely to feel the need to broadcast their feelings towards their mothers because it is a bit performative?

Sorry but I do think creating narratives based on one or two social media posts is such a basic form of observation, it’s pretty much how the tabloids work.

I have a very fractured relationship with my mother. We see each other about once or twice a year. We don't live near but that's no excuse really as my MIL lives a 10min drive further than my mother, and my DP (and often me and our children) see her every month and he speaks to her twice a week. I speak to her once a week.

I love my MIL. I get why my DP loves her very much.

I think you have missed the issue with the DIL v MIL issue.

It isn't about a MIL and her son being close.

It is about a MIL expecting the DIL to treat her as she would her own DM and to manage birthdays/christmas/mothers day but not holding their son to account whose actual responsibility those things are.

It's about MIL's who over step boundaries and can't step hack from a position of control and supreme importance in the lives of their sons.

It is not all MIL's. My ex's mum was amazing, her death was a massive blow.

My current MIL has been a nightmare almost from day 1. She has overstepped, created issues, been rude and surly with me.

I chose not to involve myself in the toxic drama

It's not nonsense. It's a fact that a good relationship between a mum and adult daughter is celebrated and one between son and mother is not.

Posters are being obtuse.

BUT it's not the unfairness one might think.

Good nother-daughter relationships in adulthood become close friendships, a relationship of peers. That is why they are celebrated.

Close mother son relationships are often ones of codependency. Ones where the mums still treat the adult sons as a child, or ones where they expect fierce loyalty over any partner.

Of course I generalise. But broadly speaking, this is why.

It's a fact that a good relationship between a mum and adult daughter is celebrated and one between son and mother is not.

in this hall mark style awful open, yes

sure as heck not in my reality

I'm the same. My mum has never met her grandchildren, whom are 25, 14, and 6. I too have not needed her since the age of about 12.
She is the most unmaternal woman I've ever known.
The sentimental stuff is lost on me.
My grandma is my true, real mother.

This. I always send my mum a Mother’s Day card with a heartfelt poem in and a couple of carefully thought out lines about how much she means to me. My brother sends her a jokey card with ‘love you mum’ in it. She displays both with utter pride as she knows we both adore her - my brother just wouldn’t buy the sentimental (crap, as he’d call it 😂)

also, love my MIL

Nah. My brother is great friends with my mum and dad. They spend loads of time together along with my lovely SisIL and nieces.

he’s just more likely to buy a card about farts than those sentimental cards. My mum knows his love language 😂😂

I will also just add, my DH recently spend AGES choosing a card for his dad. He was actively trying to out-shite his brother so his dad ended up with two hilariously crap cards from them. He knows them literally from birth though, so he thought it was the funniest and best thing ever