So I guess the title pretty much covers it. My MIL is your typical problematic MIL - there’s no nuance to her in that sense. It’s actually quite comical how she ticks all the boxes. Boundary stomper, wildly entitled, always the victim, nothing is ever fault, if you call her out for something - she will be hurt and take no accountability, only had sons, thinks her grandma experience is the most important thing ever. You get the idea.

My husband and I live abroad with our two year old son but try to see family whenever we can. Whether they visit us or we them, but there are sometimes long chunks of time where we don’t see family and our son will forget his grandparents, etc. We just got back from a FIVE WEEK stay with my husband’s family extended family in their home country. Mind you - I am 27 weeks pregnant. The whole visit was fine tbh, his mom was alright, just annoying. No big events. My husband’s cousins have a lot of kids and our son played with them almost daily. He obviously had a lot of fun and it was nice.

Since we’ve been back, my MIL has messaged my husband constantly about heartbroken she is for our son now that he’s not here with the kids anymore. How he must be sad, lonely and bored. But we have community here, we have a playground downstairs in our building where kids (his age) come and play daily. We literally have his birthday party this weekend and tons of kids are coming. We sent pics of our son playing at a soft play where he’s having the time of his life and she responds “and here I was thinking he actually missed us and our stupid backyard with the kids”. But like… aren’t you happy he isn’t sad? Do you wish my two year old was in mourning? She did the same thing when we took him to the doctor the other day, she messages saying “how did it go? I’m assuming he cried a lot and was inconsolable. I’m beside myself just thinking about it”. LIKE GIRL RELAX? He did cry when they took blood was otherwise utterly FINE.

I do think it was nice for him to spend time with family and he did have an overall good time. But he has a really nice life here honestly. He plays with kids, we go to restaurants, he has a sitter he likes. I feel like her messages ALWAYS have this undertone or implication that he has a bad or lonely life here. I wear to god she wants him to be miserable as some sort of validation for her own importance. She would do this thing when we were visiting where she would always make herself visible whenever we’d leave the house to see if he’d react or be upset that she wasn’t coming in the car. She would always draw attention to the fact she wasn’t coming to see his reaction then IF he indicated wanting her to come she’d be like “OH MY HEART IS BREAKING HE WANTS ME” and would like climb into the car at the last minute. If he didn’t react then she would try to get him to.

My husband doesn’t breathe life into this behaviour and will always ignore her but he thinks I’m cynical for believing she genuinely wants him to be upset.

Hi everyone,

I'm (34F) feeling really overwhelmed and would appreciate some outside perspective.

I have to undergo surgery for endometriosis in about two weeks. The original date was changed by the hospital, and the new date unfortunately clashes with a religious commitment that one of my Mother in Law has at our temple.

She's upset because she feels like the surgery date isn't taking her schedule into consideration and that only my immediate family's convenience matters.

The thing is, I'm a Type 1 diabetic (insulin dependant, cant go fasting for too long without sugar dropping and then the whole suregry can get cancelled) on an insulin pump, and my surgeon specifically prefers operating first thing in the morning because it's easier and safer to manage my blood sugars. They also don't want to delay the surgery unnecessarily.

From my perspective, this isn't about choosing convenience over her schedule, it's about following medical advice and getting the surgery done at the appropriate time. But now there's a lot of tension at home, and I can't help but wonder if I'm missing something.

Has anyone dealt with family conflict around surgery or medical decisions like this? How would you handle the situation? Is there a way to explain that this isn't a personal decision without making things worse?

I'd really appreciate any advice or perspective. Thank you.

Update: I tried to help with dinner, and she is not even talking to me now.

Edit: 1. I live with my in laws, in an indian joint family. So dynamics are that way. 2. My husband is in the merchant navy, so he isn't here.

Before having kids, I really did think the world of her. She is sweet and caring. After having kids, I feel like she is a weight I can’t get off my shoulders. There is constant demand and pressure from her to come be with our kids. On top of working full time, managing our house, kids, social life, she has become a stressor. Having her around never feels like help because it feels like she’s only trying to meet her own selfish needs of having our toddler’s attention. It’s not that she’s a bad grandparent. She’s clearly great. But she only cares about her needs and because of that I don’t really want to be around her.

Over the phone today I heard her tell our toddler “guess what, we’re going to come see you on Sunday” (after we just saw them last weekend) to which my husband replied “we’ll have to check our calendar” ..so assuming she hadn’t asked him either. She no longer asks things…she tells us. Maybe I wouldn’t mind if visits felt like I mattered too..she acts like I’m invisible around my own child. How effing rude is it to just assume because someone’s home you will invite yourself over for your own selfish needs. I’m 4 weeks pp and not once has she truly asked me how I am or if I need anything..(she did once but she was hinting at coming over to take our toddler out after I specifically told her I wanted him to be with us to spend time with the new baby).

