Let's Talk About In-Laws

mrs_tacos

Tell me the good, the bad, and the ugly. Do you love them, hate them, or fall somewhere in between? How have the reacted to the news of this pregnancy, if you've even told them yet? If our bitchfest, twatwaffle, and FFFC threads are any indication, I feel like we have some crazy stories lurking out there, and I want to hear them! 

hatrats

Haha good thread. It sounds like we have some winning in-laws in our group. I'm very thankful that I don't have many complaints at all about mine, especially since they only live about 5 minutes from us. My biggest complaint is MIL will occasionally just show up unannounced at our house to "drop off" something or whatever. Um, no. If my house is messy or I'm in my pajamas, guess what? Not answering the door. Don't care how obvious it is that I'm home.

Inanigloo

A whole boatload of craziness with my inlaws but they seem to be calming down after 11 years finally. We've moved half way around the world once to get away from them if that indicates my feelings towards them in general. 

They've reacted pretty good to news though. Excited. Though my father in law almost outted us to our daughter the other day. Thank goodness she doesn't listen to anyone. And mother in law just feels its her right to share the news with anyone and everyone despite us wanting to keep it quiet. But it could be worse. 

Becky012016

That meme is hilarious! 

Parent in-laws are decent. Brothers in law on the hand are craptastic. Older BIL hasn't even acknowledged DS exists so we won't be telling him at all about this pregnancy. He can just get pissed off finding out through the grape vine. Younger BIL is ok. He doesn't acknowledge that I'm his SIL but at least he occasionally asks about DS and sent him a Christmas present. YBIL has also been engaged for over 2 years and finally set a wedding date with 5 months notice (its a destination wedding for everyone but them). DH ended up telling him about this pregnancy and that we most likely wouldn't be able to travel for the wedding and his response was, "well I guess you can't do anything about the pregnancy now, can you?" NOPE, sure can't and now it's awkward around the extended in laws because they see it as us "skipping" the wedding instead of not actually being able to travel that far that late. 

lap018

As most of you know they reacted to the news by throwing a huge pity party about how she "cannot let the hurt and pain of the last 10 years go" and how "she cries all the time thinking about the person DH used to be" and "her whole world is not right when they are not right" lovely. Then we told her the gender with a reveal picture that we texted to all of the grandparents and her response to DH was "oh great another important grandparent announcement sent via text, course with us we should be happy to know anything at all" DH texted her the pregnancy announcement pic because she told me they were just too busy for us to stop by the three days I tried to plan out with her and that maybe next weekend would work. Then she sent DH a text about how she knows he's too busy hanging out with his dad (his mom and dad are not together) and not her blah blah. The issue is that I am the one who texted her the gender reveal photo and to me she was all fake nice about trying to ask me in a round about way if we were having a party without her .... ??? She's so narcissistic it's insane. Every time we have a big life change go on she throws a temper tantrum and guilt trips DH to kingdom come 

mrs_tacos

Since this was my idea, I'll start us off.  

I fall somewhere in-between with my in-laws- I don't hate them, but the love is strained at times. My mil especially just has some issues that make every visit interesting. You're just never sure what weird thing she's going to pull out of her hat this time. For the first several years of our marriage our relationship was strained- they didn't really approve of me, but instead of ever having an adult conversation with DH, they just get oddly passive aggressive. Things have been better the last several years, but that's mostly because DH and I have set our limits, learned our boundaries, don't give in to or feed into the nonsense, and they have finally realized that I am not the devil incarnate come to steal their son's soul. (They are extremely conservative- women don't work outside the home unless they absolutely have to; they wear skirts and dressed to the knee or lower; no birth control; women live under their father's roof until they get married- i.e.: no going away to college; etc. etc.)

They've been mostly great about this pregnancy. We told them on Valentine's Day, and they were all very excited, my mil cried, it was nice. But since then they have said little things along the lines of "Of course we're excited, but Amanda's parent's must be more excited, since it's their daughter who's pregnant." ...As in, a daughter's children are more exciting than a son's children? They know about our losses and our struggles TTC, and they know this might be their son's only biological child. I know this isn't their first grandchild- they'll have two others by the time this LO comes around, but still. It's his only child. You could at least try to pretend you'll love our kids as much as you love his sister's kids. (Not that this should shock me, his oldest sister is easily the favorite kid, but still. )

hatrats

@Inanigloo oh yes MIL went ahead and told her entire side of the family last time after we told her we were only telling immediate families at that time (I was only 10w). This time I want to wait until after 1st tri screening, in part bc I know she won't keep her mouth shut. She told me about DHs cousins wife being pregnant when she must have been like 6 or 7 weeks (about the same as me at the time). I seriously doubt we are supposed to know. They still haven't told us. It's going to be a bit awkward telling her so much later after discussing the cousins pregnancy multiple times and me not bringing mine up.

