Hi everybody! I was recently told about this group from some moms in my local babywearing chapter. I've been reading the boards regularly but am posting with a new anonymous screen name. Sorry for the length, this is my first time really putting any of this is writing. I have been with my DH for 6 years and we have a 6 month old daughter. Now for some BG on my IL issues..
I honestly don't know where to start.. When DH and I first got together, we were in college (locally) and he still lived at home. My MIL was extremely welcoming at first and treated me "like a daughter" (controlled me like a daughter). I blame our tolerance of her early behavior on our young age and pressure from extended family to accept the behavior (honestly we were just dumb). DH had many issues with his parents growing up. His mother had a very dysfunctional childhood and has severe control issues as a result, so was extremely emotionally abusive to DH. She's also the perfect definition of a narc. His dad is terrified of MIL leaving him if he disobeys her so is the ultimate enabler/enforcer. At the same time that she mistreats DH, she has a very weird obsession with him (views him as her object). We (DH and I) even jokingly call her Jocasta because of how "in love" with him she is. She is the kind of woman that posts a picture of him on the debil once a day with captions like "the love of my life, my beautiful son". It gets really creepy. Sorry for the length.. Anyways I digress..
I wish I could somehow give you guys all the background of her boundary stomps, but it would take a novel. Her actions have always included snide/rude comments that she can play off as "joking" when we call her out and constantly obsessing over how much she has done for us financially in the past. (Money is the only way she knows how to show love). Issues such as her expecting to be filled in on every detail of our lives (when she first met me she asked me if I was on birth control) and expecting to talk to us numerous times day were just the beginning. When we wouldnt answer her texts she began showing up unannounced. We never rewarded this behavior and always refused to answer the door. She is the type of person to call us at least once a day to check in and then finds random "reasons" to call a couple more times each day. In her eyes we will never be respectful or loving enough towards her and will never spend enough time with her (this makes us want to spend less time with her). She totally tried to railroad our wedding and has a way of making everything about her. Her lack of respect of our boundaries has led to numerous TOs (months at a time). She has issued just as many "non-applogies" and for some reason we used to accept them. Before DD, we honestly hoped she was trainable.
Something important to note is that right around when DH and I started thinking we would have to cut them out all together, his parents decided to move out of state for a new job opportunity for FIL. He would be running the newly built branch of his company and receive a huge promotion. Things started to get easier for us because this move meant we had help with boundaries because of their distance from us. When we would ignore calls there could be no lawn tantrums. This was freeing.
Well flash forward 6 months and things got really crazy when we found out we were expecting DD. When we announced, MIL freaked out about how our lives were over because we weren't financially stable enough for a child (we completely support ourselves and budget our money very well) and proceeded to tell everyone how bad she felt for this poor child. ***TRIGGER**** She had the nerve to tell people we should get an abortion. ***END TRIGGER***. We told her that her opinion about our family was completely inappropriate and to keep her comments to herself. When the comments got more nasty, we put her in another TO. Unfortunately FIL will always be collateral damage because he enables MIL's crazy. She knows that DH loves his father and has issues with her so she doesn't let FIL talk to anyone. She answers his phone when DH calls and relays messages between the two. Unfortunately his dad thinks his mother is always right in the arguments. For example, DH sent his father a picture of the baby's first ultrasound during the TO for MIL and his father responded "You think I want to see this shit while you're treating your mother so terribly? Until you man up and treat her with respect, don't ever contact me again". This led to a 4 month TO for his whole family. Things were especially difficult for DH because this TO means we have no contact with his then 12 year old sister.
MIL is also the ultimate rug sweeper. She texted DH after those four months and said she was genuinely sorry (We knew she wasn't) and wanted to be a "huge part of her baaaaaby's life". We were dumb back then and everyone was telling us we were cruel if we didn't give her one more chance, so we agreed. Well the surprise was on us because the very week after resuming hesitant contact, she announces that they bought a house a few miles from us as "a gift to us, so they could be a part of our lives and help with the baby". We were appalled when we heard that news but even more so when MIL told us she called FILs boss and said if he didn't let FIL out of his 10 yr contract that she would divorce FIL. I honestly was not surprised as this is the type of person she is. But I was terrified of how this stress would effect us. We told them not to move back for us as we were established in our routine and didn't have extra time for many visits. She completely ignored our warnings.
She acted respectful enough of our boundaries until DD was born (besides CONSTANT comments about babysitting and sleepovers and how she's sooo excited for "her" baby to be born). DD arrived 5 weeks early and had fragile health. MIL is a smoker and promised she wouldn't smoke when coming to visit. The first visit she didn't smoke and pretended to respect our rules. She did however have a weird obsession with taking pictures of our dd with her diaper off and just changing her diaper in general. We would be sitting on the couch and she would say "OP, get me a diaper the baby pooped!" And sure enough, the baby had NEVER actually pooped. She did this every hour. I finally said something about not wasting our diapers and she freaked out that "I've raised children before OP"... We ended that visit there.
