Topic : Getting Along With Your In-Laws

Hope you don't mind me suggesting a compromise that will respect your ILs right to serve alcohol in their home, respect your wishes as a mom and would also be in the best interest of the relationship between you and your ILs.  Have a talk with your MIL... tell her you realize it's her home, but this is a "first" for you too and you've been looking forward to planning and hosting the party yourself.  Tell her it would really mean a lot to you if they could hold off on the alcohol until after everyone has eaten and the baby has had his cake and presents... since it will only be a couple of hours until they can begin their adult drinks.  Tell her you'll pick up the beverages you'll be serving when you purchase the food... and you'd like her to just relax and enjoy herself before and during the event.  If she wants to debate it... don't, just ask her to "please understand".  This way you all have what you want and there's no resentments.  Then when the drinking begins, you can take your son and leave.    Good luck.     

I have never had to work at a relationship as hard as this in my life, and it seems like the more I try the worse it gets. To make a LONG story short. I have been married to my husband for 5 years, we have 2 children together and I have a son from a previous relationship. My husband is the youngest of 5 and I will say the most successfull as well. We live Very well, while the rest of the family gets by. And the reason I am including this is to explain the differences between myself and my sister in law. My husband's brother which is older has been married 2 times before this last marriage that took place 2 years ago. His past marriages ended due to him cheating on his first wife and left her for his second wife and then basically bankrupting himself is the cause for the 2 wife leaving him. He meet his 3 wife with in about of month of being separated from his 2 wife, and she too was still married and going threw a divorce. He started this 3 marriage with NOTHING and when I say nothing, I  mean nothing. My husband owned the truck he was driving, and was also his employer. He did not own a house, he lived with my husband and myself for awhile, and he had maybe 2 suitcases full of clothes.

So anyways on to the sister in law, we had always gotten along during the first year, we would go shopping, go out, talk on the phone, the normal things that girls do when they are pretty much family. Then when my husband and I announced that we were having our 2nd child together, I started to notice a little bit of jealousy from her, not knowing at the time that they had been to doctors and she had been trying to get pregnant. So we announce that we were pregnant, about 2 weeks later they get engaged, after 2.5 years of living together, and then about 2 weeks later announce that they were pregnant as well, even though my brother in law was told that he had a 1% chance of ever conciving. So know it is time for there wedding and there has been ALOT of tension between myself and my future SIL, my husband has always been one to ignore and I am one to not ignore anything that bothers me, but I did in this case cause everyone that would have been bothered by myself pointing out the problems would be my in laws. At the wedding I am told by the lady cordinating the wedding that my SIL told her that we did not get along and that I was not to be in any of the Family pictures, so I wasn't, I was treated like crap by her family at the reception, I at this time am about 6 months pregnant and no one from her family would allow me to sit at there tables, everyone said that the seat was taken. Now mind you this was a very smaill wedding about 40 people, so the odds of someone not knowing who I was to her was slim. So I left the wedding in tears cause at this time I did not know of any problems, just felt tension. Time goes by, they move to 3 acres that my husband and I sold them (The BIGGEST mistake We have ever made). We live on a lake and have a bunch of land, and they did not have the resources to buy a place so we sold them land to build a house on. Everything is just ok not great. And in april of 2003, one day I turn on my computer and there was an email in my inbox, sent from an annymous sender and it is my SIL bashing me to a friend of her's. and the things that were in this email were lies, not a single thing was true, basically saying that I have a money spending problem, I have a nanny for my kids becasue I can't handle them, talking about my husband business, and lots of other things. Well I immeditely call my husband and was crying, well he wanted to ignore it, because he has the attitude that he doesn't care what people think of him, but I had a hard time doing that cause they were lies and this was my famliy and the day she sent that email she had me over to her house to give me some presents and have dinner.

So anyway a month goes by before I convince my husband to talk to his brother and they talk and his brother says that he will handle it, well she sends me an  email about 2 days later trying to explain why she said those things, Never once appoligizing. We all sit down at my house and talk it out, she promises me that she would never talk about me again, and that she was onlying saying those things because someone lied to her about something I supposedly said.

We try to do things together again, and I just couldn't feel comfortable around her, and I think vice versa. 