Inanigloo

@lap018 Ugh. She sounds wonderful.

DaphneMoon1

My ILs mean well, but my MIL drives me crazy. She makes constant jabs at me. As soon as she walks in our house she starts cleaning, no matter how clean our house is. I ask her not to every time she is here but that doesn't matter. She's done my laundry, reorganized my closets, and the last time she was here she cleaned out my garage. It's so annoying. 

Im pregnant with twins and this will be 3 and 4 for us. She's been nothing but negative. Most of her comments have been "good luck" or "I'll pray for you" with a smirk. 

Becky012016

@lap018 your MIL sounds like DHs aunt. I feel for you. Those types of personalities are so hard to deal with. 

@amandarene112; that really sucks your in laws have a clear favorite child. Hopefully they get more excited for your DH as we get closer to September! 

mrsmarygs

My in-laws are amazing! I moved down to Florida for college where I met DH. His parents live in the same town, so we spent many many weekends with them. Their house basically became my second home, where I would do laundry, graze the refrigerator and nap on their couch. I even lived with them for 3 days when I was sick with mono and could barely move.
MIL and SIL helped me with all my wedding planning and bridal shower since my mom and sisters were states away. And once we got married, we rented out the apartment that's right next to their house. 
The only negative thing I have to say is once my SIL (DH's brother's wife) blew up at DH for "disciplining" her son (he was literally trying to stop the kid from climbing up the bookshelf), and said some pretty hurtful things. The worst of which was that her "hell" was worse than ours and we had nothing to complain about. DH had just lost his job and been looking for work for two months, while she and her H had lost a business and gone bankrupt. Granted, she had three kids and we didn't have any at the time, but we had our share of problems and stress. And we aren't allowed to complain? Ugh, still gets me mad at times when I think back on it.
We've smoothed things over since, but there were some awkward birthday parties and family dinners for awhile.

sugarrush

I mainly like my MIL/FIL.  However there have been moments where I mouthed "wtf??"... like when I said I wanted to have our wedding at Caesars in Vegas, MIL said she didn't feel comfortable flying that long.  Two weeks later I hear that MIL, FIL, BIL and his girlfriend decided to plan a trip to Arizona two weeks after the proposed date I wanted to get married in Vegas.  My MIL eventually apologized, blaming FIL not telling her...  eye rolls.  Otherwise, I like her a lot and I think thats because we think the same.

MyNamesTaken

Mine are pretty good. I get along fine but don't have much in common with FIL to talk about. MIL passed away before DH and I got together. I get along fairly well with his siblings.

Haven't told them about this pregnancy but should be fine! Last time we told FIL and he said congrats and then started on some totally random story. It was weird

kelseyrayay

I love my inlaws! They are very nice! They feed me on Saturdays so I can't complain lol in my last bmb they decided to buy a private island and ship all the terrible in laws there. lol I see some of you need a inlaws island 

mrs_tacos

@lap018 she sounds like a piece of work. My mil isn't narcissistic per say, she's just pretty controlling in ways that I think have a similar emotional impact. I think she has a lot of issues from her childhood, and with men, that she's never worked through. I don't think she's ever known what to do with a son, so the opposite of being clingy to DH, she doesn't seem to know how to get close to him at all. But there's always some guilting mechanism hidden in there, something that communicates to DH that they're not close and it's his fault. Which is ridiculous and not true, but whatever. You pick your battles.

mercury94

MIL is awesome. She cried when we told her and was basically jumping up and down excited. DH's step-dad can be an annoyance. We used to live in a house he owns and bought a house because he was trying to use that to control us (even though we were basically paying market rent). He would just show up unannounced and get mad because he didn't like the way the house/yard looked. Also, he refused to fix anything. I'm pretty sure he's still mad at me for buying a house.

