Letters to the Editor
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My MIL - siilar story...but I wish I had dealed with it differntly
In LW's situation, I recognized many aspects of my relationship with my own MIL (in my first marriage - I married at 19). The passive-aggressive actions on her part: while babysitting, she'd change our daughter into clothes she had bought and then describe the clothes we brought her in as "rags"; the constant, irritating questions at family gatherings at our home like: "do you really want so much cream in the gravy"; "do you think (our daughter) is dressed warmly enough since you have the thermostat so low", etc.
Like LW (although perhaps younger), I was "a scientist" pursuing a BS in math/physics when I married, while my MIL had a HS diploma. This was not a problem for me (my own mom didn't finish HS), but I now suspect it was a problem for MIL - I believe she felt threatened. BTW, I continued on to a scientific and reasonably compensated career.
Over time, we established a silent truce- enough so that we could "do" holidays and other family get-togethers.
She passed away 20 years ago.
But, here's the most important thing. Now that I'm older, (and,if not wiser, at least I have learned from life experiences), I truly wish that I had had the maturity to understand that my MIL (threatened by a superachieving DIL) had a lot of both history and experience to offer me...and I didn't understand that in time. I truly regret that.
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Wishing you a Perfect Future
TO: Invisible Daughter-in-Law,
I happily wish you a perfect son, or if providence wills it, many perfects sons.
Your daughters-in-law will appreciate having their perfect husband's mom in their lives. Please don't wish them death, otherwise they may be writing to Cary Tennis.
Dee
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The LW's perception of the MIL's power is shockingly inaccurate. When I read this letter, I see a very old, somewhat silly woman who is intimidated by her DIL and is completely lost in the modern world. Therefore, it's surprising to me to read that a young successful woman with a PhD of which she is rightfully proud and a "perfect" husband and child is responding to this sad old woman as if the old lady has every bit as much power as the LW's vicious, snobbish, highly educated parents had over LW as a child.
LW: your MIL is entirely powerless. Entirely. You clearly need a location for your rage, so you've chosen to ignore what a pitiful creature your MIL is and aim your rage at her. It's not that she's not annoying. I'm sure she is. I'm sure it's very annoying when she won't give you your child the moment you ask for your child. However, this is not a moment in which your MIL is displaying any power over you at all. She's displaying her weakness and her silliness. You have already won. There is no dragon in this sad small old woman for you to defeat.
It's hard to figure out some of the levels going on here without further answers from LW. LW reports that she was "expected" to cook a huge Thanksgiving meal 3 days after giving birth via C-section. What exactly made you feel that that expectation was in place? Did your in-laws really show up uninvited, completely unexpected, with no word to anyone, you or your husband? I find that difficult to believe. I think it's more likely that they "notified" your husband they would be coming, your husband didn't tell them not to come, and because you desperately need your 12-years-older husband to be "perfect" you therefore need to frame the situation as one in which they are entirely responsible for their unwanted presence. What was it about their arrival that indicated to you that there were expectations? Did your MIL demand you cook for her? Did she indicate by verbal or non-verbal disapproval that your lack of intention to do so meant there was something wrong with you? Or is it simply the fact that they were there, on Thanksgiving, and since you automatically respond to the presence of anyone (or perhaps any female) who is older and who you perceive to be in a parental role as somehow looking for something about which to criticize you, so you assumed that since she was there and you were not cooking, that meant she was judging you?
I suspect a lot of LW's complex ideas about what her MIL thinks and feels and intends regarding her are products of the LW's imagination. Her MIL, quite frankly, is probably not complex enough to think this way. And since we're all amateur psychologists on the interawebs, I think it's likely that LW was raised by a borderline mother and a distant father, and so the drama she's trying to work out via her husband and MIL is one in which the distant father figure, LW's husband, leaps to child-LW's defense and obliterates the hated mother figure at the slightest hint of negativity toward the LW. The LW shows some borderline tendencies herself; her language of extremes, everyone in her life must be all good (perfect) or all bad, and an obviously silly and not too bright old lady is somehow permanently engaged in sophisticated psychological warfare against her. LW does show instincts against this, so I suspect that while she's using the language of the borderline that she learned in childhood, it's not her natural language. She is willing to present husband's childhood as a happy one, even though to do so presents a big problem with her opinion of her MIL now. And she cannot target her husband for any weakness at all, because to do so makes him problematic, since LW learned as a child that people are either perfect or wretchedly horrible and enemies. So she leaves out the obvious, obvious question, what is your husband doing when his mother treats you so horribly? The answer is either A. The treatment is not so horrible - at least to him (which means either his perception or LW's perception is incorrect) or B. The treatment *is* horrible and the husband is (gasp!) not perfect.
Good luck, LW. I think from the very fact that you do not attempt to cover the gaps (rather, you just ignore them) that you realize that your perception may well be incorrect. Since you've managed to come that far alone, I think talking with a professional can definitely help you the rest of the way. The old lady may still be annoying, but your sense of helplessness is what should and can be alleviated.