Polygamy, first family and financial trouble - need some perspective here

[Lillonely]

Right so I’m going to try and be as a clear as I can be without being massively outing.

DH is from a minority community in the UK. His father has 2 wives. MIL and SMIL. It was some nasty business how it was done, both had no idea. It is not bigamy because only one marriage is legal MIL, so please no bigamy Comments. Polygamy is accepted in DHs community. There is a clear 1st and 2nd family situation. DH grew up in squalor and 2nd family grew up with the best of the best. MIL has never worked a day in her life, (she’s a very simple woman, illiterate no English) she claims she couldn’t work, she doesn’t claim or has never claimed because she woildnt ride the bus to get to English classes and job interviews etc and obviously it was during school time/ working hours so DH couldn’t accompany her. From 16 years old DH worked 3 jobs whilst in school to provide for them. he still went to university and got a degree and started working but due to financial burden was racked in debt. House repairs, bills, her glasses, dents treatment, food, new boiler, bathroom, kitchen you name it, DH paid for it. FIL gave them when DH was a child a £15k auction house, so there were A LOT of repairs needed.

he met me, we married. Prior to marriage he was upfront about his debt, because he was in a v bad place and long story short he had to beg FIL to start covering MIL expenses (to be clear it is now religious and cultural obligation to do so especially in a polygamous marriage). We worked out his finances and he’s still paying his way out of debt nearly 10 years later. I’m from another culture and not to go into it because it’s not strictly relevant here but MIL has been quite unkind to me over the years, she is better now that I have children but it’s worth a mention:

it has come out that FIL has purposely cut MIL and DH out of the will. He probably assets included it’s about 300k. DH told MIL and she said she didn’t care it’s DHs responsibility to pay for her to live, that’s why she had him to take care of her and we should sell our house to take care of her because we shouldnt have bought a house. I don’t know where she thinks our 3 kids are supposed to live. He’s her only child.

FIL has had some health scares lately and with the rising cost of everything we’re both worried about this additional financial burden. She’s paid no NI so has no state pension. She has money but won’t spend that to top up NI because she’s saving it for a religious pilgrimage. We have good jobs and we most certainly do not live beyond our means. We live in the most affordable decent area commutable distance from where we work, but also close enough to her because she had a meltdown when she found out we wanted a house. We also have 3 kids and associated childcare and expenses, a 4 bed house, one car, no pets, we do have savings but it’s for our retirement at probably 80 and for overpayments and rainy day funds. We have good jobs like I said, between 85-90 before tax, but the rises in everything are steep. Mortgage looks like it will be going up by £200 a month (no extra borrowing) childcare has gone up by £7 per child per day, we all know about energy and petrol and inflation. Our annual rises didn’t even touch the sides of how high inflation is. We are fairly comfy and definitely aren’t kitted out in designer attire but I do feel loathed to stop the children having any hobbies or sell our house to cover the extra £5/600 for pcm for MIL cost of living, or basically live from paycheque to paycheque and start the cycle of debt, which is what would happen given the rises, which will keep rising. Even selling the house would be daft because what we paid for a 4 bed would get you a 3 bed now because property prices have risen so much.

FIL is a v unkind man who has treated her and DH like dogshit for years, I do genuinely believe the best outcome would be for MIL to file for divorce and then she’d be entitled to half of his assets, even if she just got 75k, it’s something. But she won’t. She’s also not w particularly nice person in truth, a lot of emotional manipulation and abuse has been used against dh over the years.
i cannot move in with her for my mental health so that’s not an option, even if we got on like a house on fire, it’s a v small house. 2 bed, one a small double and the other a single.

what’s the utopia here? I can’t think straight, how do you work through this situation. She won’t work, won’t claim, won’t divorce him, would spend her money on a pilgrimage rather than cost of living and will have no inheritance, it’s just for DH to figure out. DH has spoken to his M and it’s like banging head against a brick wall and frankly the things she is coming out with are repugnant. Like you can’t afford to take care of me, well you should have thought of that before you bought a house you can’t afford’. It’s making us both stressed and me quite angry because I’d never put this on my kids: I’ve got no issue with helping out someone in need or even helping her out a bit but I think we might go under if we took everything on with no other income.

can anyone suggest anything?

OP - I know sadly from dealing with my ex boss's clients that this is very common in Muslim (or even non Muslim community) - he saw one client (daughter/sister) where basically they were left out of wills but left jewellery etc and their husbands provided for them so they were left houses/money. My boss thought this was a bit unwise (because you never know what the husband will do) but the daughter/sisters seemed to have blind faith in their male relative who would never see them homeless etc! I think they did speak English.

Then there was my Iranian colleague - a lot of his clients were men/women - Iranian - could speak English sometimes and sometimes not. Almost always had to have a chaperone but some women did come alone.

