How do you learn to be more assertive with a particular person?

[twinklyfingers]

Since my relationship with my now dh became serious, on a regular basis I have been floored by comments my mil makes. These comments range from minor to major things that I find personally insulting/offensive/hurtful to comments about the facts of a situation as she sees it, that she assumes I agree with or wants me to agree with. These insults are often quite subtle or patronising and not how I am used to being spoken to by virtually everyone else in my life. I feel blindsided by these comments. I can never predict how she will respond to something in order to 'prepare' a response to her reaction - she often takes me totally by surprise. She also does this to my dh and I find this more upsetting as he is a wonderful son.

I don't manage to respond appropriately at the time and as time goes on, I'm becoming more frustrated with myself that I'm not defending myself or explaining my point of view. I am not a pushover, I can disagree with friends, my family, work colleagues and say my piece. I am polite and respectful and I think she takes advantage of this. I want to continue to be polite and respectful, but calmy say, "No, that's not true," or "Actually, I think..." I know that this will not change her ideas, I don't want to fight with her either, but I want to state my position so she is aware of my feelings. If she should ignore that, that's fine, at least I've said my piece.

How do I do this? I'm at a total loss. With other people I can listen to what they say, then take a breath and say what I think. Mil breezes on with what she is saying and the opportunity is gone. I am expecting dc2 and I don't want my children growing up watching someone say things they know their mum disagrees with, or listen to personal insults, without standing up for herself.

Does anyone have any advice about how to tackle this situation? It is making me miserable and dread seeing her.

Twinkly I'm sure lots of sage advice will come your way on this.... But in the meantime I think the standard MN response is, "Did you mean to sound so rude?"

Not easy to say, especially at first.... But it is very effective!

I had massive MIL issues after getting married. It all came to a head when I sat her down after dd1 was born and told her she had to play nice or not be part of our lives.. She was stunned . It worked. I have lots of examples of past unacceptable behaviour and told her the rest was up to her. I told her I didn't particularly like her either but that we has to be polite and pleasant for dh / dd etc.

It worked a charm and 5 years on we actually get on very well

I have thought of that Django!The idea of saying that to her makes my heart race. I am also sure she would just say "No, I wasn't being rude, I'm saying..." I suppose though whatever happens here I'm going to have to man up, so this response is as good as any!

You also need to look at DH here in all this. How does he get along with his mother these days?. Does he have feelings of fear, obligation and guilt with regards to his mother?. He is part of the problem too I would argue, has he previously spoken to his mother about these comments she keeps making?.

What sort of comments is she making, is she disparaging your parenting skills, your appearance etc?. Does she totally ignore your point of view or she is more, "enough about you, lets talk about poor old me some more".

Are you defended by him at all when she starts saying such stuff , does he hear it (perhaps not as it could be said out of earshot, some women are crafty like that) or does he clam up completely when she starts?. Some men do find it very difficult if not impossible to stand up to their mothers due to inbuilt conditioning from the mother not to do so.

You do not mention your father in law, is he still around?.

You have likely also come from a normal emotionally healthy family unit yourself so this is difficult to deal with as well, its completely outside what you have experienced to date. I am not at all surprised you're finding things difficult.

I would suggest you read "Toxic Inlaws" written by Susan Forward as this will give you more ideas of the dynamics here. I would also think carefully about your children and how much time they spend with such a person in the first place. They need positive role models, not a grandmother who keeps putting their DIL down all the time or using the children as weapons against Mum. Not all grandparents are kind and loving.

At the very least you need to have (and raise far higher than they are currently) your own set boundaries with regards to what is and is not acceptable to you re her behaviour and follow these through to the letter. If you can get your DH on side so much the better because it is best to present a united front but if not you can certainly act on your own.

I saw a counseller.
I had anxiety, used to talk to her about alot of things and aswell as anxiety i was told i wasn't very assertive when it came to certain people, funnily enough it was my MIL ! :') anyone else i had no problem with.

The reason was because she was my husbands mother and cause of that she got away with alot as my husband was also not very assertive!