He also treats his dogs like they are more important than his family/kids. I love my dogs, but they are dogs, not children. He can't go anywhere around 7 at night because he has to feed the dogs (it's a whole thing with a bunch of different kinds of food, some made from scratch).

mrs_tacos

@mrsmgsee Don't you hate that? Life is not a pain olympics, one person's stress or pain does not invalidate someone else's! 

@Becky012016 It's especially sad because they have five kids, and the other kids all know they can't really live up to her. It's not her fault at all, she's lovely, and I think it makes her uncomfortable. 

mrsmarygs

@bridge-and-wall I truly do not understand people that treat their dogs better than they would treat kids. Yes a dog can be a friend and a comfort and what not...but it's an animal at the end of the day. 

HollyGolightly09

Oh goody! lol 

I want to preface this by saying that my MIL really is a nice person. She is very kind, and when it comes down to it I know she would do anything for me if I asked. 

Now, lets get to all the reasons she drives me 100% crazy. 
She is sooooo narrow minded. Not only are people of different religions wrong, but people that go to different types of churches within the same religion are wrong. She has turned DH completely against church/religion of any kind because it is always so black and white with her. He spent most of his life feeling guilty for almost everything. She knows absolutely nothing about politics, but will blindly support and defend any candidate her preacher supports. Even if you ask her why she likes that person, her answer it always "I have prayed about it and that is what I feel is best." 

She loves to have something wrong with her. Granted, she does have legitimate health issues, but she almost seems to enjoy having those things wrong. She likes to have people feel sorry for her, to the point that she flat out refuses a treatment that the Dr has told her for years is the only way to really fix one of her biggest health issues. 

She thinks everything is her business and that she should have a say in everything. For instance, she was mad at DH and I because she wanted a certain line to be in our wedding vows, and it wasn't. ETA- (trigger warning) She also started calling people I don't even know after my pregnancy loss in the fall, after she knew we specifically hadn't told people about the pregnancy in case something went wrong. Then, got mad when DH asked her to please stop.

ETA- how can I forget the constant recipe sending? She has sent me 37 recipe videos on Facebook messenger since Christmas. Not sure if she thinks her son is being starved or what. I've told her in as many subtle ways as possible that seeing uncooked food makes my stomach turn. 

lap018

@amandarene112 so much yes! They don't know how to be mothers to adult sons! They are expecting the kind of details and closeness that they had when their sons were unattached and were living at home! Like I'm sorry but some things now are none of your business! I'm sure being a friend/parent to an adult child is difficult in a way because you have to let them make their own decisions, not be intrusive, and still be a friend when they need one but telling them that they're the reason you are always crying and expecting a daily phone call spilling all of the details about his married life with a son and a little girl on the way is just not how to do it! I have begged her to start a yearly trip somewhere not too far away for her and DH to go on (every year my dad and brother and me go to gatlinburg tn about 2 hours away and it is so much fun! I have tried a thousand times for her to adopt something like this with DH but that's not what she wants) she wants him to come see her every day, call her every day, us to bring our son over to her house all the time (like you have no toys or baby proofing at all why don't you come over to our house??) she wants it to be like when he still lived with her and she needs to grasp reality. I mean it's getting ridiculous. They now haven't talked in forever and she just grows more bitter by the second. And I'm like just schedule a "date" with him or something a movie, dinner, an activity of any kind.... something! All she does is send him text messages that guilt him or piss him off. And he's like why would I want to be around that? I try telling her too that when he's at work I don't even get a text back usually! He's so busy! He works for a very large cell phone carrier, and so his day is packed full, and she gets all buttt hurt bevuse he doesn't respond to her every question comment concern or whim. Oh well she's the one dividing their relationship not DH

Souptin

My MIl and I have had our issues, our biggest hurdle is my family often gets forgotten compared to my hubs other two sisters and their families. She very much favours them and their kids over us and ours. I am a grownup I can deal with it just fine but I worry about my son and this baby when they are old enough to notice it for themselves.

mrs_tacos

@lap018 I can't even imagine living that close to someone like that. We're moving in May, and we'll only be three hours away from them then. Somethings about it will be nice, but you know the burden will always be on us to visit, and they'll probably expect us to go up at least monthly. I adore my fil and sils, my niece, and I know I'll love our new nephew. But on a train or renting a car once a month with an infant may not happen, and I hope she can deal with that. I'm sure it will somehow lead to comparisons between our and sil's parenting, but whatever. (Oh, she also refers to it as "babysitting" when a dad takes care of his child. Because babies and kids are for moms, dad's are just there for providing money and fun.)

