Disclaimer: I have been an avid reader but have never posted before so bear with me.
I (32 F) have absolutely reached my breaking point with my toxic MIL and her blatant refusal to respect the boundaries DH and I set.
DH and I were away on a trip recently, and my mom was watching our 12 month old son. While we were away, DH’s parents both got COVID. MIL (who sounded so sick she could barely speak) called my mom wanting to come over to see the baby. My mom told her, of course, that she could not come while she was sick because the baby would get sick, and MIL proceeded to claim that she could just wear a mask. My mom stood her ground and told her that she was welcome to come when she was no longer sick. MIL obviously did not take that well.
As part of her temper tantrum, she repeatedly called DH during our international trip (including when it was 1am her time). Conveniently though, on the day of MY birthday, she didn’t call. Not even a HBD text.
We came back from our trip, and it was my DH’s birthday. MIL claimed she wanted to come over for his birthday (complete bs btw because last year she barely acknowledged his birthday). This was an excuse for her to force herself because she didn’t get her way while we were gone.
They come over, and she still sounds sick and is actively coughing (into her hand btw). MIL hands DH a plastic shopping bag claiming his birthday gift is inside. She didn’t even bother to wrap it. No birthday card. She didn’t bring me a birthday gift or acknowledge that my birthday was the prior week. Mind you, for her birthday, we took her out for her birthday and bought her gift. Again, it’s not about the gift but the complete lack of consideration. This just confirmed my speculation that she didn’t care to come over for his birthday—she was coming over because she was told no the prior week, and she couldn’t handle that.
She then kisses my son, which of course, boils my blood as I have told her multiple times NOT to kiss him. DH kindly asks her not to kiss him so he doesn’t get sick. A normal person would’ve been embarrassed that they even kissed a baby while sick but nope! MIL proceeds to bark at DH HE WONT GET SICK.
Hours go by and FIL keeps asking her to leave because he can tell we’re exhausted, and she keeps ignoring him.
Finally, they decide to leave and DH goes outside with FIL. MIL lingers back. MIL then proceeds to grab my son’s leg and kisses it. I immediately pulled his leg back, shocked at her audacity. I am actually kicking myself thinking back that I should’ve put her in her place right then and there but I was so taken back in the moment.
I was so angry and upset that once again she purposely didn’t respect our boundaries. When DH returned, I explained how upset I was and told him that he needs to have a conversation with her. He agreed. I’m frustrated because she consistently crosses boundaries and either it gets swept under the rug or when she is confronted, she gaslights and plays the victim.
For example, when we first told immediate family we were expecting, we specifically told both families we were not ready to share with others and that they should keep it to themselves. When we found out that she had, in fact, not followed our wishes, DH got into an argument her and instead of admitting fault, MIL yelled at DH denying it (when we had proof she did) then when she realized it wasn’t working, she proceeded to BLAME DH that it was his fault.
When my son was a day old, she kissed him, at which point my mama bear instincts kicked in and I SNAPPED at her (PP hormones really came through). She of course did not take it well and
barked that she kissed him on his foot. I told her I didn’t care. He’s a newborn.
I feel like ever since that day because she was told she couldn’t do something, she has made a BLATANT effort to try to kiss him every opportunity she can.
I am fed up and have limited contact with her. We do not see her often but when we do, she does the same shit.
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What are the consequences of crossing your boundaries? Boundaries without consequences are just requests. She needs to be put into timeout. And you let her stay after she kissed your baby? Why would she ever listen to you if there’s no consequences?
She’s got a serious disregard for boundaries. You’re right to limit contact and set firm boundaries. DH needs to step up and enforce them too. Don’t let her gaslighting get to you, you’ve got proof of her behavior.
You are telling her what you want her to do, and only talking to her when she disregards you. That is not setting boundaries, that is making requests. Boundaries require consequences. Time out, no visits for now.
Also, you are allowed to tell visitors to leave your home. There was no reason for their visit to go on for hours. Next time (whenever you feel comfortable lifting the TO they have earned themselves), your husband needs to set an end time with his parents ahead of time. When that time is getting near, stand up and say, “It’s been a nice visit, but we need to get ready for bed now.” Hand MIL her purse and walk her to the door.
She sounds toxic.
“MIL, we’ve asked and then told you not to kiss Baby, but you continue to do so. We’re going to set a timeout for a month, at least, until you decide to follow our rules for Baby.”
Don’t call. Don’t come over. If you contact us or contact us through someone, we’ll have to take a longer break. Baby is our baby, and you aren’t going to spend our precious family time upset because you refuse to respect us, Baby, and our time. You called Husband repeatedly at all hours while we were travelling, which is also anacceptable. You aren’t going to be running things in our home.
