to want to whack my mother in law with a cricket bat?

[ac27]

My husband's Australian, his parents live in Sydney. We live in London. We have two lovely children. The refrain of my life, coming from m-in-law over the phone, via email, in cards, letters, on skype, is:

"Oh, I'm so sad. It's just so sad. You know, some days I just don't know what to do with myself, I just miss my two beautiful babies [i.e HELLO?? MY beautiful babies] so much. It's horrible, you know. Just horrible."

The guilt my husband feels at being happy here with his wife and children grows every month. There's a constant pressure for us to move over there, even though in London my children have two grandparents, two uncles, an auntie, seven first cousins, two second cousins etc. etc., half of them on my husband's side. And in Australia - two elderly grandparents. That's it.

The woman (to whom I am charming, by the way) is unstoppable in her passive aggression. I sent her four emails of lovely photos, this is a transcript of the email I get back: "Thank you for all the photos - it breaks my heart we are not closer - just want a cuddle and hug!! the pendulum swings back and forth and I get v sad!". WTF does that even mean? What pendulum? What? WHAT??

Could somebody please empathise, before my eyeballs explode. Or tell me I'm an unreasonable, classically unsympathetic daughter-in-law - I'll mull it over, if so.

YAB a bit U. I think when you marry someone from another country, then all this stuff comes with the territory. It is very hard for the family 'left behind' to deal with.

I'm in this situation myself. We've lived in both places and there's always one side unhappy. It sounds like you have a good supportive family around you and you are living in your own country, so putting up with an annoying MIL can't be too high a price to pay.

Agree with Gmarksthespot. There is so much vehemence and nastiness against MILs - as if being someone's mother and grandmother is of no account.

Most of us on here by definition are mums - imagine in a few years time if your own DILs were conspiring against you and you found it difficult to keep in contact WITH YOUR OWN DS (albeit an adult verson). Show some sympathy towards this lady - she misses her son as I would, if he lived in a foreign country....

Am also a bit at Ninedragon's description of the UK as "Poverty Island" and why would she move here? Well, plenty of Australians do move here.....it's not that bad

"Show some sympathy towards this lady - she misses her son as I would, if he lived in a foreign country...."

It's irrelevant who she is. She's being very annoying.

Being a relative doesn't give one the automatic right to be PITA.

It's my English-born DH's term for the UK, actually, not mine. He hates it and left as soon as he'd graduated.

My mother in law pays for us to go over once a year, and comes to visit once a year. And the fact we have skype these days means we can be a huge part of each others lives even though she lives in USA.

I'm in Singapore too so slightly different as it was us who moved away but we get the same from my Mum (MIL has another Grandson and so I don't think it's quite as bad). Mum and Dad have been out twice for 3 weeks then 1 month since the birth of our DS in August 2008. When we lived in the UK we were living 2 hours away from them and had no room for them to stay over (well not if we had a DS anyway). So arguably they spend a lot more time with us now than if we were still living in London.

We're going back for 2 weeks to have DS christened next month. What I really hate is that MIL and Mum are constantly comparing who gets to spend most time with DS when we do go back. You can't win at all!

I have a MIL who feels sorry for herself no matter what happens in her life and no matter what you do for her. She lives in the USA and also does the whole guilt thing constantly. I have learned to live with it. It washes over me now. I make sure I send her photos regularly and call her/email her. We go over once every year or two, she comes over whenever she likes. I smile sweetly, bite my lip and put up with it. What else can you do? I don't know about your MIL, but mine is 75 and is never going to change, so for the sake of all involved I out up with it (and have a good bitch about her to my mum./sister when I need to let off steam!).

My mum does this - she's always telling us how much she misses us and how she wishes she could see us more often etc etc etc. And she adds to it - she calls the house and leaves sobbing messages during the day saying, "I didn't want to disturb you but really wanted to hear your voice so just calling your answering machine because I miss you so much."

I am feeling slightly heartless though after reading all the responses on here - it doesn't annoy me because I simply feel nothing. She's ridiculous and I can't work up any energy to buy into it.

