My In-laws are worse than your In-laws!

[Chiker9]

I have been married to my husband for 11 years and my MIL has not liked me since day 1. The worst thing she ever really said is something my husband and I can howl with laughter about now but I found it pretty hurtful at first. A week after my second daughter was born, my husband e-mailed pictures of her to his Grandmother (MIL's mother) in North Carolina and we went to see my in-laws about a week later. While I was sitting in the livingroom, I heard my husband's mother talking very loudly to him in the kitchen, about how "Grandma called and said the new baby looks "very dark" and is wondering what is going on in your marriage". She kept making comments about this the whole time we were in their house. I really think she was hoping to make my husband suspicious. The funny thing is that DD is not dark at all but did have very dark hair when she was born-she is blonde and has blue eyes.

 

[Erin1700]

Happy Birthday and Happy Easter!

Thank you!

 

[DisneyCrazyMomma]

Although you said he didn't want to tie his shoes, I just wanted to let you know I'm 50 and CAN'T tie my shoes - at least not like normal people do. I make a bow on one lace, then a bow on the other lace, then I cross them over and loop them through. It's just one of those things I just have a mental block on.

BTW, I think your MIL was downright mean to your son. Whats wrong with people? I too believe in picking your battles, and so what if he doesn't want to tie his shoes. Bet she didn't say to cousin, "you may be able to tie your shoes, but can you read chapter books?" So sorry you have to deal with this.

Thank you! Somehow it just helps to know that I'm not crazy! I think it was mean too... broke my heart. And you're right, she never says anything mean to the cousin. Not that I want her to be mean to my nephew...

If I were you, I wouldn't worry about shoe tying either. Sounds to me like you get by, and honestly, who cares. So many more important things!

 

[DisneyCrazyMomma]

I can't tie it the normal way either. I use bunny ears to do it

Maybe we need to redefine "normal."

 

[Teresa Pitman]

My sister told me that her mother-in-law hated her. I didn't really believe her until I went with her, her husband (of about six years at that time) and their little girl when they visited the mother-in-law. The mil kept calling my sister by different names. Say her name was "Mary," the mil would call her "Mandy" one time and "Marsha" another time and "Monica" the next time she saw her. It wasn't a matter of memory problems - she remembered my name just fine and she'd only met me a couple of times. Yes, she also made plenty of snarky comments, but it was the deliberate messing up of her name that I thought was the worst.

Teresa

 

[ColoradoDisneyFreaks]

I didn't learn to tie my shoe "properly" until i was 16. My parents are right handed and I am left. They just couldn't teach me. I finally locked myself in my grandparent's guest room and taguht myself how to do it. I want to say it took about an hour or so.

For all you folks who use "bunny ears" to tie your shoes, don't stress it, both systems actually end up with the same knot, so you're doing it different, but not wrong.

superme80, I had the same problem, I'm a lefty and my folks were righties and just couldn't figure it out, finally, my older brother, who's also a righty, just sat me down across from him, and told me to do what he did on the same side, that way, his right hand aligned with my left one, worked like a charm!

 

[spacemountainmom]

For all you folks who use "bunny ears" to tie your shoes, don't stress it, both systems actually end up with the same knot, so you're doing it different, but not wrong.

superme80, I had the same problem, I'm a lefty and my folks were righties and just couldn't figure it out, finally, my older brother, who's also a righty, just sat me down across from him, and told me to do what he did on the same side, that way, his right hand aligned with my left one, worked like a charm!

Another lefty here! I had the same issue and my grandpa figured it out and taught me just like your brother.

I married a lefty and our oldest is a lefty. The "baby" is a righty and we had to use grandpa's trick to teach him too!

 

[beachlover9395]

My sister told me that her mother-in-law hated her. I didn't really believe her until I went with her, her husband (of about six years at that time) and their little girl when they visited the mother-in-law. The mil kept calling my sister by different names. Say her name was "Mary," the mil would call her "Mandy" one time and "Marsha" another time and "Monica" the next time she saw her. It wasn't a matter of memory problems - she remembered my name just fine and she'd only met me a couple of times. Yes, she also made plenty of snarky comments, but it was the deliberate messing up of her name that I thought was the worst.

Teresa

It's as if the MIL was trying to invalidate her DIL/your sister as a human being, or to imply that she wasn't important enough of a person in her life to remember her name. Talk about passive-aggressive! Unreal -- your poor sister. Why don't people stop and think about their behavior???

