The Big News from my self to me is, my DIL's do not have to and may not like me. May be they'll like me some of the time. Maybe they won't like me at all. Maybe they'll like me sometimes, and sometimes my welcome will wear thin on them. Maybe they don't want to spend their free time with me.
Holy crap.
And so? So what? What does that mean? Are they evil? Am I evil? I don't think so - I think it just means what it says. It is what it is.
From the reading and work I've done on the not so big life book came an epiphany - not everyone is going to like me. Not only that, even those that do like me aren't going to like me all the time or want to be with me as much as I want to be with them.
That may not be news to you, but it's news to me. I've always thought that if I worked hard enough, did everything right (even if I wasn't always "nice" -- i.e., if I was at least honest) I would be liked and admired for my goodness and other wonderful personality traits. But of course, that's not so.
This epiphany also turned on a light in the MIL - DIL portion of my brain. A while ago I came to realize that the reason my first MIL stayed in touch with me was not because I was someone she just couldn't get enough of (though she was really a kind and caring person, along with being funny, practical and keen), but because as the custodial parent for most of the time my son was growing up, I was the contact person. Staying in touch with me, being nice, remembering birthdays and including me in her yearly Christmas newsletter was also smart. This didn't stop after my son and his dad started spending more time together, because she didn't do that as a manipulative ploy. She also, I think, was trying to like me despite myself.
In any case, what now comes to me, as the light brightens or spreads out, is the realization that just because you or I are MIL's doesn't mean our DIL's necessarily like us. That was a shocker to me -- I'd always assumed my son's girlfriends, and then later their wives, just thought I was the most wonderful mother and potential mother in law around. Surely they enjoyed my wit and humor! They found my housekeeping methods amusing, if a bit unorthodox. I'd always thought if we hadn't met through my sons but through work, we might have been friendly co-workers.
Now, with this newly shed light, I'm not so sure. Because after a few years of the newness of it all have worn off, as a wife becomes confident that they are indeed the main woman in their husband's life, perhaps it isn't so necessary to try so hard to force herself to put up with a MIL's odd behavior, to her too personal or too impersonal behavior, to forcing herself to like someone who seems a bit.. incompatible.. to her.
As I roam around the boards and read books and listen to other MIL's, I do hear comments along the lines of "she isn't who I would have chosen for him, but..." or "I am trying to like her because my son loves her but..."
You can pick your fleas by Nanas_Alley
Guess what? The reverse may also be true. Just as we don't choose our children's spouses, they don't choose their spouses' parents. And yet most of our children's mates are going to start of trying to like us -- after all, we're the ones that spawned the person they fell in love with. There must be something about us that is related to the aspects of their partner that they love? And maybe they would like us, if we gave them enough reason and space. I have to ask myself - how much would I like any woman who seemed to be a constant presence in my life with my husband?
After awhile, wouldn't her welcome wear thin? And wouldn't it be possible that welcome would grow even thinner if I had to present on the outside some kind of externally glowing smile, in order to not upset my husband? Good God, I think I'd grow weary of it sooner rather than later!
In the midst of all this, my 2nd son had invited me to go to dinner and a movie one Friday night with his wife and himself. Keen, I thought - I had just dropped off my youngest at school and had no date, hadn't seen them in a month - they'd just been away spending their vacation with his dad and step-mom.
Then I read her post on Facebook, posted before he'd sent me the e-mail invite. "Looking forward to going a movie with my hubby Friday night" she'd written.
My new light flashed urgently, much as I wanted to ignore it. "Read that!!!" it shrieked.
"I read it, she's looking forward to the movie," I told myself.
"Read that, read that, read that!!!" it shrieked again.
I read it and sighed. "So?"
"Think!!!!" it screamed at me. "Remember the last movie you went to with them?"
A dim older light flickered off and on - yes, I recalled. My DIL had seemed distant and grumpy that night. I'd written it off to her being tired from a long work week, or maybe she and he had had some kind of argument. Whatever -- I shrugged it off.
"Seeeeeee?????" my bright new light flashed brightly at me.
"Hmmmm". I had to admit -- if I looked at this from a DIL standpoint - after spending two weeks with my husband's other parents (much as I enjoyed that), how would I feel sharing our first Friday night back home going out for a romantic dinner and movie with.... my Mother in Law.
So, I e-mailed my son and backed out -- you know, there are a lot of other things I can do. And we can get together another time - it doesn't have to be on their Friday night date night!
I thought back to my last conversation with that same DIL, in which she kept asking me about my social life -- did I enjoy being single, was I ever going to date again? Hmmmmm. Maybe she was trying to tell me something!
This insight certainly has given me something to think about and also some relief. I don't have to pretend to myself to like them all the time. If I can accept that they don't have to love me, then I can forgive myself for not auto-loving them. I can do my best because they married my children, but if I don't love someone my child picked as a spouse as much as I love my child, that doesn't make me the MIL from hell. What would make me that is if I thought I had to love my child's spouse, couldn't and then put the blame on him or her for not being lovable by my standards.
That aside, perhaps we can begin relate to each other as people.
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