The next visit, she showed up at our house unannounced and was let in by my unsuspecting cousin who was visiting. She ran upstairs and burst into my room while I was changing and the baby was sleeping. She didn't even flinch as I looked terrified and grabbed the baby and left. I was hysterical and my DH freaked out. She did apologize for this mishap.
We assumed she realized that we wouldn't loosen up on our smoking rules after the first visit. Well after being at our house for 5 minutes when my DD was 2 weeks old, she snuck out back and smoked. My sister saw her and my MIL threatened my sister not to tell us. Of course my sister immediately told us and my DH pulled her aside to address the situation. Within thirty seconds we hear her screaming and crying about how DH is belittling her and a disrespectful a**hole and how second and third hand smoke are just "myths". Well FIL goes over and tells him to stop being so abusive to his mom and that he is, and always has been, too dumb to know what he's talking about. DH started to tear up (I NEVER see him cry) and FIL started fake crying and mocking his son. It broke my heart, I honestly don't think I can ever forgive that. They then told dh to go F*** himself and stormed out... Leaving DH's hysterically crying sister behind. So with the added stress of a preemie we had his sister here (soo upset) and they wouldn't answer her calls as to when they'd pick her up. They showed up to get her later that evening by honking outside and then peeling out. The very next day mil has the nerve to text us and say "when can I see baby again????".
The only time we've seen them since this incident was at a family party. I have made it extremely clear to everyone (including MIL) that our DD has severe eczema and allergies that are exacerbated by detergents, soaps, and scents. Well I left the baby for fifteen minutes with DHs aunt in the next room over. After the fifteen minutes of talking with a different relative I heard my DD screaming. I ran into the room to find MIL frantically applying lotion to my daughter's blotchy, red skin. I also immediately noticed that the sink was full of water and bubbles and a bottle of adult BUBBLE BATH was sitting on the counter. I ripped my daughter from MILs hands as I realized (in horror) that she had given my daughter a bubble bath at a family party because "she spit up on herself"!!!! When the bubbles made my daughter break out terribly, she panicked and lotioned her up, making the things much worse. We left the party immediately and put her on an immediate TO.
I'm SO sorry again for the length. I promise I'm wrapping things up. Well after a long talk, DH and I decided we were fed up with this craziness and We have had very little contact with them since this blowup. I realized DH may have been a bit of a DuH and we've just recently started therapy. I guess I'm just wondering if I'm overreacting or if a CO is definitely necessary at this point? If you think it isn't, how do we go about enforcing boundaries? There is so much more background to it than this (I feel like I'm rambling and don't know if I have provided enough BG to go on), and i don't think she will ever ever change. Having DD has DH and I determined to protect her from their craziness. She's helped us to realize how insane they are and we will no longer expose our daughter to such dysfunction.
I honestly don't know where to start.. When DH and I first got together, we were in college (locally) and he still lived at home. My MIL was extremely welcoming at first and treated me "like a daughter" (controlled me like a daughter). I blame our tolerance of her early behavior on our young age and pressure from extended family to accept the behavior (honestly we were just dumb). DH had many issues with his parents growing up. His mother had a very dysfunctional childhood and has severe control issues as a result, so was extremely emotionally abusive to DH. She's also the perfect definition of a narc. His dad is terrified of MIL leaving him if he disobeys her so is the ultimate enabler/enforcer. At the same time that she mistreats DH, she has a very weird obsession with him (views him as her object). We (DH and I) even jokingly call her Jocasta because of how "in love" with him she is. She is the kind of woman that posts a picture of him on the debil once a day with captions like "the love of my life, my beautiful son". It gets really creepy. Sorry for the length.. Anyways I digress..
I wish I could somehow give you guys all the background of her boundary stomps, but it would take a novel. Her actions have always included snide/rude comments that she can play off as "joking" when we call her out and constantly obsessing over how much she has done for us financially in the past. (Money is the only way she knows how to show love). Issues such as her expecting to be filled in on every detail of our lives (when she first met me she asked me if I was on birth control) and expecting to talk to us numerous times day were just the beginning. When we wouldnt answer her texts she began showing up unannounced. We never rewarded this behavior and always refused to answer the door. She is the type of person to call us at least once a day to check in and then finds random "reasons" to call a couple more times each day. In her eyes we will never be respectful or loving enough towards her and will never spend enough time with her (this makes us want to spend less time with her). She totally tried to railroad our wedding and has a way of making everything about her. Her lack of respect of our boundaries has led to numerous TOs (months at a time). She has issued just as many "non-applogies" and for some reason we used to accept them. Before DD, we honestly hoped she was trainable.
Something important to note is that right around when DH and I started thinking we would have to cut them out all together, his parents decided to move out of state for a new job opportunity for FIL. He would be running the newly built branch of his company and receive a huge promotion. Things started to get easier for us because this move meant we had help with boundaries because of their distance from us. When we would ignore calls there could be no lawn tantrums. This was freeing.
