You have GOT to be kidding me?!?!?!?!?!

Oh I am SO sorry. She is rude and mean-spirited, even if she has convinced herself in her own mind that she has altruistic reasons.

If you want, I can come on out there and read her the riot act.

Or I could just come out there and give her a dirty look.

Either way, you just let me know.

**LOL! I may take you up on that!

My dear sweet mother-in-law passed away about 10 months after my husband and I got married 15 years ago…at the age of 60, far too young. My best friend’s mom passed away three years ago at 60. Yet two of my dearest friends have mothers-in-law who are ANCIENT, miserable and in perfect health. There is no justice, but as my one friend says, “Mean is a good preservative!”

**Oh no! Does that mean my MIL will live forever? LOL!

Ugh. MILs. I never understood why some people nag their kids about having babies. Kudos to you for not telling her off, I know it was hard. I think you need to eat some chocolate or something.

**She’s always been like that. My Mom says I should just put up with her since I don’t have to see her often.

OMG - you poor thing.

No, I will not take her on a bus, I will not take her in the car with us. I will not take her with her flaws. I would not like your MIL!!!

But I’m afraid I can relate - only it’s my mother. And she’d be the one insisting the sky is falling and I’m not being careful ENOUGH!

Hope she makes it home and away from Honolulu before you both explode.

My thoughts are with you!

** It took me a while but I finally got the “Green Eggs and Ham” reference. LOL!

LOL! I’m guessing your MIL is Asian? Mine is too. Yours sounds exactly like mine. Happy for us, we live in DC, she lives in CA! Aiya!!(ps, glad I found you again, hope things are better are safer for you here.)
~Lorri

**Yes, she was born and raised in South Korea. I’m glad you found me again, too!

Oh my.
It’s like right out of a sitcome or something. Unbelievable.
Oh my.

ugh my mil won’t buckle kids up either and they don’t ride with her for the same reason

That sounds absolutely AWFUL! UGH.

(((big hug)))

Im glad to hear you held your ground and waited, i would have done the same thing. BB is your child, and you have the right to keep her safe, regardless of what others think.

There is no reasoning with someone who insists they are always right and refuses to listen to everyone else. Unfortunately for you, this person is your MIL. I’m assuming that your DH knows this about his mother and doesn’t think you are the villain in these situations. If that is the case, then maybe the best thing you can do is simply smile and nod silently while she rants and raves. She continues to think she is right, you don’t have the stress of arguing with her, and hubby isn’t caught in the middle. It’s not really a win-win situation, but maybe it will keep the peace.

BTW, of course you were TOTALLY in the right about the car seat. In this argument, you have legalities on your side. It drives me absolutely insane when I see kids not in car seats or not wearing bike helmets. I know we survived without them, but nowadays, things are very different. My 7-year-old son still sits in a half-booster seat in order to make the seat belt fit correctly. I believe that 4′9″ is the recommended height limitation.

Smile serenely, K, and maybe she’ll think you’re on medication! That way she can blame it on that!

**Yes, I’m thankful that DH takes my side every time. He knows what she’s like and unlike him, I’m still not used to it. It would be a very different story if I couldn’t vent to him.

Wow, and I though I had mil problems! Yours takes the cake. What a prize. I hope your husband is supportive of you to her. Ack, I hate family disputes.

Thankfully he is. His brother always takes the Mother’s side over his wife’s. That causes so many problems in their marriage! I don’t know if I could handle it if I felt I couldn’t vent to DH about her.

She wants you to have more kids so that she can…kill them w/o car seats?!?!? That would drive me crazy too. And I’m guessing that DH won’t back you up with her either…nice.

If she starts up with the having more kids thing again, I would say that DH can’t have anymore. hee hee! ;D Maybe that would shut her up.

Sorry that she ruined your dinner.

**DH does try to reason with her because he knows she’s wrong. It’s like talking to a stone wall. Once she hung up on him and refused to talk to him for a month. What a child!

Yikes, good thing you live on seperate islands!

(My MIL has the same attitude regarding car seats, even though my husband went though the windshield as a child while being held on her lap.)

OMG! Was he seriously hurt? You would think she learned her lesson!