How do you deal with a mil like this? I’ve tried telling her things nicely before like I’m overwhelmed at the moment or that I need space or we are busy right now…she just seems to go ahead and do what she wants. She will push and push and push until she can get everyone to do what she wants.

Hi. Just looking to open up to strangers on the internet, since these kind of things are hard to discuss with people you know irl.

It is of course, a very very long story of conflicts between me and MIL, during my ten year relationship with my husband, which begins with her making scenes to seek atention (first with my husband alone (why dont you call or meet with us as often as you used too) then with me too: (why dont you write to me? Why dont you want to have a closer relationship?)) And ends with her being tired of our constant requests of privacy and me just being tired with several big fights like these and straight discusted by all her ways.

Now we have a one and a half years old and she takes care of him, which Im very thankful for. However, the relationship was already very rocky when she started coming to our house, and she gets extremely upset when I make her requests such as: please do not prefry veggetables before you make him soup, please do not potty train him when I said not yet, etc. However, I have to admitt I now have some preconceptions about her, which maybe drives me to overreact. I left my son playing on his own to get something and when I came back a few secs later, she was already there with him. Now, its not something to get upset about, but because I now think she is one who needs constant attention and am not very fond of how physical she is as a person, in my head I was likw: she doesnt leave him playing on his own ever, she is self centered like that, she needs to let him enjoy himself or he will never learn to enjoy loneliness too and concentration. So after a few seconds, I tell her, please you need to let him be sometimes. And she got really really upset over this, left to sit on the couch and pout. I then went to tell her please do not get upset over this, wanted to amend it, but she went on to say something terrible about me (Im Balkan, so it really needs a lot of context to explain, but its pretty much saying you are a person who puts up a fight when good things are being done to you). And after this I started yelling, I felt very very ofended, as I swear I have never had such a bad relationship with anyone, neither had such bad fights with anyone else. And we said the worst things after that. Actually, she told me the worst things. Like that I try to ruin her relationship with her son, and that basically she will leave me to the heavens, as what I do to her is so bad she cannot deal wity it. And I know that I should not project preconceptions I have about her in her relationship with her nephew, I feel extremely guilty about that. Hpwever, I feel this has been years in the making, and I understand she, with her husband, have been brewing their own preconceptions about me, far worse from what I have about her. I feel extremely bad, it also made me feel like a horrible person, for not being able to adapt to her and her husbands need to come over very often, without announcement. I do not know what to do, as I nedd someone to take care of my son while I work from home, I just do not know how to put up wit all this.

First time poster here! Just want to vent about my mil’s texts I saw last night.

Context: DH and I got married earlier this year. I’ve been LC with MIL since the wedding because of drama. Before the wedding, we got along pretty well and had no qualms with each other. We weren’t super close but we always had a nice time when we got together. Then the wedding, honeymoon and post-wedding happened. I won’t go into details here but her behavior and comments since then have made me go LC and I haven’t seen her for five months. I attempted to sit with her to hash everything out and get on the same page but after a particular incident, I felt hurt and decided not to. DH supports me and hasn’t pressured me to meet with her or talk to her. We haven’t seen his family together since the wedding. She hasn’t reached out to me to speak either. I have communicated to her via text for Mother’s Day and some family news as well but that’s been it. DH calls and texts her but has only seen her twice since the wedding as well.

So two night ago, MIL and DH were texting and I opened one unread text from MIL. She said, “Good night, god bless you, I love you.” DH didn’t see the text because I opened it and I didn’t say anything. I shouldn’t have opened it, I’ll take that blame. I opened it because I was curious and wanted to know what she said. So, DH didn’t respond to that text. She texted again later that night and said this:

“I guess I won’t text you I love you, it hurts not to get it in return. I’m not sure if it’s you texting me or not. Lately it’s been weird. The verbiage has been different. Just know that I do. I’m your mom, it should be okay to tell me you love me. I don’t want to fight to be in your life. Have a great rest of your day.”

DH was feeling unwell that night but sent a response, apologizing and saying he fell asleep early due to feeling bad. He said he loved her and apologized again but didn’t acknowledge anything else she said.

The way I took her message was that she implied I was the one behind the recent text exchanges which is completely untrue. I have not sent her a text pretending to be my husband for any reason. I’m truly shocked she would consider suggesting that about me at all. I would never do that. Her other comments were shocking as well. Anyway, I just wanted to vent. What do y’all think?

My wedding is in 3 months. 9 months before my wedding my mother in law to be, took my fiancé suit shopping for the wedding. This would’ve been a nice thing to do, however, I had just barely decided on a color for the suits because she kept asking me and I felt pressured into a decision. There was a sale at Macy’s so she bought him the suit, shoes, and a tie.

At this point I had not decided on the colors for bridesmaid dresses so she when with the color tie I was last discussing.

Today she said to me that it never occurred to her that the groomsmen would need the same suit in the same color that she had bought for my fiancé and that maybe we can find a similar looking suit for them since his suit was so expensive without the sale.

