What mad/batty things does your MIL do or say/or has she done?

[meggymoo]

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my mil suggested ds go on valium to stop him sleepwalking....
she also looked after ds for a week when he was 4 and told me she would have him clean and dry both day and night by my return.... Ha!!

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My MIL is generally a sweetheart, but didn't react well to my pregnancy. At first tried to pretend it wasn't happening, then when dp told her the 12 week scan showed the baby was growing well she said, "It's not a baby yet, you know".

Oh ok, my foetus is coming along nicely!

My favourite sting-in-the-tail backhander came from her sister to my dp's SIL, though: "What a lovely outfit! It makes you look half your size!"

My MIL is generally lovely, if prone to speaking first and thinking later, as demonstrated by the following.

She and FIL came to visit on our first full day at home following DDs birth. I needed to breastfeed DD, and was really no-where in the house comfortable for them to sit whilst I was doing so in the living room, so I told DH to tell them it was OK to come in whilst I fed her. Cue MIL knocking on the door, walking in and saying 'I heard it was OK if we came in to watch you breastfeed' . Told her that 'no its OK to come in and NOT watch me breastfeed'.

This prompted much wailing from me to DH about not being a bl**dy exhibit etc. We are going to stay with them this weekend, so hope attitude to breastfeeding has improved, as I don't plan to be shunted off to a bedroom to feed!

My MIL is American which brings a whole load of cultural differences into it.

She wanted to rum spiced rum onto DD's gums to help her sleep and stop the teething pain (she wasn't teething at the time)

She got DD toffe popcorn and a happy meal aged 7 months and was amazed when we wouldn't let her eat it (she'd only been on solids 3 weeks at the time!)

She makes comments like "You wait til she is around NORMAL children" (I.e. when we live in the USA)

Shes a lovely lady but I am very relieved she lives on the other side of the atlantic!

Hester, you MIL sounds horrible! My MIL is exactly like Pauline Fowler but more eccentric, recently we were all having a conversation about what we would do for a job if we had our time all over again. Most people were coming out with doctor, teacher etc and she pipes up with "I have always really wanted to empty the sanitary towel bins that they have in office toilets, I imagine that would be a lovely job." The scary thing is she really was being serious!

Shocked at reading these! WWW, I don't normally condone violence but your MIL deserves a poke in the eye!

Me n my MIL do not speak which is a shame and I have cried many tears over her. She told DH he was fat stupid and irresponsible for 'getting' me PG with DS1. She hasnt even seen DS2 and he is 8 months now.

Horrid woman.

My MIL is quite mad and has upset me by her ridiculous comments many times but I am over it now and just answer back!

Like when DH and told her I was pregnant with first baby she said "oh, thought you weren't into that sort of thing". Nice. Probably thought because we waited until we were ready to have kids that we didn't want them. DH's face dropped. No squeals and hugs, we left the house quite deflated.

She also left me £5 on the tv after she left our house to "buy DH some cornflakes, he likes those". We'd lived together for 2 years by then and not a wiff of a cornflake.

Today - she has given £500 to the kitchen company who are fitting her new kitchen - in cash, no receipt, nothing signed, because "he was a nice man and they can't start building it until we give them £500". Give me strength. I'm scared to go home - DH is so stressed out by her!

My MIL is normally horrible so I would limit myself to things that make me wonder if she is OK in the brain department:

She introduced DS to her aquaintances with a different name, and when I asked why, she said that she didn't like his name and that she will continue to introduce him with the name that she had chosen for him.

She believes that oil paint is perfectly safe for toddlers and even edible because it's made with natural products (cadmium, yuuummy! ).

She thinks it's OK to serve and mix yesterday's o dog food with the one of the day with the same spoon she is using to feed DS, but find it "disgusting" not to wear shoes while you are at home.

She has some binoculars in her terrace to spy on the neighbours

IF DH's is using the phone, she picks up the other extension to hear the conversation

She walks through Harrods wearing a fluffy multicoloured rabbit skin jacket while loudly commenting about the "bad taste in dressing" of English people.

And the list goes on...

Fio, mine does that quite often, calls me DH's ex's name. She hadn;t seen her for 3 years the forst time she did it.

Also has DH's ex wedding photo up (13 years ago) but none of our wedding (2 yeras ago)!

Told me that DD2's mouth was much smaller than her cousin's because I hadn't breastfed(?)!

Said she didn't know what to get me for Xmas so hadn't got anything.

After hearing that my mum is a smoker commented that all smokers look the same, probably because of the nicotine....

Luckily she lives in USA!!

Chandra, I love that one about calling your DS the name she likes

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Well, we have been warned... she had told us long time before DS was conceived that she didn't authorise us to use those horrible foreign names on her grandchildren.

She also told us that she had already decided which school our DS was to attend: "A very nationalist school that pays proper attention to the importance of the great Mallorcan values" Very useful considering that all my failures according to her are caused by my foreign upbringing.

And talking about decissions, the one that became a classic was when I said that our children were lent to us and the time will come to see them leave, and then she said "My children are mine and I decide what's to be done!"

No wonder we have no contact anymore.