Well flash forward 6 months and things got really crazy when we found out we were expecting DD. When we announced, MIL freaked out about how our lives were over because we weren't financially stable enough for a child (we completely support ourselves and budget our money very well) and proceeded to tell everyone how bad she felt for this poor child. ***TRIGGER**** She had the nerve to tell people we should get an abortion. ***END TRIGGER***. We told her that her opinion about our family was completely inappropriate and to keep her comments to herself. When the comments got more nasty, we put her in another TO. Unfortunately FIL will always be collateral damage because he enables MIL's crazy. She knows that DH loves his father and has issues with her so she doesn't let FIL talk to anyone. She answers his phone when DH calls and relays messages between the two. Unfortunately his dad thinks his mother is always right in the arguments. For example, DH sent his father a picture of the baby's first ultrasound during the TO for MIL and his father responded "You think I want to see this shit while you're treating your mother so terribly? Until you man up and treat her with respect, don't ever contact me again". This led to a 4 month TO for his whole family. Things were especially difficult for DH because this TO means we have no contact with his then 12 year old sister.
MIL is also the ultimate rug sweeper. She texted DH after those four months and said she was genuinely sorry (We knew she wasn't) and wanted to be a "huge part of her baaaaaby's life". We were dumb back then and everyone was telling us we were cruel if we didn't give her one more chance, so we agreed. Well the surprise was on us because the very week after resuming hesitant contact, she announces that they bought a house a few miles from us as "a gift to us, so they could be a part of our lives and help with the baby". We were appalled when we heard that news but even more so when MIL told us she called FILs boss and said if he didn't let FIL out of his 10 yr contract that she would divorce FIL. I honestly was not surprised as this is the type of person she is. But I was terrified of how this stress would effect us. We told them not to move back for us as we were established in our routine and didn't have extra time for many visits. She completely ignored our warnings.
She acted respectful enough of our boundaries until DD was born (besides CONSTANT comments about babysitting and sleepovers and how she's sooo excited for "her" baby to be born). DD arrived 5 weeks early and had fragile health. MIL is a smoker and promised she wouldn't smoke when coming to visit. The first visit she didn't smoke and pretended to respect our rules. She did however have a weird obsession with taking pictures of our dd with her diaper off and just changing her diaper in general. We would be sitting on the couch and she would say "OP, get me a diaper the baby pooped!" And sure enough, the baby had NEVER actually pooped. She did this every hour. I finally said something about not wasting our diapers and she freaked out that "I've raised children before OP"... We ended that visit there.
The next visit, she showed up at our house unannounced and was let in by my unsuspecting cousin who was visiting. She ran upstairs and burst into my room while I was changing and the baby was sleeping. She didn't even flinch as I looked terrified and grabbed the baby and left. I was hysterical and my DH freaked out. She did apologize for this mishap.
We assumed she realized that we wouldn't loosen up on our smoking rules after the first visit. Well after being at our house for 5 minutes when my DD was 2 weeks old, she snuck out back and smoked. My sister saw her and my MIL threatened my sister not to tell us. Of course my sister immediately told us and my DH pulled her aside to address the situation. Within thirty seconds we hear her screaming and crying about how DH is belittling her and a disrespectful a**hole and how second and third hand smoke are just "myths". Well FIL goes over and tells him to stop being so abusive to his mom and that he is, and always has been, too dumb to know what he's talking about. DH started to tear up (I NEVER see him cry) and FIL started fake crying and mocking his son. It broke my heart, I honestly don't think I can ever forgive that. They then told dh to go F*** himself and stormed out... Leaving DH's hysterically crying sister behind. So with the added stress of a preemie we had his sister here (soo upset) and they wouldn't answer her calls as to when they'd pick her up. They showed up to get her later that evening by honking outside and then peeling out. The very next day mil has the nerve to text us and say "when can I see baby again????".
The only time we've seen them since this incident was at a family party. I have made it extremely clear to everyone (including MIL) that our DD has severe eczema and allergies that are exacerbated by detergents, soaps, and scents. Well I left the baby for fifteen minutes with DHs aunt in the next room over. After the fifteen minutes of talking with a different relative I heard my DD screaming. I ran into the room to find MIL frantically applying lotion to my daughter's blotchy, red skin. I also immediately noticed that the sink was full of water and bubbles and a bottle of adult BUBBLE BATH was sitting on the counter. I ripped my daughter from MILs hands as I realized (in horror) that she had given my daughter a bubble bath at a family party because "she spit up on herself"!!!! When the bubbles made my daughter break out terribly, she panicked and lotioned her up, making the things much worse. We left the party immediately and put her on an immediate TO.
I'm SO sorry again for the length. I promise I'm wrapping things up. Well after a long talk, DH and I decided we were fed up with this craziness and We have had very little contact with them since this blowup. I realized DH may have been a bit of a DuH and we've just recently started therapy. I guess I'm just wondering if I'm overreacting or if a CO is definitely necessary at this point? If you think it isn't, how do we go about enforcing boundaries? There is so much more background to it than this (I feel like I'm rambling and don't know if I have provided enough BG to go on), and i don't think she will ever ever change. Having DD has DH and I determined to protect her from their craziness. She's helped us to realize how insane they are and we will no longer expose our daughter to such dysfunction.