My mother in law

[w3lshb1acksh33p]

I've always had a fractious relationship with my mother in law who has caused drama. Now we have become parents and during the pregnancy, she has never listened to us and made us feel like we are wrong in bringing up our child. She had always been a selfish individual

She has complained about numerous things such as naming our child through to us apparently saying that we have stopped her seeing her grandchild (which we haven't). I've lost my cool with her, argued and now she doesn't care that I exist. I've tried to see her on neutral territory but she declined me.

Now she only wants a relationship with my Wife and child. Is the MIL being unreasonable?

I hope your wife is sticking up for you and refusing to see her dm alone with your child?

My wife is sticking up for me with her mother although, I'm not a monster and categorically saying that she can't have a relationship with her. However I have said that I want my MIL is have limited time with my child. Should I be civil with my MIL for the sake of my child?

I guess it depends on how much you can stand it really. Dh and I don’t get on with each other’s parents. I usually see my dm without him, I take the kids to hers. The only time they see each other is at Christmas and then he just smiles and grits his teeth for the couple of hours she’s with us. Same with his parents... it works for us but you have to learn to just not talk about it to each other, otherwise you end up arguing.

The thing is that she doesn't like the way we are parenting (it's only been 11 weeks) and doesn't listen to my Wife and I on any matter. Unfortunately she has done too much to us and expects the world? Any thoughts? Her own mother was a vicious old woman and she was dragged up as a child.

How is it going to help your child to have a relationship with this person?

Will your child have other relatives that they will see often ?

Both of you need to present a united front here along with having firm and consistently applied boundaries. If your wife is backing you up here re her mother then great. To my mind you are either all accepted or not. Toxic stuff like this can and does go down the generations and I am not at all surprised to read that your wife's grandmother was vicious as well. Her own mother likely meted out similar treatment to your now wife too.

Would you want her mother to be at all around your child at all given how she has treated you and in turn her now adult daughter here?. She was not a good parent to your wife when she was growing up, she is more likely than not going to be a poor example of a grandparent to your child too.

the MIL has been nasty and vicious since I've known my wife.

I can't even talk to my MIL because

1. She doesn't listen to me
2. If I say what I feel then that would cause more trouble with my Wife's relationship with her.

Let your wife deal with her. You’re throwing a lot of insults around and it’s not possible to tell from what you’ve written if you are bossy and controlling and dictating terms to your wife and MIL about the relationship they get to have with each other and your child, or if your MIL is really the one being “vicious” (as you’ve described her twice).

What do you hope to achieve by getting everyone on the forum to agree your MiL is being unreasonable, are you going to show the posts to your wife and tell your wife that everyone says your MIL can only see your baby (say) once/month, so you’ve decided that is how it will be?

@w3lshb1acksh33p we have no contact with MIL for similar reasons

I hope your wife is sticking up for you and refusing to see her dm alone with your child?

What rubbish. If his wife wants to see her mum alone then she has the right too.

How is the relationship between your wife and her mother now?

It would be interesting to hear both sides of the story. I wonder what your MIL would have to say about you? Yes you should be civil to MIL because like it or not, she is your dgc's grandmother.

I think referrering to her as 'the mil' might be getting peoples backs up.

I don't think it's hugely beneficial for children to have a relationship with someone who is openly hostile to one parent. That said, I think it's worth trying if it matters to your wife.

My MIL hates me (in her mind I'm the reason her little boy moved away and doesn't live the life she planned for him). Honestly, I'm not fond of her either. We're very different people and she's done some very unpleasant things.

But my DH is very clear with boundaries with her. Years ago, she and I fell out when DH's godfather phoned and said she'd been telling anyone who'd listen (and those who didn't want to) what an awful son he was. DH told her she could apologise to me & hope I accepted it, or not, but he was following my lead - if I cut her off so would he.

She apologised. I accepted it, because I love him and he wants his mum in his life. We both pretend to get on well. With our dc, she can say what she likes about our parenting but she has no say and she isn't left alone with them. I don't argue because her opinion doesn't matter on this topic. Once or twice she's said stuff in front of them ('if you do that in again daddy will give you a good whack') and then I will correct her and reassure dc.