 

[Rence]

My sister told me that her mother-in-law hated her. I didn't really believe her until I went with her, her husband (of about six years at that time) and their little girl when they visited the mother-in-law. The mil kept calling my sister by different names. Say her name was "Mary," the mil would call her "Mandy" one time and "Marsha" another time and "Monica" the next time she saw her. It wasn't a matter of memory problems - she remembered my name just fine and she'd only met me a couple of times. Yes, she also made plenty of snarky comments, but it was the deliberate messing up of her name that I thought was the worst.

Teresa

I have a friend whose MIL pulls the same stunt. The MIL is now referred to as Endora - the MIL on Bewitched who never could get her SILs name right (Durwood, Darwin, Dodo, Dumdum) - Everyone refers to her as Endora behind her back. I'm just waiting for the day that someone slips and uses the name in front of her.

 

[pkondz]

I can't tie it the normal way either. I use bunny ears to do it

:ahem: Don't you mean you use Mickey ears?

I'm a lefty and my folks were righties and just couldn't figure it out, finally, my older brother, who's also a righty, just sat me down across from him, and told me to do what he did on the same side, that way, his right hand aligned with my left one, worked like a charm!

You've got two things there.
1. A smart brother
2. A nice brother

Good combination.

 

[superme80]

For all you folks who use "bunny ears" to tie your shoes, don't stress it, both systems actually end up with the same knot, so you're doing it different, but not wrong.

superme80, I had the same problem, I'm a lefty and my folks were righties and just couldn't figure it out, finally, my older brother, who's also a righty, just sat me down across from him, and told me to do what he did on the same side, that way, his right hand aligned with my left one, worked like a charm!

If only my big sister was so nice. She had more fun laughing at me than anything.

 

[NaLisa]

Reading these posts makes me want to drive 10 hours to hug and thank my MIL. She's a wonderful person, not the slightest bit mean, but she's always been much more involved with SIL's children than mine & DH's. I think she realizes it and feels guilty about it, but SIL has a way of monopolizing her mother's time. It hurts DH's feelings and he's resentful toward his sister, but we just try to keep in mind that SIL and her family need more support than we do.

My ex-MIL, OTOH, was a nasty, manipulative, hurtful woman. She was constantly angry at someone in her family, especially one or the other of her sons. She would go years without speaking to them and then just show up one day out of the blue with some expensive gift, so she'd have something to take away the next time she got mad. Her ex-husband (exDH's father) had cheated on her many, many years ago, and she spent the rest of her life trying to exact revenge on him and then on their sons if they dared to try to have a relationship with their father. When her boys were young, she once drove them to a motel and made them look in the hotel room while their father was having sex with another woman. Now what her ex did to her was terrible, but what she did to her young children to poison their minds against their father was unforgivable.

The boys went years without speaking to their father because she convinced them he was evil. She told the boys horrible lies about their father and convinced them both to lie in court so she could get full custody. The boys had been very close to their father and missed him terribly, but they feared her wrath should they have any contact whatsoever with him. When they were teens, both boys got to know their father again and decided he was an OK guy, despite having cheated on his wife 10 years before. She was so angry that she kicked her sons out of the house and refused to speak to them for years.

She got mad (again) at my ex a couple of months before our wedding and wouldn't answer any calls or letters, so we were forced to plan the wedding without her in it. I didn't notice but later discovered she showed up five minutes after the wedding began, sat in the rear of the church, and left just before the ceremony ended. Did not show up for the reception. I was thankful that that was the extent of her involvement in the wedding, because we spent a lot of time worrying that she would somehow sabotage our special day.

That woman was so consumed by hate for her ex that she put the rest of the family through hell.

 

[Dragonfly_34]

http://www.emailsfromyourinlaws.com

 

[cabanafrau]

As a general rule, I find threads w/many, many, many pages to be too much work & generally skip them. Occasionally I'll do a skim, but bail quickly if the horse seems beaten to death on page two.

Decided to check in on this oldie by heading directly to the last page, wondering exactly what kind of whackadoodle car wreck I was going to find this many pages in on an IL thread. I absolutely adored finding posts about learning how to tie shoes when the page came up! I have absolutely no idea and just cannot imagine how the discussion wound up there -- and I am going to remain in blissful ignorance.

 

[spacemountainmom]

My dd16 was telling me yesterday about her bff. The bff just broke up with her boyfriend of a few months. Apparently the boyfriend's mom facebooked the bff a very nasty message following the breakup.

