What kind of relationship do MIL want with their children?

[just2baccepted]

Prissy and Luise - Can you give details into what kind of relationship you would enjoy with your adult sons and their wives?  How many visits, how much contact etc.  What would your ideal relationship be with them?

Anybody else is welcome to answer too!

[Prissy]

Just2b,
Just to be accepted and treated with respect.  That sweet love only a child of your own can bring.  That's all. 

I don't even want a relationship with his wife anymore.  I'm sorry to say this but I just can hardly stand her. I'm being brutally honest.  She is so controlling, so rigid, so strange and so unlike anyone I've ever known.

She slipped and said one time: "he changes when he's around you all".

 He is a total robot with her. We don't know him any longer.  Can you imagine?  Can you imagine raising a child and them becoming a stranger?

Her parents are just perfect to her (these people are the fruitcakes of the earth) I'm not kidding. We were loved in this town (50,000 people) and loved by our sons so much.

We had a happy family until she came into the picture. Still, I catch myself and know that this is what he needed. He needed to be controlled.

I wanted to be treated the same way she treats the fruitcakes who brought her up.

Just2b...I relate so much to all you said in your first note.  In fact, it made me cry because it brought up so many painful memories.  I don't know why your MIL rejected you. I can feel your kind spirit in your words. 

How did you want her to treat you?  How does your Husband treat them?

[SunnyDays09]

  Not too much involvement.  A phone call to say hi, how ya doin from EITHER of them.  (Now I am going back a few years).  Perhaps when I invite them over for dinner they don't let out an exasperated moan, ask each other, put hand over mouthpiece and discuss for awhile.  And if they do accept they try to come on time?  Partake in the banter at the table and not leave so soon?

   Include us in something about their lives - something that is happening in their lives? 

  Any little morsel would do. 

Not to just be called when they need someone to watch pet, house, take them to car repair, loan money, etc.   
  Just to be treated a little like some of their friends.  That we aren't just some awful obligation they feel they HAVE to fulfill, begrudgingly.  With her parents it is so different. 
  They were always going out with one of them - since they are divorced - having little get togethers, shopping, etc. 

[luise.volta]

I would like to have been given a clean slate when she met me. My elder (deceased) son decided when he was about 13 that I was totally unacceptable. I don't know when the DIL I am writing about decided that about her own mother, but when they got together the "somebody done me wrong-song" was fully established and we were both stereotypes. We were treated like second-rate citizens; tolerated but definitely inferior, unwanted and unloved. I never understood any of it.

My second son's wife was prejudiced in the opposite way because he thinks he really lucked out in the mom-department. (Same mom, for heavens sake.) Anyhow, she came into my life with open arms and an open heart. We are very different but we have a deep respect for each other and can count on each other when either of us needs help.
We have a friendship that is separate from their relationship and we love to do stuff together, email back and forth, etc.

My point is that there was no clean slate in either case. A picture was painted of me that highly influenced our relationship before we ever met. I know that is hard to erase, but I would like a future DIL to decide for herself what she wants from me and what she has to offer...after we have met and had a chance to get to know each other. It can be pals, or just courteous. It can provide the opportunity to go deeper or stay on the surface. I'm able to adjust. I just want it to work.

[SunnyDays09]

Courteous!!  Oh my, you said it right there! 
   Ours are a whole different generation.  I was taught to respect and be kind.  I didn't look for any problems with my mil and I didn't find any.
   I went along with the program as best as I could but I was always courteous to his family.  I was just raised right I guess!!

[Prissy]

uh, yeah, that is gone with the wind, I think. These young women are "different", not respectful. (I know, Luise, not all of them. I don't know one who isn't, that's all)

She whispered to me one time, triumphantly: "you don't like it cause I stole your little boy"

How low can you go?

[luise.volta]

I think there's a lot to be said for that. We can be independent, self-starters and still be gracious. I know the old, down-trodden and passive "little-woman" is a thing of the past (thank heavens) but we can stand tall and still be gentle about it. We can listen and we can understand...those traits don't have to be trashed along with dependency.

Opps! Almost fell off my soapbox!

[just2baccepted]

Luise - I went into my marriage I guess naive to the realities of family relationships.  Since my family seemed to accept my hubby then I assumed that as long as I was nice and welcoming then his parents would like me too.  Oh my gosh was I wrong.  Were they just prepared not to like me?

[luise.volta]

Well, if there was that mind-set, to already not like you even before they met you, what a bummer. I'm sure that happens.

I was just as innocent at age 62 when I married my now-hubby and made the same assumptions. But his son and DIL were terrible to me. I thought if I made his dad happy, that would put a star in my crown. Not even close. I was much younger, so I must be after his money. What money! LOL! 

[Prissy]

That's terrible!! Off with their heads!  I can't believe it.  Oh but yes, I can. People can be so mean.

[luise.volta]

Well, twenty years later he thinks he invented me probably because he doesn't have to deal with his aging parent but maybe he just figured out that I'm wonderful! More LOL! 

[Prissy]

You have 8 pluses    I am so jealous.

[luise.volta]

Are we doing good cop/bad cop? 

[Prissy]

I haven't decided 

[SunnyDays09]

The PLUS  *hint*hint to this is that they can learn.

   If one truly wanted to be a friend to their mil, they would be.  end of story.
 
   There is always passive aggressiveness.