Relationships  Discussion Forum

Hi All,


Just came across this message board and thought I might get help from you all. Oflate I am too depressed about life. I don¡¦t feel like living, am feeling life is a burden.
Atcually from the outside I am a happy woman in her 25 with a loving husband and a 1yr old daughter.
The problem with me is I am not able to handle people well, in the process I get hurt by them. I was brought up in a nuclear family my parents and my sis.
I am the most pampered one between the two of us. Maybe that¡¦s the reason I don¡¦t know how to interact with people. I try pleasing them but finally end up getting hurt.
For instance I wud like to share some situations, I got married and came to the US. After 1yr I went back alone. So I had to stay in my inlaws house.
It was all new to me , how they behaved and I guess it hurt me a lot. Like for instance when in the morning my mil will say we had tea, u make for urself. I felt as thou they are separating me. Its not that I want tea early in the morning , so if I don¡¦t make , she forces me to make ƒº which again I did not like.

Then when she is prapring lunch , I will ask her if there is any veggies to cut. She will say its very little work and that she can do and will ask me to go to the living room and read paper. I feel bored sitting all alone, so when I go upstairs to my bedroom and then come later after 10mts, what I see is my Fil cutting the veggies.
When all this is happening around me , I really don¡¦t know what to do next .I blame myself, I say nobody likes me .
Then she complains to my Husband telling that I dodnt cook and I don¡¦t cut a green chilly also.

I just need to stay there for 1mth and then I retrned to the US. Now the problem is my inlaws are here to look after my daughter since she was falling sick often going to daycare.
I go for work and then come in the evening.Now her work is to monitor me , what work I am doing etc. She does not cook .When I come in the evening I got to cook and again attend to y daughter , she is an infant so feeding her will take time. One day she is telling my FIL, its been 2hrs since she reached home, she has not given anything for the baby. I feed my baby dinner at 9:30pm after all my work gets over.She was complaining abt this to her husband telling must feed babies at 7pm look at the way she does things.What pisses me off is she tell all this indirectly to her husband , she can tell this directly to me right. I did not say that I will not listen.

Anyways the problem is I just cant stand her anymore. And they need to be here for another 5mths. I just cant stay with them 1 day more.I will go MAD.
On the other hand my husband wants them to finis their 6mths stay and leave. Please advice me on how to handle /tackle my inlaws.

At the same time I don¡¦t want to hurt myself in the process. I have no friends to talk to to share my problems. After coming to the US , I have no true friends.
I don¡¦t want to trouble my mom calling up to India. Anyways she will ask me to bear with her.

I tried to love her like my mother. Used to have lots of respect and love for her. But after her bad treatmet I just HATE her now.
Its been 5yrs of our marriage , all these years they used t send a card with Happy B¡¨Day daughter. When they are here now they gae a card saying Happy B¡¦day DIL .
It hurt me a lot to think they don¡¦t consider me close. I want to be nice with them , but when their behaviour pisses me off.

How shd I react , I don¡¦t want to fight with them or my husband. I just want to be HAPPY .And again I don¡¦t want to slog in the kitchen just becoz she is here.
She was telling that I don¡¦t cook BF for her son. I told that in US nobody cooks BF , everybody eats cereal.

During these tough times my husband also does not support me. He tells them she is not a mature girl , argues with everyone, am the one who is putting up with all her tantrums. This sounds so ill of me , look how negatively he projects me. Agreed that I am a little short tempered. But I don¡¦t fight /argue unnecessarily.I do them only when the person hurts me and I cant bear it any longer.

I hate him telling abt me to his parents.OFlate becoz of this me and my husband has had many fights.

U know what to tell the truth before I tried to like them like my parents. But I was ill treated on many occasions. And guess now internally I just hate them.

How shd I continue. Will anyone be able to help me out of this. Tell me exactly what I shd be doing at this moment.

