Help please re over-bearing/bullying FIL

[SparkleSoiree]

Don't know where to start really. Don't want to write an epic yet need to convey crux of problem.

FIL is a chauvinist first off. Very much has it set in his mind that women do one role like preparing food and tend to mens needs whilst men go out and be 'the worker' as he refers to it. Very belittling in his tone and always with a smile/laugh. It is driving me nuts.

I have been with DH for 7 years now. He thinks I am lazy because I am not at DH's beck and call. He has no respect for me displayed by his derogatory remarks and I feel like a child in my own home when he is here because of his continual criticism. DH has pulled him up on it every single time he has heard it and only last year I ejected him from my home as he made one rude remark too many. This is his first visit back since then and I have tried very hard not to get into conflict with him. MIL and I often talk about women's roles in the world and if FIL overhears he raises his head and snorts almost as if it is pie in the sky philosophy. His opinion of me is made worse by the fact I had nasty PND 3 years back and he thinks I have been permanently left 'cuckoo' as he so nicely says.

There was an incident this evening in the kitchen where I had finished clearing the table after dinner (which I cooked) and had just loaded the dishwasher. I took out a bit of Vanilla baked cheesecake I had saved from yesterday (which is my favourite!) in the fridge and sat down. FIL came in and made a comment about me eating in secret tucking myself away from everyone who could see and that I was greedy. He complained to his wife that I was not sharing! He has a strange attitude to food and is very much 'I get served first' and will eat everything on the table until it is gone as he hates waste. He then stomped up the stairs still going off at me as he walked up and I choked on my cheesecake as I was so upset! (Not sure it's my favourite anymore )

It's things like 'come on get the dinner cooked' or 'make me a hot drink' in very controlling tones that are making me feel like a slave! DH is great but I have told him after this visit I don't want his father in my home again because he makes me feel so bad. THEN I think that I allow him to make me feel bad and I need to stand up to this but I don't know how to without making a scene. DH is nothing like his father and we are definitely a partnership running our lives jointly but I do fear this may be the end of my in-laws relationship....I recently put my foot down with my over bearing mum nearly 2 years back and have managed to maintain that position with her so why can't I manage it with FIL? He laughs a lot at me when I get wound up with him and try to challenge his behaviour. Today my MIL told me I was a soft touch - you know in a nice way she said.

Advice anyone on how to deal with it in the future?

i would have eaten the cheesecake! Damn right in my own home! What a weird thing to focus on. Oh, just like the idiot fil.

He is toxic. I would tell him straight that his obnoxious sexist and downright obnoxious behaviour is not welcome in my home.

"it's just fil" isn't good enough. Next time your mil says that op, say that it simply isn't good enough.

Glad to have provided some OP!

That particular technique has got me through several different circumstances - mostly I think because instead of focusing on the nasty things said (or whatever you are using it on) you have taken the sting out because they are no longer nasty things, they are just glorified labels on a bingo board. They mean about as much as the individual numbers on a bingo board and if you give yourself a treat for each one - even if it is only a square of chocolate or a mouthful of wine - it turns it even more into 'points make prizes' and puts a different spin on the whole lot.

On a different level you realise that you can predict all the bad stuff they are going to say or do - and that gives you a level of control over it and dealing with it - and if you turn it into a trivial game then that is dis-empowering your fil (or whoever the bingo is being used against) even if he doesn't know, because it changes your attitude towards him, reducing the respect he gets, and because his comments no longer cause the hurt they once did because you no longer take them seriously - which he will notice, even if not explicitly or straight away, he will realise that something has changed!

good luck and here's some to keep you going!

perfectstorm you and i are definately on the same page.

Well he has gone home at long last and not without incident either! BUT with a little encouragement from here and I have somehow managed to stand at the door waving with a smile on my face not feeling as bad as I did the other day.

The night before he left I was unwrapping some chocolate for DD(4) in the car whilst waiting for DH to come out of the house. FIL (who has been packing his car in preparation for the next day) chapped on the window saying I was being a pig eating the kids chocolate. I wound the window down and asked him to repeat what he said which he did and I replied 'oh shut up and go away'. He looked shocked and I felt surprised that I said it!

When he left yesterday he told me to get him something to clean his car with. He didn't ask me he told me. I told him he would find what he was looking for in a particular drawer and he just stood and looked at me. I was tidying up (in the kitchen again!) and he said 'well get if for me then' to which I replied 'you will find it in that drawer' and promptly walked out of the kitchen. He was surprised I think because he just kept still staring at me as I walked past him.

I do find him incredibly overbearing and ignorant in his approach to people and am relieved that I have my house back to myself and am able to sleep in my bed again!

