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March 2013 Moms
laujam31
member
MIL Question
laujam31
member
So my mil and I had a FANTASTIC relationship. Until my dh and I got engaged. She made wedding planning very difficult and things have not been the same since. We have tried to talk things out and we don't fight but things are just VERY different. Now that we are pg, I feel like history is going to repeat itself. Anyone have a really bad wedding planning experience, but when kids came all was well with MIL?
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Re: MIL Question
Good luck.
We are. And he is an amazing liaison between the two of us when *** starts to hit the fan. In the past he has gone to his mom and explained how she was overstepping bounds and offending US. He is always on my side and it's great. But actually what prompted this question id that dh has 2 brothers. An older one who still lives w my in laws and a younger one who just got engaged. MIL has taken a step back with my bil and his new fi. But after all the things that mil put us through during our planning I was a little annoyed that we got the brunt of everything ad now anything they want to do is fine. We were forced to invite family we didnt know and my in laws friends but mil told bil and his fi that they dont have to invite who ever they dont want to. So long story my dh's older brother asked him to go out tonight and kinda flipped on him for still being mad at his parents for our wedding bs.
I understad that she is sorry for how she acted during our planning, but I'm just not hopeful that this apologetic side is going to last when the baby comes. She already started inputting.
I guess I just feel like the *** bc in the end i did stand up to mil and things are shitty now, but my soon to be sil doesnt have to do that and now I look like the botchy bad guy.
Gr. Sorry this turned into a bit of a rant.
Just lay down the shiznit again if she starts getting pushy. YOU are having the baby here and YOU will be raising your child for the most part. While you appreciate her thoughts, you would rather form your own in the matter of children. Don't be disrespectful by any means, but perhaps direct her energy and if she brings up how she bottle fed Joey, say how you really want to get ahold of X breastfeeding book. Things like that... unless she gets super crazy.
Good luck! Oh and if you wanna be awful, don't find out the sex of your baby until birth... it drives people nuts! It is so expected nowadays that when you don't do ultrasounds, people think you're crazy. But really there are no solid studies on the safety of repeated use.
My ILs are great, we clashed sometimes, but I don't think they ever crossed the line.
I'm sorry the situation is causing you such stress right now. If you have truly forgiven her though, why are you still so upset? And it seems she learned her lesson and is trying not to repeat the same mistake with her other children, but that is making you angry? It sounds like you are still holding on to your bad feelings, especially if you BL feels he needs to address it with your DH,
Are you still mourning the loss of the wedding you wanted? I did that with the birth of number 7. She turned footling breach and after 6 vaginal deliveries we had a C-section. I was so upset and it was nearly 6 months before I could look back on my baby's birth without all the anger and disappointment. I'm not sure who I was angry at, the doctor, my body, my baby, but I was angry. I had to remind myself that the most important thing was I got a healthy baby out of it, the same result as my other deliveries, and even though it took me a year to heal from the C-section (long-story) I was truly blessed to bring my baby home when so many other mother's don't get that luxury. You are married, and have a sincerely supportive husband and isn't that what really matters?
So maybe you need to revisit your feelings over the wedding, maybe give your MIL some credit for not repeating her mistakes. Try to move on so the bitterness you feel does not taint the relationship you have with your ILs once you have the baby.
We are pregnant with #1 but the writing is on the wall. DH is an only child so when we got married, things went all sorts of haywire. I honestly think that MIL sees me as the "other woman" in their relationship. It is really unhealthy but DH thankfully sees it for what it is finally and doesn't tolerate her meddling. Doesn't stop her from trying, and in fact the more he pushes her away over it, the harder she tries. Some days, she does her thing and all I can think about is, "lady, some day I'll be the one choosing your long term care facility. Perhaps you could TRY to be nice to me" :-P
We've already had all sorts of unsolicited "advice" from her and I just nod and smile. If anything gets really pushy, I'll probably pull the "well, things have changed since DH was born and we'll be doing what our pediatrician thinks is best" card. If it goes beyond that, we'll have the "our child, our choice" conversation. My best advice is to let your DH deal with her. Present a united front but try your hardest not to fixate on the crazy. It'll just drive you mad.
For us, it got worse at each milestone, engagement, wedding, baby. No joke, MIL expected to retire and take care of DS (without ever having spoken to us about it; in reality, I was staying at home). She went out and bought more baby gear then I have now. When it didn't come to fruition, she showed up daily, cried, and begged for time alone with with DS (which was really kind of creepy). It was/is imperative that DH and I are on the same page and thank goodness we are.
I hope your situation is different and she has learned from prior drama. And when people say she means well and you're lucky, blah, blah, blah, ignore them. It's your life, your family, you need to do what's right for you.
MILs can be very difficult to deal with once a baby is in the picture. I know. I think GENERALLY they mean well (there are some very obvious exceptions of just wretched MILs though). My MIL tends to get on my nerves. She has lots of "advice" and opinions, that I really just don't care to hear. However, with her, I know it's not coming from a malicious place, so I tend to just nod and smile and let it go in one ear and out the other. Once you have a baby, you have so much bigger things to worry about than your MIL commenting that you're swaddling too tight or that you should do this or that. It's just not even worth letting it bother you.
One thing to remember, is that she is your baby's grandma. And again, unless she's a truly awful person that you really don't want in your life, you are going to want your kid to have a good relationship with their grandparents. This is when we have to suck it up and put our own biases aside and just let the MIL do their "grandma thing".
DD was a surprise, so we (I) planned our wedding in under 6 weeks (which we joke now that as crazy as I am we may not have made it through a typical 9 month engagement). MIL never really got a chance to get too involved, though I did the "print your own" invitations in a Wedding.com pack from Micheal's, spent days on end and asked my MIL to help stuff/stamp. So she came over, sat there for hours and helped. My DH got a call that night from his dad asking if he had any issues, or if he was mad or something. Turns out, when I printed the invitations I put my parents name (daughter of) but not his and she was extremely offended, like I did it purposely to show that they don't matter. So I had to redo all of them, spend the money on more invitations, re-print, everything. I was so upset that she sat there and didn't say anything and then went home and got all mad. It was never intentional, I looked up samples online and went with the most common... sorry- got riled up just thinking about it. They were grateful in the end, so whatever.
When DD came around they would give all sorts of unsolicited advice, we would politely listen and do things our way, but then when they would watch her they would do it theirs. In my post-partum craziness I wanted to explode, but at the end of the day putting socks on her (don't ask) isn't a big deal. Though the other day she told DH that we needed to broaden DD's food horizon and make her eat more vegetables and I wanted to come unglued. They have backed off quite a bit since DD is such a good kid, I'm sure they would be a lot more "involved" if they didn't think we were doing a good job with her. Plus, I'm like a dog that pees on stuff, I mark my territory and DH, DD, my house, etc. are MINE....