Has your DH ever stood up for you in front of his parents?

Yeah My DH has stood up for me once in his life time which I given the details about it in one of the recent thread started by me.

Recently my MIL and FIL started to behave strangely by not talking to me and not eating what I cook, she used to cook for herself and my FIl after I leave the kitchen and I was really wondering what has gone wrong with her, this went on for a few days and finaly when my DH confronted them she said I have been saying nastly things about them to her sister, for this my said " dont blame her unneccessarily and she is not that type" It was such a pleasant surprise for me and OMG my MIL's face turned pale.

My fil plays his tricks mostly when his son is not in the scene. Even if he is around, it complicates if we talk back all the time, and we prefer to leave it like that if no reply is required. There are times he has called me to talk for myself since he did not know about a particular incident. But whenever DH was equipped with all that he has to talk about, he has always been supportive.

Once an argument is started, my FIL will turn a deaf ear to all that we say and he will keep repeating "your wife is only important to you, you will nod your head only for her", without even listening to what we have to say. Once when he kept saying this again and again, my DH said "yes, just like your wife is important to you, she is important to me. can we now talk about this problem?" FIL mouth shut !

Well, he either keeps quiet or joins them in their accusation. I cannot remember any incident where he supported me.

Once or twice, he did speak his mind out, that what they did was wrong. When I was carrying and my mother was preparing to come to US for my delivery, my mil instructed my mom not to buy new jewels for the baby (the things tied around the hip to protect the baby or ward off evil eyes) as that is our family tradition. That they put on old jewels for the baby. So, my mom said she will present the usual stuff later on when we come to India. Having said this to my mom, she went to the jewellers and got new things for the baby and proudly showed it on webcam to us, saying that my parents are not doing the needful and so she is doing it. DH already knew that she had told my mom not to buy new things. He immediately told her that what she did is not right and will land her in trouble, as my parents will complain!! That was RUDE shock to her and she started cribbing, crying, demeaning my parents and all. End result: DH was pissed off and regretted having been fair. He ended up speaking ill of my parents and me to console her. (Finally, my parents offered to pay her for the jewels that she bought and didnt raise a hue, that is another story).

DH does know the right and the wrong, but simply refuses to point that out to his mom/dad fearing their tantrums.

Sandhya

Originally Posted by pmahensa

What a wonderful thread to discuss our *nice* hubbies for a change!


2. My dear MIL is a bit of hygiene freak. She thinks we should take off all our clothes when going # 2 and take a shower after each # 2 as well. When she first came to visit us here in the US, she tried to force me to follow these rules. As soon as DH got wind of it, he gave her a lecture and told her she was free to follow those rules, but I was not going to.

3. My dear MIL also gets up at 5am every morning to wash clothes EVERYDAY. She has a washing machine at home but does not use it bec. it does not clean clothes as well as she does. DH knew this and thought that when she came to visit us here in the US she might try to make me do this so as soon as he bought her home from the airport, the first thing he did was to show her how to use the washer and dryer. You should have seen the look on her face


5. On Valentine's day which was 2 days after the huge fight with her, he got me 6 presents, 4 from him and 2 from my son to me. I asked him well where is your present to your mom, (in front of her), he said she does not need them, you do! OMG! I swear her jaw dropped to the ground! Especially after she saw the price tag on the pair of earrings that he had presented to me

There are countless more incidents like these but these are the ones that have stayed on my mind.

OMYGAWD pmahensa your MIL seems exact carbon copy of MINE!!!!!!!!!!!! She has never asked me to wash my body after #2 but makes comments of me being unhygeinic.
You are very lucky that your DH had the guts to give you nice gifts in front of his mother...i dont think my husband would ever do it...my MIL is visiting us at our place these days and we have our anniversary coming up...I have a very nice gift for him but will not take it out unless he gives me sumthing too. If he doesnt have a gift for me, I will wait for MIL to leave and then give it to him. You should touch wood and thank God for giving you such a supportive husband.

Originally Posted by pmahensa

On Valentine's day which was 2 days after the huge fight with her, he got me 6 presents, 4 from him and 2 from my son to me. I asked him well where is your present to your mom, (in front of her), he said she does not need them, you do! OMG! I swear her jaw dropped to the ground! Especially after she saw the price tag on the pair of earrings that he had presented to me

A husband and wife exchanging gifts with each other for Valentine's day is one thing.

