Classic mother in law quotes...What's yours?!

[manuka]

Mine has just said this beauty - [with reference to 8month old dd who had woken from nap and was grizzling, clearly not going to go back to sleep] "Why don't you just leave her until she's screaming her head off?" !!! I thought that was a real corker and had to share that with you all!!!
She had in fact pooed herself and got stuck in a crazy position in her cot so on reflection I'm glad I didn't follow mil's advice.

[liath]

When dd was 2 weeks old and I was struggling with BF MIL was holding her and she started crying "Ooh, your mummy's not making you enough milk is she?"

She's nothing like as bad as some on here but when she stayed for 2 weeks this xmas even DH was referring to her in the privacy of our bedroom as "that miserable old woman"!!

[finknottle]

Some of these are horrid - mine are mild by comparison, though with ds1 I was fuming about her.
She cried when we wanted another pushchair to the one she'd chosen. Sulked for 3 weeks because we bought a car seat when she'd bought us said pushchair as it had a carrycot ds1 could be in while in the car.
Told me I couldn't take ds1 to see my parents in England when he was 5m (they hadn't seen us since a week after his birth) because he wouldn't recognise her when he got back. Used to ring me up and demand to come and see him because her life was "like rain" and he was her "sunshine". Slept with a photo of him under her pillow. Started EVERY sentence for the first 18 months with either: "You should..." or "You shouldn't..."
When ds2 was born "Shame that he's a boy, I really wanted a granddaughter." Ignored him till he was 2 (even ds1 used to say, "Doesn't my brother get a present too?")
Needless to say both dss were ignored when dd was born.
"Are you able to peel potatoes now?" (to me aged 28)
"We look after our guests, you don't."
"Are you wearing new perfume? Thought so, it's given me a terrible headache"
"Are we allowed to come and give ds1/ds2/dd a birthday present?"

[ssd]

when we got married MIL said she'd buy us a dinner service from House of Frazer.

she told me to go in and choose one. so I did, got the girl to put it all aside.

told MIL who said I'll give you the money for it and you can collect it.

she then gave us £20 in a wedding card for the dinner service....

Dh was mortified........

[AnAngelWithin]

i always get 'well YOU were the one who chose to have 4 kids' whenever she asks how i am and i dare to reply with anything other than that I am fine!

[tkband3]

On being told that I was pregnant with DD1 "Oh. So do I say congratulations or commiserations?"

While in the car with SIL, after FIL's first prostrate surgery..."well P had the most enormous erection the other night, he just didn't know what to do with it. Well of course, he does know what to do with erections, we do still have sex, but you know what I mean'... . SIL says she just didn't know where to put herself - fortunately she was driving so didn't have to look at MIL. So glad she didn't say that to me .

FIL (who was v. sweet but useless at anything domestic), coming into the kitchen where OH and I are each holding a screaming, week old DT, 'can I have a glass of water?' 'of course'. Waits to be given a glass of water...'there's the tap, there's the glasses, help yourself.' They'd come to stay to 'help'...for 2 weeks

[whywhywhy]

rofl at Pavlov's MIL- 'bf is not natural yo know, we are not animals!' !!! it's brilliant.

oh, someone should publish a book of this stuff

[Sherbert37]

AnAngel - we too have had "You knew what you were doing when you choose to have 3". Not sure we did really, especially given the non existent family support.

[manuka]

Just remembered the first and worst thing from mil. My dh was with a foreign woman for 11 years who refused to learn English or go to college or work. This obviously annoyed mil who could never be left alone with foreign woman cos she just layed into her "why aren't you learning English etc?"
I have my own business and my own house so expected she'd be happy for dh.
How silly of me!! She wrote him a letter saying I was bossy and controlling and how horrible I was for pushing foreign woman out of the picture and can she have foreign woman's address cos she missed her and wanted to write to her!! (foreign woman could speak basic English)
Last Christmas she put up christmas card from foreign woman plus previous christmas cards from foreign woman's parents plus a birthday card from foreign woman!!!!
If only she knew how much money foreign woman keeps asking dh to send her she'd soon shut up. unfortunately thats too big a can of worms to tell mil.

[Lovecat]

Don't have a MIL, but I do have one by proxy - the OH's mum died when he was 12 and her twin sister has always kept a motherly eye upon him and his sibs.

She is lovely, but renowned for being a bit dappy and utterly tactless, everyone gets it from her so no-one is too offended, but here are a few of the things she's said to me:

"You must MAKE him stop smoking!" (yes, because I am Paul McKenna in disguise!)

