I’ve posted about my just no MIL before. The basic gist is she’s manipulative, narcissistic (and I don’t use that lightly), and very sneaky and conniving. My husband (who is also pretty awful) has been hospitalized for the past several months and will be discharged next Tuesday. He will need a lot of physical support and caretaking, and he wants his mom there to help.
I have been working on my exit plan for a while now, to get out of this marriage and away from his horrid family. And I REALLY don’t need her finding any evidence of that. I also have been suffering from my own chronic illnesses (Lyme disease, hypermobility disorder, and Hashimoto’s) for decades, which all came to a head and were finally diagnosed about 3 years ago. But because I had been getting progressively sicker with no answers for so long, my home fell into a cluttered, messy, disastrous chaos. My husband has never contributed much to housework, and I just couldn’t keep up. I have made huge progress on my home in the last year or so since my diagnoses (and starting treatments), and about half of my home is in a pretty good place now (primarily kitchen, bathrooms, kids room, my bedroom, foyer, and mudroom), but other rooms (living room, dining room, closets, my office, and basement) are still over-cluttered with excess stuff/laundry that just never got put away or gotten rid of.
My husband had previously, during the worst points of my illnesses, threatened to kick me out of our home, and even tried to photograph and document the state of our house as “evidence” that I was unfit to stay or care for our kids. (He clearly didn’t get that it also reflected poorly on him.)(Also, I have always taken excellent care of my kids. I greatly neglected my own health for way too long in order to prioritize them. I know now that I actually have to be healthy in order to do that well! But at the time, no one could figure out what was wrong with me, so I just pushed through.) I know that many of these insane ideas in his head about “evidence” and “unfitness” come directly from his mother.
So NOW, I have to have her in my home for god knows how long. I still have brain fog most days from the Lyme, so PLEASE help me (very quickly) strategize how to protect myself and my kids from her manipulation and snooping? I’m already moving some things to a small storage unit and removing an extra mattress from our home so she can’t get too comfortable. What else can or should I do?
TLDR: MIL will be staying at my home for an unknown period of time. She is manipulative and sneaky. What should I do to protect myself and my kids from her prying eyes and conniving ways, and protect the secrecy of my in-progress exit plan?
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She erased me from the narrative of my child’s birth and infancy!, 10 months ago
Help me prepare for a visit from my JNMIL??, 10 months ago
MIL is planning a Mexico vacay with my kids (7 & 9). I found out from them. , 11 months ago
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All evidence of exit planning should also be put into the storage unit, under lock and key, or into a safe deposit box or other such safe space.
Hope your medications continue to help you feel better and better!
If you havent already, secure any important documents and things that have evidence of your plans. Leave them with a trusted friend or relative if you can but you need to lock them up tight and keep them a secured location which should also have a lock on it so she isnt just roaming the house.
Honeslty, might not be a bad idea to lock up the rooms/closets you know she has no business in. I highly doubt you have important items crucial to helping your husbands recovery in the cluttered closets.
Make sure any and everything your husband or MIL might need are in a very accessible place and anything they do not need acess to is locked away.
If you can, I also reccomend moving the clutter and try to condense it all to less rooms. Even if that results in a room full of boxes/bags of stuff. Clean up the living room or any other room she will most likely be in alot.
It will also make it easier when you do get around to cleaning it all out. Toss the obvious junk in a box labeled junk and then throw it in the basement or something. If you dont want it obvious what’s inside, color code them and dont tell anyone what the colors mean.
My MIL is a massive hoarder and has so much useless garbage but she organizes it so it doesnt look like a messy unkempt hoarders nest that it is. A big thing she does it get bigger things that look nice to contain all her garbage she won’t throw away in. Walking in, it doesn’t look cluttered but you open up the drawers and cabinets or look into the ‘decorative’ baskets and you will see all the broken and useless items she will never use but wont get rid of.
Doing something similar might help make it seem less disorganized if you aren’t in a position to properly go through it all and throw it out. Depending on how old your kids are, you could probably have them help you out a little to make it go faster too.
