Mother in law!!!

barbiedoll

If your OH is home two hours earlier than you then he can take the dog out for a walk! And staying at mummy and daddy's all weekend is just a joke, you are supposed to be a couple, not a pair of housemates.

Change the locks (tell him you've lost your keys) and do not let her have a set. There's no reason why she should be practically living at your house all week, I would hate to have someone else in my place all the time I'm at work. There can't be that much housework to do if you're both at work all day and if you are using her as the unpaid help then you need to decide what is more important to you, your private life or your dusting done for free. It's fair enough seeing her once or twice in the week but every day? It's unnatural!

The weekends have to stop. I don't see why you can't BOTH visit them over the weekend, say every other week but by letting him and his mother get away with this, it has become normal behaviour. No wonder his sisters have moved far away! Insist to his mum that you need to spend time together at weekends, tell her that you have diy projects that you want to plan and your OH needs some leisure time with you. And let him know that enough is enough. My dad was like this with his mother (he was the classic only child and couldn't cut the apron strings, that's why my parents were divorced) and my mum had to put up with her MIL every single weekend, inviting herself over for dinner and tea. Plus my dad would be there two or three nights a week whilst my mum was stuck at home with two little kids.
Don't end up like her, tell him how it is and how it's going to change. If he won't consider your feelings or the relationship then maybe you should think about your future together. If she's only 54, you could have another 30+ years of this! :eek:

Lucy1973

Show him this thread. If nothing changes then show the MIL.

sulkisu

Yoghurt_Pot wrote: »

She does come to walk our dog and things whilst were at work but she will purposely stay longer to see her son

Make alternative arrangements for walking the dog, do the 'other things' (whatever they are) yourselves, and then insist that her key is taken away so that she can't come and go as she pleases. I did sympathise when I read your OP, but TBH I would be pretty peeved if someone said that they were happy for me to come to their home to do things for them, as long as I left before they came home.

shy-but-need-help

MOONGAZER wrote: »

It looks to me as though your MIL either likes/puts up with you, but as far as her little soldier is concerned, she wants to play happy families - that is with herself, her hubby and their son. What about your parents/siblings? So they come and stay/keep calling in? Would your OH appreciate them being there all the time? Or hhow would you both cope with a home like Crewe Junction with parents and relatives dropping in all the time? You HAVE to draw up ground rules. If he is too weak a mummies boy, (which i feel he is), you must do the manipulating. Arrange a weekend away for yu both as a romantic 'surprise', when you go home and she is there, say your going out with friends, etc. Believe me, if you dont do something now, it will get worse as she gets older.

I like this idea, as MIL would undoubtedly challenge them being there all the time if when she came over one of your family was in the house doing cleaning etc and then when she complained you'd be able to point out it's only exactly what she does.

It took my DH saying he thought it was fantastic we (him, me, other SIL & her husband) would be in the delivery room for the arrival of littlest SIL's first baby for her future-MIL to realise how intrusive her own assumption that she and her daughter would be in the delivery room with littlest BIL when the baby arrived. When DH enthusiastically told her we were all looking forward to being there she replied with "but she doesn't want just anyone in the room" DH replied "I'm her brother, who are you?" and it drove the point home- result? Littlest SIL got to have her baby as she wanted with just herself and her partner there

balletshoes

Yoghurt_Pot wrote: »

She does come to walk our dog and things whilst were at work but she will purposely stay longer to see her son

see now if you or your OH asked her to come by your home every day to walk the dog because you are both at work, it makes perfect sense that she would hang around long enough to see one or both of you.

the sleepovers every weekend are just weird though - and I'd be concerned that your OH hasn't figured that out on his own by now!

make_me_wise

Yoghurt_Pot wrote: »

Hi

Just a quick one, my partner and i have been together 3 years and a year ago moved into our own property.

He is very close to his mum and she comes round everyday and he stays there every weekend... we never get anytime alone... she cries whenever i try to say to him i'd like us to spend time without her becuase of course he tells her what i say, she has a key to our flat because he gave her one...
He is almost 30 and while i accept their closeness i also think we should have time alone,

How can i say this without seeming unreasonable?

Your post has actually made me shudder. There is something very abnormal about there being this degree of closeness between a mother and grown up son. On a public forum I am not going to spell it out to you, but I think you can read between the lines.

belfastgirl23

I think fire fox makes some really good points.

Do you want to be the person who comes between your DH and his mother? She will hate you forever and when she passes on (as eventually she will) he may well blame you for him not paying her enough attention.

You need to talk to him about what kind of life you both want. TBH either he wants to spend time with you or he doesn't. Maybe it suits him well enough to toddle off to mummy every weekend and have his dinners cooked and his every word worshipped. Maybe he likes mummy being there when he comes home from school. You can't change this. But what you can do is ask him to think about the impact on you as a couple and ask him whether he thinks it's fair on you. Ask him to look at his friends and see if this is how they do things. And then ask him what he thinks is reasonable. You don't have to accept it of course, you are free to leave as well.

What do you do all weekend if he's at his mums by the way??

paddy's_mum

In the three pages of this thread, many people have used the word 'insist'. It sure sounds good on paper ... but there is a major flaw.

When you are faced with this amount of determined unfairness, unhealthy clinging and total disregard of the partner's perfectly normal rights and expectations, exactly how are you going to change it?

If you issue a challenge, I'm quite sure that he will watch you leave rather than give up the soul stroking he is currently enjoying.

Leave, OP, because at 30 years of age and both of them still naively and (they say!) totally unaware of the unwholesomeness of their way of living, you will never, ever come out as number 1.

I'm truly sorry for you. What a carp reward for loving someone who loves someone else more than you. Good luck.

pigpen

Yoghurt_Pot wrote: »

there is nothing wrong with her, she is only 54 and she is perfectly fine!

i spoke to my partner and he said if i didnt want to see her then i didnt have to come

She really isn't perfectly fine!!!

If my mother wanted, expected or even accepted that I would be staying at hers every weekend or if she inflicted herself on me daily I would think she had lost the plot!

It is called flying the nest, growing up, leaving home, becoming an adult!! It sounds like she has a severe case of empty nest syndrome.. and OH is being a namby-pamby molly-coddled sap for allowing it to go on..

You have a few options.. let him read this thread in the hope he will realise how his behaviour looks and how bizarre it actually is and how distressing it is for you.... start running ~ fast!! ... Make it quite clear something has to change because it is just not normal behaviour!.. or put up with it.

My family are close.. we live in each others pockets and know each others business in fine intimate detail.. but this kind of freakishness does not happen.. yes we spend hours yapping on the phone or in each others company and have gone away for weekends en masse.. but those apron strings are very much cut and we can survive without each other.

Oh.. and it is a dog.. it doesn't NEED to be walked during the day.. thousands and thousands of dogs survive perfectly happily having a walk in an evening and just as many get no walkies at all! What a feeble excuse!

sashadesade

My husband is a bit of a mummy's boy, he talks to her every day on the phone and used to see her twice a week though he had to cut it down to once due to him not having the time. He has had a few ideas (usually planted in his mind by his dad, who is the master of wacky ideas) that I've had to veto as they were a bit too much for my liking, ranging from us all going on holiday together to us both selling our houses and moving into one big house together(!).
Thankfully if I stand firmly against something he'll realise it's not going to happen, though there are usually a few arguments before he accepts I'm not shifting. Perhaps if you tell your OH that you're not happy with the situation and a compromise has to be made, he'll agree to at least cut out the silly weekend sleepovers!