What do I do with my mother in law????

avocado · Dec 29, 2012

OK this is the first time I'm writing in Indusladies... I have read quiet a bit of the forums, but I need serious advice, and I have NO clue who else I can talk to. Please help me... this is going to be one LONG story

I had an arranged marriage in India 3 years back. I come from a pretty rich family, but have no mother. I only have a father, an elder brother who passed away this year, and younger brother who lives with my dad. I did not grow up very traditionally, especially not having a mom. But my husband's family is pretty traditional.
So 3 yeaars back I got married. My MIL said during the wedding, that they do not care about dowry, they just want a daughter. I never had a real mother, so it was like music to my ears. We went out for dinner, with my husband's family and and all that (my husband lives in the US).
As the wedding came nearer, she started saying how even if we gave her nothing, we needed to give nice things to her relatives. We needed to give gold coins to this family memeber and that. She gave a list of people that we needed to give sarees to(Like 15). She said we needed to give gold earings to her mom. Suit pieces to all the men in her family(15 men), also said that we needed to give MIL 2 sets of gold jewllery and yadi dadi daaaa...
And her tone was always SOOOO SWEET AND LOVING towards me. I went and relayed everything to my dad, because I thought she was guiding us cuz she knew that I had no mom.
Well guess what? we did EVERYTHING they asked us to do, the wedding happened. When I opened my suitcase, given from the guys side. I had 1 saree in the suitcase, and 1 which I wore for the wedding given by the groom side, and they had given me 3-4 sets of fake jewelry.
I feel like I got taken advantage of. More than that, I felt like she took advantage of my father too. Not only that, my dad had given me like 20 sarees, because I LOVE sarees. She even asked me for one of mine, 10 days after the wedding!!!
She was still SOOOOO sweet to me upfront. She would even say "I love you" to me, and totally love me. I was soooo confused! I thought I'd let it pass. I don;t care for traditional jewlery anyways, so I decided to let it pass. But my guard was up.
I came to America after being married, and me and my husband had fights about this. My husband would NEVER do anything like that, and refused to believe that his mom would do such a thing. I mean, she is SO SWEET right?
I finally gave him a list of things his family had given me,a nd what my family had given his... he said he was very sorry.
My husband is a student, and he's still studying. I have NO issues with that. He is an amazing guy, and I feel very lucky to have him. But him being a student, I needed to support us ever since I got married and came to to us. I am on a dependent visa, and so went out and found a cash job. I have been working ever since we got married, and my MIL KNOWS this. I had a miscarriage last year, but we had no money to go to the doctor, my MIL knows this. DH got sick, and had to be taken to the hospital, and it took us 2.5 years to clear that one bill. MIL knew that too.
I am my dad's loved daughter... and he missed me, like I missed him. he said to come to India, and that he would send me the tickets. Not only did he send the tickets, but remember, I'm the one earning in the house, so my dad also gave $2000 to compensate for the 2 months that I could not work. Bills still needed to be paid. And I did niot ASK him to do it, he said that we'll be fine in life in a few years, but right now, he is in a position to help, and he wanted to see me. I went. MIL knows ALL of this.
I went to DH's house... being married and all that I needed to right?
Well she was still super nice, did not ask me to do any house work or anything. In fact, I could go out, meet my friends whenever I wantedd and everything. But this lady is SOOO ridiculous.
I gave gifts to everyone in the house right? Well i guess she wasn't satisfied with hers, cuz she comes to my room the next day and says "before you go, buy me a nice perfume ok?"
while I stayed in India for 2 months, I went and stayed at my dad's house too... but whenever I could stay at DH's house, she would ask me for things. Say... "I have no other desires in life, but I like to take religious trips to different parts of India, you guys need to send money for that."
"If you dont do things for your parents when they are still alive, what will you do just taking their pics and crying AFTER they die?"
"----uncle gives his married daughter rs10,000 per month, fathers need to do things for their daughters"
"so and so's son and daughter in law sent their parents tickets to go to Australia you know (I later on found out this was not true, the people did not go on the children's cost, but on their own cost)"
Anyways.... you get the picture???

