Living with In-Laws - Men and Women

and when the wife did not move in to a joint family system? but they are living on their own and there is stil chikh chikh, by that token the gy should just say, hey your problem, u deal with it eh?

Again, your mother didnt leave her home, your wife did. Your wife is new withing your own family and you owe it to her to make that transition as smooth as possible.

him being in the middle does not absolve the ladies in the question to act like morons and then expectc him to resolve it. does it how many DILs I know who do that..err many. why is it so hard to try and sit down and resolve their own differences?

of course it is being told about how to behave because in the end the clashes are due to behavior..whether its actions, statements, whatever..that is what behavior is.

The man does have to play a role, but his is not the major role, the major role in resolving a dispute is that of the two ladies fighting, the primary responsibility is theirs..not the lad who is stuck in the middle.

ahhhhhh see, the issue came up...niether the MIL or DIl likes if the guy happens to say one or the other is right. As I stated, an adjudicator whose performance is measured soley on the scale of how much he agrees with the views of the person rating him.

alhumdulillah my mother and my wife are two very sensible and mature women, who have their differences of opinion but they have never let it come between them and never put me in a situation where I have to have some sort of townhall meeting.

I think some guys get involved because they see the atmosphere of the family being destroyed by the ego battles and cant deal with it any more.

why such rules, they can alwaysget involved if things escalate and get uglier. if one person is being extremely disrespectful and its out of hand why cant they jump in?

as I have already said, when two ppl are fighting like kuttay billian..the guy can be as fair as possible but he will be considered biased by either oen or both, because if the MIl is right and he says that then the wife would say he is biased, if teh DIl is right and he agrees with her position then the MIl would say he is biased. if he thinks both are wrong then ofcourse..both dont like that.

what they can help maintain peace is to set the expectation that they are not refereee, and people should act and behave in a responsible and civilized manner.

you know who can help the peace in homes and lives..the two warring parties.

Ummm its about in-laws, so its a men-bashing thread (or will become one). I was just trying to go with the flow.

I didn't think it was darty ... I apologize. I will ask mods to delete.

Its not a man-bashing thread...if it looks that way I apologize.

Re: Living with In-Laws - Men and Women

it id not a man bashing thread, but it hink it is an interesting issue, and people will have differing view points.

If you go through the posts, you can see that men have a tough time due to teh clashes because they get to hear it from two sides, and if the warring parties are not willing to take a step back or try to work things out then whether the guy is involved in trying to resolve stuff or not involved it becomes a lose lose proposition.

and thus the best way is to not have the clashes start or get out of hand.

that is my honest opinion

That would happen only in utopia...

Re: Living with In-Laws - Men and Women

men shouldnt get involved .. period! dil has a prob with the mil, sort it out ureself.. same thing the other way around.. thats how it is in my susral.. the only thing i do ask my husband is, how to approach his mom with diff problems... its his mom and he knows in what ways she likes ot handle things... but at the end.. i dont allow him to come in between me or mil.. my mil does the same... we both discuss our issues ourselves... leave the man to worry bout his job and bringing home food eh.
im educated, shes educated.. im sure we can make good use of it no?

If only that was the case with most of us...more often than not you will see people complaining about bad in-laws. If only most inlaw situations were being dealt with in a mature fashion. Sadly, the majority are not. They consist of bitter DIL and MIL who are constantly bickering over the guy and who he belongs to. I guess the way I see it is my husband is supposed to help me resolve those differences because as Khawateen says, he knows his parents better than I do. I dont know what they are sensitive to or what their hot buttons are...but he does.

Re: Living with In-Laws - Men and Women

^^ exactly. ask your husband how to deal with it but you should be the one out there fighting it out with your mil... if you make ure husband go out there and do ure talkin for u.. ofcourse the mil is gonna hate u more cuz for her, it looks like beta biwi ki bol raha hai...

same thing for mil.. she can ask her son how to approach his wife about something.. but it should be the mil that does the talkin ....

quite simple.

course.. this is only when both parties seriously wnat to make things work and live with peace..... i think sometimes its just unwarranted hatred towards the other.. doesnt have any base to it.... for that. there is no solution.

Not married yet but these are what i see as potential issues:

-MIL is a housewife, DIL works--> conflict bc MIL feels DIL is neglecting the family and DIL feels deceived b/c MIL knew of her intention to work

-MIL compares DIL to other DILS--> MIL just wants DIL to do 'better', DIL feels her efforts are negated

-MIL does not watch DIL in the kitchen--> MIL feels DIL is moving in on her space and doing everything wrong anyway/DIL wants to make a meal in peace but MIL is in the way and making comments.