But if the husband is getting the wife a gift on behalf of their child, as well (signifying that the child loves the mother, too, hence the gift), then don't you think that the husband should be giving his mother a gift, too, as he is HER child? I mean, the fight is between his mother AND his wife and he has already backed his wife up and supported her 100%. That itself would have been punishment enough for the Mother / MIL.

So, what was the need to hurt his mother even more by telling her that while his wife deserves to be honored with love from THEIR son on V-day, that his mother does not deserve such an honor / gift from him? Isn't that like telling his mother that he no longer loves her or cares for her? Does he mean this? If so, then it would have been better to just book the Mother's ticket back home immediately after the fight, instead of keeping her around, and hurting her by showing her that you don't really care for her anymore! IMO, if you are a human being with human emotions, then, your child telling you that s/he no longer loves you or cares for your feelings is going to hurt. BIG TIME.

In fact, it is behavior like this that gets MILs on the defensive and makes them want to break up a son-DIL's happiness. It is always better to take higher ground, and be the bigger person by avoiding unnecessary hurtfulness / misunderstandings with close relatives, especially parents. I don't mean to say that you should be a sucker and let parents / in-laws dominate / abuse you. What I am saying is that while you should stand up for yourself and your spouse (as your top-most priority), you should still avoid inflicting UNNECESSARY pain on said parents / in-laws, no matter how easy and tempting it is to do so.

yep malyatha ... I do believe my husband was wrong to behave like that ... mostly because I thought it would backfire on me one way or the other as she had already accused me of 'stealing' her son from her on an earlier occasion. I salvaged the situation by giving her a bunch of roses and some chocolates on behalf of my son. that softened her up a bit towards me for the rest of her stay.

in hubby's defense, she had gone waaayyyy out of line in the fight 2 days earlier and my hubby did not say anything to her regarding her behavior and this was his way of showing how he felt ... aggghh guys ... dont they realize that we wives end up paying ...

but I will not deny it made my day

Originally Posted by pmahensa

yep malyatha ... I do believe my husband was wrong to behave like that ... mostly because I thought it would backfire on me one way or the other as she had already accused me of 'stealing' her son from her on an earlier occasion. I salvaged the situation by giving her a bunch of roses and some chocolates on behalf of my son. that softened her up a bit towards me for the rest of her stay.

in hubby's defense, she had gone waaayyyy out of line in the fight 2 days earlier and my hubby did not say anything to her regarding her behavior and this was his way of showing how he felt ... aggghh guys ... dont they realize that we wives end up paying ...

but I will not deny it made my day

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. I didn't realize that he had NOT backed you up when she was ripping into you two days before. My bad.

no he had backed me up by saying "pooja said sorry and since she has apologized why are you creating a scene" .. that is what had led to the "stealing my son remark." after dh defended me, she continued to say a lot of things which were mean and downright nasty. I kept quiet as both dh and I had decided previously not to answer back bec. it would just escalate the situation.

It was good we let her talk without intterupting because DH got to see the venom she had stored inside of her! I think DH went into shock listening to his mom's innermost feelings and that's the reason why he was being extra nice to me on valentine's day. she really spilled her guts out that day to my advantage

Anyways, after I gave her the flowers and chocolate she softened up a bit. After this incident, I limited my conversations with her and if I felt she said something that was not agreeable I just left the room. She complained a bit abt that too but atleast I was at peace!

hi Rihana

nice thread you have started. Lot of Ilites have posted saying positive about their hubby. it is really good to read.

About me my DH is good, but he never speaks up even if my inlaws were wrong, they have told me something wrong, or behaved wrong, he will just say leave it they have become old.

For that matter he wont criticize me if they have told to him something about me.

But i feel, he should speak up for me, if i have been unnecesarily harassed or labeled something.

But nowadays i dont tell him anything since he is not going to do anything, about it.

That way i found my brother doing right thing, he will confront my mother is she is wrong about anything and at the same time, if my sil is wrong he will confront her also, which i feel is right thing to do.

Radhika it is good your brother mediates well between wife and mother. That prob. saves a lot of hassles!

But I feel that we should not have to look to DH to mediate/protect/justify ourselves to IL's. I think it gives them too much power over us in a way.

We can't change our IL's because they won't but what we can do is make sure that when our sons get married, we don't force them to choose between us and their wives.