To want MIL to stop doing our laundry?

[HannahR21]

MIL is here every other Tuesday looking after our toddler whilst we both work. She is really helpful, and tries to do stuff round the house. Recently, she has started putting washes on. I find this a step too far - the first time this happened, there wasn’t a great deal of washing in our basket - it would have fit in one wash. She left one item in the basket which was a rather ‘risque’ all in one bedroom outfit of mine if you get what I mean. She had obviously seen it, and decided to leave it (and nothing else) in the basket.

DH says she’s being helpful and it saves me a job so I should be grateful. I find it..invasive? Fully appreciate it may be a ‘me’ issue but thought it’d get some impartial views.

Not so much ‘rifling through’ underwear as taking some items from a basket and putting them in a machine. 😂

And the other point, which you skipped past, was that no, the MIL is not ‘doing as she’s told’ because no one has told her they don’t want her to do it.

If she is working in the home looking after the children, it’s not a huge liberty to also do some light housework. It’s what nannies and au pairs do, isn’t it? So as the MIL is working in that role, she is also doing jobs which help to keep the house running, which is very kind of her. But the OP and H need to make their expectations clear, eg: ‘we want you to look after the children but please don’t do anything else in the home’.

The only possible way to grab someone's knickers from her laundry basket is to rifle through them 😆

Time the dh stopped being a rude wanker to his wife then and told his mother to quit it.

She's minding the kid one day a fortnight. And au pairs are given lists of chores.

And she doesn't have a working role she's a granny baby sitting once a fortnight

But she's not an au pair so that's not relevant of course.

And OP doesn't want her rifling through her clothes. So that's that.

I'd just make a joke of it and ask her not to. Something like Honestly, Maggie, don't worry about the washes, I like to do them myself. DH and I signed a contract that no one else would be handling our lingerie, whether we're in it or not!

If I was doing childcare for my grandchildren, I would do some little jobs around the house to make the parents’ lives easier. I’d probably put a wash on. If my child and their partner didn’t want me to, they could tell me and I’d stop. Seems really simple and not something to get enraged about.

@Tinks2026 The other week there was someone complaining on here because their mother was doing childcare but not any housework. Seems these older women doing unpaid work can’t win whatever they do.

No, it seems when you're in someone's home they have a right to their own likes, privacy and choice. And it seems all older women and daughters in law are individuals, not amorphous blobs with the same wants and needs.

Choosing to babysit once a fortnight isn't a licence to rifle through someone's laundry.

And I despise people who treat older women as free labour, but since mil is babysitting one day a fortnight and there's no hint she hasn't chosen that, there's no point to the implication that she's a poor put upon soul to try to deflect away from the fact that OP has a perfect right not to want her mil rifling through her laundry.

I prefer not to rob the mil of agency and won't assume she's downtrodden without even a hint of that in the information given.

So, time for the dh to stop being a rude minimising wanker to the OP and tell his mother to leave the laundry be.

Good job OP isn't enraged then!

She doesn’t seem to be. I was directing my comment at Tinks who seems vexed about it.

Yup @Tinks2026. The DH is the one with the bad manners, not the MIL.

Better still, the woman who doesn't live there can learn some manners and do as she's told.
What? You think offering childcare gives you a free pass to be an interfering, overbearing bulldozer with no manners who ignores what the woman who actually lives there actually wants?
Blimey. In the real world rifling through a relative's underwear and interfering in an unhelpful way in their home without any discussion is always bad manners.
So anyway, doing something unhelpful, un- needed and unwanted in someone else's home isn't helping. OP, tell your husband to stop being so rude to you and tell his mother to quit it.

... etc, etc

Blimey, there's no grey areas in your world are there?

Do you generally find it difficult to resolve minor conflict and/or compromise? 😂😂😂

I sometimes do the washing when I'm babysitting for DD and SIL. They are so busy working full time with a young family that I'm just trying to ease the burden. First time I said to DD afterwards that I hoped they didn't mind - she was a bit MEH on behalf of SIL but I reminded her I'd seen his pants many times as they lived with us during Covid. She's ok with it now

“She’s ok with it now” - yes, that’s how I want people to feel when I do what I’ve decided is a favour!

Did you ask your SIL?

I did not ask him but did ask DD to check with him b4 I did it again