Living with your in-laws

Lifestyle Relationships
1

It’s a well known phenomenon, when a girl marries she goes live with her in-laws.

  • in some cases *

  • In some cases she and her in-laws don’t really get along with eachother, but she puts up a brave face because she doesn’t want to let her hubby down. But sometimes the girl tells her hubby and they decide to move out and live on their own.

  • In some cases they don’t get along in the beginning and later on they actually can live together.

  • In some cases they get along in the beginning and as time passes on, little things make them annoy eachother. And the girl just wants to live on her own with her hubby

  • and in some cases they just get along and live happily ever after.

My question to you, what is your situation? And what would you prefer, would you prefer living on your own with your hubby and have some privacy.. that would be my case or would you stay with your in-laws because your hubby wants to?

Share your stories :slight_smile:

2

Re: Living with your in-laws

Live alone with hubby. Marriage is between hubby and wifey, so they should live alone. If the inlaws are nice and allow privacy and a personal space to their son and bahoo that is one situation but if the inlaws are from hell it is best for everyone to live on their own.

3

Re: Living with your in-laws

just a quick question.. have you ever had a fight/argument with your own parents? sisters? brothers? if yes then u knw how to deal with ur inlaws..

rule of thumb.. after you get married think of hubby's parents as your own parents and inshaAllah your hubby will pay the same respect to your parents.. and it will balance out everything..

i would want to live wiht my wife alone.. i want privacy and also i wanna sleep late on weekends which i knw in my parents home is impossible :(
arguements between you and your inlaws will always come up.. its upto you how you want to deal with them

4

Re: Living with your in-laws

That’s exactly how I think about it.

5

Re: Living with your in-laws

Yes I have had alot of fights and arguments with my own family. But it’s not about the arguments and fights. I think that privacy is important for a marriage. You are right about that your in-laws are the same as your own parents, that’s what my mother has told me too. That is something really important that shouldn’t be forgotten. And it’s not that I want to cut all ties with them, when they need us ofcourse I’ll be supporting them. But sometimes it’s too much to have them around all the time.

Lol@ your comment about sleeping late. Maybe your wife won’t let you sleep late either, phir kia karo gey? :wink:

6

Re: Living with your in-laws

Living alone with hubby from the very beginning is what I would like to opt for.

Ansoon, there is difference between the fights you get into with your biological parents and your in-laws. Parents will hardly hold it against you and will forgive you, whereas such is often not the case with in-laws. It's quite natural I suppose.

7

Re: Living with your in-laws

I would prefer living alone with my hubby. I think it's a matter of everyone keeping their respect because if you see your in-laws all the time, you will find faults in them just if your in-laws see you all the time, they will find faults in you. When you go to visit your in-laws, you can put on your social mask just as you would with anyone else you would meet outside the home but once you're home you don't have to wear the mask so you don't have to act a certain way like smiling all the time if you're not feeling up to it.

8

Re: Living with your in-laws

fikar not.. this has already been discussed with her and i have my ways :wink:

9

Re: Living with your in-laws

although the ideal situation would be to live alone with hubby i think girls should try to understand that sometimes if the parents are old and they dont have some other family member to stay with then life can be very hard for them....isolation is also the worst thing for old people as the only thing they look for at that age is being around the people they have loved and brought up.....if possible i would go for a situation where we can all stay in the same house but maybe different floors so that me and future hubby would have our privacy when we need it and parents wont be alone either.....

10

Re: Living with your in-laws

An imam once told me that according to Islam a girl does have a right of her own little space with her husband.

I've seen different situations, of girls getting along with their inlaws. And of girls not getting along with their inlaws. Sometimes it's the girls fault, sometimes it's the inlaws fault. Depends on the characters of the people you get involved with.

My friend had a tough time with her inlaws, she married her cousin, left her country for him (and the last year of her school because he forced her too, while he had promised her before the marriage that she could finish school and get her diploma even after marriage, and then later join him in his country...) and tried her best to make much of life with her inlaws.

There were mistakes made on both sides. The girl was very used to being alone, so in the beginning she didn't socialise much with the brothers and sister in law, but prefered reading and writing by herself, even though they were all cousins, her inlaws were actually her family because her mom and her husbands mom are sisters. I guess my friend is a bit the black sheep of the family, she has very different interests. Anyway, after giving up all her hobby's too it still didn't work out. In the beginning her husband was often reasonable. He even would take her out for walks when they were just married. His mom didn't like it. She said her son never bought her anything, and now he's buying stuff for his wife... and she also said that the other brothers (who were also living in the house) never took their wifes out for walks, so my friends husband should not take her out either... And she kept making all kinds of degrading remarks.

