When your kids get married, please avoid meddling in their marital relationships.

[Susan in TN]

I actually had a young man (22ish) ask me the other day about Americans not caring about family. Why? Because I moved here with only my child and not with a husband and lacking one of those, my parents. I'm 31. I'm a grown woman. That's the not the first time I've gotten that reaction. "So you came with your husband?" "No." Oh, you came with your father, then." "What!? No."

 

Then he starting talking about how a new couple generally moves in with the guys parents, because family is important. I've heard this many times. It would all make sense to me if the ILs behaved, but they don't. It's their right to tell the young couple how things should be because what do young people know about life? What do they know about raising children? And no one bats an eye. Not even the tortured young couple. :lol:

 

Yes, my in-laws are the ones who always blabbed on and on and on about how important family is, and everyone LUUUUUVVVVED their family ad nauseum. And when the money ran out, well, lets just say all that love disappeared pretty quick. If you can get any of them to speak to each other at all these days, it's with a pretty thin coat of tolerance.

 

I'm sure I would be suicidal in a couple weeks of living with my in-laws. I can make it through about 3 days with them before I start feeling my insides start to rot.

[Susan in TN]

:grouphug:

 

 

 

I try to avoid my adult, married kids (five of them) because they make me nuts complaining about their spouses and their kids. Okay, the four girls do, but the stepson never says a word. I've seen his MIL, and I think she has him under control :D.

 

 

Before I was married, my mom said she didn't want to hear about any woes in marriage, unless I was in real trouble. And she learned a lesson from her parents always complaining about my dad, and how they didn't approve of him. Can't figure out why, since he has always been a very kind, quiet, hardworking man. I really think they just didn't want her to get married. At any rate, she doesn't criticise her children's spouses, and I am eternally grateful.

[Laurie4b]

Would he go for counseling? Perhaps a 3rd party would help him to understand just how destructive the situation is, and how manipulative his parents are being.

 

I agree that if he'll agree to a third party, that might be helpful. It doesn't necessarily have to be counseling, but someone whose judgment he would tend to trust.

[gardenmom5]

I am very worried for you that your dh cannot see the terrible kind of manipulation and control they are exercising over him. It's quite cruel, and if his eyes were truly, fully opened to it, he'd be awfully hurt. But it might give him some spine in the matter.

 

?

My grandmother was exactly the same, and my mother could never put her foot down and stand up for herself or her children. (though it royally stressed her out.) I realized grandmama wasn't very nice (re: manipulative hypocrite) when I was 13 and it just went downhill from there. I did not have a grave dance to the tune of ding-dong-the-wicked-witch-is-dead when she died, but did think about it.

 

What I have observed. for an adult child to recognize their parent as being a manipulative piece of work when they've been in denial requires an entire reevaluation of their own entire being as well, since they were reared by the aforementioned piece-of-work. iow- It's a big deal.

[Impish]

What I have observed. for an adult child to recognize their parent as being a manipulative piece of work when they've been in denial requires an entire reevaluation of their own entire being as well, since they were reared by the aforementioned piece-of-work. iow- It's a big deal.

:iagree:There's a sense of shame involved. "How could I let this happen?" sort of thing.

 

Wolf knew his mother was something else...I don't know if us being married caused her to amp up her game (entirely possible) or my reaction to her nonsense caused him to wake up far more (also entirely possible) but what he'd put up with or ignore before he refuses to now.

[Negin]

Sometimes, I swear, the whole 'seen but not heard' could be so well applied to certain ADULTS in our lives, rather than children!

Your words are gold. :thumbup:

[Susan in TN]

:iagree:There's a sense of shame involved. "How could I let this happen?" sort of thing.

 

Wolf knew his mother was something else...I don't know if us being married caused her to amp up her game (entirely possible) or my reaction to her nonsense caused him to wake up far more (also entirely possible) but what he'd put up with or ignore before he refuses to now.

 

My dh had the personal experience of two sisters-in-law, who had rather nasty "run-ins" with his mother before they married into the family. So when it was time for his mother to meet me, he told her in no uncertain terms that if she ever said anything to upset me, she would never see us again. And for some reason, she believed him. Even to this day she tip-toes around me just a little and that's just fine by me.

[JVA]

My dh had the personal experience of two sisters-in-law, who had rather nasty "run-ins" with his mother before they married into the family. So when it was time for his mother to meet me, he told her in no uncertain terms that if she ever said anything to upset me, she would never see us again. And for some reason, she believed him. Even to this day she tip-toes around me just a little and that's just fine by me.

 

 

THAT is my kind of man. He's a keeper. Reminds me of my dh. He has had to do the same things with b/sil to no avail. We've had to cut contact.