“Give Me Free Stuff”
“I’m a self-employed nail technician that works from home. Back in the Spring of 2020, beauticians were forbidden to accept clients due to Covid restrictions by the government. I wasn’t making any income at all for three months. When the restrictions were finally lifted, I immediately went back to work.
I started getting calls from lots of people who wanted to get their nails done, including my MIL. When I saw her number pop up, it surprised me a little because she never had her nails done by me, but I didn’t think much of it.
She wanted a simple manicure. I agreed and told her that the regular price was thirty bucks. However, because my MIL was a family member, I decided to give her a little discount and quoted her twenty-five bucks.
My MIL raised her voice and said, ‘Ok, but it’s not going to cost anything for me, right?’
I said, ‘Why?’
‘Because I’m family! You can’t seriously ask for money from your own family. Who does that? For family, everything should be free!’
I couldn’t believe it. I then went on to tell my mother-in-law that the only thing free in today’s world was cheese in a mousetrap and only for the second mouse.
All things and services cost something and at her age, she should understand that. I had done my mother’s nails, my sister’s, and my SIL’s, and they all paid me, never complaining in the process.
‘Why should I work for free, especially when I have already spent so much time without any money rolling into my account?’ I asked.
Then my MIL said, ‘But that’s not my problem that the government didn’t let you work! And it’s not my problem that you weren’t getting paid! Your clients shouldn’t suffer from your personal issues!’
I sighed, ‘Listen, my clients come for my services fully aware that this isn’t charity work. I offered you a smaller price which I don’t normally do, that’s a benefit only for the women in my family. Twenty-five dollars is a very reasonable price for a manicure. If you’re still not satisfied, then there’s nothing I can help you with. Good luck finding a nail tech who works for nothing.’
My MIL didn’t ask anything from me anymore but she did call my husband and told him everything in the most dramatic way possible.
‘I waited three months for a nail tech and now your wife is so mean and money-hungry that she refused to help me!’
Thankfully, my husband is also self-employed and understands what business means.
‘Mom,’ he began. ‘My wife is totally right. You shouldn’t have expected your nails done for free, that’s not how this world works.’
After that, she stopped bringing it up.”
“Get A Divorce”
“My wife and I have been together since we were teenagers.
After our engagement was official, my MIL started talking to me more. I didn’t mind because I knew that because I was going to be marrying her daughter soon, she had every right to know more about me.
With every day that passed, my MIL spoke fondly of me to other members of the family and friends when I wasn’t there. She would even call my mom to congratulate her on raising such a ‘wonderful gentleman.’
I was thrilled to know my MIL liked me so much.
Or so I thought.
My fiancee and I finally got married and went on a honeymoon for three weeks. We had about a month’s worth of vacation, but my wife wanted to spend the final week of said vacation with her parents in her country.
I wouldn’t even dream of not letting her visit her family, so I told her to go for it. After a week passed, she returned back. When I picked her up from the airport, my wife had a brand new bag that I didn’t recognize.
When I inquired about it, my wife said, ‘These are a few gifts from my mother to you! If I didn’t know any better, I’d think she’s trying to snatch you away from me!’
I will admit, the gifts were nice. I was truly confident that everything was going so well between us.
After a month passed, my MIL sent a text that changed everything.
‘Why aren’t you letting my daughter visit me? What have I done to you?’
I was shocked.
My wife never told me she wanted to visit her family. When she came home from work, I asked her if she wanted to visit family soon. When she said no, I asked if she told her mother that I was refusing to let her go visit. Again, my wife denied the accusation.
So, I messaged my MIL and told her I hadn’t done anything and that my wife can come and go as she pleases. Within seconds, my MIL sent a snarky text message basically indicating she wasn’t having it.
My phone started ringing and as soon as I picked up, my MIL started yelling profanities at me.
‘I knew you were the devil the day I first laid my eyes on you!’ My MIL continued to spew her hateful opinions about me. She completely flipped the script.
I was hurt because I thought we had a good MIL/SIL relationship. My wife, bless her soul, tried to defend me and clear things up, but because it was her mother, there was only so much she can do or say.
