10 Stories of Mothers-in-Law Straight From a Drama Series

Having a good relationship with your mother-in-law may be not easy, but in some cases it seems like an impossible mission. We collected some of the terrifying examples that people shared online about their difficult MILs, who make their lives a hell.

• So I just got this text from my fiancé’s mom out of the blue. She lives a few states away from us. My fiancé has not talked to me at all about her coming to stay. I would never text someone like that.
  Also, I feel like 10 days is a lot. I have a son who will be starting middle school and football the week before, and he’s never met her. So his routine will be off for a week. Text is below:
  “Morning. I wanted to touch base with you. I’m planning on coming up there, arriving on the 10th of September and leaving on the 20th. 10 days may be a lot for you to handle, lol.
  (Fiancé) said I could stay 3 days, then I needed to get a hotel room. What a great son I have. I know he’s joking. Anyway, thought I’d let you know my plans.” © buckeyes898 / Reddit
• I got engaged last week to my partner of 4 years while on vacation. We were in a different time zone, so we decided we would wait until the following morning to tell our family and friends.
  However, my fiancé’s mom had texted him, so he knew she was awake. I agreed to FaceTime her and tell her the good news, as he was excited and wanted to tell her. We told her, sent pictures, and went to bed.
  In the morning, I woke up super excited to tell my parents. We are very close, and they love my fiancé, so I knew they’d be excited. However, on the call, they didn’t look surprised at all.
  I found out that they weren’t surprised because my future MIL had texted my mom that morning to tell her we were engaged. She had sent pictures of my ring and said, ‘They called me at 3 am, but I didn’t mind!’
  I feel so upset that she shared my news without my consent with the people I was most excited to tell. This was a once-in-a-lifetime experience for me that was totally destroyed by her. © Tough_Jicama_8882 / Reddit
• My future mother-in-law is special; by special, I mean she has a very particular way of expressing disapproval—never direct, never a conversation. Instead, she sends emails. Lots of them. Always about things she disagrees with me doing.
  But that’s not all. She also prints out news articles and leaves them around the house, placed just so for maximum visibility. Once, she didn’t like that I got my lashes done, so she found an article about why lash extensions are bad for you and left it out where I couldn’t miss it. © Tinnnydevil / Reddit

• My husband cut contact with his family a while ago after we finally confronted MIL about not liking me. Long story short, she tried as much as possible to keep us from seeing each other in our early days (he was living with his parents at the time) either by threatening to take his phone and car keys if he tried to come to my place or by telling him things like I was using him for his money (I had my own place and car for years and made 4x what he did), I was likely to be unfaithful (because I had a child from a previous relationship) and I was encouraging him to disrespect his parents and that I have no boundaries (because I told him he needs to stop letting his mom control everything in his life). © lilsmokysausages / Reddit
• My hate for my MIL is affecting my marriage. Things were ok with us until I realized how controlling and manipulative she is.
  She completely ruined my first year, let alone my maternity leave, ’cause of required visits to her and tension/jealousy between her and my mom. Even 2.5 yrs later, the tension is high, and I still see it as my family vs his family because she doesn’t include me, nor makes me want to feel included.
  I mean, how can I trust a woman who left her dying mother alone on Thanksgiving just because we were in town? I was the only one who wanted to be at the hospital, I was the only one advocating for her own mother to be released. © SweetLu320 / Reddit
• I’m writing this on Wednesday, and Mother’s Day is Sunday. For extra context, my husband and I are really into rocks and archaeology. Just a couple of hours ago, my husband called and told me his mom invited him and his brother to go to a creek on her land and look for chert. He said if I want to, I can go too, which I loved the idea of that since I also find that stuff really cool. I tell him maybe, and we’ll think about it.
  Anyway, a couple of minutes later, MIL texts me saying, “For Mother’s Day, all I want is for me, husband, and husband’s brother to go to the creek. I’ll come pick him up that way, you’ll get to keep your car. That also leaves you all day Sunday for your mom, and you guys won’t even have to come over here Sunday.”
  To which I didn’t reply, but I immediately called my husband to tell him that I clearly wasn’t invited, and she doesn’t want me to go. He said, “Maybe that’s not what she meant; she probably wouldn’t care if you went,” but I really didn’t buy it. I was already super pissed at that moment.
  Then she texted me again, “I appreciate the time I get with my boys, just the three of us. We haven’t gotten to do that in quite a few years. I’m so looking forward to it that I have butterflies ♥️♥️...”. I call up my husband again and tell him what the new message says, and I let him know that I’d rather him not go anymore. He agreed after hearing that. © lil_goob4** / Reddit

• My relationship with my narcissistic mother-in-law has been extremely rocky over the past year. She was very rude and did many hurtful things to me during our wedding planning, including accusing me of lying, and I have also lashed out at her after being hurt, which hurt her. She gossips and trash talks me to her friends and my sister-in-law.
  I cannot stand this woman. She has a lot of emotional issues, and my husband is aware of them. We are in couples therapy to deal with navigating our life with her in it. I have little to no contact with her at the moment.
  We have only texted happy birthday and whatnot. She is currently not welcoming me over to her house, only her son (my husband). I only desire a very surface-level relationship with her moving forward (niceties when in each other’s company, talk about mundane things like weather, etc). © rillikchar / Reddit
• We’ve been married 10 years. I feel like my MIL doesn’t like me and continually treats me and my husband not like a married unit, but rather consistently treats my husband great and me like I’m not a member of the family.
  My thoughts are that if she couldn’t afford it, she could have been a bit more inclusive and said, “Hey, I’ll give you guys such and such amount towards the vacation, but the rest is on you guys.” Instead of being like, “I’ll pay for you but not her.”
  It’s not a very nice or good feeling to feel like you are treated like the random person your son is married to, and that’s how I feel I’m treated, rather than a DIL. © Minimum_Error_5140 / Reddit

• My MIL is divorced, and ever since I had a baby with her son, she’s been coming to our place nonstop, up to five times a week. We live in an apartment that she gave us, and she has a key to the front door, so you never know when she’ll show up inside.
  She’s not exactly the helpful type either; she constantly checks if I’ve done my chores, and if not, she says absurd things, like claiming I’m breaking the balcony door because I don’t close it properly. She makes me feel like an intruder, like this isn’t my home.
  We’ve renovated two rooms and are working on the kitchen, but inevitably, there are still doors and items left over from when she lived here. I think the best solution would be to move out, but we don’t have the money to buy a place, and we can’t get a loan because I’m on maternity leave and my husband is a medical resident. But I can’t go on like this anymore, with her constantly around me. © DianaFaur / Reddit
• My mother-in-law has photos of my fiancé and his ex on the wall of them. She is holding my fiancé, I am feeling kinda lost and jealous at this point. Like she had her house rebuilt and took the photo down, but when the house was done, she put the picture of them back on the wall. Like his ex, doesn’t even let him see the kid, or does his ex let the kid see his grandma?
  I asked him when we would go to her house to take it down ourselves because it bothered me. And he says it’s his mother’s stuff when I told him to take them down. © Dull_Club_8809 / Reddit

These stories are quite shocking, but sadly, they are not unique. To read more about difficult family connections, check out 18 Stories About Family Members Who Are Worse Than Strangers.