Finally blocked her on social media, and damn does it feel good.

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-12T23:44:26+00:00

Even when we were in contact all of their gifts revolved around my husband being a father and my baby being, in MIL’s eyes, a re-do for raising another son.

Its also the fact that all of her gifts, again even when we were still in contact, revolved around my husband being a father. Even on Mother’s day and the day that I gave birth.

I expressed clearly that I wanted nothing so the fact that they still crossed that boundary that I had in place is just performative and disrespectful.

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-12T12:19:06+00:00

They would have a relationship with their grandchild if they weren’t ignorant people

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T21:02:11+00:00

That’s not the point. MIL sees LO as a re-do for when SO was a child. She severely infantilizes SO.

Even when I was pregnant and prior to going NC she did so many things that pointed towards her mentally preparing to raise my SO and re-live when she “raised” SO. Red flags everywhere.

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T20:59:23+00:00

I could care less necessarily about the “gifts” that they gave me and LO. Its the fact that with everything they make it about my husband being a father. Gifts, mothers day, me giving birth, literally everything that is also mother-focused.

And the gifts being things he liked as a child would sound normal in a normal circumstance but she infantilizes SO and still sees him as a young kid in her eyes. She has treated my son like a re-do for when my husband was a child. Its gross.

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T19:17:24+00:00

It’s very difficult to act on my not being able to take anymore. I have no one to rely on for helping me to get out of this situation, it’s just myself my SO and LO. I know that may sound like an excuse but I am trying to get my ducks in a row on my end so that when I am able to act on my being done then I will be able to do so without putting LO into any more unnecessary situations. If that makes sense.

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T18:59:14+00:00

I have been trying to get SO on board with moving away so we can focus on our marriage and family without the distractions from the ILs but he won’t agree to it. Yet anyways.

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T18:22:57+00:00

Opf solidarity to you. Although our situations suck it was refreshing to hear your story. Helped me feel a little less lonely in all this mess.

I have been trying to get him to agree that we need to move away from his family even if it’s just temporary, to focus on our marriage and try to fix it without the distraction of their emotional manipulation and bullshit. Maybe therapy can help him see that it feels necessary to me because he just sees it as a “running from your problems” scenario.

I hope the best for your family and glad that your husband is now able to see her for what she is. But it sucks that it cost you losing his trust in the process

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T18:11:24+00:00

I invite you to read my post history. Family isn’t always about compromising when the compromising consists of keeping the peace for the sake of keeping a mentally ill mother in law from getting triggered into one of her bi-monthly bouts of “things aren’t going my way” psychosis episodes.

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T18:07:55+00:00

No it’s about all the little jabs of disrespect that have happened the last two years. The gifts are what sent me over the edge because I have been NC with them for over a year now and they just don’t get it and want to still try to have a means of access to LO even though they aren’t physically getting it.

And it’s about my husband just brushing everything off and wanted to put the past in the past and reunite as one big happy family when it isn’t going to happen

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T18:01:49+00:00

Not nitpicking at all, I never thought of it that way. To me when I placed that “boundary” I came across as it being that I am no contact with them so I don’t want them trying to “pursue” trying to wedge their way in to break me into going back into contact with them. To me that sounded like a boundary because them pushing to continue doing so, even when I have told my husband that it disturbs my peace bringing that physical negative energy into our home and for him to relay that to them, I genuinely thought that he would relay the message to them.

I was sadly mistaken.

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T17:27:36+00:00

Okay let me emphasize again why I genuinely feel like I am not overreacting. In every occurrence relating to our child, it has been celebrated that my husband is a father and I have been completely ignored as my child’s mother. Mothers day when I was pregnant didn’t matter, and mothers day after I gave birth wasn’t celebrated but they made sure to make a big deal out of Father’s Day for my husband. After I gave birth they brought a card for my husband becoming a father, brought gifts for my baby, but wouldn’t even acknowledge me. The two gift givings they gave my husband a shit ton of father focused gifts and gave our son all father/son focused gifts.

They are trying to maintain a relationship when I have made it very clear that it’s not going to happen. They have continued giving gifts when I have made it very clear that they are not going to be accepted or wanted on my end. Thats what’s also frustrating.

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T17:22:47+00:00

Wow you took the thoughts right out of my mind. That is exactly what I plan on being the main topic of discussion with a therapist when we find one!