So about 5 monthe later, my husband see's her at a local park one day with a another guy that was not her husband and it seemed to look intimate. So my husband comes home and is asking me what he should do? I tell him that we have no proof of anything and that this would only make his brother mad at us. Which I will say, his brother is a very private person and would lie to anyone to make his life look perfect, and tells no one about any of his problems. So I suggest that my husband try to get into her email address and see what is in there, (which i know is wrong, but it was all we could do, and most people that I have talked to said that they would have done it as well) well about a week later he was able to do this, and found in this email account that she was indeed seeing/talking to another guy. So my husband told me that he will continue to look in her email to see where she was going to meet this guy and the next time she did it, make sure he could get the proof and his brother there too. Well it took about 8 months for her to meet this guy again, well in the mean time we are watching her emails and seeing everything written betweent my SIL and the other man, lots of personal things, lots of orders for prescription pain pills being orderes off the internent,  and lots of lies and attacks on myself and my famliy. We are printing off everything that we could, and in the mean time We took a famly trip to Mexico with her, lots of camping trips, dinners at my house, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and having to be nice to her knowing what she was doing behind her husbands back, and remember that she lives on a piece of separated property to my place, so we see each other just about every day and she is able to act like nothing is wrong between us and I hear that she is saying things, and I catch her looking at me, or my kids and rolling her eyse at us. 

So anyways the day is here she is meeting this secret friend of hers at a bar about 30 minutes away from her house,  My husband and I rent a truck and have my parents follow her, we have 2 friends sitting in the bar waiting for her to walk in, so that they coluld take pictures with there camera phones. I am actually having surgery that day, so I  am missing out on all the catching her. But my husband receives a phone call that she has arrived, and that they guy is there holding hands with her, so now my husband calls his brother, her husband and tells him that she is there. His brother says " No that couldn't be her!" , and that he isn't worried about it. Well he called her immediately, cause our friends that were on the inside said that she was on the phone screamimg at him denying that she was where she was being accused of being, well anyways make another long story short. We hold off on telling his brother everything that we know, hopeing that she would do it, and that they would work it out on there own. We just wanted her to get caught and stop. Well she lied threw her teeth to him saying that it was not her and he believed her. Well we wait about a week and I called and told him where all the emails were between her and this guy and that he needed to read them. Well he called me back about 3 hours later, livid at me and my husband, he was mad at her as well, but wanted to jump on us for being in her email.  Well i told him that he needed to talk to his borther, my husband about this. So anyways she hates us now, doesn't want to be around us, and is ruining this famliy and I don't know how to handle this, we all have kids. And my husbands dad lives down the street, he is 84 years old and deserves to not be put in the middle of this. My SIL has turned my husbands sister that is wheel chaired bound against us with lies, and I have a hard time figureing out how to handle this. I know that this is long, but if anyone has any advice please let mw know. She is extremley jealous of me and my husband. Which I can not help that my husband had made something for his live and we live the way we do.

You really said a lot that I already have thought it my head. Sometimes I just need someone to confirm it.

Do you really think writing a letter would help? Would it really help if I do juts say "but out"? I so want to , but  I guess I am afraid of stirring more emotions up.

Thank you for replying. Little by little I am getting over her. But she just sent me a b-day card and said in the card that she "was proud of me" I wanted to just scream and kick the living crap out of her. How dare she say that bull (beep) to me!!!!

I guess I really do want to say more things to her...I just don't want to cause trouble in the family. I just don't want to be that 'in-law' that just speaks her mind and everyone else keeps there distance.

Maybe I am just hating the fact that I may not be liked. I hate the fact that this may be true, and all my life I hating having to impress anyone. If they didn't like me, their loss. I hate that I have to get her approval. Maybe this is just something that goes deeper...like wanting my own parents approval...

Anyways, thanks for replying.

~T

Yes, I think you handled this very well!!

Your MIL does these things to provoke a reaction from you, so that in turn, she can be a "victim"...after all, she was only trying to help, right?....well, thats what she wants it to appear as to other people. You should give yourself a pat on the back for not feeding into her behavior, okay? :)  Dr. Phil says that people do things to get some kind of 'payoff'...Your MIL, for example, probably has acted this way for much of her life, so for her, this is normal behavior, the way she has always been, so when she was being controling, manipulative, dominating and a bully, she could do it wearing a disguise of "being helpful"....But you didn't give her the reaction she was hoping for, so she didn't get her payoff this time!! Its a victory for you!! Next year, when it comes time to start planning your son's birthday, you can find somewhere stress-free to have it. Listen, don't let your MIL get to you, okay? Its not worth it. You are a bigger person then that. When she is pushing your buttons, she is looking for two things: one is to get her way, to be the boss, the other is to hopefully p*ss you or someone else off enough to get them to tell her off, that way she can be the "poor victim who was only trying to help..."  The best way to deal with her, in the future when she is giving advice that you are not interested in, put yourself on repeat, say "thanks, but we're all set"...."thanks, but we're all set..." she will get the  hint, even though she doesn't want to!!