Agree with the above post, get yout husband on your side. I bottled alot up and i didn't talk to him, it all got too much and everything came out, my PND, anxiety, how unreasonable MIL was being and how misreable i was. He had no clue. He was too use to her and how she was he was used to it. I'd never met a woman like her.

Things are alot better now as he stands upto her, he puts his foot down and when we discuss a problem its allways 'we' never, 'i' or 'me.' we are a team and he knows and understands that her behaviour isn't ok anymore.

she's still exactly the same but doesn't get her own way anymore. she hates it and we're the bad ones.

Talk to your husband as that was the best medicine for me, knowing you have 'back up' and you're being supported by him will boost your confidence :)

Thanks for the replies.

I'll try to answer your questions Atilla. I believe dh has been conditioned by a lifetime of this sort of behaviour. She truly does not appreciate what a wonderful son he is and he ignores the fact that she puts him down, often by making reference to his brothers. They both live far from her (I believe this is because she can be very interfering). When dh told her about a promotion he'd gotten at work, the first thing she said, before she congratulated him, was "Oh could dbil do that?" And then explained why she thought dbil would be good at that job. Dh didn't notice this I don't know how? When I pointed it out, he just went, oh well. I was so angry, but I didn't say anything either. I couldn't believe she'd said that.

The things she says don't appear to be designed to hurt on their own (well, very rarely). She has insulted my clothes before, but I just stared at her (in shock!) so she hasn't tried that again. Perhaps I am too sensitive? Today was the first time I had seen her since dh told her I am pregnant. Dd is 8mo so this is a little surprise but we're both delighted. Mil hugged me for an uncomfortably long time and said, "You should be terrified. I would be terrified if I were you." What?! I couldn't believe what she was saying so didn't even manage to ask her what she ment. I assume she ment we will have our hands full. But over the course of the afternoon she highlighted things that we are not doing - grow flowers in the garden (so low down on the list of our priorities) water the plants (ditto - we do try though), dh should keep in contact with his brothers more (they're all bad at this), visit her to collect veg from her garden every day (we don't have the time to visit daily or the ability to eat that much veg). But we both just sit and listen.

I know these sound like small things, am I being over sensitive? What makes me think I'm not is that, with almost anyone else I could politely and calmly tell them what I've written in brackets. But with her I'm just unable to. Dh does try but she just persists and he backs down. He doesn't actually change his behaviour to suit her, eg he won't ring his brothers just because she says so. This is what he and his brothers and fil do, they nod and accept then do their own thing. She seems happy as long as they make the right noises. I cannot cope with this though - I don't want to just say the right things to please her then do the opposite, I want to be true to myself and not have to explain myself to her.

She does also prefer to talk about herself. I give up if she moves the conversation back to herself but dh persists and she will listen, but she'd rather be the one talking. I don't think she is like this with her friends, or why would anyone be friends with her? Sometimes she visits and she's clearly had a list of things in her head she wants to say and she just talks, sometimes for hours and its just exhausting.

I feel she treats me and dh like little children and likes to think we can't cope with things. Every step in our lives has felt like she has been going "But you'll need our help with that. We should view that house before you put the offer in. We should read your groom speech before you say it at your wedding. We will take 1 week old dd out in the pram so you can clean." We are just normal people who get by like everyone else. We would ask for help if we were struggling.

Dh says I need to tell her when she says something that upsets me. But I just feel totally blindsided when she does these things. I feel quite crazy writing this down, it sounds quite trivial on its own, but I could write a book with all the little things like these.

Atilla I think I do need to apply my standards but I struggle with what to actually say to her in the moment. I suppose I just need to be prepared that if she says something inappropriate I'm going to pull her up on it?

Mommy I will try to speak to dh again. He gets sad about how I am angry towards her about things because he does love her very much. He certainly feels guilt and responsibility towards her and fil. I find this difficult to understand as mil does not appreciate the effort and thought dh gives them.

This all feels like rambly nonsense, I hope it makes sense!

I could of wrote this myself. Are we married to the
same man!? Our MILs sound like the same person!