Dear OP,

I don't think you're being unreasonable at all.. My MIL is exactly the same and I too am also looking for advice on how to handle this situation.

When I was pregnant she dictated everything from what furniture/clothes my baby would wear, his name and his religion which has caused huge arguments between myself and DP. She bought his pram and REFUSED POINT BLANK to let my mum buy it even though she knew she wanted to. Then when my mum said she was going to buy my sons cot for his bedroom. She tried to make me take my DPs cot from when he was a baby, said that it would save my mum and dad some money! My mum and dad are far better off financially than she is!! My brother in law bought us a crib for my son without asking was this ok. My sister had said she was going to get us a Moses basket, MIL told me to tell my sister not to get me the Moses basket as I wouldn't need it due to BIL buying the crib and her buying the pram. She told me to ask her to buy me a travel cot instead! I put my foot down with this one, said she had already made me say to my mum about the pram and caused a fallout there, I wasn't telling my sister not to get me something now too! She said I was being stupid! She said I was just the surrogate and that I had to share the baby with her because she lost her sister last year and the baby coming was her way to be happy again! I feel for her that she lost her sister but me having a baby was not her way of finding happiness I wasn't having him for her I was having him for myself!! She even interfered when me and DP were talking about finding out Sex of baby and told DP we weren't allowed to because it would ruin the surprise. We didn't end up finding out to keep her happy! Which I was raging about, I wanted to know if it was a girl or a boy, if it was a boy I would have to give him my DPs name and I wanted a bit of time to get used to this and get his name printed on stuff so I could get used to him being called after DP! On the first anniversary of her sisters death we had agreed that we would announce our pregnancy news to DPs family at a family meal to make the day more bearable for his mum. She then took it upon herself to send everybody a text that day and tell them our news!! Even though we had agreed to wait till the gathering and tell it together!!

When baby was born she didn't leave the hospital for the whole three days I was in, when my family came to visit me in hospital DPs family didn't even have the decency to clear the hospital room and let me speak to them. I also had to ask MIL to give my son to my mum so she could hold him for the first time. The night I came home from hospital DPs family were waiting in my house for us and didn't leave again until 1AM! I so wanted to come home and enjoy my new family after a really traumatic Labour/time in hospital. I will never get that night back again to enjoy with my new family. Everytime she came to visit she was snatching my son off me even if I was feeding him, even one day she came in and he was crying and she snatched him from me and said "what's she doing to you my boy" I honestly wanted to claw her eyes out!! She smokes so when she wanted to go for a smoke and put my son down she would go around everyone in the room asking do they want to hold him even though I would be saying to her to give him to me!! She just ignored me like I wasn't there. One day she done it I lost it and said could you just give him to me he's my son! When she got home she text my DP and said I had really hurt her feelings with how rude I was 😡 and of course DP took her side and said I was an unfit mother! Just one of the many names I have been called by him for confronting about her behaviour!!

I was going to have my son Christened in my DPs Religion to stop arguments because I didn't have the energy to fight about it when I was pregnant. But it must have been hormones that made me wake up and smell the coffee and realise that I was making a huge mistake in order to please others and I would have lived to regret it. So I decided against having him christened. MIL went off on one! Called me all the nastiest names under the sun and said some pretty unforgivable things about my family circumstances (I was brought up in foster care) and she refuses to apologise because she says it's my own fault!

I didn't think I was being unreasonable. I had already given my son my DPs first name against my will in order to keep with their family traditions. I didn't think I should have to give him their religion too when my religion and what I wanted was not even being considered.

She has said to DP that I'm trying to stop her bonding with baby because I have "mummy issues" due to being brought up in foster care which couldn't be further from the truth as I have a great relationship with my foster mum and couldn't care less about my biological mum as she doesn't care about me!

MIL and I have only just started speaking again after this and it was only because of Christmas. But I still feel sick everytime I'm in her company. Can feel my blood boiling when she lifts my son or when he smiles at her. My DP doesn't want to hear it anymore because he thinks the sun shines out of his mum's bum, he just doesn't realise she is nothing but a narcissist!! If anyone has any advice on how to handle this crazy lady please throw it my way!!