help me play MIL bingo and survive this week

[onemiddlefinger]

First of all I have to admit I don't know how MIL bingo works exactly
but it sounds like it could help in making this week a bit more bearable.

My ILs are visiting and the first 2 days were ok, but yesterday evening I came home to find MIL ironing DH's clothes, ALL OF THEM.
We live in a small flat, there were clothes everywhere in the living room sofas and on the kitchen table (basically all our living area surfaces), she was ironing with a loose cable in the middle of the room whilst my 2 year old was running around. Later I barely managed to stop DS from pulling the iron on top of himself as she had stepped away for a second.

Also my DH and FIL had (totally unnecessarily) changed the kitchen tap to some horrible giant monstrosity that ILs had gifted us, apparently it was expensive so I should be grateful. All I managed to say when I walked in the kitchen was "oh, my god!", DH realised that I didn't like it and was then sulking for the rest of the evening as he thought they had done such a good job. I think he is under the influence (of his parents).

I'm not even going to list all the patronising remarks that MIL likes to dish out at regular intervals - these come as a norm with her.

Please explain the MIL bingo concept to me, i'm worried I will otherwise do or say something horrible soon...

If someone said "did you mean to be so rude" to my mother they would regret it for years.

Honestly, you can't fix these people by deciding on stock replies in advance.

I hope to god that I never do any of this crazy stuff if I am ever a MIL. I cant imagine that I would as I have so many other things to do with my time....

So what do you do?

... something more subtle but still obvious - an eye-roll, a sigh, a sniff/snort or chortle etc or an obvious interjection to change the subject?

....or laugh it out with a "really? how odd/funny/bizarre!!"

....or leave her unchallenged to continue her controlling ways for many more years?

I was discussing something similar with my sister the other day about how everyone tipped toed around our crabby, hung-over, bachelor uncles every Christmas day during our childhoods - as they were so volatile.
They should have been told that their behaviour was inappropriate, unacceptable and unwelcome and that Christmas was for the children. They could then either pipe down or leave. As children we would have learnt that you do not have to tolerate shit, that you should be assertive and we would have better memories. Ironically we were discussing this as we had decided not to invite our childless brother who behaves exactly this way.

Just how much ironing is there to take 2 days?!

She sounds a nightmare OP. I'd be tempted to make a laminated bingo card with random pictures that represent her random control issues - eg a picture of an iron. Cover each square with a chocolate and eat the chocolate whenever she does something! Obviously don't do it on the sly - just let her wonder!

Somethingtodo, unfortunately it is the last option for now... I feel like it would be DH' job to call her out (and very occasionally he does, when she really goes too far), but coming from me it would be a whole other story and I don't want the responsibility of causing a family breakdown .
What i am trying to do is minimise contact, but now that we have DS it's not that easy, they want to see him and DH feels it would be cruel not to. He is the only child and DS the only grandchild (for now)

youarekiddingme -- I understood that the MIL went to get ALL dh clothes to iron - not just ones in the ironing basket....but obvs clothes that had been already ironed before and put away (clearly not ironed well enough!!)

We don't have an ironing basket and none of our clothes in the wardrobe are ironed

I gave up on that a while ago, now we just iron the item that we need on the edge of the bed

DH says it's a very practical tap - they have one in the industrial kitchen on the ship he works on.

From us both DH agrees with your take on it.

I suggest leaving it until they've gone and then starting an innocent thread called 'I'm not sure this goes with my sink, what do you think?' There are home threads that would be perfect for the topic.

The opening post 'My PILs gave us this tap for Christmas. It works brilliantly but I'm not sure if it's overpowering the sink area? What do you think?'

Tell us here and we'll all go help with thoughtful and polite responses. You can then show DH the polite and thoughtful and responses and then bash it in with a hammer (turn the water off first).

She's more of a loon than I gave her credit for then

The thing with the tap is that we had one similar in principle on our holiday rental, although it looked normal and was much easier to use, and i agreed with DH that it was a nice idea (i though perhaps for when we moved ) He then must have mentioned it to his parents for some reason and then they bought this, now i'm the ungrateful DIL who is not happy with it, "but you said you liked it"...
Definitely will have to think of a way to break it if DH doesn't voluntarily remove it.