Its wonderful that your husband has made something out of his life, and that you have a good solid marriage and healthy children together. You are living the American dream! It would be nice if his family could be happy for you both instead of being jelous, but unfortunatly, thats the way it goes sometimes, especially with in-laws. My advice to you and your husband is to keep making the decisions that lead you to happiness and stability, and ignore the toxic people in  your life. Toxic people will suck the life right out of you...it sounds like you have devoted alot of time and energy into proving your SIL is cheating...I'm wondering why? Why was that so important to you? Don't you think that all that time and emotional/mental energy could have been better spent on your own personal life, your kids, your job, etc? To truly live the American dream, to truly be happy, you have to learn how to capture the spirit of forgiveness. Right now, you are hanging onto the spirit of revenge with alot of negative energy. This negative energy is going to effect other aspects of your life, too. And for what? For nothing. Doesn't it feel bad to have all these negative feelings toward your SIL and other in-laws?

It feels nice to have happiness and to be positive about your surroundings. I know that you probably feel that you can't think of a single nice thing to say about your SIL. So, what would be best for everyone would be to not say anything at all. You say at the ending of your post how your SIL has turned the wheel chair-bound sister against you with lies, and how the 84 year old father is not involved....I have to say this, and you won't want to hear this, but you have played just as big of a part in this as she has. You could have taken the "high road" by brushing off your SIL's email that you received by mistake, after all, as you said, she isn't a happy person, she is miserable and full of jelousy. Instead, you have taken this to a whole other level that it didn't have to go to.

There was no need for you and your husband to break into your SIL's email and involve yourself in her personal problems like that. You say that other people tell you that they would have done the same thing, who are those people??!! That was a crazy decision. That was bad. Then stalking her on top of it, another bad choice. Everything you describe sounds over the top. Your actions were intended to do what? What did you want the outcome to be, what were you hoping/wishing/dreaming to be the result of your investigating?

You've got to find a way to let this go. You know that you and your SIL will never be close, accept that. There are so many good things in your life, many positive things that need your devotion. It won't be easy to let this whole thing go, its not easy to admit that you fed into it, but the best thing for you to do is forgive yourself for this mistake, and start putting your energy towards something that will have a positive and healthy outcome.

Jen

Good for you!  I think you handled things remarkably well.  But do learn your lesson and boycott MIL's house as a future venue for any of your events.  The woman truly is controlling, manipulative, petty and bullying.  It's almost as though her main goal was to tick you off- what a very strange objective at her grandson's birthday party!!  But her type just "have to" be in control.  And it is always done under the guise of being helpful.  Actually, the one good thing here is that your MIL is so blatant about it that I don't think anyone is buying her act.  She blurts out "Here's the real food," and Miss Manners would be rolling her eyes at that point, and I think probably most other guests at the party were too.

My MIL would be much more sneaky and wait until everyone else was out of earshot then make her rude comments to me alone, and when I would tell my husband what was said I don't think he ever really believed me.  It took five or six other people calling him up after our daughter's baptism and complaining about his mother's rude comments- she was vexed that I had it at our place and catered the whole thing- for him to finally understand what had been happening to me behind the scenes for years.  So thank goodness she finally showed her true colours.

By the way, my parents were very old-school British and I was always taught that even if you were served a dish you HATED at someone else's home, you had to eat it and be gracious.  That is proper manners.  Guess MIL missed that day in Good Manners 101. (LOL)

About opening gifts, one idea I learned from a friend of mine is to not open them at the party.  I was told that this encourages materialism.  Plus as the kids get older it gets longer and longer and really quite boring for the other guests.  What I like to do now is open the gifts after the party and perhaps even set aside a few items for a rainy day because at times they get so many new things they are quite overwhelmed.  Of course if anyone really wants their gift opened at the party, you can accommodate them.

Overall though, I think you did really well and your husband is clearly supportive of you and that is just great.  I think also that with careful planning next year you can make things even more stress free and find ways to not let this woman get to you.  It is really sad that it has to come down to this with your husband's mother, but what can you do?  I sometimes think they look at it as the old "divide and conquer" theory and naturally you'd never want to get caught between your husband and his mother, that is far more trouble than you'd ever want to deal with, trust me.

Sincerely,

SB