I have only just realised that she's probably trying to make me feel guilty. Oh well. I'll enjoy this one little thing that doesn't drive me insane while I can!

when I returned to Ireland with my children, my xmil behaved like a mad selfish crazy bitch on wheels. She was incandescent with rage that I was doing what suited me, and not what suited her. She honestly expected me to stay near her, to sacrafice my life for her convenience. Like ninedragons, I would have felt some sympathy for her, but she was so completely, hideously vile to me that now I think 'fuck her'.

Also, she never felt any concern or sympathy when it was MY parents travelling over to see their grandchildren (and they NEVER put pressure on me to return, even though they had no gc in Ireland)

Ah I LOVE this thread, feel for you AC27 - this has been much cheaper than therapy for me!! LOUJAY I am in exactly the same boat as you - we relocated from london to scotland to be closer to MIL. We have not seen her since the half an hour she squeezed us in on xmas eve. I also get phone calls of how much she misses us - WE LIVE A 20 MINUTE DRIVE AWAY!!!!! THEY ARE RETIRED!!!!! AAAGGGGGG!!! I am so hurt: holidays, socialising, bridge, golf, curling are so much more important than us.....not sure what to do, will start another thread, its good to know so many others live in frustration....MIL so good at the guilt trip

Is your dh their only child? She sounds like a complete PITA, but I agree with Gmarksthe spot - it would break my heart if my kids moved to the other side of the world and I never saw my grandchildren. We were living abroad for the first seven years of the dcs lives and though we are back now will be taking off again in a few years. However, in our case at least the grandparents were equally disadvantaged iyswim - you have a no win situation really even if you did move to Oz (and I'm not suggesting for a moment that you should) you'd have the same guilt trip from family in the UK. I think you should drop the cricket bat idea and take a few deep breaths instead - it sounds as though your dh finds it hard (see my first question) and I don't think furiously despising his mum is the best way forward.

My MIL is not much different. I like her a lot, I really do but I get the thing about missing us all and missing the boys growing up and how quiet the house is when we have gone. My MIL went on for years about how she couldn't wait for grandchildren, how she had to be a grandmother before she was 60 and then, as soon as they are all born, they up sticks and move. My PIL are retired, they are living in a house that is not going to be suitable for them for much longer (very steep, open stairs, no chance of a stairlift) and frankly, they should move. They say it is too expensive but DH has even offered, in more financially secure times, to help them buy a place as an investment for us as well, so that they could move. Not interested.

They have 3 sons, all of whom live down south (they live in N Wales). It is a 270 mile trip to see them and to make it worth our while we have to go for at least 2 nights, preferably 3. However, the last time we went to visit they said that DH and I couldn't stay there any more, although the boys could (although they don't want to as they hate the camp beds and sleeping under their study desks), because they didn't think they could cope with the upheaval any more. They sleep on the sofa bed downstairs and we have their bedroom because they get up early and don't want to disturb us.

So not only will we have the 'you don't visit us very much, we miss the boys' we now also have to pay for the privelege of going to see them because we will have to fork out for a hotel/B&B.

They are coming for Easter though - saves us the trip!

@ UQD comment about summertime

god this is exactly the kind of hysterical bollocks my own she devil mil specialises in.

Lilian, I don't furiously despise my MIL. In fact since long before marrying my DH I bent over backwards to make her happy. We pay for them to come over here, we spend money we don't have going over there, we skype twice a week (at least), I send photos every week, plus cards, lavish birthday and Christmas presents. When they're over here (for two months at a time, twice a year) I cook for them, organise theatre tickets, ballet tickets, opera tickets, lend them our car, get my entire family to have them to stay and have them over for lunch and supper. My son phones her EVERY MORNING.

I actually think this was my mistake, and by going out of my way to include her, she has become even more monstrous. She's like a spoilt child, who just complains and whines about everything. She's the mother of 3 boys - should have known she had no idea how to be with women.

And I could deal with it all - the passive aggression (which makes me feel violent, see thread heading), the melodrama, the self-pity, I could even deal with her complete inability to actually connect with my children rather than just mooning miserably at them - were it not for what it does to my DH.