Maybe you could limit contact to meals out with the ILs? That way you can enjoy the meal and only the paid staff will have to run around. He also may be a little more polite if he is out in public. Even if you have to pay the whole bill it might be well worth it!

I think your MIL is as much to blame for not slapping the stupidity out of him in all the years they have been married

We did the meal thing the last night they were here pippop1 as I refused to sit at my table with that man again. It was worth it not to have the stress as he never plays up in public - well rarely.

RabidEchidna* I absolutely agree with you. She usually says 'leave him be, its just how he is...blah blah.'

You dont have to have them to stay when you move. It's not the law.

Thats why skype was invented.

I think you were doing the right thing anyway. I would add, as a suffix when he says "get me the xxx" "it's in x drawer by the x, I have real children to look after, your not one of them".

Failing that, "fuck off and get it yourself". But try the first one before that because after youve said fuck off theres no way back.

I wouldnt have smiled on the doorstep though, it makes them think your playing along with his version of reality.

Have you tried telling him Off is the general direction in which I would like you to fuck?

I would laugh loudly and shake my head in amusement every time he uttered any of his stupid demands.

And walk away.

.... but telling him to eff off is equally good.

It's not easy to be as upfront as that when you don't need to be generally. I totally agree by the way.

I smiled at the doorstep through sheer relief - believe me! I am amazed at how much balls some people have when they are receiving hospitality - because you have to have some surely to be as rude and brazen as him?!

Well done op - glad to hear you managed to deal with your fil so well.

Would have loved to have seen his face when you didn't give in to his dictats! And to be a fly on the wall when he is telling your mil about how the sky is falling down you didn't jump up and give in to his bullying.

Hopefully it felt good and the next time you have to see him it will be all the easier to treat him like a toddler and tell him in not so many words not to be so ridiculous :o

And best of all- now he has gone. Yippee. Lots of for you!

my fil sounds a bit like yours Sparkle, except he is a violent man (has hit exwife and two girlfiends, almost killing one of them and he physically abused his kids)

i stood up to him after years of snide, sexist remarks.

slagging off my parenting in an hour long rant was the last straw so i finally stood up to the abusing bastard, feeling like i was literally taking my life in my hands, and told him exactly what i thought of him and that i knew all about the shit he has done in the past with plenty of swearwords thrown in.

i really thought he was going to beat me up. he was going ballistic, really, really ballistic. after i had gone up to see to the crying baby he then did all the usual NPD stuff like crying and throwing a pity party (cry all you like, cockface)etc etc.

anyhoo, sometimes it's not worth the forced smiles and gritted teeth to keep the peace, fil will never be welcome in our lives again and life is sooo much better for it.

Bamboobutton that sounds horrendous and well done you for standing your ground.

zipzap the G&T is fizzing in the glass with the lime as I type! I think I deserve a wee tipple this evening after the week we have had!

Had everyone else had pudding? I wouldn't sit down and eat something that there was only one portion of when there guests in the house; I think that's incredibly rude.

Your FIL does sound like an arse, definitely.

Well done for standing up to him, OP!

Why are people focusing on the cheesecake? Loons. Especially when there is a far far bigger issue at stake here.

If someone has been slaving and providing hospitality then they deserve a secret piece of cheesecake! Or should they martyr themselves entirely?

What did your last slave die of?
Do you not know how to boil a kettle? Let me show you, and then you can help yourself whenever you like.
I'm bust right now, but I'd love a cuppa if you're making one.

All spring to mind should he ever darken your door again!

Well done on standing up to him.

it was quite horrible, fil did all this in front of our 3yo ds, dh had been drinking so we couldn't leave that night so i had to sleep there

in dh's family fil is almost god like and can do no wrong so they are always trying to smooth it out and trying to get dh to take ds down there. ds will be going down there when dh has prised him from my cold, dead fingers.

stand firm on not allowing him back in your house, i can almost guarantee you will be nagged at by someone about it.

It sounds like you're getting on top of it... My FIL is similar but (bizarrely) remains somehow likeable. My (also married-in) BIL and I used to have fantasies about slapping him down and making him behave like a human being, but in the end we both chose to laugh rather than lecture. He's better than he was - and much better in our homes than in his. He still expects to be served first and would definitely make a comment about not sharing cake - but BIL and I would now laugh, point at his belly, tell him he'd had enough and leave him to it. Sounds like things have gone beyond that point for you, but if relations ever do improve it's something that's worked for us. I hasten to add that it's only worked because FIL has some redeeming features, however hard they are to ennumerate!