MadisonInspires

To be honest, my biggest hurdle is my own mother. My SO's mother is a total joy. She really wants to be active in LO's life, and is already buying diapers. 
My mother, on the other hand, is a mess. She's bipolar and munchausen by proxy. I spent 3 weeks trying to get with her to tell her the news and she just bailed on me on Sunday 20 minutes before we were supposed to be meeting for lunch. I'm going to have to tell her over text since I'm announcing on friday, and I know it's going to start a mess. I almost hope it does that way I can just have a valid reason to cut her out. But I hope sometimes she'll still be a decent human. My bonus mom (step mom) is wonderful, thank goodness. It just sucks to deal with sometimes. My mom blocked me on Facebook and didn't talk to me for years. She just recently tried contacting me again. She got her whole side of the family to think I'm some vile monster. It's just disappointing to know how much of a family LO is going to miss out on. But, at least I have a perfect example of who not to be as a mother. 
So I guess it's not my in-laws, it's my poor man's in-laws that I feel so bad for him having to deal with. Lol. 

SuperKristy85

I'll start my saying that I love my in laws. But let me tell you two stories that sum up how odd my MIL is...

My husband and I live in TX and he is from LA where all of his family still is. About 5 or 6 months into us dating I surprised him with tickets to an LSU home football game (where he went to college). This was the first time I ever met his family. We are at his sisters house sitting on the couch with me on the end, my husband in the middle and his sister on the other end. As soon as his mom arrives, she runs in, squeezes herself in between my husband and his sister and then proceeds to hold his hand the entire time we are there. This weirded me out so much I had to go to the "bathroom" to call my best friend and ask how I can get the hell out of that situation. (I really almost broke up with him over this). On another occasion maybe a year or so into our relationship we were in town again for a visit and were about to leave his mom's house. We had our suitcases by the door and my husband ran to the restroom before leaving. When he came out, she asked if he wanted help carrying the suitcases because he had just done so much heavy lifting the bathroom. When I didnt laugh at her  joke... she felt the need to explain to me that she was joking about how big his penis was. ummmmm yup, I got that just really wanted to ignore it. 

My husband is very much the baby of his family and they could not be more excited for our first child. I'm just very glad they get to love us from a distance because I cant even imagine what it would be like if we were in the same state... 

Oh and they are going to flip when I make my hubby tell them we will not be making that drive to see them for christmas with a 3 month old. Just not gonna happen.... 

lap018

@SuperKristy85 ummmm ew 

HollyGolightly09

lap018 said:

@SuperKristy85 ummmm ew 

Yes. Ewww.

mrsmarygs

@SuperKristy85 Ummm wow... just wow...

mrs_tacos

@SuperKristy85 That's so...just...wow... You win. If I could photoshop, I'd make you a "Most embarrassing MIL story" badge. 

 

beccam1230

Haha!! I love this one. 
I've complained before, but my MIL is a freakin piece of work. Honestly, my FIL is a pretty nice guy. He goes along with her because I'm sure it just makes life easier! So I really don't blame him for much of this. She's always thought of our relationship as a competition, she always told my husband that she's a better cook and a great mom and blah blah.. stuff like that. Once he told her I'm a great cook (she didn't know I was there) and she immediately came back with "well I'm a much better cook". Ok lady, whatever. Not here to compete. Basically the whole relationship is like this. She was giving me dirty looks the entire time I was talking to my FIL at a family get together last spring. Really? She really doesn't like it when I talk to him. It's really weird. 
Back to when we got married, she was somewhat involved, I let her know colors and she talked to my mom about what she was wearing, etc. My mom wore a really pretty black and ivory dress. My MIL freaking shows up to my ceremony wearing a super glittery extremely revealing bright red dress. Ugh.
They have seen our son twice, only when we were willing to travel to see them. I've said this before, but they get free flights. They can literally pack a bag and get on whatever flight they choose. We first visited when our son was 6 weeks old. We had to pack insane amounts of things. I was soooooo pissed.. even at DH, because he should have said no. I tried to get out of it, but by then, his sister was at his parents house because she wanted to see our son. Then last summer when they were RVing across the country, their last stop was to see us. Finally. Then the day before they got here, after I had been working hard to get everything in order, preparing their room, planning a menu, grocery shopping- they called and said they weren't coming because there were storms in the area, and they didn't want to damage their RV. These were not tornados or severe storms, just a couple regular thunderstorms. It was an excuse. I really think she doesn't like me, I don't care.. I don't know why but I'm not losing sleep. But DH is upset they don't make the effort to see us, ever. We bought a new home when I was pregnant with our son and they've never seen it. That upsets him too. 
This pregnancy, oh this one got a weird reception. We called and she wasn't home, but FIL was so DH decided to tell him first, and he was so excited for us! Everything you would expect a parent to say when you tell them. But when she got home, he handed her the phone and her response? "Oh, congratulations." Uh.. thanks. That was when I was 4 weeks. Now I'm 11 and haven't heard anything.. at all. Not a call, not a text, nothing! She doesn't even answer DH. I really don't get it.