These types of calls kept going for a week. At one point, I had enough and stopped responding to all of her texts and calls. My wife and FIL didn’t blame me for this. A few weeks later, someone rang the doorbell at two am.
Amazingly, there was my MIL glaring at me before she made her way inside our home. I failed not to make it awkward. I failed to lighten up the mood. My MIL was whisper arguing with my wife constantly.
She spent one long dreadful week with us and left. I decided to ask my wife about what she talked about.
My wife flashed me an awkward grin and said, ‘Oh, she said to not have kids yet. You are not to be trusted yet.’
Now, my wife didn’t agree with her. But we weren’t for kids yet, so it didn’t matter that much. Over the next few months, the same arguments happened over and over. Either my wife visited her family and MIL would try to stop her from coming back to me, or MIL visited us and tried to convince my wife to leave me.
Last month, I decided enough was enough. For the first time since my MIL and I stopped seeing eye to eye, I called her out on her BS. The only reason I didn’t do this earlier was for my wife.
This led my MIl to drop all contact with her daughter. Because, as my FIL told us, my MIL was upset and kept saying things like, ‘How could my own daughter let her husband speak to me that way?’
I remember my wife crying a lot after her mother cut her off. I, on the other hand, finally had some peace of mind, but couldn’t bear seeing my wife cry.
So I tried to make things work between them. I called and had a three-hour-long conversation with my MIL while my wife was at work. My MIL claimed that I lied and manipulated my wife into living moving out of her birth country to live with me.
I informed her that we loved each other very much and that not talking to her mother was hurting my wife.
‘I’ll start talking to her again but under one condition,’ my MIL then said, ‘I want you two to get a divorce. I should have never let you marry my daughter.’
It took me a while to summon the courage to tell my wife about her mother’s demands. In the end, after I told her, my wife immediately took my side and decided to let her mother come around on her own time. It still hurts my wife when my MIL acts distant, but there really wasn’t much else to do.”
“Be More Grateful”
“My MIL got very angry with me a while back. For context, my MIL is a mild hoarder. Her house is filled with stuff and she has a bit of a shopping addiction. Overall, my MIL is a nice person, but she is very passive-aggressive toward me specifically.
She came to visit for one week and brought a truly unbelievable amount of junk for us to keep. My MIL cleared some items with me and some with my husband separately, so we didn’t know how much stuff she brought until things got way out of hand. She also brought a large, broken plastic dresser with TONS of toddler clothing that we didn’t need.
I was frustrated by this because it was a recurrent issue. My MIL excessively gifted random things from her house. This went on for ten years. My husband tried getting his mother to stop by having multiple conversations with her about excessive gifting before, but my MIL got more difficult when we had our daughter in 2020.
My husband patiently thanked his mother for the gifts. Satisfied, my MIL stepped out for a while. I used the opportunity and spent over an hour that same evening sorting clothes and putting them in donation piles. When I tried to move the dresser it collapsed because it was missing part of the frame.
The next morning I put aside bags of clothes to get rid of. I intended to hide them, but I got sidetracked by a cranky toddler and a blowout disaster. When my MIL arrived from her hotel, I asked her if she wanted the dresser back and offered to put it back in the car for her.
My MIL immediately got upset and asked, ‘Oh, so you can’t use it?’
‘We don’t really have space,’ I pointed out. Then my MIL saw the bags of clothes I set aside and said, ‘So you’re just going to get rid of those too, huh?’
‘Unfortunately,’ I said again. ‘We don’t have enough space for all of it, but I picked out a good bag worth of clothes upstairs and I might donate or consign the rest.’
I said this nicely but just didn’t have the energy to lie like I was originally intending to.
As soon as I stopped talking, my MIL immediately left the house without saying a word.
I had a job interview while my toddler was napping, then I sent her the nicest possible message that I know she was upset and that I understand she’s disappointed while I can’t keep all the clothes, I’m happy to talk through things with her when my husband got home. I even invited her to come over and play with her grandchild, but she left me on read.