-Son and DIL want to go alone for dinner-->MIL feels hurt that she isn't invited/DIL feels annoyed that she doesn't get any time alone (even worse--son doesn't say anything).

-MIL wants DIL to change her religious practice, preferred language, or dress code and DIL resents it.

-DIL disciplines children to prevent them from getting spoiled--> MIL gets upset and immediately runs in to 'save' the child/DIL is upset because her words are just dismissed and the MIL-DIL issue just teaches kids to be manipulative

-MIL walks into son's room--> MIL just wants to feed her 'baby'/ DIL feels her privacy is invaded/Hubby enjoys the glass of dood and DIL is pissed! (i wud be too)

-MIL makes some snide comment and when DIL tells hubby, he blames it on her. DIL is upset that her opinion means nothing and MIL is upset that her son found out...she might get upset at DIL too.

i can imagine more...ughhh....but iA i will be living with my MIL and i can figure out the solutions to these potential probs beforehand..i hope they exist!

Re: Living with In-Laws - Men and Women

^ wow.... my MIL NEVER did any of that!

PERFECT...

Re: Living with In-Laws - Men and Women

a lot of the friction also has to do with expectations methinks- the wife has her own, the MIL/SIL have their own and never the twain shall meet. i think whats best is to have no expectations of each other other than civility and common courtesies, at least initially, and that initial period might be 3 months or 3 years.

and then of course, sometimes you just have to recognize the other person is the small-minded, petty, weirdo that they are and the only thing you can do to save your sanity is the classic "in one ear, out the other" tactic. my general rule of thumb with such people is they get to say one crazy thing per visit and after that, i'm going to ignore them. i'll do it really politely, but ignore their crazy talk i will- i'll either change the topic or talk over them- works like a charm everytime! eventually they'll get my point, and i keep my temper and my sanity in check!

Re: Living with In-Laws - Men and Women

I personally believe you can only control your own actions and no one else's. If I do everything I can to be nice, the opposing party would be crazy not to respond in the same manner. If they are still mean, they look bad. If they are nice, no harm done.

But what if you have one of those nasty MIL's? The kind that were just born to make your life miserable? Anyone ever had any run-in's with their kind? What did you do to get out or resolve the situation?

well i think my MIL will be pretty nice, based on my 5 min interaction with her. she doesn't seem particularly 'nasty' or 'weird'. But the thing is all the conflicts I listed above can still occur because of differing expectations of what is right. For example, if I think it is totally wrong for my kid to have a TV in the room, and my MIL thinks i am being totally cruel by depriving her of hannah montana, then who is right? You know what I mean?? If my husband agrees with me, his mom might feel like he is putting her down. And if he agrees with her, i am going to be annoyed. NOT because it's his mom, but because I think I'm right! So...I think the difficulty lies in the fact that it is much easier to compromise between two people, rather than three. I say three, instead of four because I have never heard of anyone having FIL issues. Usually the FIL retreats into his own world:biggthumb Prob the most important thing is that the husband needs to be a firm type of personality-he should not be easily manipulated by either wife or mother. Also people need to talk! For example, husband should tell his wife if there are any expectations for her BEFORE marriage because it is unfair to put her in a situation she doesn't want. And the most important thing is both sides should be forgiving. I mean I totally look over the fact that my mom has called me 'nakummi', 'julli', 'bewaqoof', etc. it's not something that haunts me everyday...but if my MIL called me that...shytt i KNOW i would remember that!! So before getting mad at someone, think, would i be mad if my mom had said this? if not, forgive and forget :)

Re: Living with In-Laws - Men and Women

I guess thats a good approach but wont your mother love you regardless of evil or terrible you are? It isnt the same thing, is it?

Re: Living with In-Laws - Men and Women

In most cases MsIL have nothing else meaningful in life going on so they target the newly arrived DIL as their pet project. If the pet doesn't obey then trouble starts.

Some bilkul faarigh DIL also need time paas and indulge in such wasteful activities.

The crux of the issue stems out of faaltoo time and no purpose in life other than to cook, clean and eat. They need a career. MsIL need it more than anything because the children are almost all grown up and independent. So they don't need her. And she is used to being "needed" through her early married life.

The only solution is educated and career oriented women. We must encourage our sisters and daughters to be career oriented and not waste time talking crap over the phone all day long. Screw the virginity and ghairet crap. Send them to schools and get them goal oriented.