The In- Laws

Relationships with in-laws are often referred to as difficult and uneasy. The particular relationship with the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law is especially difficult. What makes this relationship so hard? How is it different than others?

These women are brought together for one reason: a man. These women fight for this man in different, yet similar ways. Attention, love, support, assistance and more are all desired from this man. According to the textbook these tensions exist for these reasons: the coconstruction of two adult women’s personal relationships with each other occurs almost involuntarily as they commence an ongoing relationship with each other as “strangers”, the women may have high levels of emotional involvement and commitment with their children, probabilities exist for their having an involved long-term relationship with each other that sometimes lasts longer than the marriage that created the relationship, usually have strong emotional attachments with the same man but may not share the same cultural social values or belief systems with each other on other important matters.

Though I do not have a mother-in-law, I’ve seen this relationship through others. My sister’s mother-in-law honestly is slightly crazy. She is baby-obsessed and can be very annoying. Yet, she is also very kind, supportive, and caring. My sister and her butted heads for a while, but now somehow my sister has accepted her and life is fine.

The book lists several characteristics of relationships associated with a mother-in-law and I’ve noticed several of these: interfering, possessive, nagging, criticizing, dependent, inconsiderate, pampering, spoiling, intrusive, overtalkive and gushing.