She is very nice and has a similar sense of humor to my mother, when we are together, we get along like a house on fire.
HOWEVER... she still sticks her nose where it doesn't belong. When I was pregnant, hubby was terrified to tell his mother we were expecting because of how much she harped on how we're not ready, don't have enough money etc etc. Of course, the fact that I am now 40 and that IF we are to have children it can not wait somehow escaped her notice.
Meanwhile, I have a lot of things I could say to her about what I believe she failed to teach her son.
On the one hand, I am glad to be here where she can help and where hubby doesn't feel out of his element. On the other hand, having to depend upon them for things because of language and such has made me (allowed me?) to lose a bit more of my independence than I am truly comfortable with.
believe it or not, this issue --the choice of buying new fridge is another scenario with my MIL (evening the money is out of our pocket) !!!!!!!!!
she strongly (remember ---it's "strongly") believe it's not necessary to buy a fridge of this price and that her whatever brand lasts for 40 years without a single problem. As like what I mentioned, she made a long list of reason and rationale on why I should give up buying an expensive item which perform pretty much same (as she believes) as all others 'reasonable priced' items in market.
I told her off politely in many many trials and and finally with a note which I thought being smart (and ended up proven silly ) to close the conversation. I said "thanks for all the opinions and sharing. I really appreciate that. My husband and I are really keen to take Miele cos we just love it and some of my good friends have also excellent experience with them....." She turns completely upset and said "I had 40 (high pitch when speaking this number) years of experience in Fridge !!!" Shxx. I screwed.
..the story hasn't ended, after she accepted the reality I'm going to pick Miele, she 'helped' to dig into the catalogue and told me, in a helpful and sweet voice that I actually don't need the model I pick, it's too big and using up too much space, blah blah blah....
Luckily enough, she went so far that she ruined my Marriage, made me her ex-daughter-in-law!
Retrospectively thinking, she made me the biggest favor! Now, I have a great man and an angel for a MIL.
I really might want to go by someday and thank her, coz she gave me what I needed to get out of a bad relationship with her son.
you see, nothing in life happens without a reason!
Just keep on looking at the bright side...
So the conclusion is -- you can not beat them, why not join them? After all, she is only trying to be helpful, she speaks from a long experience (a 40-year-old functioning fridge is to be treated with respect in any case) and she wants to help you, among other things, by helping you to save some money.
If at any point you start having real issues with her, talk to your husband and let him sort it out. This is the best piece of advice I got and it has worked for me fine for over a decade.
seriously, my husband doesn't side with her but of course he kind of accepts the way she is. I'm actually glad that my husband thinks the same way as me most of the time. My strategy is ....the less she knows the better, the less we see each other the better. I know it might be a bit negative to see this way but I don't think i could ever change her, neither do I want to change in order to just please her but suffering myself. At the moment, we see each other like 5-6 times a year, each of which is less than a week and I would say it's fairly at max...
Wow, you're really having a strong mind to stand firm on this especially when your MIL threw all the tears and scream to you. I hope it didn't drag into a fight between you and your husband as a result of this....
We both stand side to side on that. His parents tried many time to convince me (they knew if I was going on their side, their son will fallow.) And the also tried to talk to him. Most of it, I learned it much later. He didn't want to stress me with this fight during the pregnancy.
I love my M-I-L. She loves me too. She threats me like a daugther and I am lucky to have a great family. She is control freak, but we are able to not get to much in to it. Thank God, we live enough far, that's help!
At least this is what i do with my OWN mum! Otherwise it is impossible to get along with her
And you are female with children
Where I run into trouble is that I don't feel like my MIL is willing to meet me part way, I wouldn't dream of thinking that she should meet me halfway. But, after being apart for them for a few years, I can say things have gotten better. I'm not sure if it's her or if I'm just better able to let things slide off my back and not be so affected by them now that we don't live as close. Most likely, it's a combination of the two.
It's been interesting to see my husband's siblings marry and how my in-laws react/interact with the other daughter-in-law and son-in-law. We paved the way for them, I must say.
As much as my own mom drives me nuts at times, as someone else said, I am able to better reason with her than my MIL.
it's very often to heard about comparison and jealousy among women than men. It's just the women's nature. Men always said we're complicated. Right?
Do you remember what you did when dealing with 2 complicated things at work or in life last time? First thing to do is to handle it separately and try to avoid getting it to mix up. So here it goes the answer. The further apart the better.
Sorry, but you really don't know what you are talking about. Actually even females without children have no idea, and I know that from experience. Even the women on here are perpetuating this wicked MIL nonsense. It's just human nature to care about the human being you have had in your womb, brought into the world and cared for. It's simply not easy (depending on the relationship) to let go when the time comes. It's just one of the challenges of being a parent. I too will have to hand two sons over (hopefully) and I hope I will have the sense to stand back and let them live their lives. But there is no guarentee I'm going to actually get on with their partners, just because my son loves them. Both my children have been failed in one way or another by their grandmothers and I don't intend to do the same. I can't see why EF members are trailing through threads that they have no knowledge or experience of then complaining about the state of things.