Wow! I have a few things I could call her but I am supposed to be a lady I think. My husband’s grandmother is exactly like her. She can’t get it though her head that I can’t have children. She thinks I’m not trying hard enough! Like it isn’t hard enough not being able to have children…she has to open her big mouth! Apparently it’s not good enough that we adopted our sweet little girl. For us it is!!! Anyway, I feel for you. It sounds like you had a really hard time conceiving BB. Why can’t they just mind their own business? You have two beautiful girls! My husband says she’s just a crazy old lady and to ignore her. That’s tough. You have it worse though, she’s going to be around much longer! Sounds like your MIL is becoming a baby instead of a senior citizen!

You poor thing. Sounds like you have it pretty rough, too. I can totally relate!

So very glad to hear that your DH stands up for you. Sorry to hear that your BIL doesn’t for his wife.

A good friend of mine had issues with her MIL her DH stood up for her…her BIL didn’t stand up for his wife. MIL accused DIL of having an affair because she got pregnant…the DH did try to show his mom that his wife was innocent there, but I don’t think that they are still together.

I read that your MIL is from S Korea… they still don’t use car seats there (well, as of 2000). It probably doesn’t help any that the stores charge way too much for car seats and all baby protecting stuff.

**I had no idea that they don’t require car seats in Korea. I guess that would explain a lot.

I got a bit of that yesterday with my own family. “You need to get working on another baby! You’re getting up there you know!” Forget that I have four kids already and after seven pregnancies and two years on fertility drugs it’s just NONE of her business. But you can’t say that. I can’t even write it on the blog because family drops by there all the time. I can be a bit more open in comments somewhere else.

At least you didn’t drop her in the ocean. You would have been justified.

**Why do they feel that nagging will accomplish anything? BTW, I had no idea you’ve been trying for 2 years! I hope everything works out for you!

Ack! I have a very sweet MIL; however, she did things like that to me also. We were driving from Pleasanton to Fresno and she was sitting in the back seat with my newborn (who was my first child after 8 miscarriages and only 4 lbs at birth) and he started to cry, she immediately unstrapped him and was holding him in the backseat while I was driving through rush hour traffic. I almost had a panic attack and pulled the car over and told her to strap him back in…argument ensued and I won lol. But ouch nerve racking to say the least!

** First of all, you’ve had 8 miscarriages? How in the world do you deal with that? You must be a very strong person! Secondly, my MIL did the same thing when my first daughter was a baby. She took her out of the car seat while I was driving. I almost blew a fuse!

That is horrible. What a bitter woman and very childish at that!!
I”m glad your husband tries to reason with her. She sounds like a very unreasonable person.
My MIL isn’t perfect, and we have our disagreements, she’s quite the opposite. She’d insist I wasn’t being safe enough! She still has my neice in a booster seat, and she just turned 6.

**That sounds pretty bad, too. I wouldn’t want to be called a bad Mother!

I’m I glad I had a good MIL. Excuse me for asking, but what nationality is she? My daughter’s ex-MIL is like that and she’s pake! Hope your readers don’t understand that. ;-P My daughter used to fight with her all the time. She is a total biotch.

**I’ve always wondered how to spell “biotch”. LOL!

That’s too bad about your MIL. I’m sorry your Christmas had to be that way, but a mother has to do what a mother has to do. If she is going to give you the silent treatment over protecting your little one, then so be it. I think any mother in her right mind would have done the exact same thing. I don’t blame you for not wanting her to babysit for you, I wouldn’t either.

Hang in there lady! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Holy Cow. Now I can see why they may not visit that much. What is MIL from the Britney Spears school of child rearing?

Okay, I spent the biggest part of Christmas day in the ER just to be told I have bronchitis, so I’m not in the best of spirits right now, but my goodness, she just sounds like a dadblamed “mama scrooge” !!! I hope you and your family had a great Christmas OTHER than having HER there LOL (Mine would have been better had I not been so sick but I still had a good time being with my family!)

Oh my, I can so relate.