This is the one and only time we’ll be having this conversation. If you bring it up, we’ll have to cut contact until it stops.”
Consider following up with what you’ve said in email
Do not apologise. Do not argue. Do not repeat yourself more than once, if that.
Don’t say, “I feel”; say, “I think”. Don’t say “I’m sorry, but…”
Be absolutely clear. No debating, no discussing.
Remember that boundaries are for you, not them. If they cross your boundary, you need to remove them until they learn.
She’s not clueless, she’s deliberately testing your boundaries to see if she can bulldoze them. This isn’t forgetfulness; it’s dominance disguised as “grandma love.” Kissing a baby while sick is straight-up selfish and reckless. If DH doesn’t shut it down hard, she’ll just keep escalating. You’re not overreacting, she’s playing power games with your child’s health. Cut the visits or enforce consequences. Period.
I would get DH to message her and tell her LO has been sick and, as she completely disregarded your wishes to stay away if she is unwell, you will now be taking an extended break from her. She’s actively putting your baby at risk and doesn’t care! She’s more bothered about what SHE wants
She think of you as a pushover, it’s just powerplay. And since there are no consequences, she will continue to do that, and maybe do worst. You need to call her out or limit her contact with your son until she behave. You know, she doesn’t need to approve your boundaries, and she doesn’t even need to understand it. She just need to respect it and do it your way. Because it’s you and your husband’s son. Stop needing her approvation or acceptation, she will alway gaslight you and never acknowledge her wrongdoings. You will alway be the bad guys in her narrative, so be the bad guys for your son and family. If she still not understand it, it’s not your problem. Her behavior is not normal at all.
She needs a long time out and you need to tell her exactly why. “MIL, you will not be seeing baby again at least until (X time) because you cannot seem to understand or respect our rules and we are not willing to compromise our child’s health for your desires.”
What were the consequences to the violated boundaries?
It doesn’t sound like there any.
If there weren’t, then you don’t actually have any boundaries.
Shine your spine, put her on time-out, babe-wear, or whatever.
Boundaries don’t work without consequences. It’s time for DH to step up and lay down the law.
“MIL, you kissed LO multiple times despite knowing we don’t allow it. We aren’t going to have visits for [X months] because of that. Maybe you’ll learn that our rules aren’t suggestions.”
Then you take a giant leap backwards and ignore the explosion. Delay answering texts, let calls go to voicemail, and don’t let her in the home. She’s going to make demands, throw fits and manipulate. Ignore, wait it out and when her time out is up, decide if she’s adult enough to visit.
Take cues from your mother and learn how to say no. Your responsibility is to protect your child, not MIL’s feelings. Those are hers to manage and she is unsafe to be around your LO. This is the perfect opportunity to put her in time out. Also, reminder to never remind your husband about MIL’S BD or to help with a card, gift, call or text. She gets exactly what she gave you.
What are the consequences for her constantly crossing boundaries? You and DH need to work on that, starting with her being banned from seeing your son for some time for kissing him when you’ve told her not to. Good luck with this one OP
Next time she kisses baby, remove him from her hands, with a disgusting look on your face, walk him to the sink and wash the kissed area with soap and water. MIL does not get within kissing distance of baby for the rest of the visit (if you don’t kick her out, or if she doesn’t leave because she’s offended).
6 month time out. Boundaries without consequences are just suggestions.
You now tell your husband you and baby are no contact with her since she can’t follow the simple rule of don’t kiss the baby. He is free to continue see them as often as he’d like however if either is sick you hope he won’t then as the baby could get sick. Simple as that you and baby no longer interact with her talk or text or FaceTime calls all gone she has crossed your boundaries too many times so this is her consequence.
Why did you guys let a known boundary stomper in your home while she was visibly sick? Infections can spread very easily through droplets and airborne pathways. Any close contact in a non adequately ventilated space is a huge risk. Your mom did a better job keeping baby safe than his parents. Make sure you thank her profusely.
If she tries this nonsense again, turn her away at the door. Your baby needs you to protect him more than your MIL needs coddling and appeasement. Covid can have lifelong repercussions for any of us and it’s a roll of the dice who gets affected the most. Talk to your husband, set boundaries and strong consequences for her selfish actions. Your MIL should be ashamed of herself.
As evidenced by the comments here, consequences and further limiting contact are the only real solutions here. The only thing I thought might be worth adding is that if you and DH aren’t comfortable or able to call her out in the moment, that’s just further reason that contact needs to be limited (re: nonexistent) until that changes. Get therapy. Practice in a mirror. Have a list of go to responses to use. But explain to DH that until you’re both 100% comfortable and confident that you will shut that shit down as it’s happening, you simply can’t be around her. And until she gives you a very compelling reason to believe that she will respect your boundaries, she doesn’t hold LO, and if she approaches either of you while holding LO, you absolutely turn away or prevent her from getting her hands and lips on the baby.