On asking me if dd was talking in sentences yet, as her wunderkind gd1 was doing so at 9 months (yeah right) and being told no "well, dear, you do speak very fast, it's probably confusing her" (I'm from Liverpool and we do speak a bit quicker up there, but wtf?? How does she think babies learn to speak on Merseyside?)

When I vaguely floated the idea of going back to the clinic to talk about having a sib for dd - "Well, I told DIL that she's far too old for another, so you definitely shouldn't be thinking of it" - DIL is 35 and I was 39 at the time...

But then she used to moan to me about her student ds2 and her fears that he was gay because he hadn't brought anyone home to meet her - at the time her ds2 was sh@gging my sister (I only knew because sister had confided in me) so I had to go 'oh, really, do you think? No, I'm sure he'll meet a nice girl soon...' while trying not to explode laughing...

[Runninglate]

MIL arrived from America for 9 days, the day after DD was born. As she was here, my mum came to visit too for a couple of hours. Both arrived within 20 minutes of each other, my mum first.

When it became clear that neither of them were going to do anything like make cups of tea etc, I said clearly that I was worried about DH running around after all of us and got up to go in to the kitchen to help. MIL turned to my Mum and said 'oh she won't let me do anything to help' and Mum said 'don't ask her, just do it!'

Bizarre - MIL proceeded to spend the 9 days just wanting to hold the baby and did bugger all. My mum left that day with a sandwich that I'd made for her to eat on the train home.

I'd given birth 24 hours earlier - of course I would have let people do stuff to help!!!

[manuka]

Runninglate that's SO CRAP!!! I would have exploded in that situation! My mum's an angel and came over every day for 6 weeks after my c section and cooked and cleaned etc.
Mil came over last weekend and dh, dd and myself are all ill and she did nothing!!!

[Runninglate]

Ah Manuka, now that is crap!! What on earth was going on in her head?? Did you say anything???

Do you know - I wonder if something happens in their heads and they think they're being helpful somehow. I think they become like children and you have to specifically ask them to do specific things, otherwise it just doesn't cross their minds. It took the best part of her visit to get her to put her empty tea cup in the kitchen. When offered tea, she would occasionally say 'oh don't worry, I'll make mine' (!!!!) It's most curious! I did wonder whether she was trying to make herself seem invisible somehow as she realised that her visit was not actually the best timed but there was nothing any of us could do about it.

I am beside myself as we are going over to visit her for a week next week. Desperately don't want to go!! DD now 12 weeks.

[liath]

My MIL is just like that, too. She stayed when dd was 2 weeks old and didn't lift a finger to help but kept offering to take her off me so I guess in her mind she was "helping".

When she was up over Xmas it was the same, she just sat on the sofa while I ran round doing everything. If I specifically asked her to do something she would do it but otherwise she would even ask me to get her glasses of water!!!! On Xmas day she actually offered to help and peeled some veg and then that was it, she just watched as me & DH ran around and my parents mucked in then I heard her talking to SIL on the phone boasting about how she'd helped by peeling the bloody sprouts.......

I think they genuinely can't appreciate what they are really like.

[GrumpyOldHorsewoman]

My MIL isn't that bad, but she's as nutty as a fruitcake and quietly manipulative.

FIL (deceased) however, was a selfish man who has somehow been sainted since his untimely demise. He and MIL had been separated for almost 20 years when he died, and when he was alive I heard nothing but the bad stuff about him - all the crappy things he had done all through his life. Now he is dead it is a different story, and I struggle to recognise the character they talk so fondly about from the man I knew him to be. All this despite the fact he neglected his family throughout his life, was a womanising absentee father who liked a drink (and keeping all he earned for himself) and, finally, when he died, left everything he posessed and a not insubstantial sum of money to his girlfriend. His four sons were only mentioned in his will should the girlfriend not outlive him by more than 14 days. Not even a memento for any of his 4 children and 5 grandchildren. It wasn't about the money, it was just the final insult.

[Elk]

My mil is great but tact is not her strong point.

10 days after dd1 was born with me still not very well dh tried to make me feel better by saying I looked great. My MIL turned round, poked me in the stomach and said ' I don't know you've still got a lot of weight to lose'.

I can laugh now, but then!

[Guitargirl]

7 days after DD was born by emergency C-section my MIL told me I should be wearing a corset to get my stomach back in shape.