SO after all this, I did not want to drag my husband in between. He loves his mom. I lost my elder brother this year, and I know what it means to lose someone. IF anything happens to DH or his mom, I could not live with breaking up a mother-son relationship because of me. If anyone understands the value of family and love, I do.

I got pregnant, and she was so happy. She started being extra sweet to me and calling me and all that. I just could not stand the hypocrisy.
So i decided to speak to her one on one. i told her EVERYTHING. I saaid, I told her she asked mme for this and that, despite knowing that my husband is a student, and I am doing a cash job. I told her that I am her daughter in law, and NOT Santa Clause. She had nothing to say. She said 'sorry', that she did not realize it. YEAH RIGHT!!!!! How do you not realize all this?????

She wants to pretend like nothing has happened, and wants to come here for my delivery. i put my foot down and said NO. She is trying to make me feel guilty for it...
I am still standing for 6 hours and working. 2 weeks back, I cried with her and told her I was having a very hard time doing this. I am now 7 months pregnant. She was about to take a 2 week religious trip again, and when I told her I was having a very hard time, and cried, all that she said was,"Yes, what to do, its very hard. Let me come for the delivery." Thats ALL that she cares about, what SHE wants. I got really mad. So our hospital bills, our problems are all our problems, but our income, is hers too?
I lost it, and asked her how she could ask me to ask my dad for 10,000 rupees, and how I did not trust her at all, and how she was nothing but a bunch of words. Thats it. She hung up on me, and has not called me back. I am at peace. My husband has no clue that all this has happened. I have no clue how to tell him. All that I know, is that I am not at fault.
Everytime I stand and work, I hear her voice in my ears saying,... give me this, I want that, and the wedding, what she did. Just EVERYTHING.

This is eating me up alive... how do I let go? I am so scared that once DH gets a job, she will USE us to no end. I cannot respect her. She used the one BIG weakness I had, the need to motherly love, and used it to extort my dad. I do not trust her one bit.
But how on earth do I let go of this rage within me??? It is killing me more than anyone else.

rose8282 · Dec 29, 2012

I am in a hurry to go somewhere but very quickly, whenever she asked you something, why didn't you ask her to ask your husband? I mean your husband cannot just be so ignorant. He needs to know...I know you didn't want to create a tough situation for yourself and you would do that if you complain against his mother. Instead whenever she asks something, you could say.. I don't know, I give my earning to DH...DH is asking me not to ask anything from father...blah blah.

Barnowl · Dec 29, 2012

OP, extremely insensitive behaviour from your MIL. For her, you and your dad are just an ATM. And she is downright cheap and plain cruel to exploit you by playing the 'sweet mom' card.

You don't have a mom and you are now pregnant. You must think only about your kid. For god's sake, stop stressing over your MIL and other sh*t so that you don't end up affecting your baby's development. For no fault of the baby.

Remember your baby needs you and needs you NOW much more than your greedy MIL.

Regarding how you'll relay the new set of events to your H etc etc, they can wait until the baby is born. And born healthy.

Stressfull · Dec 29, 2012

OP

Pls dont take too much stress at this last trimister its not good for ur health , leave all the thing aside and try to be happy read some religious books and listen to some good music . I know its not easy when there is no financial stability to be peaceful ,but u had to for the sake of ur unborn kid.

Regarding ur mil its a never ending drama in many houses including mine especially when we r staying abroad they think we will get the moneyfrom our backyard trees, be thankful that she is not creating any dramas and directly exposing what she want.

But I dont know why im seeing a positive side inn ur mil she apolozing to u is a big thing for mils jmo.

prettydevil · Dec 29, 2012

dear... relax.... don't take unnecessary tensions at this stage.... ignore all this for now and enjoy your pregnancy time.

also... your husband should know about all this.... either thru speaker phone or something else.. it is your husband's responsibility to fulfill his mothers wishes and not a pregnant DIL. How come you haven't told him about anything. You must be having receipt for few items atleast, you can show that as a proof to him.

Just don't let your MIL come US for delivery. You will be able to take care of everything alone rather than she constantly demanding stuff.