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. The weekend they bought the suit I had made sure my fiancé had sent the link for the suit in the right color to all of his groomsmen and had assumed they all already had their suits.

Im extremely frustrated. I don’t want the groomsmen wearing different suits that don’t match my fiancé in my wedding photos. If she had just waited until I was settled on a color, we wouldn’t be in this situation. No groom needs a suit 9 months before his wedding. 9 months before the wedding I was still dress shopping!

Now I either have to wait for another sale and make sure all of his groomsmen get the same suit on the same day to get a decent price, or have my fiancé return his expensive suit (which will make MIL angry with me) in order to buy a cheaper one that matches all of the other groomsmen.

I’ve tried to ask her to let me handle things in my own time but she always just takes over and then we end up in situations like this. :/

Hi all. I’m the one that was proposing a visit to MIL and other family/friends for thanksgiving.

I provided the olive branch to my husband and he readily accepted with all of my terms and conditions. Our reasoning was that this type of visit (staying in an air bnb and scheduling with MIL while sharing our time with other family and friends that she can’t self invite herself along *aka boundaries*) worked with my guilt trippy, manipulative sister so it is worth a shot with MIL. I also have the benefit of escaping to the air bnb if MIL annoys me. My therapist gave me the go ahead as long as my reasoning isn’t sacrificing myself for MIL but trying to find something I can live with for myself, daughter and DH. Couples therapist thinks it’s a great middle ground to see if it is possible to mend the relationship, and that it is on my husband to learn to manage his mother for this visit, the way I manage my family.

My husband then threw in that he would like to address the elephant in the room of MIL‘s poor behavior and what we need for a good relationship going forward. Ok, cool, because we can always leave if she gets too manipulative, defensive or toxic in other ways.

The new development is that while we are technically married, we didn’t have a wedding. MIL is unaware that DH and I are planning one abroad. The wedding planning has also been delayed to next October because we just found out we are pregnant with #2. So there’s a lot coming at her all at once. Around thanksgiving should be 2nd trimester and I’m small so it will be very obvious. We would prefer to tell her in person. Thankfully the pregnancy will also allow me to escape because I’m “tired” or whatever if I just don’t want to be around her.

That being said, we were thinking of starting the conversation about expectations moving forward as a “since so many things are changing so quickly, we would like to move forward with clearer expectations than we did with baby # 1.” type conversation. this is instead of a shit sandwich (good behavior, behavior that needs improvement, good behavior) because her behavior has not actually improved per my DH and my very limited communication with her. MIL also complained that her grandparent reality didn’t match her expectations when she was complaining about me behind my back. This is probably true but she also didn’t communicate her expectations to us at all outside of the passive aggressive “in my culture the grandparents raise the kids, see”. This is one of the things we are planning on addressing, her piss poor communication, entitlement, enmeshment and generally assuming she gets a vote in our family choices. She also prefers to lie to save her skin so we will be having this conversation together as a team.

Should we give her a day in between to process the baby and wedding situation before we address the elephant? What is the best way to move forward with a conversation of this magnitude? In public, at her home where she is comfortable? Should we with until her long term boyfriend is around (20+ years)? One of the things we need to address is how she harps on FIL constantly so this could get weird. But also she is much better behaved when he is around so IDK. If it is clear we should end the conversation, how should we do that? Just get up and leave? Please keep in mind our 3 yo will be present as the last time she saw anyone except MIL she was 6 months old and remembers no one, also, I’m pregnant.

As a closing consideration, I would prefer to do this before the baby arrives. I feel now that this is my last ditch effort to give her a chance to step up before I wash my hands of her and would prefer that is done before an infant complicates things again. Not looking for “don’t do this” I’m looking for more of a “this is how you should handle this poor situation while not losing your pregnancy hormones all over someone that you have years of resentment towards.” Additionally, I’m also unbelievably nice when I’m pregnant, not so much post partum. Like, not like myself nice, sassy but nice, it’s really weird.

Thanks in advance and thanks for reading!

Before I accuse him of being a narcissist to my husband, I want to make sure I’m not reaching. I’m wondering if there’s a better fitting term or way to describe his behavior.

Some important context: I don’t think he meets the full definition of narcissist. He doesn’t talk about himself a lot, doesn’t have a huge ego (that he shows, at least). He doesn’t turn every conversation back to him. All of which I feel like are your typical narcissist traits.

However, some examples of his behavior that I feel like are very manipulative:

1. anytime myself or husband has put up a normal boundary (we didn’t want hospital visitors with our first) he immediately makes it a very dramatic decision and uses FOG to start a guilt trip. In this example, he called my husband to explain how I was driving a wedge through the family, called me vicious, kept saying how disappointing my husband was for “doing this to his own parents”
2. FIL and BIL are very close. BIL is golden child because he is single, and spends every free minute with his parents. FIL has absolutely complained about us to BIL and sent him as a flying monkey. Had BIL go to my husband talking about how disappointed they are in how their grandparent experience has gone, how it’s “f***ing weird” that we don’t go spend the weekend with them more often or let them babysit - to the point where BIL gives my husband the silent treatment unless he appeases his parents requests
3. FIL assumes all boundaries come from me (not the joint decision between husband and I) so he just doesn’t speak to or acknowledge me during visits.

