Hello!

How do I handle my mother in law? I’m just after some advice. My mother in law and I used to get along. Once my daughter was born she started causing fights and being rude in front of people and acting dismissive towards me. Our daughter is 4 months old and she lives only 15 minutes from us and she has only seen her 3 times in her whole life, due to her not making an effort. She continually will start fights with my husband or myself and I’m at my wits end. Need some advice on how to deal with her please.

Posted by anon, 24/10/13

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  • Perhaps your husband should find out what’s wrong and try and sort it out.


  • I hope you were able to work things out with your MIL.


  • That’s awful to live so close and still rarely visit. I would kill to be in her position of being able to visit my grandson regularly. I would be avoiding her and hoping she sees sense soon. Or send hubby round to talk to her about things


  • I would tackle issue head on and confront her and if she still is dismissive and rude then I’d stop making an effort am until she realises. You have a four month Bub and don’t think you need the worry of inlaw.


  • I would cut her out of your life. You say she never visits,bro I assume she dies her trouble baking when you visit her or via phone calls/texts. Easy to stop these. Or have you tried talking to her, making her aware of your feelings and possibly finding out why she’s doing this?


  • Yes! Try and talk to your partner about this situation.


  • Does your husband feel the same way? Perhaps he could raise it with her directly. Maybe she has an issue that she’s been holding onto and hasn’t raised it with you?

    Good luck. Family issues like this aren’t easy.


  • ignore her, go to any family outing, perhaps make an effort to visit her on a sunday afternoon drive with bubs, ringing first and making the appropriate arrangements, she may feel put out, or she may be wanting to be asked for help and not want to appear to interfere, My mother in law did the same thing, she just did not want to interfere. or be perceived as an interfering MIL, just extend the olive branch a bit at a time, and when visiting perhaps ask her advice on something trivial to let her help out!!!


  • Stop contact and then let your husband have a chat with her to let her know how she is acting is effecting you


  • Stop contact. She needs to see the error in her ways.


  • stop talking to her, just don’t involve her in day to day things. She isn’t your priority and you husband should side with you, his wife


  • is it any better now


  • Cut her out for a while. If she rings and becomes abusive, hang up. If she shows up and is rude and dismissive, walk to the front door, open it and ask her to leave. Tell her the door will be open for her again to return once her attitude improves as you want her to be a part of your family, but the negativity is not appreciated.


  • You are married to her son, not to her! If she is having a negative effect on your family, I would take a break from her into she makes the effort to change.


  • Has the same thing happen to me. My gynecologist noticed my blood pressure rising and asked what was going on. I told her. She said to divorce my Mother-in-law before she wreaked our marriage.
    I spoke to my Husband (a only child) and pointed out what she was saying and doing and I told him we were solid but she was trying to put a wedge between us. He decided that we would try this method and it seemed to work well. He would go visit her at lunch-time and on the way home keeping her happy and showing her lots of photo’s and teller her how the are. She had plenty to brag about to her friends and I was happy that we no longer had anything to do with her. She cotton-on that she had not seen the kids in a very long time and she then realised that she needed to change her ways if she wanted to see the whole family. This saved our marriage for sure!


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