Slowly within a few months, there was practically no real marriage relationship left. My friends husband started to treat her disrespectfully and it all got more and more worse. My friend, gave up everything as a naiq larqi (gosh I hate those words!) should, all for nothing, if her life after marriage would have been happy, she wouldn't have minded. But her life stopped the day she got married. Usually peoples lifes really begin when they get married, my friends life just stopped.

This is an example of a very bad ending that can happen. My friend is divorced now after much trouble. She was accused of splitting the family with her divorce, go figure!

Anyway, if her family inlaw is ok, if they are normal reasonable people, a girl can easily live with her inlaws. It all comes down to characters capable of giving and taking equally.

11

Re: Living with your in-laws

I think that’s impossible. You can love them and respect them, but I don’t think one can have the same relationship with their in laws as they do with their own parents. I can get away with a lot wiht my mother that I could never try or do on my mother in law,but no way does it mean that I disrespect my mom in any way.

12

Re: Living with your in-laws

I think if ur marriage is a love marriage and ur inlaws are happy about the marriage, u would do anythin 2 get along with ur inlaws. May b not stayin with them but actually visiting them as often as possible because they are old an need ur help an care. Now if the husbands brothers or sistas give u greif den dont put up with it tell ur husdand straight he should handle it, otherwise i pick stayin with da husband alone but still makin sure his parents are ok an not left alone coz leavin old ppl in lonliness is the worst thing eva an it should neva b done.

13

Re: Living with your in-laws

treat ur spouse's parents the way u want ur spouse to treat ur parents. simple as that.

14

Re: Living with your in-laws

women are catty. and that's where the problem starts - is when they try to play power politics...and people think men are the only ones able to play politics.

15

Re: Living with your in-laws

thank you suroor..

Sara.. i have done this practically.. ofcourse you have to give time for the relationship to develop but if you dont’ have this goal in mind then i think it gets hard..:slight_smile:

16

Re: Living with your in-laws

Ansoon and others, it is very well possible to have a good decent relationship with your in laws. However, it cannot compare to the relationship you have with your parents and i don't think there's anything wrong in that....

17

Re: Living with your in-laws

i lived with my in laws for almost a year and i had very good relations with e'one specialy with my mom in law coz she loves shopping and i always drive for her and u know what she always buy something for me........i miss her she was so nice.......

18

Re: Living with your in-laws

I am not saying its an absolute nesscity (sp?) but Sara all i am saying is to have that mind frame, maybe i wasn't clear in my earlier posts... sorry about that.. its the attitude, i guess that's what i am talking about :)

19

Re: Living with your in-laws

I think most people here know how I feel on this issue. I would rather not live with any in-laws, at least during the first years of marriage. A marriage is difficult enough for the husband and wife during the first few years, especially in an arranged marriage situation where both don't even know each other that well. Adding an entire family to the equation makes it even more, and unnecessarily, difficult.

I think it's hard for both sides, for the girl to adjust in a totally new environment and for the family to welcome in this girl and treat her like one of their own. I have yet to see that happen successfully without the family drama/fights that occur during the first years of marriage. It puts an additional strain on the entire household, especially the marriage. For me, it would be easier to live seperately and maintain a good relationship with the in-laws rather than risk it and go into an environment, living together and possibly destroy any good feelings between the girl and the in-laws.

I think it is especially difficult for girls born and raised in the west cause we are just not used to this kind of environment. Girls from Pakistan know how to play the game (remember, "the game" is not a bad thing) and seem to be able to handle the politics and drama a lot more diplomatically than girls from here.

A good friend of mine has been living with her in-laws since the day of her marriage. Even though she was her mother-in-laws choice, the girl has never been treated like their own daughter and is constantly reminded that she's just the DIL, nothing like their real daughter. It's a pretty horrible environment and you can feel hostility between everybody. This is just one example and I have plenty. Unfortunately, I have not seen many instances where there is peace and a healthy environment so it is difficult for me to see the other side of this situation.

All I know is that if the parents want their DIL to treat them like her own parents, then the in-laws should be prepared to treat their DIL like their own daughter, not like an outsider.

20

Re: Living with your in-laws

^ My sister, born and raised in the west, moved to a new country, lived with her in-laws since day 1 and had an arranged marriage. 5 years on she's very happy, and considers her in-laws a real blessing! i guess she got lucky with nice in-laws...and her own personality counts too.

Chintu here--