Is there any way you and the kids could stay with someone from your side while she was there? Or maybe even an air bnb if you needed to be close to their school. If that’s not possible I wouldn’t do one thing for her or pos husband. Let mommy dearest take care of him, I’m sure she would think you were doing everything wrong anyway. Focus on your kids and your health and most importantly getting away from those two. Best of luck to you
Can you leave now? I feel like her coming is a perfect opportunity to say “well I’m not dealing with her so I’ll be staying with X.” Then just don’t come back?
Any sensitive documents, including your birth certificate and passport, need to be out of the house. Not just your divorce plans. I would also include those documents for your children if you have them.
Put a password lock on your computers, phones, and any other electronics that you may have done research with. Make the passwords something that she (and your husband by extension) would not be able to guess.
Move any medications you take to a secure lockbox. This prevents her from snooping through them and tampering with them. They make boxes for medicine that are small enough to fit in most medicine cabinets.
Any personal items of monetary or sentimental value should be removed from the home while she’s there. The same goes for your children. If they have anything they don’t want her finding, encourage them to let you hide it. Regardless of what they bring you, don’t ask questions, don’t lecture them, just get it secured in your storage unit.
Stress to your kids that you are on their side, and that if they catch her doing something shady, they need to tell you. The best way to get through this situation is if you work as a team and watch each other’s backs.
I giggled at the mattress part. I, too, removed furniture from my guest room to avoid spending more time w that awful woman.
I wouldn’t worry about the cleanliness as much as making sure the clutter isn’t snooped through. There are people you can hire to organize your home. Might be worth it to protect your privacy.
Speed up your exit as much as possible. Once Hubby has her in residence, he won’t need you any more. She’ll never leave. They will make you and your kids even more miserable than you think.
Get yourself a safe or bank deposit box for all important paperwork and jewelry
Anything of value gets stored somewhere where she can’t get it
Buy yourself noise cancelling headphones and a drum set for the kids — the mil problem will likely take care of itself 😁
Your husband can want whatever he wants but YOU don’t need to accommodate any of it
Maybe he should go stay at her house
Oh wow, I have Lyme, Hashimoto’s, and mild EDS symptoms… are you me from another timeline? 😆 So sorry about your awful husband and MIL, hope you get out and start a better life!
Can you install cameras? I feel like that might be a good idea to cover yourself in case the two of them try to pull something. Otherwise, is there any chance you can leave now? Stay with a friend? Or, get someone else to stay too, who would be on your side? Tell them MIL is there to help him, this other person is there to help yiu
And when Mommy Dearest pops her clogs & only then he will look around and wonder why he’s on his own.Where’s my kids? Disgusted at how you treated their mother and far far away.
Secure your personal documents, passwords, and sensitive info. Consider a safe or lockbox. Limit access to your devices and accounts. Set clear boundaries with her and your husband. Keep your exit plan offline and off-paper. Prepare your kids for potential manipulation. Stay alert.
Lock down your private stuff, documents, electronics, even notebooks, somewhere she can’t access. Keep interactions surface-level, don’t overshare, and treat every “casual” question as reconnaissance.
Do you have any friends or family close by at all to help you with anything? If you do get them to come in and help you with continuing your decluttering and cleaning. Get rid of as much of your shit as possible. I promise you that you really won’t miss it. Out of sight. Out of mind. It’s a bit painful at first as I’m sure you know but, then you feel better!
I’ve kinda sorta been your shoes with the house mess and caring for a bedridden husband and him having adult children who would never help but loved tearing me down and hating on me and meanwhile I was still recovering from 2 major spinal fusion surgeries.
Lock down and lock up anything and everything that you do not want her to see or have access to. You are going to have to guard your privacy with your life. Women like this will do their damndest to get into your everything! Give age appropriate warnings to your children about keeping their stuff away from grandma.
Is there a reason you can’t leave now?