SuperKristy85

I know!!!!! This is my life yall!

lap018

@beccam1230 your and my mother in laws sound so similar! Mine walked into the guest house I was getting ready for my wedding in and said "(insert DH name here) has been in the fetal position all morning on the bed saying he can't do this" ............ da fuq? Later I asked him about it and he said it was about being in front of so many people not about marrying me. Like what a bish! And the competition thing! I make this blueberry pie for my DH that he loves! And once she made a strawberry version of it and said that if he didn't like it better she would be crushed.... like what?? Who gives a riff?

mercury94

Wow. I think I will never complain about my in-law situation again. I do have some good stories about my mom and my brother's MIL, but my in-law complaints cannot compare. I'm so sorry, ladies. 

mrs_tacos

@beccam1230 @lap018 My mil didn't communicate with us at all for four months before the wedding. We weren't even sure she had a dress for the wedding until the day of. Then when I finally saw her, she looked me up and down and said I looked "lovely" in the stiffest voice. (My dress was form fitting and strapless- not her cup of tea.) And they almost didn't come to the reception because there would be dancing. (It was an afternoon wedding- there was a first dance, a father daughter dance, and a dance for all married couples. Nothing crazy.)  I just don't get these women. If I ever have a son, I'm going to go out of my way to be kind to whoever he marries. Joining a new family is weird enough without having to navigate all this mess.

missyrosek

My SIL and her husband are super close to us (emotionally. We wish they were physically closer than an hour away), she's known about the LO for a couple of weeks and is really supportive and excited for us.

My husband's mom won't know until the minute before we're ready to announce it to the world because she can't keep a secret. I love her to death, but we learned with our nephew that she just isn't all that interested in grandkids. She loves him, but she's just too involved in her own life to be bothered with the details. Luckily for all of us, she takes long trips (four months at a time) to see her siblings overseas. It gives us all a needed break, especially my SIL since her mom lives with them.

wannabeamongoose

hatrats said:

Haha good thread. It sounds like we have some winning in-laws in our group. I'm very thankful that I don't have many complaints at all about mine, especially since they only live about 5 minutes from us. My biggest complaint is MIL will occasionally just show up unannounced at our house to "drop off" something or whatever. Um, no. If my house is messy or I'm in my pajamas, guess what? Not answering the door. Don't care how obvious it is that I'm home.

MIL has keys to our house so she will literally just come in if we don't answer. One day DH was home sick and she assumed we weren't home so she just came in without knocking or anything. He heard her in the living room and came out of the bedroom wielding a golf iron thinking we had an intruder. There's a tiny part of me that kind of wished for just a moment that he would have cracked her over the head. Would have served her right. I would never walk into her home uninvited and unannounced. Who does that?

DaphneMoon1 said:
My ILs mean well, but my MIL drives me crazy. She makes constant jabs at me. As soon as she walks in our house she starts cleaning, no matter how clean our house is. I ask her not to every time she is here but that doesn't matter. She's done my laundry, reorganized my closets, and the last time she was here she cleaned out my garage. It's so annoying. 

MIL constantly does my laundry, the dishes, sweeps, cleans the bathroom even. On the one hand I super appreciate the help. On the other hand I can't help but think she disapproves of my housekeeping. She's never tried to reorganize but I think that's because she was telling a story about how rude SIL was after she reorganized SIL's kitchen and I looked her straight in the eye and said "I don't blame her for being rude. It takes a lot of nerve to reorganize someone else's house."