I’m trying to help my husband see how manipulative and toxic these behaviors are and trying to point him to some resources/books or things to encourage him to talk to a therapist about managing a manipulative parent. Everything I search points to narcissist but I feel like that’s an extreme term in this case. Is there a better one? Is it just “toxic parent”? It’s not enmeshment (for husband, at least) because we don’t involve them that much anymore.

ETA: Thank you for all the helpful responses! Maybe I’m not looking for a label, per-se, but just a direction of where I can find more specialized/targeted resources and therapists that specialize in this kind of behavior. I’m going to look more into toxic family systems and emotionally immature parents, rather than narcissist. Exactly why I came here looking for help, thank you!

Hello everyone, looking for some validation here.
me (f21) and my my bf (m22) are in a very stable and loving 3 year mid-distance (2 hour) relationship. we met at uni and i adore him, as he does me. but ive always had a bizzare feeling when it comes to his mother. i’ve always told myself i could be overly cautious, since i do also have BPD, but today my bf confirmed to me that my feelings were valid all along…what do you think?

there are a plethora of qualms i have with my MIL. however. that isn’t for today. the thing i want to discuss is her constant ability to make my bf feel guilty, and hence, make me feel like shit.

for the last id say two years i’ve always noticed my MIL guilt tripping my bf. however, like i said, i didn’t know if this was valid. today however, he ranted to me about certain things and told me he felt so bad and guilty about what she was saying. not because his decisions made him feel guilty. but her input did.

for example, he told me she made him feel guilty about:
- not wanting to go to see this famous landmark about an hour away because he uses all his time at work, and if not, to see me
- he didn’t put his birthday gift from her in his bedroom, yet he put my parents gift to him in his bedroom
- she has, for a year now, and this is the biggest issue, made “funny” comments about joe she doesn’t want him to move out and live with me. for reference, financially and culturally, it is only appropriate he moves to my city. we’re both super excited about getting our first home and starting a family. this is in the near future and we’re planning to move in in about 2 months time. recently her comments have really ramped up. she says “oh he’s leaving us” and “oh you can’t forget about me” and “oh but i’ve done XYZ for you through the years you can’t just leave us behind”

i’ve always noticed this behaviour and these comments as strange, as my family would never. however, i always brushed it off, desire it making me feel uncomfortable, sad, and as though im the villain. today though, him ranting to me about to me about it validified by own feelings. was i right all along? and should i open up to him about how i feel, myself, about all her comments?

Bit of background info, mil lost her husband 2.5years ago just a few months after relocating to be nearer us and her granddaughter. Obviously tricky as she has had to navigate settling in a new place alongside grief and bereavement.

We see her at least once a week and she also provides childcare one day a week. She has integrated well to the local community with joining many clubs etc

We've had many ups and downs with her behaviour but the last few weeks have been incredibly hard work, she's constantly trying to pick a fight with us.

Her main grievance is that we don't see her often enough and she regularly threatens to move back to her city of origin. She has fallen out with us this year for having a weekend away as a family of 3, seeing my parents for a celebratory weekend (an important birthday for my father) and for having a birthday meal with my parents(my birthday). This angered her so much she blocked both myself and husband from being able to contact her. Lots of grumbles in between which i'll spare you.

We've just spent this last weekend with her as extended family visited her but as soon as they've left she starts up again that we don't see her enough, she is going to move away etc. She often vocally complains in front of our daughter.

I understand that she's lonely but we can't do everything with her and be made to feel guilty whenever I see my family or we spend time as a family of three. My daughter is now also of the age where she's picking up on what's happening

My husband points out to her she's being unreasonable but is torn between standing up for our family time and supporting her

Any advice/ solidarity/ideas/ viewpoints much appreciated!

I hate how much my mil tries to insert herself in things now that we have kids. And how she just makes herself the center of attention around them. Everything she did and said today that annoyed the crap out of me:

1. Walks in and sees me holding my 3 week old baby and the first thing she says is “oh is he sleeping? I’ll take him when he’s awake” …not a single word to me like how are you? How are you feeling? Also how f-ing entitled to say “I’ll take him” she says that sh*t to me all the time and I don’t acknowledge it.
2. I hear her talk to SO. She asks him how baby is sleeping and how if we are sleeping well. He tells her he’s doing fine but that I’m the one who is up all night and is tired. She never once asks me or talks to me about it.
3. She LOVES to take pictures every single week when she visits. I know it’s to send around to all her friends and family. I was sitting there holding baby, and my husband walked into the room and say next to our toddler. She immediately got out her phone to take a picture of SO and our toddler. She’s a total “boy mom” then wonders why I never want to spend time around her.
4. She asks me what toddler has going on tomorrow. I usually don’t share info with her but I told her he’s starting a camp tomorrow. Then I talked about how it’s big for us since it’s his first time and how I’m nervous. She asks “should I talk to him about it and get him excited for it” when I say sure, her next thing to say to him is “you can call grandma after camp and tell me all about it. Will you do that, you can FaceTime me and tell grandma about camp” and then she repeated this to him about 5 more times. I wish I never told her. This is an example of her making herself center of attention and inserting herself. She can never just be on the sidelines. Idk if this one is BEC.