Or I could ask my parents to gift us another tap and let them fix it whilst DH is at work

It strikes me that it’s your husband’s job to stop enabling his mother. I’ve seen the no boundary situation where there was the tearful ‘But we were only trying to help’ when unwanted, and discouraged, interference created the opposite effect.

I’d suggest that he tells her to stop invading your personal space, otherwise she doesn’t visit. Do mention to him that if she continues to do so, you’re going to get a friend (so different handwriting) to compose a series of sexy notes, addressed to you, which you’re going to leave in your personal places like your underwear drawer or the laundry basket for her to find when she’s looking in places she shouldn’t. . Mention to your DH that they are going to be so bad as to be unrealistic, along the lines of “Oooh Ermintrude! When I think of our last afternoon of passion my tanned and muscled body ripples with excitement …..(etc) from Sven, your darling Swedish Masseur xxxxx”

If his DM is so self focussed as to have no boundaries whatsoever, she’ll tie herself in knots as to what she should say to her DS. It might stop her, or at least shock your DH into action.

OP -- it is a badge of honour that I wear with pride that I IRON NOTHING.

My friend's MIL took off her childrens clothes to iron them when she dropped them there one afternoon to be babysat!!!!

Good thread OP.

I feel for you all.
I am jubilant because I left the company of my MIL yesterday after a week's torture.
I literally had to go for a walk so I could scream "FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU" where no one could hear.

A particularly delightful comment of hers was that it was a shame I was leaving on the 24th and not earlier due to sleeping arrangements with arriving family members.

So I gave her her wish and left a day early, staying in a hotel last night.

Am I the only person who read this on the mobile app and then got on the desktop site to look at this tap? Just me?

It looks like something they have in an abattoir or mortuary. Is that the sort of look you're going for in the rest of the kitchen? If so, keep it, big thumbs up.

This is why I don't like buying people big things for their house (or making them stuff, because then they defo feel obliged to use it), you're imposing your choices and preferences on someone else. It's like a tomcat pissing up against a wall or something, marking your territory.

Craic, I must confess I thought mortuary as well. Good for sluicing pints of blood down the sink.

I really do like the idea of the oversized napkins, or even perhaps plastic coveralls (poss fitting in with the mortuary theme although actually I was thinking about the ones toddlers wear when doing messy play). Accompanied by a tinkly laugh and 'oh we're so messy we like to cover up completely, your little napkins just wouldn't work for us'.

As to the ironing, is there any way you could pile it on the drive and then run over it? Too extreme? Also remove the plug from the iron without explanation.

Something,
That MIL is even crazier than mine! So far my sons clothes have been left untouched, but she does have 3 days to go...

CuttedUpPear,
Im happy for you that you got away, but such a rude comment!

CraicDealer,
Abatoir or mortuary
Yes, it really looks like it would fit right in in either one.
Not quite the look i was going for in our kitchen but maybe in our next house

Can someone explain why women feel its ok to do things like this to their adult children and their partners?
My Mil cries when I say "please dont put my knickers away for me, I find it intrusive" or "please dont re-arrange DCs wardrobes again" and then I feel both cross that she has done it and awful for making her cry :-(

That tap looks like a flaccid penis.

Please say that ^^ to your mil over Christmas dinner

What you want OP is to get her one of these green plastic aprons they wear in morgues for her birthday. When she gasps in surprise at her thoughful gift you must say, "oh no MIL, that's not all- we wanted to thank you properly for our lovely tap, so we also got you these white wellies for pottering around in. They'll go really well together, won't they?".

This thread is making me glad we are NC with the MIL.

Pre-NC corkers included dusting the entire house and cleaning my oven while we were away. That was before informing me dh did far more for the dc when they were small than I ever did.

Oh, and that she had to bite her tongue with all her DIL's on occasion. Like that didn't cut both ways

Goth because they are controlling manipulative loons- its about domination and destruction of your boundaries and as TheCraicDealer so brilliantly put it :

"It's like a tomcat pissing up against a wall or something, marking your territory."

And as I said above any challenge - a calm reasonable "please dont touch my knickers...." - results in the eruption of a tantrum/crying/hysterics - so that she projects on to you and you can be blamed for upsetting her...so she is in total control

www.leec.co.uk/products/mortuary/mortuary-trolleys

whole range of collectable, multi purpose morg stuff - xmas and birthdays sorted for years!