MIL took down all my Halloween decorations 😒😒

[Orchid90]

Just that .
We went out, invited her to come out too , she refused .
Got home and she took down all
the decorations, which I wanted to keep up a bit longer as it’s my house and I like them!
I know , there are bigger problems in the world , but I’m annoyed and had to tell someone .
I would never clear up anyone’s house without their permission .
she made it clear she didn’t like them and I guess they triggered her OCD .
I am gonna have a very very dark gothic Xmas this year, I always wanted a black tree anyway.

Maybe they're the ones who stuck this card through my door last week, the day after my kids decorated the front door... 🤔😅

I wouldn’t have let it slide and I would have put them back. Letting her get away with this behaviour only reinforces that she is right and can do what she wants.

Perhaps she way crossed the line & it was really rude of her ..

Yeah I'm much like you! The bin the cards next day people & I don't gel!

There’s a place near me has had Halloween decorations up now for at least 3 weeks! They definitely didn’t come down in the middle of people out trick or treating!

I’d have been so tempted to say “oh I see, thank you - you didn’t need to do that because I like to keep them up for a few days” and then promptly put them back! In reality though I wouldn’t have had the energy, wouldn’t have said anything and then would’ve felt incredibly uncomfortable and unhappy in my own house until she left.

HOW DARE SHE! That is beyond rude in someone else’s house. It doesn’t matter what your own opinion is if you’re a visitor which she is! No different to you deciding her house needs the walls painting green and cracking on with it whilst she’s out.

She is absolutely out of order. Get DH to have a word with her and let her know she crossed a line.

My DD likes to decorate outside her home for Halloween, for a month before. To be honest it's not my thing but it's her home and her choice. Last year her elderly male neighbour took the lot down, way before Halloween, his wife was livid and apologised - he does have an excuse however as he has dementia....

My MIL did this with my son’s birthday decorations a year or so ago. I think she thought she was being helpful but actually I was keeping them until I had time to pack them away properly to reuse again. She just pulled everything down and threw it in the bin which I could have obviously done.
I assume it was well intended but I think people really shouldn’t clean other peoples houses. Even where it’s well intended I dislike it. Things just get cleared off sides and shoved in cupboards, never to be found again. I think people feel they are doing you a favour (especially when you have young kids and little time) but I really do hate it.

Is your MIL my mother?

Read the post properly.

OK. So I freely admit this could all be conjecture on my part, but I have observed similar before.

I'm betting MIL didn't say much at all, particularly if the DH was present...Just let OP express rather angry amazement that she'd done it. If she'd done it out of love to be useful, that would already be apparent in her overall attitude to OP and she would freely admit why she did it and be at least a bit sorry and OP probably wouldn't have needed to post.

I think she saw a piece of OPs work that she'd put time and effort into, was perhaps a bit jealous in how it compared with MILs efforts in DH's childhood school holidays and thought... "Well that's coming down."

It keeps up the "harmless little old lady, just trying to help, look how she speaks to me" vibe whilst not acknowledging any fault at all... or not really explaining why she did it, (so there could be a real discussion and solve the matter there and then and move on) -which also looks like MIL is "rising above it"

How very Royal Family.

It then becomes harder for OP and DH to work out what to do, because they don't understand why she did it ( just look at this thread we're all puzzled) which irritates them, and because the real why of it is so unclear and so frustrating, OP is very cross about it... (as intended). OP starts to look like the aggressor of the piece. Which becomes even more annoying.

The MIL is effectively going into another woman's house and making her mark/imposing her will, in a way that will cause disruption and annoy OP because OP will complain to DH and start (MIL hopes) to look like OP's being mean to MIL, or OP can't get on with her etc. Essentially that its OP's fault. MIL may not even realise she's doing it, just thinks shes asserting herself.

Or maybe I'm reading too much into it 😀

Is she a Witch?

Get her a broom stick and leave it outside the front door of her house. With a note on it saying.

You left this the last time you came to see us.Presume you dtil.really need it to get about

Can you also make it us some bat and toad soup and bring it round?

🐸🦇🎃🧹

X

LOL at the people saying ‘She probably thought she was being helpful’. Either they’re incredibly naive or they have a very warped idea of what ‘helpful’ is.

If your idea of ‘helping’ is removing decorations from someone else’s house without asking them, because you have unilaterally decided that ‘everyone’ takes down decorations immediately after/on the day of the thing they are celebrating, you have quite the ego on you.

It isn’t ’helpful’ to assume that you know better than your host what’s good/right for them. It’s rude and arrogant, and being the parent of one of the hosts doesn’t make it any less so.

Saying ‘Want me to take the decorations down for you while you’re out to save you a job?’ would be an indication of wanting to be helpful. It allows the host a choice of saying ‘Oh, that would be great if you don’t mind’ or ‘Thanks but I like to leave mine up a bit longer’.

Even better would be ‘Anything you’d like me to do around the house while you’re out? You’ve been running round doing things for me and I’d love to help out and be useful’. That’s what my mum would probably say.

A lot of people of that generation have undiagnosed mental health issues and personality disorders and it’s fucking exhausting to deal with because they won’t ever admit they have anything wrong with them so we all have to tolerate their bonkers behaviour or deal with the aftermath of challenging them - where they play the victim and then you’re suddenly the bad guy for saying something awful about them! Your Tim Burton Christmas sounds fab - I hope MIL is invited, I’d love to see her deal with that!

More to point, who are all these mothers of sons - and it's always the mothers of the male in the couple - who are driven to go to someone else's house and start rearranging things or removing things, or even - complete madness in my opinion - cleaning the house or doing the laundry?

Speaking as a mother and MIL, nothing, but nothing would make me want to go to any of my children's houses and start messing around with their stuff.

Are there really groups of weird women running around like demented cleaners waving buckets and mops aloft looking for homes to adjust to their liking? I suppose there must be, given how many of this type of threads there are on MN.

Uh-oh, she's activated the rules of Halloween. Now reddit has to prank her.

My point is only that there are many people who would be diagnosed as having OCD but who do not get diagnosed.

Asking 'is she diagnosed?' is unhelpful.

The better question is 'does this person appear the have OCD as clinically defined?'

Yes, clinically-defined OCD is debilitating and serious.

She sounds like my mum who I drive nuts by having clutter in my house. She’d always ask if I want her to come over and sort things out, although she’d never just change anything herself.
One year she was carrying on about a few thistles in my yard and toddler that I am I dug my heels in and refused to remove them. I let them grow to over a metre high and then decorated them with tinsel and sent her a picture.

I didn’t mention diagnosis at any point in my post? I simply stated the traits as OP described them are not what make OCD.

Edited as I’ve no idea how my comment posted on wrong thread.

She shouldn't have taken them down, not her house, but I've never known anyone have Halloween decorations anyway. Are you in America? People make more of a thing of it there than here.

I think Halloween is an odd thing to celebrate.