He was a Westernised Muslim and didn't even really practice (so he said), we would sometimes get women who were told by the Iman/Sharia council that basically they were entitled to nothing if they wanted a divorce, Sharia law and all that and that if the ceremony happened abroad, same thing, entitled to nothing etc.

We took great pleasure in referring them to our British family/divorce lawyer who would sit in on meetings with the Iranian guy translating and put them right. One woman was going through a divorce when I left the company.

In your MIL's case as others have said yes Sharia law will sometimes trump UK law but depends what she's entitled to etc. She certainly should look into what she is entitled to rather than be homeless or rely upon you and DH.

quote from www.inbrief.co.uk (sharia law in Britain):-

"In the UK, Sharia law is mostly applied in the context of family matters. However, there have been growing concerns that Sharia councils are operating in a discriminatory, illegal and unacceptable way towards women, and a government inquiry was launched last year. There is also a rapidly developing practice of Sharia finance in the business world."

i think what’s in part holding her back is the community backlash which would be huge (I mean let’s face it they are all complicit in this abuse at this point). DH was talking to a cousin and he mention divorce to him and he was told that ‘don’t say this again, it won’t go down well in the family’

in this space I feel for her, because if she loses the community, given the fact she’s not integrated into the UK, she’s got nothing. Yet those bastards wouldn’t say shit to FIL and SMIL about everything that’s gone on. Left DH as a child, if anyone has seen top boy, remember the season when Jason was a little boy, that how DH used to look, he didn’t steal and hustle drugs but I’m talking that visible level of neglect and no one did anything, nothing but boiled rice to eat and nothing.

By the way, I do sympathise with your MIL - it must be hard for her to want to learn English because she's not been educated, been used to having husband/father look after her and now, it probably seems like too much hard work for her. Also, even when she went to English lessons before she probably thought why would it benefit me, as I can't/don't want to get a job. If she's got her friends who speak her language there's no impetus for her to learn another one (English, German if she was in Germany etc).

She would love to live with you and her son I'm guessing.

My DB a few years ago made a short film on Walthamstow and communities there - English and Asian which is where I saw a few of the Asian women filmed had gone to English classes and were doing other classes in crafts etc. But they have to want to do it.

I totally get you re legal separation - shame in community.

The Sikh woman I mentioned - if the worst came to the worst they'd get divorced (years ago) but shame and her bringing up her boys away from her husband (even though the area is quite white) would have been big for her and her parents. So they stayed together but the parents arranged that her husband had to treat her better, allow her to work etc or she would divorce him. She was lucky in having understanding and nice parents.

I can see why your MIL would prefer to be a widow than a divorcee. A widow with a son who provides is obviously very desirable. I think there’s something slightly off in the dynamic if she won’t let dh lead though. Surely he could just explain that she must attend the appointments and he will manage the money. If it would help you could illustrate how much more quickly she could go on pilgrimage if she does.

wife #2/ the other woman/ mistress or whatever you want to call her is listed on ALL other assets and has stealthily been moving everything into her name to basically abound a challenge to the will or the splitting of assets post divorce. THIS Is the issue with her that she has control over all assets other than the house that MIL lives in, and let me tell you it was a battle to get that in her name.

this could be perceived as deprivation of assests so done purposely to avoid payment, usually for nursing home but in this case a will

i would seek legal advice that the husband has transferred owner ship to another outside of the legal marriage

I think DH needs to turn pressure on to the family. At the minute they can turn a blind eye as on face of it FIL has gifted her a house and she has a son. Everything is swept under carpet.
Can he call a family meeting and explain position that FIL is not paying anything and has left her nothing in will. Son has done a lot but can’t carry on. All the dirty linen is going to come out. FIL may have brothers, cousins and son in laws why aren’t they reminding FIL of his obligations to his wife. In effect make it their problem. They can’t bury head in sand that this is ok.
Do you have any contact with her friends? I can imagine her narrative is I’m ok I have a house and a kind son. Is there anyway to get them to speak to her.

Does MIL have any family members that would intervene. Perhaps contact them initially under guise of getting her citizenship sorted eg you need dates or paperwork and it might start ball rolling.

FIL does have brothers and surprise surprise they are nasty pieces of work, forced marriages, beat their children etc, last people that would help they are all about looking religious but wouldn’t do a kind turn for anyone.

i don’t know what you mean @5zeds by she won’t let my husband lead? She’d probably let him manage the money but she won’t claim for it and doesn’t care that DH just doesn’t have it to give. She’s already got the hajj money or at least 90% of it in the form of gold and few savings here and there.

that’s pretty much it @GonnaGetGoingReturns She’s got no real impetus to learn or want to because she’s got by thus far and to learn a new language that’s not in the same language family when are are completely illiterate is graft.
she initially wanted me to live with her, that’s actually the incident that triggered the egging (omg is this my life) but we live about 30 mins away from her and that’s ‘too far’ and now she’s vowed she never will. Plus there is the safe guarding incident with a child in the family that happened meaning I’m not comfortable with her alone with my children, and the fact she has been very cruel to me (even physically) for many years, my mental health can’t hack that, so it’s not an option. I love my husband dearly but I’d sooner divorce him

If his family are all about appearing religious I was meaning for DH to use that in his favour - it won’t look good for their family when ‘Auntie’ is destitute. Make it clear it will be their issue, the days of DH picking up slack can’t carry on.
Thinking about forced marriage I’d contact charities dealing with that for advice. We think of forced marriage as young girls. But you said MIL was betrothed as a child, married in her home country and brought over here i’m assuming as a very young, illiterate girl. She’s a victim of forced marriage.