When my husband came home and messaged her, my MIL apparently told him about what happened. When he asked if she wanted to come over for takeout and to talk, my MIL refused and said she was leaving and didn’t want to see us.
A few days after, my FIL emailed my husband and said my MIL was upset because I NEVER thank her for all her gifts and said expected me to be more grateful for her gifts.
I didn’t think this claim was true. It was pointless to try to understand. My FIL also said that my MIL wasn’t giving me the silent treatment, she just wasn’t speaking to me because she might say something she might regret to me.
From there, we started a strict no-gift boundary.”
“Let Me Come On Your Honeymoon!”
“A few months back, my husband and I announced that we were finally tying the knot!
A few days after the announcement, while talking with my mother-in-law on a video call, she asked if we were going to travel. Not thinking anything of it, I shared that we were going to visit Greece for our honeymoon.
Out of nowhere, my MIL casually asked if she could join us.
I was completely stunned. I looked at my husband who also had a very confused look on his face. We both said no and of course, my MIL got angry and demanded we let her come.
‘I have never been out of this country! I deserve to travel, I am the one who gave birth to him so this should be special for me too! If it wasn’t for me there wouldn’t even be a wedding!’
She went on for several minutes, but my husband and I held our ground.
To this day, I still can’t get over how bizarre her outburst was.”
“Cancel Your Vacation”
“A few years ago I made a social media post about our plans to go to Disney. After she saw the post, my MIL demanded we push our trip out by ten days because she wanted to go. Because of COVID, we actually ended up postponing the trip until the following fall. At the time, we decided to let it go.
Unfortunately, my MIL proved once again how selfish she was. A little later, my oldest BIL mentioned wanting to take his fiancee on a hiking trip in Utah when he got back from deployment and my SIL mentioned she would be going on a girls’ trip to a concert, while my husband and I planned to go to Italy in the summer to celebrate our anniversary.
When she found out about everyone’s plans, my MIL called me to vent about how my BIL wouldn’t take her with him on the hiking trip.
My MIL is disabled and can’t walk long distances. She also has a low heat tolerance so I wasn’t even sure why she wanted to go on a hiking trip she couldn’t even participate in.
After our conversation was over, my MIL called my husband to talk about me behind my back. She continued to complain about how I should not take so much time off work so I could continue to bring in money for us.
That’s right.
Because no one wanted to take her on the trip, my MIL started sharing her hypocritical thoughts considering she hadn’t worked in over twenty years.
My amazing husband was over her behavior and started declining her calls. If he did have to speak to his mother, he kept the calls very short.
Surely I can’t be the only person with an extremely entitle MIL?!”
“Give Me The Baby”
“Last summer I was going through tough times. I was pregnant and always exhausted. My house wasn’t in tip-top shape. I gradually started getting rid of stuff to clean up. In the middle of cleaning, I was hospitalized.
We asked my mother-in-law if she could come help me care for the baby when I got out of the hospital. Well, before I was admitted, I had bins organized in the living room for things to get rid of and things to go to storage.
I’ll admit, it was hard to walk because I was getting rid of a lot of stuff. When my MIL walked in, she freaked out and declared our house was disgusting.
A few days later, my MIL told my husband that his dad wanted to talk to us. It turned out my MIL told my FIL our house was disgusting with stuff everywhere and it looked like we lived in a hoarder house.
Again, I had everything organized to show what was what. Despite this, my husband’s dad proceeded to tell us that if our house ever looked got the way that it was again he would call CPS.
We ended up having to move very soon after giving birth. Our house wasn’t fully unpacked because our baby had medical issues and we were at the doctor’s constantly.
At one point, my MIL demanded a FaceTime from my husband to see if the house was unpacked and ‘put together’. She then declared that since she helped us at the old place she had a right to know.
Needless to say, she called my husband back later crying about how we used her. My MIL then said our new house should be clean and if it wasn’t up to her standards when she came to visit she was going to have to take the baby away until we ‘got our act together.’
She then said she was tired of seeing her son get used by me because I was a stay-at-home mom and the house wasn’t perfect.
We still don’t get along very well.”
