Eight things a woman should never say to her daugher - in - law
Monsters-in-law! My apologies I meant mothers-in-law. However, many are the times when the distinction between the two can be blurred.
It is a well known fact that mothers-in-law are not the easiest people to deal with. They know no boundaries when it comes to meddling in their son’s lives and criticising their daughters-in-law.
It is no wonder the local show ‘Mother-in-law’ is such a hit. Most women can relate and at times find consolation in that they are people who have it worse than them. It is high time mothers-in-law learnt things they should not discuss or better yet not say .
1. Your cooking has improved.
In real sense, this is what you are saying, “Your cooking was terrible before but has improved. But I still think you have a long way to go.” In this part of the world, once you mock the cooking skills of a woman, you are questioning her entire worth. In a land where a woman’s cooking is used to define her beauty, this is an attempt to defame her in the eyes of her husband.
“I always take hours to prepare meals whenever my mother-in-law visits in an effort to please her. However, she always finds fault with something. The day she asked me whether she should show me how to prepare a ‘decent meal’ was the day I realised I had to stop trying to impress her. My husband has no complaints and that’s what matters,” Rita, a 35-year-old nurse said.
2. Discussing your son’s past girlfriends.
“The nerve of that woman is unbelievable. We were once enjoying a lovely afternoon when she started explaining how she had met Joy, a woman my husband had once been engaged to, ‘I always liked Joy. She told me that she did her masters in the UK and she now has an ACTUAL job with the UN. How could such a wonderful girl still be single?’
The implication was that I did not have a real job since I am an air hostess and perhaps my husband should give her a call,” Nancy laments. Why is it so hard to accept that your son has made his choice?
You cannot pick whom your son will marry because the next thing you will be doing is selecting the boxers he will wear on his wedding day.
The concept is that your son is a grown up, let him make his choices and mistakes. You should trust that you did a good job in raising him and as such he is wise enough to know what he is doing.
3. How to maintain her house.
The key word here is her house, not yours. It is therefore well within her right to do as she pleases with it. “This is such a mess!” These were the words of Tracey’s mother-in-law when she found dirty dishes in the kitchen sink.
The fact that they had just finished having dinner half an hour ago did not cross her mind. “I had not even finished my dessert yet she seemed to expect me to be waiting by the kitchen sink to clean the dishes as they streamed in,” Tracey said.
It does not matter whether the house has a pile of garbage in the living room (unlikely), you are to keep quiet. If you have nothing nice to say, don’t say anything at all.
4. If that was my child…
Here is a shocking fact: that is not your child. They are your grand children whom you love and want the best for. However, that does not give you the authority to question the parenting skills of your daughter-in-law, at least not loud.
“My mother-in-law told me how if it were her son she would not let him have ice-cream,” Daisy, a 28-year-old hair stylist explains, “she went on to explain the bad effects of ice-cream making me sound unlearned and as if I was endangering my son’s life. I knew the bad effects but I could also tell it was a hot sunny day which called for something cooling. What bothered me was that she questioned me right in front of my son.” Bottom line is that no one has the best interest of a child at heart more than the child’s own mother.
5. My son looks stressed.
In Emily’s case, her mother-in-law was more straight-forward, “You are obviously not taking good care of my son because he has lost weight. Are you even cooking for him?”
How can you expect not to infuriate your daughter-in-law with such words? The golden rule should be that you ought to think before you speak. Sometimes the mother just wants to start a fight as was with Emily’s case.
Her mother-in-law knew that her son was experiencing some setbacks in his business but instead of re-assuring them, she saw that as an opportunity to undermine Emily. And you wonder why it is monster-in-law.
6. You have it easy.
This is when the mother-in-law proclaims how back in her day they did not have gas cookers yet the food was ready in time. How they did not have hot water showers yet they were always clean.
How they did not have cell phones or wrist watches but none of her children was ever late for school. She goes on and on as if expecting her daughter-in-law to give her a standing ovation.
Technology has improved but to be a mother, you have to give birth to a whole human being and raise him/her. That is not an easy task.
7. My son provides.
“According to my mother-in-law, everything we own was bought by her son and therefore I should be grateful because without him I would be nothing. The fact that I also work to support our family is forgotten,”
Anne, a 40-year-old marketing executive explains. You have to remember that your daughter-in-law contributes one way or the other. She might not have bought the house but she makes it homely and keeps it from falling apart. The modern daughter-in-law is an equal partner in her marriage not a dependent.
8. My son likes…
“My mother-in-law was always keen to tell me how her son likes his food prepared or clothes folded. One day I had enough and told her that I had been married to her son for more than eight years and I knew what he liked. The woman still had the audacity to tell me ‘He is my son’ and walked away,” Rachel vents out.
When your son gets married, you have to stop viewing him as your child and therefore stop trying to run his life. That is now his wife’s duty (Men will always need someone to run their lives).That does not mean your usefulness in his life is over. It just means your purpose in his life has changed.
Mothers-in-law have to learn to co-exist with their daughters-in-law, hating them won’t change the fact that they are married to your son. It all starts with a simple thing as biting your tongue. Therefore, in an effort to prevent world war three, the following are vows mothers-in-laws ought to take:
I promise to carefully think about the words I choose before I say them and keep quiet if they will come out as criticism.
I promise to recognise that my son, though once my baby boy is now a fully grown man with a family.
I promise to respect my son’s and daughter-in-law’s rules while in their house.
I promise to maintain composure. If I don’t agree with something, I will review vow number one and if I still want to speak I shall do so calmly and in a non-mocking manner.
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