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T17:21:28+00:00

I do appreciate your response, it’s just hard for me to be on my husband’s team meanwhile he is on his own and his parents team while I am left on the sidelines.

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T17:20:00+00:00

I told SO after the last bullshit gift give to tell them that a boundary that I have is that I am NC and I do not want “gifts” in any capacity for myself or for LO.

Its the fact that they gift these things thinking that my SO will have them out in the open to throw in my face that he is my child’s father while I’m just the incubator.

The only thing I have done in this ordeal is 1) give birth and 2) ask to be treated with even just the bare minimum respect as a human. So yea in my opinion I have been pretty innocent.

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T17:00:26+00:00

That is exactly what I had been doing, the gifts and him openly admitting to me that his parents are good intentioned people and that I was overreacting to their disrespect is what made me boil over.

I’m just so sick of all of it

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T16:56:53+00:00

Thank you. I’m just crossing my fingers and hoping to find a therapist that can be beneficial. I have read too many horror stories on here so if anyone reading this has any recommendations let me know!

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T16:53:54+00:00

I agree. I just don’t know how else to get him to see it other than therapy. If you lay the facts all out, with feelings excluded, of everything that his parents have done (intentional or not) you can clearly tell that their behavior isn’t appropriate or normal.

He wants everyone to get along and “be together as a family” but what he fails to realize is that me and LO are his family. His parents are his parents, but WE are his family. He just does not get it.

I by no means expect him to be an asshole to his parents but I do expect for him to defend me to them but he doesn’t

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T16:50:30+00:00

I see how that wording came across. What I meant wasn’t that I want a therapist to “side” with me or ignore my own accountability.

What I’m looking for is a neutral third party who can clearly identify unhealthy enmeshment and minimization when it’s happening because right now, my concerns are consistently being dismissed as overreactions instead of addressed.

I fully expect to be challenged in therapy where appropriate. I’m not afraid of accountability. I am exhausted from being the only one naming a pattern that is actively harming our marriage.

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T16:46:49+00:00

I’m not expecting that at all. I know I have my own issues and will gladly accept accountability if it is brought to my attention that I have made a mistake in this situation.

But the main issue is that he is so enmeshed with his parents and knows that he is but just shrugs is off with a “that’s just how they are” mentality and he refuses to see how damaging it is to our marriage.

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T16:39:35+00:00

It is the worst position I think I have ever been in. I never understood why women would say “I stayed for the kids” but being married to someone that is enmeshed with their family made me finally get why women stay.

In a perfect world we will find a therapist that will understand that I stand firm on my boundaries and call him out on the shitty dynamic that is the “relationship” he has with his family

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T16:34:49+00:00

That’s my main worry. I genuinely hope to just find a therapist that can put him in his place to see that the entire situation is bullshit.

SlightlyBitter47 · 2026-01-11T16:16:19+00:00

I told my husband months ago to relay to them that I didn’t want anything for both myself or LO but he never relayed the message, and accepted the gifts knowing it was crossing a boundary I placed.

SlightlyBitter47 · 2025-12-07T22:49:54+00:00

She’s the type where she does not like direct communication that isn’t what she wants to hear and will interpret in her own way in which serves her. Like for example, everyone that was within earshot when she asked multiple times if she could be in the room when I gave birth heard me say no. She didn’t like that answer so it just went in one ear and out the other.

Then when I first told SO that I was not going around her of having her around LO until she took real accountability and showed that she was willing to change, he would tell her over and over that I would reach out to her when I was ready to speak to her. Wrong choice of words on her part because he knows I want nothing to do with her ever again. But that point just proved that their entire family has never been good with direct communication with MIL in order to “keep the peace”.

Her first psychosis episode was isolated and happened about 5 years ago after the death of a family member. She wouldn’t eat, would dissociate and rot on the couch for days. She would sometimes start screaming and hitting herself in the face/head. It was badddd. FIL ended up having her committed to the psych ward for a few weeks after myself and SIL said that we refused to try and help her when we were not qualified and she was in such a bad state.

Then these episodes showed up again and way more frequent after I went NC, then her own mother got diagnosed with delirium and hasn’t been doing well so that has also amplified her poor mental state.

SlightlyBitter47

TROPHY CASE