Also, when DD was 9 days old and had her first really bad colicky night, MIL was staying. DD was inconsolable from about 11pm till 4am and I was at my wits end. Am a first time Mum and never seen a baby with colic before, the only thing that would calm her down was to bf DD but I wasn't sure if that would make it worse as I really didn't know anything about colic. Anyway, got all my pregnancy/baby books out to see what could calm colic. The next morning after I'd not had any sleep for about 30 hours and was knackered anyway, MIL said 'you know GG, there are some things you just can't learn from books, you have to learn from life itself'...could have cheerfully headbutted her...

[pookey]

GG I had the corset comment from a middle aged work colleague who came round to see our new baby!

I have never met my mil as dp does not speak to his parents, its sad but sounds like I have been saved a lot of grief.

When I said I didnt think it was a good idea for 19 mo ds to walk on my dinning table in his dirty shoes (or even not in his shoes for that matter!) my mum kept telling him 'mummy says no' in a 'computer says no' accent. Hmmm slightly undermining.

[expatinengland]

My MIL lives in California, and has always disliked me, but after DD was born in England she expected us to fly the baby as soon as possible out to see her because her 'pain level' is too high to fly over here...she's been having high 'pain levels' for over 20 years and has never visited our home no matter where we have lived. DH is now so mad at her that he says he doesn't care if she ever sees DD. He's serious, and she's not speakikng to either one of us now. She's actually jealous of DD I think. I'm quite happy not to hear her crap.

When I was pregnant, she kept telling me to have an elective c-section because "it's safest for the babies because birth is too traumatic" for them. She accused me of being "selfish by not putting my baby's needs first" since I didn't want a c-section.

Other 'lovely' comments:
When I was thin and fit, she used to say I should quit wearing running bras because they "would inhibit my ability to b/f in the future", but when I b/f she told me "that's old-fashioned..does anybody still do that now?"

I had gained some weight when I got pregnant, and she said, "well you'll never get that weight off now, and you should have done something about that before." (She's very obese.....)

The best is the old clothes she gives me..some of them were gifts I gave her several years ago.

I too could go on and on, but these are the best ones.

[pookey]

blimey expat what a wise and well informed mil you have.

[Ripeberry]

Actually my MIL is much nicer than my mum and has helped loads in the last few years.
My mum said to me when i announced that i was pregnant, Oh don't tell me that i'll have to worry about grandchildren!!???
Then 2 months after DD1 was born she goes into a major attack of manic depression and has not been right since.
So now she says its my fault she's like this.
She is not interested in the kids that much and so i don't bother visiting her that much.
Will have to show my face though this weekend.
AB.

[clairemow]

Nothing to do with children, and just to lighten it all up, my (unfortunately not around any more) MIL once pointed out some chickens, and said very seriously to me and DH, "they lay eggs, you know". We fell about laughing and she wasn't allowed to forget it.

[Tortington]

"when i die, everything will go to xxxx" ( the youngest grandchild - not any of my children.

[shoemania]

My MiL is vile. She's said and done many awful things that I could write a book about them. One of her classics was when she was talking about my husband's ex-girlfriend. She takes on a dreamy look and says "Oh she was every bit a lady, nothing like you." Then carried on talking as though she hadn't insulted me!! It's worse now though. She doesn't talk to any one of her three grown up children and numerous other people, me included. She falls out with me automatically when she falls out with my husband which is frequently. They've not been on speaking terms for 9 years. Now when she passes me in the street she calls me 'pig' or 'ugly cow' and this is a woman in her mid-sixties! I'm happy that I'll never have to have anything to do with her again.

[mosschops30]

'i think that if you're big enough to have children then you should be big enough to stay at home and look after them properly'

she also loved dh's ex-girlfriend and even tried to talk him out of the wedding about a week before telling him how much happier he was with ex etc etc.

I hate the old dragon

[shoemania]

Just read some of the others and remembered a few other things my MiL said. This is such good therapy!

She's refer to me as 'Milk Lady' when talking to my daughter who I was breast feeding. It really got my back up and it was just another way of her trying to sideline me.

She said if I died tomorrow my daughter wouldn't care less because she was too young. She was a few months old and it wasn't what I wanted to hear!

When she was about 2 weeks old MiL told me she needed to see my daughter on her own without me every week in order to bond. I was terrifed of being pushed out of my own daughter's life and felt as though we were competing with each other.