True MIL Confessions - Edition 9

1. I would be forever grateful if you would just please forget that I exist, or move back to Canada so I could finally hear the end of how great Canada is and how much and my home town sucks. Don’t like it, then leave!

2. PLEASE stop forcing food on me and my children. You are overweight and so are your sons. My children and I are not and I'd like to keep it that way. I am trying very hard to teach them to eat when they are hungry and stop when they are full. Being asked every 5 seconds if they want something to eat (something that is never a fruit or vegetable, BTW) is NOT HELPING.

3. You left him to live your life, got mad at him when he was just a child - being a child - when you divorced his father. then you made bad choices, continually. And now today - after not being there at all for him, you magically want him to just be everything you weren't? before you got ill, you saw our child THREE TIMES in two years, and you wonder why I don't visit you every time you send your sister with your hissy fit? trying to kill your self by starving is not going to garner the attention from us you think it will. we can't heal you - he can't heal you and I won't stand by and watch him drain himself, kill his soul, trying to.

you don't deserve him. or his efforts.

and while I encourage him to try to heal his wounds and forgive you and build some sort of relationship, i personally don't have to like you. and I will protect him from you for ever.

4. I'm sorry, but your house is tiny and uncomfortable. I wish you could understand that if you would allow us to stay in a hotel (without the extreme guilt-tripping) we would all be happier, including you. Maybe we would even stay longer or visit more often. Think about it.

5. Would it kill you to acknowledge me or my children? When I send you pictures, although you have behaved poorly and boorishly to our entire family, sending me an email about how proud my husband must be to be their father doesn't help. I took the picture, I sent it to you, and we have raised those precious children.

True MIL Confessions - Edition 8

1. Please stop buying my son toys. He’s not 3 anymore and has outgrown nursery rhyme themes.

2. Stop using baby talk to talk to my son. He is six years old, with a vocabulary and literary skill set far superior to yours. The baby talk irritates him and me.

3. Please stop asking when we will plan another baby. We have enough to worry about financially and otherwise while you gamble you fixed income away, have unexpected expenses come up and your get rich quick schemes that end up with your attorney son, my hub, sending a threatening letter to whom ever swindled you.

4. You’re a very miserable person. Very mean and selfish. I cannot believe my hub grew up w/ you as a mother. You are in no position to ever give advice or comment on my parenting skills when you passed off your two daughters as your sisters. I realize that in the 50’s there was a certain shame with children born out of wedlock. But, I will never understand how a mother can deny her children and live a lie. Your mother, to whom your daughters refer to as Mommy, was a saint.

5. Please stop asking how everyone in my entire extended family is doing. Just take for granted that if there was a problem, your son would have told you about it. My guess is that you ask because you want there to be a problem or illness. I’ve seen how you beam with glee when describing the latest illness to hit a relative. It’s really sick.

True MIL Confessions - Edition 7

1. A rather sweet thank you card from you arrived in the mail today. We're glad you appreciated our presence at and assistance with your daughter's wedding. But there seems to be an issue with the envelope in which you sent this card. It's addressed to Mr. and Mrs. MyHusband'sLastName.

Please, I beg of you, for the love of all that is sacred in this universe, would you take just one second out our your busy schedule to LEARN MY FUCKING NAME? I've been married to your son for almost three years. For not a single moment of those three years have I been Mrs. MyHusband'sLastName. I am Ms. MyOwnLastName, and for the fifty millionth time, I would appreciate it if you recognized me for who and what I am.

And I will never convert to your beloved Mormonism, so please stop buying us copies of Joseph Smith's biography.

2. Please stop calling the monthly money your son and I give you a loan. You gamble your entire Social Security on your weekly casino visits and you never pay us back, and so this transaction cannot be referred to as a loan. Plus, you’ve never thanked ME once. Yes, your son earns twice the money I do, but my income is rather significant to our household, and apparently yours too.

3. Please stop hosting dinners at your home. You cannot cook. And according to your son, you have never been able to cook. You think I’m a picky eater. No, I just don’t enjoy eating fish casserole with whole bones and vertebrae, nor do I enjoy your week old cakes and pies that have been left out on the counter uncovered. I also don’t like eating on filthy food encrusted plates and glasses at your cramped crowded dining room table surrounded by the mountains of garage sale crap you collect.

4. Please don’t buy me another single X-mas or B-day present. In case you hadn’t noticed, the last few decorative gifts you have given me are not in use at my house. Your taste is nasty and tacky, seriously get a clue. I throw the stuff away as soon as your son isn’t around. I wait till he goes out of town, and I throw out the cheesy crap you buy for him too.

5. Please don’t buy my son clothes. In case you hadn’t noticed he is NOT A GIRL. The ruffles and bright colors like pink, lavender or aqua should give it away that it does not belong on a boy.

True MIL Confessions - Edition 6

1. When you were told that we didn’t want anyone at the hospital when our son was born, that included you. When your son called you to let you know my water had broken you asked if he wanted company, he said no. That meant that you should not have shown up at the hospital anyway and tried to come into the room while I was pushing. Also, the nurses were not rude for telling you to leave the room – WE DIDN'T WANT YOU THERE.

2. You call so often and ask the most asinine questions, that now when I see your number on the caller ID, I just don't answer the phone.

3. My MIL is a raw food vegan who is obsessed with organic health food -- to the point that she will not eat, drink or use ANYTHING (toothpaste, shampoo, whatever) that doesn't come from Whole Foods. She came to help out soon after my baby was born. I was having supply problems and a really hard time with breastfeeding so we were supplementing with formula. She constantly told me how she never had any problems breastfeeding any of her children and didn't understand why I was. I could tell the formula really bothered her, but I thought I'd finally gotten it through to her that my son was not getting enough to eat on my milk alone, plain and simple, amen.

One night she encouraged my husband and I to go out for dinner together. Since I was constantly pumping in between feedings in hope of upping my supply, I had a small stash of breastmilk in the fridge. But I knew how much my son ate (HINT: A FUCKING LOT) and told her it might not be enough and to give him formula if he was still hungry.

We rushed home after dinner and the baby was awake and screaming. He was starving. She'd refused to give him the formula.

She let my baby go hungry instead of giving him an ounce or two of goddamned formula. I wanted to throttle her.

The kind of hilarious part was that I'd had some wine and spicy food at dinner and had to pump and dump while my husband gave the baby formula anyway. The kind of awful part is that to this day, anytime she visits with us she STILL pulls the passive-aggressive shit to correct our "mistakes." She sneaks him bottles of water and puts flax seed oil in his milk and deliberately spills baby food on him so I have to give him a bath after she's seen me apply some kind of bug spray or sunscreen that she thinks is going to give him cancer.

For his first birthday next month I'm making him a damned Duncan Hines non-organic chocolate cake with frosting from a can. And then offering her a piece. Blah.