My first thought was that the mom needed to get a life and stay out of her teenage son's relationships and my second that was that this woman is probably going to be a miserable mil to some poor girl in the future.

 

[Disney Doll]

Yes...any woman that gets that overinvolved in their teenager's romances is troouble right from the word go.

And what makes a parent be that invested? I can tell you that my mother barely had any idea if I was dating or not dating someone at any given time. I'd have gone out with a guy for like 6 months, we'd break up and about 3 months after the break-up she'd say something like "Where has that nice Michael been that was around a while back? Is he working a lot or something?". I'd say "No Mom, we broke up" and her stock response was "Oh well, there are other fish in the sea".

Even when my next-most-serious-boyfriend before DH & I broke up (because his sister got engaged to someone and he didn't want to get married yet...not that we had discussed it or even mentioned it but who understand men) it took her a week to notice and here was the conversation:

Mom: "What happened to Pat? Did you break up?"
Me: "Yes, he broke up with me because his sister got enagaged and he's not ready to get married".
Mom: "Had you discussed marriage?"
Me: "No".
Mom: "Well that doesn't make any sense, but there are other fish in the sea".

God bless Mom...she had the uncanny ability to boil things right down to hteir logical conclusion.

 

[DisneyCrazyMomma]

:ahem: Don't you mean you use Mickey ears?

Love!! Thanks for the smile

 

[spacemountainmom]

Yes...any woman that gets that overinvolved in their teenager's romances is troouble right from the word go.

And what makes a parent be that invested? I can tell you that my mother barely had any idea if I was dating or not dating someone at any given time. I'd have gone out with a guy for like 6 months, we'd break up and about 3 months after the break-up she'd say something like "Where has that nice Michael been that was around a while back? Is he working a lot or something?". I'd say "No Mom, we broke up" and her stock response was "Oh well, there are other fish in the sea".

Even when my next-most-serious-boyfriend before DH & I broke up (because his sister got engaged to someone and he didn't want to get married yet...not that we had discussed it or even mentioned it but who understand men) it took her a week to notice and here was the conversation:

Mom: "What happened to Pat? Did you break up?"
Me: "Yes, he broke up with me because his sister got enagaged and he's not ready to get married".
Mom: "Had you discussed marriage?"
Me: "No".
Mom: "Well that doesn't make any sense, but there are other fish in the sea".

God bless Mom...she had the uncanny ability to boil things right down to hteir logical conclusion.

Update

Bff's stepmom read the boyfriend's mom the riot act about getting involved. The boyfriend's dad ended up calling and apologizing for the ex-wife's behavior.

I guess as a mom I am more like your mom. It was a good week before I realized that my dd had broken up with her boyfriend. She was very level headed about it and I can't imagine a situation where I would need to get involved unless a young man did some kind of harm to my daughter. Breakups are a part of life - deal with it mama!

 

[ColoradoDisneyFreaks]

You've got two things there.
1. A smart brother
2. A nice brother

Good combination.

At 6, sure, after that, all downhill!!!!

 

[Hutchy]

When this thread started I was still married and really felt bad for everyone with a horrible MIL because I always had a very good relationship with mine. Then my ex decided the week of Christmas to blindside me with a 3 page list of reasons we shouldn't be married. We decided to wait until after Christmas and go to marriage counseling and see if we could work things out. I really had no idea our marriage was to the point that he "had been thinking about divorce for a few weeks"..... yeah. He had to work over Christmas so I went home to see family and while I was home he called his mom and apparently told her I was the worse wife in the world. My BIL was the only one that knew ex and I were having issues and when I went to see them the day after Christmas I knew she was acting a bit odd but nothing unusual for her and when she walked out of the room BIL told me that ex had called and she was completely on his side and threw me under the bus. Wow! OK then. I go back to my ex and he informs me he is no longer willing to try marriage counseling because MIL said it was pointless and didn't work anyway. Of course her only experience with counseling was pointless because it is hard to fix a marriage when 1 of the people has NO intention of breaking off the relationships with his mistresses. Yes, plural. She hasn't said a single word to me since the day after Christmas and at first it really hurt me because we were so close I thought the least I deserved was a "sorry you are going through this" text or email. The funny thing is we live on the same road about a mile apart and I still haven't run into her around town. I'm sure that will be super awkward when it finally happens. YAY!!