Today I am welcoming a guest to The Dose of Reality. AnnMarie writes one of my favorite blogs Tidbits from the Queen of Chaos. Since I began reading and loving her blog, we have become online friends, and our friendship goes beyond reading and commenting on each other’s blog at this point. When I realized that she had a story to tell, but did not feel comfortable telling it on her own blog, I invited her to share it here.
All summer long, I have suffered from writer’s block. All of my thoughts are tangled up in the anxiety of thoughts that surround one thing: My mother-in-law is back in town. I know I am not the only one who has in-law issues and what better place to work through it than on The Dose of Reality. It doesn’t get more real than this. I can’t make this stuff up.
There were obvious differences from the beginning. A different language, different religion, different values. One thing the same: Love for L. He had never brought a girl home before. Never dated anyone long enough. Maybe she thought I was a passing phase. L is an only child. His father passed away when we were 23 (she remarried three years later and I will forever be grateful to her husband). Maybe those are the reasons.
It’s been 23 years. I feel suffocated. I feel dread. I feel angry. I feel in constant flight or fight mode and I’m sad that we each can’t be the kind of person both of us need. I wanted a mother-in-law who loved me for who I was. I wanted one who knew her place and stayed there. She wanted a daughter-in-law who put her first. She wants to be close. She says it in every single conversation. I wish I could let the years of hurt wash away and I could forget. I would have loved to have been close…to have another person in my life who I could love who would love me too. Someone who would play with my kids and just love them. I’m from a big family…we know how to let people in and love them. For some reason, even from the beginning, it’s been a struggle.
L lived an hour away from me so I would spend the night. I slept in the make-shift family room but it was always freezing. When I told L, he switched with me. His mom said the next morning, “I don’t want L to sleep in that room. It gets cold and I don’t want him to get sick.”
But it was fine if I got pneumonia.
“I picked L up from daycare and he ran to me all muddy to give me a hug and it was the funniest thing. I had to run from him so he wouldn’t ruin my fur coat.” She thought this was a hilarious story to share.
It probably did nothing for our relationship that I told her that was the worst story ever.
Upon hearing that L and I got engaged, she hugged me and said, “Well, at least we know each others’ faults.”
No, “Welcome to the family” or “Congratulations.” Who says that?
L and I were dancing in the kitchen a year before our wedding day. She came out and asked what we were doing. We said, “A year from now, we are going to be married.” She ran from the room crying, “It’s too soon. It’s too soon.”
We had been together for 7 years before we got married. In what world is that too soon?
When I had my oldest son she said, “I know the mistakes I made with L and I won’t make the same ones with N.”
I didn’t have kids so she could fix the mistakes she thinks she made with her own child. The relationship between a mother and a son and a grandmother and a grandson should by their very nature be different.
For years she would give me back gifts that I bought for her. When I asked her why, she replied, “I like things with designer labels in them.”
It didn’t matter that I was a stay at home mom with three kids (at the time) and designer labels are expensive.
After my daughter threw a fit, she looked at my daughter and said, “You get that from your mom. Your dad never did that.”
Again, who says that?
“We need to always be close.” This is said after every single conversation. Being close is something that happens over time and it is a give and take. It doesn’t happen just because someone says it. This is usually accompanied with, “We need to talk more. You need to call me more.” It’s also usually said when I finally do make the effort to call.
We spend the whole conversation talking about how I never call.
She has told the older kids that some things are just for them to know and they don’t have to share it with me. I think it is pretty ballsy of her to even say that to them. Some things said under those pretenses:
“Your mom doesn’t like to come here because she gets jealous of your dad’s and my relationship.”
“You need more culture in your lives.”
“For some reason, your mom doesn’t want us to see you guys.”
They of course do tell me because they know that we have NO secrets.
Some of the zingers that stand out over the years:
“You’d be so pretty if you wore some make-up.”
“You are in Boca now…enough with the T-shirts.”
Some instances that have caused major rifts in our relationship:
For our wedding, she picked out a white dress with a veil. I told L that as the mother of the groom she couldn’t wear white. She responded with, “So noooo one else can wear white. Juuuust you?”
She proceeded to buy the same dress as my mom when the lady showed her my mom’s and still tried to have a black veil made. As if she were in mourning, I guess. L talked her out of the veil.
When our first son was born, it was traumatic. He had to be in the NICU for a week and when we finally could bring him home, she called L and demanded he help her husband out of a jam on that day. Since it was the day his son was coming home from the hospital, he told her he couldn’t but was just the beginning of the tug of war between L having to choose between her needs and his family’s needs.
My mother-in-law and her husband moved to Florida for the winter months which has really been a blessing. When they came back that first year, she said, “The kids get to see your parents all winter, in the summer it is our time.”
I quickly told her that it wasn’t my parents fault that she doesn’t see the kids all winter so they aren’t going to be punished all summer. It’s been a constant battle with her wanting us to drop everything when they get back.
When I was going through IVF to get pregnant with Rocco and then when I was pregnant with him, she drove me crazy with the constant need to see the kids and not understanding that N was playing on a tournament team and then playing football. When Rocco died, she didn’t come in for the memorial. She just wasn’t there. Maybe she wanted to and L said no. She caused me so much anxiety and I was already at the brink of a breakdown that it’s possible. When G was born, she didn’t come in. By that time it was a relief.
She calls N her “Golden Boy” which would be fine, except I have three other children. Somehow I am not sure they appreciate their grandmother picking only one of them to favor.
Some of the differences between us:
She has admitted to being materialistic. I think she might be proud of the fact that she has nice things and can afford the finer things in life. That is great but we have four kids, two of whom have a chronic, life-threatening illness. I don’t need to hear about a country club that costs $45,000 a year when we are trying to raise money to find a cure for CF or we are paying hundreds of dollars a month in copays.
She is Bloomingdales and I am Target.
She is architectural tours and I am the zoo.
She is French food and I am Lou Malnati’s pizza.
I just wish she knew her audience when we are having a conversation.
Over the years, we’ve had many discussions, letters, fights trying to bring things out in the open and mend fences so to speak. Too many to count, really. I wish I could say they made any difference. I wish I could be less real (like why can’t I plaster a smile on my face and nod yes when she is talking to me?) or less affected by this. I wish there wasn’t the immediate thought of how to avoid.
I don’t like feeling ugly, and all of these feelings make me feel ugly, but the reality is that we are two people who didn’t ask to be thrown together and in any other circumstances would not be friends. Not everyone is going to get along with everyone. It just makes it so much worse because it happens to be with my husband’s mother and my kids’ grandmother. 
They say that the in-law relationship is that of a dance and sadly, I think the time has come where I need to sit this one out.
Do you experience this kind of delicate dance with your family? How have you learned to navigate that relationship through the years? Tell me in the comments your best advice for managing difficult family relationships.