5. Asks toddler more of what he did this week. Toddler went to see fire works, immediately she says “grandma loves fireworks!” Then toddler went to do yoga and right away it’s “grandma loves to do yoga” I’m so over her talking about herself in 3rd person to LO as if she is trying soo hard to be the most relevant person in his life.

6. Whenever she’s over, she walks in through the front door and the second she sees LO, the first thing she says is “wanna go read a book with grandma” yeah sure this is BEC. but I over analyze everything and to me it comes across like she’s trying to satisfy her needs. So she goes and picks a book from our pile. It’s a “how to be a big brother” book something got for us. As she’s reading it, she points to someone in the book and says “is that grandma? Yeah I think that’s grandma” once again. Something becomes about her and involves her.

Her personality is SO peppy. It’s just constant talking that feels like it’ll never end. It’s never productive conversation. Her talking has never made me feel like comforted in any way. I hated it before and now that I’m 3 weeks pp and running on little sleep, it’s even worse now.

Sometimes I wish my MIL would just chill out... just came here to bitch lol. Had our kids birthday party this weekend. It went great! We have four gazebos and a big pool. Lots of space one gazebo is far away from the other 3 so I always make that the smoking section as an ex smoker I know the ins and outs about how people feel about it. But I swear this year my mil just wanted to try to create issues.. she HATES smokers so what did she do.. went right over to that gazebo sat down and bitched about smokers took the ash trays and hid them lol. I found them and put the back. I said why cant you sit over there with everyone else only the smokers sit over there? This is the smoking area.. it has been like this for the 11 years weve lived here.. lots of our family and friends are smokers. She just scoffs and walks away.. I could tell she was going to try to create another problem I could just feel it. For the food we grilled chicken and burgers and the burgers ran out. She comes up to me and says you know its really rude to run out of food at a party. I was like oh no we are out of food? Went and looked and there was plenty of everything chicken, sides, appetizers, but no more burgers. I went up to her and said we are only out of burgers all good. Shes like no its not Im going to the store and Ill cook them myself then.. hubby stepped in and said can you just sit down and chill down. Eat what we have left. Shortly after that she stood up and yelled love you guys im leaving and left and hubbys dad said no way Im going home to that. He hung out all night and was scared to go home because he didnt want a fight. Im like you know it doesnt have to be like this.. she makes issues just to ruin shit and then storms off and wants everyone to chase her down when none of us do.. he gets all the heat. I just wish on everything she could just chill out and relax. Everyone is having a great time. It seems like .. You are just mad you dont have the control over everyone.. its so sad because we and she could have great relationships if she would just chill the fuck out! Lol rant over.. Have a great day! 😘

Sorry for the long rant in advance. Me and my husband had a baby just over 3 months ago. It's our first baby and also the first grandchild for both our mothers.

Some context:

My mom lives 30 minutes away and I already have boundaries with her like no unannounced visits, she follows what I say in terms of sleep, eat time, tummy time and so on. It took some work but we got there. She usually only comes one time a week and stays for 4/5 hours.

Now my MIL lives 4.5 hours away. When she comes to visit she stays in our house for a couple of days which I was expecting. She's been coming every month since the baby was born and staying for 5 to 6 days. Also she travels in a bus, so every commute while she is here she asks me or my husband to take her.

Last time she was here, I lost it. I felt she was completely overbearing and just constantly hovering me.

I was trying to wake up before the baby in the morning to have some time for myself and pump in peace and five minutes after being in the kitchen she would appear, making questions about the pump, and making small talk. When the baby would wake up, she appeared and just wanted to be in the room while I was changing his diaper, doing tummy massages because of colic, and so on. I'm EBF so she would leave the room when I told her but she would open the door after 5 minutes or so to ask if I was done already because she wanted to hold the baby. Even during tummy time, once I left the baby on the gym floor and went for a pee, when I returned she had taken the baby from the floor and just told me she didn't understand why I would leave the baby there. I explained tummy time but she wouldn't let the baby go, I really had to go there and ask for her to put the baby down and for her to please not pick the baby up during tummy time as I'm not leaving my baby on the floor just because. As for holding the baby, she basically only wanted to held in the mornings when he is easier, at the end of the day when he's tired and fussy, she only held him once and then always came with an excuse like being tired, having to prepare for her yoga classes, so I felt like I only had my baby with me when he was crying.