She sounds really unkind and difficult. My focus would be on firmly directing her through dh. I’d honestly ignore FIL, he sounds like a dick and probably not worth the effort. If dh wants to pursue MIL “share” when he is gone there will be no shame attached as he is the eldest child and SMIL can be seen as treating MIL terribly without upsetting MIL “face” in the community.

You aren’t the first nor will you be the last with dependent elders. ☕️

@Dixiechickonhols - there are some families where trust me (have heard about them!) they don't care if they look bad, if they get what they want. So as long as it 'seems' as if they've helped their relative they sort of gloss over it. Then they sadly seem to bitch/gossip about the relative.

I think sadly unless something isn't sorted out ASAP for MIL then she'll rely more on her son and less on her DH.

Also, the forced marriage thing won't mean a thing to relatives. All they'll say is 'that's the way it was done in our way, never did us any harm etc'.

You're honestly dealing with people who I've spoken to (young Muslim men, presumably British born, or very British) who when I spoke to them about honour killings, thought there was nothing wrong with that. These were men who I considered were open and socialised with the English colleagues in pubs/bars etc.

^ his family aren’t quite the honour killing kids but they are definitely the disowned and never to be heard from or spoken of again kind.

the thing is with involving the wider family, they are a) dicks b) don’t actually care c) should keep this all private and will massively backfire on My DH and d) it will probably end up my fault as ‘this is what happens when you marry outside the family’ they didn’t want me to marry my DH they’d already tried to force him to marry a cousin from back home and bring her here, so I’ll end up with the blame. I just don’t have the energy to for another egging/tomatoing (said partially in jest)

Kind not kids^^

No I didn’t mean raise force marriage with family I meant there’s several charities that deal with issue. From what you’ve said she may well meet criteria for forced marriage. Just because it happened 40 years ago she’s still a victim. I’m suggesting contacting them and seeing what they can help with or signpost too - MIL certainly won’t be only woman in this situation.
No I can see how it can be turned on DH - a good son would help his mother and carry on brushing everything under carpet.

Oh yeah I know you didn’t mean raise the forced marriage with them but I think what I mean and I hope this makes sense, is for them to signpost to organisations that can help MIL would be for them to acknowledge that there is a problem in the first place and then act on it in anything other than lip service. I mentioned this to DH and he said over the years there were incidents in his childhood where FIL hadn’t given them money and she’d simply ran out and their gas/ electric had ran out too (was on a meter) and he had to go knocking on their doors as a child and ask to borrow a few quid and no one would give them more than £1. Same with food.

its actually why this whole situation is so difficult and I’m really grateful for all the kind words and guidance, because they just don’t act like normal decent people would. Most would be outraged not this lot.

Do you think FIL has stayed married to her as a kindness (in his mind) or because he still considers her his wife or because he believes she can refuse to be divorced?

You are in such a difficult situation Op. Your DH must feel very torn. On one had carrying on paying for her must seem easier route but long term he knows it’s not viable.
Does she have her own family (as opposed to FIL family) you could approach or is it all the same family - cousin marriage.

You know I actually don’t know, I’ve often wondered this. He’s lied and said it was because of DH and because he asked her for a divorce so he could marry wife#2 legally and mil allegedly begged him not to divorce her, but dh asked MIL about this and she was outraged and swears it didn’t happen (for what it’s worth I believe her)
i wonder if it’s because of the money, she’d have been entitled for 50% of his house, business, assets.
the community he’s got his ‘good Asian wife’ and then his love wife
I also think she’s his back up to care for him if he needs it. He used to mess with her head and say I want to see you I miss you but wife 2 won’t let me. When wife 2 and him had fights earlier on he’d move back in with her so for a long time I think he just kept her on the hook just in case.

I think it’s a combination of all of those things

but this is just my opinion no one has said anything either way

pretty much it’s the same family/ village from back home so everyone is related to everyone in some way. She’s got some siblings here but they’ve borrowed money from her too and ‘can’t pay it back’ some of the other family is back home and they hate FIL.

So has she hit you OP?

She’s slapped me once and also thrown things at my car

You poor thing. Shame you can't slap her back

My mil is so kind and generous towards me

This is Relationships not AIBU.

So why be a dick?