Guess I am not a practical person , only book knowledge. I was always spoon fed by my mother and now look upon you guys to tell me on how to overcome this prolem.
Its not that me and my husband were so happy and it all got ended when my inlwas came. We were having occasional fights and living along , but now that they are here its become worse.


Another DIL replied. Whoever you are, when I read your post, it looked like you are writing my story with a different name!

I am exactly in the same boat as you are, with very minor changes here and there. Though the difficulty you are undergoing is a tough one to solve, I am writing here just to console you that there is someone else sharing your experience.

I am a person who loves & respects people generally especially elders. I did the same to my in laws also. Only problem with me is that I am not very talkative. By childhood I am like that, mom says as a toddler I used to observe people than keen on talking. But once I get close to anyone I will talk about anything and everything. My very close firends and my mom only knows about this nature of mine.

My in laws complain about this with others(including mu hubby) that she is not interested to talk to us. I listen to them and show due interest in anything they talk. But still. I am very well educated and was in a very respectable job before marriage. I am proud that I have achieved a lot in my young age. They think that I am showing this in fron tof them by acting great. I never ever can think of that with anyone, forget my own people. But they do not have a single % of respect or pride in what I have done. Never mind.

We are staying outside India from last one year(married for 3 years). But I got to spend very less time in in-laws house as I was aborad (alone) on an assignment for sometime after marriage and now we both are together in some other country.

But in that less time, my mil tried everything she could to prove me wrong. Whenever I am with them, I only do ALL the work. She won't even bother to enter into kitchen. But I never mind it. She would intentionally tell me wrong recipes so that the preparation doesn't become eatable. And then she would console everyone saying she is new and has to learn a lot of things. Sh would console me also in front of everyone, so everyone felt that she is such a good mil that she never mind if preparation by her dil is not good! I used to get surprised and used to tell my hubby that she only told me to do that way and now she behaves as if she didn't say anything! Initially he also like other didn't believe it. I started becoming more alert after such 4-5 incidents. It took me that long to realise that she was doing it intentionally. One day fortunately when she was trying this trick again with me, my hubby over heard that and he apologised with me for not believing me earlier.

Another incident is when there were some guests at home and we all were going some place and had to start early in the morning. Though everyone felt that preparing breakfast in the morning for so many people will be watse of time, she objected and said that at least she will need breakfast from home only. And of course I have to cook it. Noboody else. Her daughter was also there that day but made sure to get up after breakfast was almost over. Beauty of this was that
1)mil denied the breakfast item I had prepared saying something is missing in that. Everybody else enjoyed.
2)when everyone came for breakfast I was forced by mil to go for bath and made sure her daughter served everyone. I could hear people appreciating her for her effrots early morning and surprisingly my mil or her duaghter didn't clarify that it was me who prepared it!!! She took all credit.

By my virtue I can keep any no. of maids for any work, I am that capable. But I never open my mouth thinking that ok..let days go as elders want. My in laws are dead against maids. If I think some of my friends in my position, I feel they would have taught everyone a lesson by behaving appropriately. But unfortunately I am not that kind of a girl. Cannot say a rough word on the face.

My hubby had told me in the beginning of our marriage itself that it is his dream to see me and his mother in harmony unlike any other mil-dil. So I tried a lot not to see the -ve thing but finally I am forced to. My mil also keeps reminding both of us everytime that in spite of her son and dil, they are not taken care by them and they have to live all by themselves. There is no choice for us. They are not ready to come here and if we go back to India my husband will not get a job. I might get as I am in the software field. She always says that we are eating/taking shelter from them and they will never. Such a comment I never thought I would hear from anyone.

Anyway this is my story. Though we are away from in laws now, whenever I think of those incidents I feel very down in life. Just because our next vacation is due in some months and we are going to India and ofcourse stay with them. And all similar things will repeat.

My husband thinks these are all minor things and doesn't want to involve himself in any of this.

I think we better and live with these problems through out rather than complaining. What say?

Best wishes.