Any passive aggressive MIL comments or just plain rude ones to share?

[KiwiDollar]

My in laws are coming over tomorrow and I always dread it as my MIL is so down and negative and she can be quite passive aggressive towards me, well I did steal her only son! I am now knee deep in perimenopause so I don’t think I can bite my tongue anymore after 28 years! Here’s some of the comments and things she’s done in the past. Feel free to add your own, would love to feel I’m not the only one!

On my in laws 2nd visit to our first house the MIL bought her own mug as she said my mugs were “too heavy for her hands to hold”

Around 3/4 months after my DD was born she wanted to come and stay a week to “help” She walked in and announced immediately “Right, I’m not here to do your cooking or housework, I will nurse the baby while you carry on with your jobs” I was breastfeeding my DD at the time! She just sat there and did nothing but hold my baby and play the new mother. She made me one sandwich the entire week. That was her effort.

When my DD was a baby (until she was around 2) the in laws would come to visit always mid week when my DH was at work so I had them all day from 10am - 8pm. She would speak through my DD to try and control my parenting I.e. say out loud “oh mummy stop doing that. Oh mummy I don’t need to be picked up now, oh mummy stop fussing over me” I wasn’t ever doing what she said, she was just really jealous every time I held her.

One time my DH took DD over to theirs when she was about 2 1/2 to stay the day and night as we were at a wedding. I got all my daughters overnight things ready and my husband left but he forgot her coat. The next day she came back wearing the same clothes I had put her in and the same knickers even though I packed a clean pair, and clean clothes. Fast forward a year later and MIL tells me she came across the coat from the time they had DD for the weekend. “It was from when you forgot to send her with a coat, do you remember? It was such a cold weekend and she had nothing so I had to find one quickly. It was at least 2 sizes too big!” tinkly laugh staring at me

The most recent one was when I made a sweet and sour chicken for us all which I know she likes. I know she loves red and orange peppers but not green as we’ve talked about it before so I didn’t put any green in. She was in yet another dark mood that day and ate it really slowly. We had to wait for her as usual. She pushed all the peppers to one side and didn’t touch them. I said “why haven’t you eaten the peppers?” She replied in a grumpy tone “I don’t like peppers, I never have” We have NEVER been invited to theirs for a meal. They always come to ours and I have to cook.

Just a few, but think I could write a book! Would love to hear your stories.

I have a DS who is still very little but I hope that if I ever become a MIL I will not suddenly turn into a horrible woman 😂. Its hard to say what the menopause will make me do though 😂.

My own mum sometimes makes comments I have to call her out on and she has definitely changed since the menopause began bless her but it's not her fault (still, I always tell her if she says something I find in any way hurtful so we can iron it out straight away). I think it's harder to have those kinds of conversations with MILs though so I don't blame anyone for keeping quiet and just trying to dodge them or live with the awkward interactions instead. It's tricky sometimes.

My ex MIL was very subtle with the little odd things she did that I didn't always fully appreciate 😂.
For example whenever we came round and she cooked she would always dish up my food last and gave me the smallest portion. EVERY TIME. I know this is actually a norm in some cultures but this was not the case here, she just wanted to make sure son, dad, daughter and her (yes, in that order every time) got fed first and so I always got whatever was left 😂. It was reassuring that at least she also put herself on the bottom of this food hierarchy. Maybe she just valued females less in a family structure in general? I don't know. She was always a full time mum whilst FIL worked so maybe that's why.

When FIL got cancer again after some years of being cancer free she only told me. She said: 'im only telling you because YOU'RE NOT FAMILY so it won't affect you'. I understood that she needed to share the emotional load with someone and appreciated that she trusted me and that she didn't want to worry her kids but there was just something hurtful about the way she worded it. Again, I understood that I wasn't biological family but I married into the family and considered myself close to FIL so a bit hurtful and Ive never really forgotten that.

On my wedding day she made it about herself a little bit. Her and FIL never got married and so she cried and told me that she was upset that her son 'did the right thing' and proposed to me whilst his dad never proposed to her. Again, I understood she was feeling emotional but why put a downer on her own son's wedding because of jealousy? I just told her that it means she raised him right with the values she wanted to see from her own partner so she should be proud as a mum and she rolled her eyes.

She wasn't a horrible woman by any means and compared to some of the stories I read here she treated me fairly well. All I'm saying is that sometimes MILs just do weird things we may not understand because of their emotional state etc. and it doesn't necessarily mean that they're trying to be horrible. (But some are absolutely horrible and I feel for you if you have one like that).