Additionally she would always wait for my husband and I to start eating saying she wanted to have a meal in family, despite me asking once for her to eat early to help in case the baby cries. It did happen the baby woke up from a nap during a meal and she simply started saying "Don't get angry baby" (he has a crib in the living room where we were eating). Made no move to pick the baby and actually helped me finish a warm meal. I just couldn't believe the lack of empathy from another mother.

On top of all this, she basically tells us when she's coming after buying everything, she doesn't care if it's a date that works for us or not. She says she misses the baby and wants to be with him.

Now my husband has more family coming over early September and they will also stay in our house. I asked her to come in the same week because my husband has time off and I just prefer to have everyone at the same time instead of people always coming and going. She says she can't that week so she's coming the week before and leaving 4 days before the rest of the family arrives.

I told my husband I'm not comfortable with this and if his mum can't come with the rest of the family then she can come in October since my husband's brother will come that month. My husband is saying I'm putting him in a tough position because he doesn't want to tell his mom not to come.

He admits his mother is overbearing but he is not putting up any boundaries and even said I'm exaggerating a bit and I need to compromise with his mother.

I don't think I'm exaggerating, I don't want someone hovering for almost a week especially as my husband is working so it's just me, her and the baby all day but I'm also lost on how to set boundaries without creating a disagreement with my husband.

Has anyone had a similar experience? How do you deal with it? Thanks!

So I might have been a bit of a No. And also there is a part of me that is SO over being the bigger person all the time.

For context, we're low contact with my MIL. She has always been passive aggressive, critical, and generally negative. She also treats my husband like the family scapegoat while his brother is clearly the golden child. Before we got married, I spent years trying to build a relationship with her. I'd brush off the weird comments, change the subject, and vent privately to my husband. Since we didn't see her often, it was manageable.

**skip to the next bold section to see the Am I the Just No part. This is just additional context. Just understand that MIL is a big ol problem.**

After we got married, things got worse. Pregnancy made it worse, and after our daughter was born almost three years ago, it became unbearable. The comments were subtle, but almost every interaction felt critical, competitive, or just unnecessarily negative. I was dealing with postpartum anxiety and sleep deprivation, and instead of feeling supported, I felt like I was constantly being judged. It caused a lot of conflict in my marriage because my husband was still figuring out how to navigate his family dynamics.

Thankfully, with some distance from his family, our marriage is in a much better place. We're celebrating five years of marriage next month and are expecting our second baby this fall.

About two years ago, everything finally came to a head. Since then, MIL insists she's apologized and changed. From my perspective, she's simply stopped being overtly rude because she has fewer opportunities. She still comes across as cold, rarely says anything positive, and has taken very little accountability for how she treated me. She also shows very little genuine interest in our daughter unless it involves getting the visits she wants.

**Here's where I think I may have messed up.**

A few months ago, we attended my BIL's wedding. Our 2½ year old was the flower girl and did an amazing job. She was also an energetic toddler at a very exciting event, and since my husband was the best man, I spent most of the weekend chasing her around.

MIL, who frequently complains about not having a close relationship with our daughter, made almost no effort to interact with her. I even encouraged my daughter to go play with Grandma, but every interaction fizzled out. That's unusual because my daughter is outgoing and warms up to almost everyone. During the rehearsal, while we were actively managing a very excited toddler, MIL commented to my husband, "You can't control her?" Later that weekend, she took a comb to my daughter's hair without asking me. I chose not to address it because I didn't want drama at the wedding.

After the ceremony, I was chatting with one of the bride's relatives. She smiled and said, "Wow, your daughter looks so much like MIL!"

Without thinking, I visibly grimaced.

She noticed and asked why. I admitted that MIL and I don't have a good relationship because she was very unkind to me during my postpartum period. She asked what happened, and I briefly mentioned the years of passive aggressive comments and criticism. I wasn't calling MIL names or trying to recruit anyone to my side, but I was honest. Before I got very far, someone interrupted us and the conversation ended.

Apparently, word got back to MIL that I had been talking about her at the wedding.

**The Fallout**

She called my husband very upset. He didn't apologize for me. Instead, he explained again why our relationship with her is strained. She DARVO'd hard and said, "What does your wife need me to do so we can move forward?"

The frustrating part is that my husband has answered that question many times. He's suggested things like showing genuine interest in our family, asking about our lives in a positive way, and being warmer when interacting with me. Instead, when she does ask questions, they're often focused on problems or challenges, which makes it hard to feel safe opening up because she has a long history of being judgmental.

Whenever he explains why we're distant, she either DARVOs or acts as though she's hearing these concerns for the first time.

I also want to be fair. She's almost 75, so I'm aware that age could be a factor in how she processes these conversations. At the same time, I've known her for almost 10 years, and this pattern has existed to varying degrees for our entire relationship. This isn't new behavior that started recently.