But mostly MIL is great - everything little annoying thing she does at least comes from a good place. She just doesn't have the best common sense or boundaries.

wyomama0427

So DH's parents split when he was 8 or 9, I can't remember exactly. Maybe 7...? Ugh I can't remember. DH's dad cheated on DH's mom a LOT and was emotionally abusive.. when they split he proceeded to tell DH that his mom left them to "go walk with the devil"... Not joking. DH remembers his dad always trying to turn him against his mom. So fast forward, DH ran away from his dad at 16 because he was emotionally abusive to DH as well. Refused to let him see or even call his mom, broke his phone, refused to let him go to work. So when DHs dad went to the gym DH ran away to go see his mom and because of the custody agreement he had to stay or she would have been charged with kidnapping.
Fast forward to present day...
DHs dad still can't let go of what happened so we haven't seen him since DS was two or three days old. DS is now almost 14 months. Doesn't call or text or try to see us, but he calls DHs sister every week. Ugh. At our wedding he showed up looking like a bum. When we did the sand ceremony it we decided to surprise our parents and invite them up to do it with us. None of the parents were told in advance because it was a surprise! DH's dad comes up super late and snaps at DH "I wish you could tell me about these things in advance." If looks could kill I would have killed that MFer dead right there. DH tries to act like it doesn't bother him but every now and again he'll say something like "I just don't get it, Easton could never do anything that would make me love him any less..." Now that he's a father, I think it hurts him even more. One day when I'm further along and have a noticeable belly (I seem to be able to get away with more when I'm noticeable pregnant lol) I'm going to drive over to the town dbag dad lives in and invite him to lunch just me and him, and lay everything out for him. And he gets to decide if he's in or out. In meaning you make an effing effort to be present in your son and grandsons lives or you stay the hell away for good. Because DH can't handle anymore of the wishy washy bullshit. And I'm not putting DS and this baby through that either. Why does my grandpa love my cousins more than me? Nope.

My MIL and her husband, DHs stepdad, are AMAZING. We used to live about 45 minutes away from them and they always had us over for dinner and holiday parties. So awesome. DH was kind of a mamas boy and when we were dating he would always text her and ask her opinion on our newest fight or something. She always had my back! She would tell him if he was being stupid and stuff. She's great. Seriously love them to pieces and I'm so sad they moved to New York. The last time DH and I saw them before they moved I had to drive him home because he just laid on the truck seat and sobbed. It broke my heart. He finally reconnected with his mom and she moves but she had an amazing amazing job opportunity that she's worked so hard for. When she and dbag got divorced he took everything, including custody, and left her sleeping on a friends floor. So she way deserves this because she's worked so hard to build herself back up. Hopefully one day when she finishes school they'll come back, but I'm not expecting them to any time soon. 
My SIL, DHs sister, is a royal C U Next Thursday. I can't stand her. She's to mean to DH, and her husband is a big ol POS Dbag too. Seriously. They're just.... ugh. Not great people. Pretty sure her husband was hitting on me one thanksgiving. It was uncomfortable. 
His grandparents live in the same town we do, literally I could walk to their house in five minutes, but they're his dads parents so we don't hear from them almost ever either. 
Sorry that got so long. I get heated talking about DHs dad lol. 

mrsmarygs

Lizlann said:

*snip*
MIL has keys to our house so she will literally just come in if we don't answer. One day DH was home sick and she assumed we weren't home so she just came in without knocking or anything. He heard her in the living room and came out of the bedroom wielding a golf iron thinking we had an intruder. There's a tiny part of me that kind of wished for just a moment that he would have cracked her over the head. Would have served her right. I would never walk into her home uninvited and unannounced. Who does that?

Actually me.  MIL gets mad if I knock, so most of the time I let myself in and then yell "hello" so she knows I'm there. She tells me to treat her home as if it was my home. 