About 4 weeks ago, my MIL babysat the girls while they were sick so I could go grocery shopping. We got home and saw Emma standing on our window seat… she does this all the time so I wasn’t alarmed. Then I saw her wrapping the blinds cord around her neck, unsuccessfully, I was alarmed. I waited another minute, just standing there watching her the whole time, but waiting to see how long it would take my MIL to get off her lazy butt. Meanwhile Em is at it another 30 seconds, finally I see she isn’t going to give up and almost has it around her neck, I go and bang on the window and yell at her… she gets startled and knows she is doing something bad and lets the cord loose from between her two hands and it drops. Then I see my MIL running from the couch area. When I get through the door, she is holding Emma and acting like nothing happened. I say very loudly that Emma was about to strangle herself, she says no she wasn’t, that she was just on her way over to the window. i say I know she wasn’t because i was standing there for over a minute. She said back that there was no way it was over a minute, basically calling me a liar, John backs me up.

Another day she says for the hundreth time that ONE DAY we will let her baby sit both kids at her place. i say no, that our house is child proof and Emma was in danger of strangling herself, what would happen at my MIL’s apartment, since it’s not child proof. She begins arguing with me again about how long it was before she headed over there to get Emme from the blind cord. i said she only got up because I was pounding on the window, otherwise she wouldn’t have even noticed. She gets mad.

A few minutes later she says, “Well, my kids and my sister’s kids all survived without child proofing.”

What the heck is that supposed to mean, anyway? Just because your kids survived doesn’t mean there weren’t thousands of kids that didn’t. I tell you, it’s a miracle to me since I have seen her put her needs before my kids. I only ask her to babysit if I absolutely have to. My husband don’t go out to movies or dinner alone ever.

It may seem like a minor thing, I hate to think what could have happened to Emma if we had been home a few minutes later…. But my anxiety is related to this post.

http://almostsomewhatpositive.blogspot.com/2006/06/family-sigh.html

OK, now that I have responded in essay form, I don’t think you over reacted at all. We live in different times… the women back then had to sacrifice child safety to get things done the way they were expected. the house was supposed to be spotless when the husband got home from work, and the wife was supposed to keep the kids quiet and dote on the husband. When the heck did they have time to pay attention to the kids? That’s they way it was for them, so I I think they just don’t get it. I would have been po’d too!

Thank goodness you came home when you did. You never know what could have happened! Glad you stood your ground with your MIL. It’s amazing that their sons didn’t get seriously hurt while growing up!

Thank GOD she’s not speaking to you! Good GRIEF!

I agree! LOL!

Sorry your MIL came in like a storm. I wouldn’t be speaking to her if she was my MIL. If it makes you feel better, I don’t leave J with my MIL either. It is all about trust.

In answer to yours:

** First of all, you’ve had 8 miscarriages? How in the world do you deal with that? You must be a very strong person! Secondly, my MIL did the same thing when my first daughter was a baby. She took her out of the car seat while I was driving. I almost blew a fuse!

My miscarriages were in the first few weeks. I can’t imagine a miscarriage at 5 months. It was very upsetting, but my family was very supportive. My first son was a blessing, the second was a gift (we weren’t planning on having any after the first one,felt lucky to have the one, then oops along came number 2).

Dealing with MILs is never easy. It is harder for me because of a cultural difference (I’m causasian, my MIL is japanese), but with a lot of grinning and trying we have become good friends; however, she doesn’t get angry with me like your MIL did and I try very, very hard not to get angry with her when she does stuff like that (never easy and I have lost it occasionally). I am very thankful for mine.

What is WRONG with her?!?! Why would she ever, ever, EVER want to jeopardize her grandchild? And, excuse me, but the last time I checked, MILs didn’t get to decide how many children their offspring had. Ask her if she’s willing to be a surrogate. Wait. Don’t ask. She just might take you up on it. Ewwwwwwww! Can you imagine how that would go over? “That’s our child, we’ll decide what’s best.” “No, I’m the one that spent 9 l-o-n-g months carrying that baby so you could….” Nope, not worth it.

Definitely NOT! LOL!

[...] LocalGirl presents Take My Mother-in-Law . . . Please! posted at Local Girl. [...]

After reading this I wil never complain about my MIL again. . . .
Uh but don’t tell my husband I said that!

Wow. Sounds like my MIL AND my mom wrapped into one. We rarely let them take care of our 4 kids because stupid things have happened. Fortunately no one has been permanently maimed.

DigitalRich
Here via Carnival of Family Life

**Wow, sounds like you’ve got a lot to deal with. At least my Mom is pretty normal most of the times. I’m amazed that my husband and his brothers survived to become adults! LOL! Thanks for stopping by and for supporting the Carnival! Hope to see you next week!