She has successfully lynched him. Instead of DH and I and children being a happy family unit, he now sits himself firmly in MIL's camp, ("Poor Mum, poor Mum..."), while my family are seen as the enemy - why? Just for being close, in distance, and to my children.

This is what I can't cope with, and think is wicked. She's making her son unhappy, and negatively affecting his marriage - she knows it, and revels in it.

So MrsMattie, WentworthMM, ItsMargot, OhBling: Big Up and Yo. Thanks for the empathy. And giant respect to ninedragons for such stellar boundary drawing. I'm longing to say - "enough, actually, and, also, fuck off" but know that if I do the Grand Canyon will open up between me and DH.

Perhaps I could pay a third party to whack her with bat. Anyone up for it? ticket to Sydney included.

i think calling her a 'poor miserable wretch' is extremely rude. She may be irritating but I think your claim to be always charming plus your way of talking about her here sounds like you may be doing your fair share of passive aggression. Do not like the piling in to slam MILs here either. We may all be MILs one day and i'm not sure we'll be all that better. And yes, I have had troubles with mine.

You might laugh ac but as a cricketer I do have three bats to choose from (much to my wife's disgust)So I can offer you a choice, long handle short handle the Newbury or the Bradbury.
To be honest I wouldn't want them ruined on a MIL...

ruty, I didn't ACTUALLY call her a poor miserable wretch. Perhaps my literary style isn't up to much, but was attempting an OTT, jocund paraphrasing in keeping with OTT, jocund thread heading. And so you don't get alarmed, I'm not ACTUALLY proposing to whack her with a cricket bat, either, as that would be, you know, criminal.

Being as I am myself, I can happily inform also that I don't go in for passive aggression. I either smile and deal with it, in order to protect my marriage, or I'm straightforward. Or I blow off steam in receptive corners such as this message board.

I sincerely hope both my children fall in love with good people, and thus I'll be a MIL some day; and I hope even more that when that happens I will urge both my children to celebrate their lives and protect their families - that is, their partners and children.

Sheesh.

And thanks BGD for the gentlemanly offer of not one but several bats. Fancy a family holiday south? (Note to ruty, not ACTUALLY proposing BGD take his children to Australia on my buck to watch their father beat shit out of stranger's MIL with several bats. Is joke.)

you did post in AIBU. That means people can agree or disgree with you, no? You did say you wouldn't send her any more photos if she was upset, no? That sounds very passive aggressive to me. Sorry not to back you up with the MIL bashing, just felt that missing one's children and grandchildren, and being irritating about it, was not enough to warrant such huge disrespect of your children's grandmother. Anyway, I'll bow out. As you were.

Of course disagree. Is refreshing. Alls I was saying is that your disagreement might work better if you had a little humour.

i have humour. But still think YAB a bit U.

I had a huge falling out with my in laws when i asked them not come and stay in our two bedroom flat the week before ds was born for a month, as they had planned [they live overseas] I was told i was not treating them with respect, and MIL is very hard to persuade to come over ever since, and a whole collection of other stuff. I do sympathise. But I think MILs have a raw deal on the whole, especially when living far away, it must be awful. I think it was the piling in here on fairly little evidence that i found a bit off putting.

ac - i am in awe of all the effort you have been making! i would possibly have the good will and intentions in the same situation, but am far too dippy / lazy to actually do it. i have huge sympathy for you. is there any way you could have a quiet chat with your mil about how upset she makes your dh? or would that just encourage her to pile on the pressure to move to oz?
i might offer to prod your dh with a big stick actually, for not standing up to his mum and making her realise how much you go out of your way to make her happy! her behaviour is really damaging to everyone involved.

yes a direct talk might be better. How you feel you do all you can but you just can't move etc. Or maybe you've tried that.

I agree with ruty.

MIL is clearly being OTT, but my brother and his wife live in Australia (as do her parents, she is an only child) and I have never seen my nephew. They have seen DS but not our other nephew. Mum goes over there once a year and they are very good to her, but do you know what? We miss them. We want to know their DS and we don't. It is hard.