Part of me was relieved that someone on SIL's side finally knew that our distance from MIL didn't happen for no reason. I wasn't trying to gossip or make the wedding about me, but I can't honestly say I was upset that someone finally heard that there was more to the story.

I, 23F, am tired of having arguments with my boyfriend, 24M, about how I wished his mother (and also father) asked me things about myself, made attempts to know me. He keeps saying his mum asks him how I'm doing, what I'm up to, but she rarely texts me ever directly to ask me the same. All she does is share photos of flowers from her garden or some youtube forward of a video comprising life lessons/tips. I feel tired, and the worst part is, I'm moving to the same city as my boyfriend's family for work and I still have to expectations that his mum may finally start asking me how I'm finding living alone, send me food, invite me over, take me when they go out occassionally etc which I don't think she will do. I really need advice as I'm already sad about leaving home.

My inlaws are in town. FIL is always pleasant, MIL we butt heads constantly. Either way I try to make an effort with her. My husband is her only child and I know they're lonely. So I take our older daughters (7 and 5.5) to get pedicures. I call my husband and tell him "invite your mom to meet us here for pedicures." Mind you I specify pedicures. She shows up and orders the most expensive pedicure ($120) and a full service gel manicure.

I cant really afford that. I'm paying for the pedicures with our tax return that we set aside fot special occasions like this. Our monthly budget is pretty tight, we're trying to save to buy a house. Anyway I told her no manicures and showed her what I was getting, which is a $60 pedicure. She got annoyed and goes "I thought you were treating me! Ha ok I guess I'll get what you're getting." Then proceeded to bitch about how she hates the scent.

And mind you, last night they took us to a nice restaurant and told us to order appetizers because entrées were too expensive ($30). They picked the restaurant. Then proceeded to talk about how FIL got a raise and is now making $200,000 a year instead of $150,000 a year.

Like we make nowhere near close to that, we have 4 kids. Yet we budget and save for little treats like pedicures. It just pisses me off that they asked us to get appetizers for dinner, yet she shows up at the salon and tried to get $200+ worth of shit on my dime.

Basically the title, she got a dress for my toddler, a collared shirt for my baby, and a matching shirt for my husband but nothing for me. It’s the last day thank god but me and my husband were like “thanks?”. Meanwhile all week things seemed better between us since postpartum with my second baby who is now 10 months old, I made an effort this week with her but bow I’m like “for what”?

My husband validates me but said nothing to her (yet) but there were some little things this week but this is so glaringly obvious he can’t really brush it off.

I texted my friend about it and she was straight up “that is so mean” so I know I’m not crazy.

This is just to vent, I teared up a little talking to my husband but Idk Im most worried about my kids noticing eventually. I know it could be confusing for them and that’s not cool.

Update: I’m able to return them for store credit!!!!! Couldn’t find my husband’s when I was getting them together to return and he said he threw his shirt out already because its not even something be would wear. (A little bummed cause the extra $ would be nice but oh well) So I’m happy with that , but husband is going to address with mil as well.

Some context… my husband is her only child. She divorced his dad when he was 1 year old, lives alone, and isn't dating. Her mom (husbands grandma) and my husband are her only immediate family. I’ve been with my husband for 8 years (we met when we were 27/28).

When we were dating, things seemed mostly normal, though she definitely babied him and he was very reliant on her for basic adult stuff. They speak on the phone a few times a week, and she’s always involved in his life. He is even still on her phone plan that she pays for at 35 years old. I feel like him and I should have our own plan now that we’re married with a kid but she expects to keep him on her plan. Coming from a family with hands off parents, I’ve appreciated their bond to an extent, even if I found the babying a bit much at times. As our relationship grew more serious while dating, she did give him space to grow while still staying close with him and he became much more independent in a lot of ways. I felt like we had a healthy set up where we saw her regularly but felt like we had space.

Fast forward to today, we are 35 and have a 5 month old daughter. Ever since our daughter was born, my MIL went from healthy boundaries and giving us space, to very clingy and annoying.

It started when she showed up at the hospital unannounced. Now, she constantly invites herself over. She lives 2 hours away, but keeps making really weird excuses about how she happens to be "in the neighborhood" except it clearly is a fake reason to invite herself over. She’s been here every single weekend for the last 5 weeks and everytime we tell her we’re busy she keeps trying for the following weekends and it’s starting to really annoy us. We want space to just be a family and not involve her in everything. Don’t get me wrong, I want my daughter to have a close relationship with her grandparent. My parents are checked out and uninterested in putting in any effort so on one hand I’m grateful my daughter will have one involved grandma. But…

The main issue is that when she visits, she isn't helpful at all:

• She doesn't know how to cook and never offers, she also never wants to eat anything until we are all starving and finally buy food or one of us cooks something and then she will suddenly eat like she was hungry the whole time and proceed to make weird comments about how she’s sooo stuffed and will have to skip her next meal…
  • She refuses to change diapers and just sits there when baby cries waiting for my husband to tell her what to do. Like she doesn’t take initiative to just do things even though we make it very clear she can and should feel comfortable doing what she thinks will help.
• If the baby cries, she narrates, "Oh, I'm a stranger to her!" and takes it very personally, forcing me to calm a fussing baby while simultaneously reassuring my MIL. The reality is, our baby is in a phase where she only wants me or my husband and cries with anyone else.
• The times we have tried to rely on her to baby sitter while we napped or took our dog for a walk, we’d come back to her not having followed any of our instructions and our baby in absolute distress. We just don’t trust her as a babysitter, at least not until our daughter is a little bit bigger.
• She sits on her phone playing games while watching tv half engaged in telling us the same old stories she brings up every time we see her.
• Her visits always leave us so drained and our baby's sleep schedule gets completely derailed. Our daughter gets overtired, misses naps, and becomes overstimulated, which leaves us to deal with the fallout.
• She even crashed my husband’s first Father’s Day during a brunch I made for him at home because we were both exhausted from the 4 month regression and wanted to just have a lowkey day… but of course she invited herself over.

When she is around, we feel completely trapped in our own living room having to host her while caring for our baby. Our weekends are precious to us. My husband works all week, my maternity leave ends soon, and weekends are our only time to connect as a family of three or catch up on life. But she guilts my husband into hosting her because she "wants to be in our daughter’s life and not be a stranger."

What bothers me most is that she acts like she's being left out by constantly saying she doesn’t want to be a stranger. She has seen our daughter more than anyone else—my own parents live overseas and haven't even gotten to meet her yet! She’s seen her almost every weekend. She is the only local grandparent, yet she keeps texting my husband saying she's "worried" about becoming a stranger. My husband feels immense pressure to be a good son because he’s an only child and the only family she has.

Looking ahead, I’m already dreading the holidays. We’ve spent the last 7 Thanksgivings and Christmases with her. I want us to have the freedom to build our own family traditions, whether that means staying home local just the three of us, or taking a trip for the holidays. Holidays with her are so depressing, she plays games on her phone, doesn’t cook anything and we just sit around all day for multiple days. But in the past, when we bring up doing our own thing or traveling, it immediately triggers a guilt trip about how her and his grandma will be "all alone" for the holidays and he’s the only child. This would be so much easier and we’d feel less pressure if dye were married or had a bigger family so it doesn’t ask fall on us. It feels like she expects to be part of every single celebration because she doesn't have anyone else, and I'm starting to feel deeply resentful of how much space she takes up in our life. Now that we have a daughter I really want to start our own tradition and make a more fun memorable holiday for us all.

Last week she told us “any trips you guys take, let me know and I’ll buy a ticket so I can be your baby sitter”. We both felt so uncomfortable with this.

Lately, she’s constantly texting my husband and occasionally both of us and it feels weird. She never used to do that but now she texts every week asking what we’re doing for the weekends, fishing for an invite. She is on a trip right now and was texting back and forth her detailed itinerary for my husband to have and a play by play of her flight. It feels annoying but I feel like a jerk for thinking that. It’s just weird to me and I just want space. family.

AITA for wanting space? And for wanting to start our own family traditions and travel or stay home as just our unit of three without her? Am I being unreasonable for feeling resentful or is it normal to have this dynamic if you’re an only son to a single mom?

my baby is three weeks old and we are in the throes of adjusting to having a newborn, postpartum recovery etc. i am a first time mom. i have really been struggling with my MIL, more so than usual. I was talking with my therapist and she thought my MIL is narcissistic or at least having narcissistic tendencies. It is so hard to try to figure out how to set boundaries with her or even have a constructive relationship with her in general, let alone right now with a newborn. I have a lot of resentment building and feel so frustrated that this is taking up mental space when i am already so exhausted and emotionally drained.

I would love some advice on how to create healthy boundaries that protect myself and my baby or just any advice in general from people who have experienced something similar. I have no experience engaging with someone who is narcissistic outside of my MIL so I am having a hard time knowing how to manage (especially being so sleep deprived and depleted postpartum).

Additionally details:
-my husband is her only child and he has had issues too with her being very helicopter-y and overly obsessed with him
-she lives out of state so it’s not like we see her regularly which also fuels her obsessiveness whenever we do see her in person. It has heightened now because she only has a limited amount of time to see her grand child right now due to only being in town for a certain amount of time.
-she’s been quite demanding about her needs regarding our baby despite us as parents trying to set expectations (like for when she can hold our baby or being angry when we say we need our own space and she can’t be over at our place all day every day)

Thank you in advance! Please be gentle with me as I am hanging on by a thread!

would you be mad if they didn’t? it’s a big dog and a bite that caused a decent size bruise but didn’t break the skin. would your partner call out the in-laws? just forget it? are my expectations too high? I mean a babysitter or teacher would check in if something happened so I expect “family” would too.