@daniellelynette  I'm sorry about your FIL, but I'm glad you have an amazing MIL!

jessieR358

I used to be much closer to my inlaws but the more time has passed the more they annoy me. 
last pregnancy my MIL called very single day and would tell me how awful her pregnancies and labors were. When DS came she did nothing at our house. She called us on our way home from the hospital and asked about lunch. I was pretty annoyed with her after that. She tells me the same things over and over again about her job and family issues. It just gets annoying. I quit calling her because she would never let me get a word in. My DH gets upset and says I don't try but I just don't really care honestly. I don't need to talk to her daily. She is not my mother.
Now my real beef comes with my youngest BIL. He is my least favorite and when DS was born I refused to sign our will until he and his wife were taken off as guardians. My brother died unexpextedly 6 months ago and I didn't hear a word from that BIL or SIL. No I'm sorry, how are you or anything. Didn't come to the funeral, send a card, nada. I was about done. Fast forward a month and I asked for our wedding video that he filmed (this was like the 10th time I had asked) because my brother was on the video and I wanted it. He casually tells me he lost it and will see if he can find it. Again, no remorse or anything. I haven't spoken to him since so family gatherings are awkward, but i don't think I'll ever forgive him. We have a vacation in Florida with my inlaws and I'm dreading spending a week with my BIL and SIL. Oh they also have not acknowledged this pregnancy. 

parker0706

For the most part my in-laws are awesome. We've had a few hiccups here and there, i.e. I made it very clear that I wouldn't cut DD's hair until she was at least a year old (southern tradition thing and they're not southern lol) and DD went to stay with them for a weekend at around 14 months, long story short I came home to my baby with chopped off bowl cut bangs and a massive cut on her face (according to them she fell and cut her face, not sure how, but it was because she couldn't see from her bangs even though I sent hair bands to pull her hair back!) It literally took everything I had to not cuss them out and I just had to walk away sobbing. 

I will say that they treat me like a daughter and like me a lot more than my SIL because I let them be involved in our lives. They only live 45 minutes away but will come in an instant to babysit if we need them too or whatever but don't barge in whenever they want.

beccam1230

@lap018 Oh jeez!! That was so sweet of her... nothing like seriously stressing the bride out right before the ceremony. It sounds like she was just trying to create unnecessary drama. Ahh.. the pie, it just sounds so familiar! I really don't get it. Shouldn't she just be happy that you make him happy?! 

@amandarene112 that's unbelievable! I would have said something back, like "well it's a good thing I didn't ask for your opinion about my dress!" And heaven forbid you have dancing at your wedding. How unusual. Haha, I've never heard of anyone having an issue with a wedding reception because there would be dancing. Especially not parents of the bride or groom.
I completely agree with you, ever since we knew we were having a boy the first time, I have always told myself that I will go out of my way to make whoever he marries or brings home to meet us, feel comfortable and at home. There's no reason to create drama and competition! Just as long as my son is happy, I am too.

smashlie-2

I have a love hate relationship with my in laws. So, they are both lovely when they are not together for the most part. But together they are super passive aggressive towards each other and well us, it's awkward as hell. They are very negative in general. They complain about little things. Just stupid things. Like the waitress isn't fast enough to bring us our water, or they messed up something small in our order. Instead of having something fixed and moving on they dwell on it. It's to the point where it's not enjoyable to be around them for extended periods of time. My mother in law likes to play the victim. She will say things out of the blue with no instigation like "Oh you guys probably hate when I make this don't you? (referring to food....and she will repeat herself until you deny it)." Or... "I will just shut up you guys probably hate listening to me talk"...I am talking OUT OF THE BLUE. We will all be enjoying ourselves and it's like she has to put herself in some sort of victim situation where we should all stop and feel sorry for her. I don't play into it. My husband doesn't either anymore. In fact he's gotten to the point where if they say or do something uncalled for he will call them out on the spot. He is very blunt, and he doesn't mind telling you like it is.
My father in law will make inappropriate "jokes" or "comments" on FB posts that I will comment on. Like a friend of a friend who made their post public instead of private, he has to comment on it. Doesn't know these people! I finally told him if he didn't stop I was going to block him from seeing my posts. He apologized and quit. He thinks he's funny and I know he doesn't mean any harm by it, but these things are not appropriate and certain people will and do take offense by it! But at the end of the day, they love us. They seem to be pretty happy about the LO on the way. They are hoping for a granddaughter. They don't have any yet. Their other child, my SIL has 4 boys, and we have one boy. My SIL has a similar relationship to her parents that we do. Distant but close. We don't live near them so that helps. I will say this though, I feel emotionally closer to them than I do my dad and stepmom. While I was close to them in my later teenage years they have made zero effort to keep in touch with us and stay close after we got married and moved away. Despite the fact that they stay in close touch with my two step sisters and little brother.