Just relax and make limited conversations with her. Spend the best of time with your husband and have fun.

ZenSojourner · Dec 29, 2012

Avocado, while I agree her past behavior was pretty reprehensible, there is the bare possibility that she is truly in sympathy with you during your pregnancy and her offer to come and help may have been genuine. Unless she was asking you for money to make the trip? I'm not clear on that point. But there may have been genuine wish to come and help you and to try to make up for earlier mistakes. It seems she has not called up your husband and complained about you, so that may also be a sign that she is not so bad that she would try to get between you and her son.

Could you give her the benefit of the doubt at least? For your own sake you need to forgive the past actions, even if you are wary for awhile that she may do it again. It is eating you alive and you know it. All these things with dowry are very terrible in the ways that they get in there and mess up people's relationships and sometimes its not actual greed (though there is often that) but misunderstanding - sometimes people look very rich to people who are not so well off, I mean richer than they actually are, and as Stressful says, there is this idea that if you are living in the US money just falls off the trees for you.

In my case there was no dowry which bothered some of my husband's family no end (I wouldn't have allowed dowry if my life depended on it) but instead I had my own job and my own education. My husband, it turned out (I didn't know this at the time, he only told me later) basically told them my "dowry" would be my job, LOL! I don't know who was upset about it, he never told me that, but whoever it was never made an issue of it other than maybe one or two letters. But these dowry things are the cause of more family strife and hardship than any other factor, I think, and all this profligate gift-giving. These kinds of things (bales of saris and gold coins to relatives) were typically only done by truly wealthy, but now even people just scraping by seem to have these expectations of rich weddings, I just don't know.

Anyway, the fact that she isn't pestering your husband with all this seems to lend weight to maybe a huge misunderstanding on her part and some rude behavior, but maybe not evil intent. Her not calling you could be a sign of both guilt on her part for past wrong behavior and also hurt feelings that now she is trying to honestly help you and she has been spurned.

Also, have you thought about a positive consequence of her coming to stay with you is that she would see how you are really living and this would brush away all thoughts and imaginations of hers that you two are living here richly? A little dose of reality could clear away the last of those cobwebs in her mind about your situation here.

Just a few thoughts. But you know you really must let go of the anger you feel over her past actions for the sake of your own health. Emotions can run wild during pregnancy and you know that is having some effect in making these feelings so very intense. Are you getting proper prenatal care?

Tashsin · Dec 29, 2012

OMG really feeling bad for you dear...I know all MIL do same they use to show we are very caring and all but actually they want to take advantage of DIL...so forget your MIL all her advises...
Take care of yourself ask your husband to join some part time work..so that he can help you...
I really want to say this...think about your baby....not about MIL..and I am sure on your delivery she will demad so many things from your father..as mine did..so call your dad and ask him if he want to give anything to grandchildren..he can give directally to you not need to involve inlawz....

sitamum · Dec 29, 2012

Hi
I think it is going to be expensive asking your mother inlaw to come for your delivery. You know Indian mothers they will want to cook all the time wash the clothes most of the time and your energy bill will shoot up. They dont care abt the fire alarm but will want to do pappad. She may not be of real help. Once she visit you, she will ask to buy gifts to her entire family on her return as she visited USA. I know how tough these part time jobs and student life is. So better go through the delivery by yourself with your husband. You will have enough help from your hospital and on returning home you can take your friends help.
May be you can invite your dad to do some baby sitting for you after the delivery. He will be understanding. Mother inlaws wont understand u. Never expect them to be ur mother. Put your foot down and say NO. No money dont come. Tell it as plain as it and whatever money you make use it for yourself and your little one. Save up in case of emergency. Dont waste your time making others happy. Esp during this time. Take care of yourself and your baby.

tulipzz · Dec 29, 2012

Op, relax. Your mil atleast said sorry!

Some parents believe children abroad have unlimited money. Good that you drilled reality into her head.

Don't argue with her often. Just tell her "sorry mom we can't afford now" nicely when she asks. Don't put yourself under unnecessary pressure.