🚨 no contact alert no contact alert no contact alert I repeat this is not a drill this is not a drill no contact 🚨 brought to you by the unruly mother-in-law scan system this is not a test this is not a test 🚨🚨🚨
I know you are beating yourself up over this visit. You are a good mom, but this is definitely THAT moment to really be a “lesson learned”. As soon as you heard her coughing the visit should have been ended and they should have left. But also the biggest issue is it’s like she has ODD (probably along with being a narcissist) and just keeps doing things despite told not to. NOW this is the time when your husband speaks to her a consequence is put in place, not just a conversation being had. He needs to tell her “since you not only came over still showing symptoms, you twice kissed the baby after repeatedly being told not to. We need space from you for a little while to reflect on our relationship with you moving forward.”
Then you DO NOT engage. She will blow her top, call her flying monkeys, possible show up to your home, whatever she thinks she needs to do to regain control. You ignore it all. Even when aunts/uncles/ her friends are calling your husband tells them it’s between him and his mom and he doesn’t want to talk about it. Harsh lines in the sand need to be drawn. You guys are on the right track already, it’s just time to get a lot stricter
Time for your MIL to lose access to your son.
So she doesn’t gaf about your sons health and your boundaries. It’s time for no contact.
>kindly asks her not to kiss
Part of the problem is how the message gets delivered. You are protecting your child. Do not be afraid to get nasty.
NC until she respects your wishes.
time to go NC with MIL. She knew she was sick and intentionally endangered your your child. What a vile and despicable person.
Now with regard to your husband “talking” to MIL about her the very dangerous event with your child. Prople like your MIL could not care less about words – they just continue to do whatever they want. Your MIL will continue to do whatever she wants.
MIL needs severe consequences. It should be NC. You and your husband are suppose to protect your child. With MIL having access to your child, she is dangerous to his well-being.
MIL intentionally visits your child and then kisses your son with still having covid or the aftermath. Go online and lookup information of the effect of covid on a baby. It is not pretty.
MIL wants only what she wants, and too bad for anyone else.
If MIL continues to be allowed to see your child, and something awful happens to your child, this is on you and your husband. i hope the two of you can live with that.
Your husband needs to understand that this can’t be a conversation. A conversation implies give and take, and she’s showing you that take is all she can do. What needs to happen here is a one sided lecture with applied consequences for breaking the rules. Your husband needs to lay down the law and punish his mother for her transgressions, because fear of consequences is the only thing that’s going to fix her behavior.
Something like this should help as a place to start:
“Since you have proven yourself unwilling to follow even the simplest of rules, prioritizing your own wants over the health and safety of your grandchild, I am instituting a three month moratorium on any contact.”
Wait for her to stop screeching at you.
“If at any point during these three months you attempt to circumvent this decision, successfully or not, the timer will restart, adding another three months to your wait. During this time, I suggest you do some soul searching and ask yourself if what little you’ve gained is worth the time you’ll be missing out on. Once we reach out to you to reestablish contact, we will be sitting down to clarify the rules and consequences, which you will agree to follow if you wish to remain a part of our child’s life. This is not up for negotiation.”
I honestly do not understand the dilemma and confusion here. “MIL, you specifically did what we asked you not to do, so no baby visits for you for a month”. Try later and if bad behavior exists, it’s two or three months etc. Why in the world would you continue to put your baby in danger?
I would not let her around my child at this point. She has no shame and is clearly not open to discussing your boundaries, let alone respecting them.
You should buy her a Scolds Bridle to wear so she can’t even talk, let alone kiss anyone. Tell her to wear the bridle or walk away and don’t come back – ever! I’m pretty sure FIL will enjoy life a lot more too.
Don’t allow her around baby. Breath. You got this.
I swear these mil’s with their kissing and overstepping. Its like they want to suck the blood of these babies to continue their own relevancy. My exmil was the same.
Stop seeing her!!! Stop letting her see your child!!! She is not a safe person and your child will grow up to think that it’s the expectation to just swallow grandma showing up and breaking your family boundaries and comfort whenever. Don’t let your children think that this is normal behavior or part of a loving relationship. No grandparents around are better than toxic ones!!!
“Since you continue to overstep our clear boundaries, this is the last time I am going to say this: Under no circumstances can you kiss our child. If we find you do it again, you will not see the child any more. This is not personal, you just happen to be the only person who refuses to respect us.”
Stop being kind. You said yourself she barks back at your boundaries in your home? Stop allowing her to be a literal bully and stomp on every single thing you say to her. Start being mean back or genuinely cut her off because her games are bs and your kids health is NOT something to play with.
It is your home, your child, and your boundaries. She does not have to like the rules, but the only way she will believe that she has to follow them is if there are consequences when she refuses to. If she shows up sick, you tell her to come back when she’s well and close the door. If she kisses your baby knowing that is crossing a boundary, you ask her to leave and not come back until she is able to behave properly.
She will hate this, she will bark and rage at you over it. She will try and make you out to be the villain. These are manipulation tactics she uses because they work. She thinks she can get away with it, because so far she has. When she crosses a boundary again, inform her that visitation is over and ask your husband to come let you know once MIL has left, and promptly lock yourself and baby in another room until they go. Then it’s NC until you receive an apology and an assurance that it won’t happen again. There should be a limit to the number of times you’re willing to go through this with them. Make sure you and DH are on the same page about this from the start.
MIL, FIL, and DH need to come around to understanding that this will be the protocol when boundaries with baby are crossed. Anything less than strict enforcement from you will only encourage MIL to continue trying to get away with things. We know that explaining and asking nicely doesn’t work. For her, this is a power play. You’ll need to demonstrate to her that in your home her manipulations won’t get her what she wants.
It sucks having to put your foot down and enforce boundaries so hard when others could so easily just respect your wishes. But unfortunately that’s the only feasible option here if you want to go through the effort of keeping MIL and FIL in your lives. Good luck.
She is trying to create a power struggle between the two of you. She keeps doing the same thing because she wants to bait you into reacting and then she can play the victim. Don’t play the game with her.
You tagged this as advice wanted, so here it is – she pushes at your boundaries because she doesn’t like it when you tell her what to do, and she KNOWS she can do whatever she wants. You think you calling her out is enforcing your boundaries. But it is not. You are just asking her to do something, and she is taking great delight in spitting in your face for asking.
Your mom realized your MIL was sick, and did not let her come over. Period.
You realized MIL was sick, and you let her get close enough that she could kiss the baby. She continued to stay – while sick – for hours in your home. And then got close enough to kiss the baby again.
Your mother enforced. You asked and got denied.
Until you get to the point where she shows up at your house sick, and you point at the door and say “Nope, leave now,” she is never going to stop pushing back against everything you say.
sorry to be harsh but she does it because you and DH allow it to happen. there are no consequences. Limited the time you see her but she still sees LO and does what she wants. She’s proved she doesn’t care about your baby‘s life. she could get LO sick and then how will you and DH feel? You need to step up and protect your baby! If she starts to gaslight or play the victim cut her off. Tell her this is not a discussion you will not kiss baby at all. every time she opens her mouth you tell her – this is not a discussion we are telling you this is how it is – you will not have unsupervised visits, you cannot be trusted. you kiss baby you do not see baby for three months.
again I’m sorry to be harsh but your baby counts on you and DH to protect them. and the last thing you want is for you and DH at the doctors or worse the hospital and LO is sick because she did what she keeps doing and you and DH regretting not stopping it sooner.
The most helpful thing anyone has ever told me is that boundaries are about how you will be reacting to unwanted behavior.
Your mother provided an excellent example to you of how to do it. She stated the boundary both negatively and positively (“you may not visit when you are ill; you will be most welcome once you recover”) and in such a way that your MIL clearly believed she would enforce it. Presumably she would have refused your MIL entrance had she just showed up.
All boundaries should have a consequence. You may not need to start out saying the consequence, but it needs to be clear there will be a consequence. For example, if they tell people info you don’t want them to share and they choose to share it anyway, inform them they will not be getting timely info for a while, or will be left out of the next privileged share. Showing up unannounced or when told they are not welcome (like if they are told not to come while sick and then arrive under the weather anyway) will ensure they are asked to leave before even entering the home. That sort of thing.
Remember: you cannot control what she does, only how you react to it. Telling her what your reaction will be served as a negative incentive for her, a positive reinforcement for you (you’ve said what you will do, so it is easier to follow through) and covers your butt so she can’t holler about how unfair it is or whatever.
A lot of my boundaries are about timing (“we will be leaving at x time so that we will be on-time for our reservation/dinner will start at y time; we will not delay as the kids are hungry”) because my MIL is chronically late (I think some of it is a control tactic and some is genuinely because she is ill but that’s another story) and it’s been delightfully satisfying to be able to say “hey, I told you the schedule.”
TL;dr
Remember: boundaries are about defining both your limits, and how you will react to them being tested. While a normal person might not balk at the very basic boundaries you are setting, it sounds like you will need to enforce consequences for this woman.