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halfpint2230
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PathStep 9 Compassion hearts11 Forum posts4 Forum upvotes6 Current upvotes6 Age GroupAdult Last activeOctober, 2021 Member sinceOctober 9, 2021
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Advice for dealing with MIL
Family & Caregivers / by halfpint2230
Last post
 October 10th, 2021
...See more My mother in law causes a lot of stress in my relationship. My spouse and I both Work full time and she watches our 2 year old daughter once a week. She never follows the rules we give her. I am Not asking for anything crazy. Life jacket in the pool and an adult has to be in there. No sugary treats, special occasions are fine but she has a habit with her other grandkids of going in excess. Currently my daughter is on antibiotics for lymes. This makes her sensitive to milk and milk based products. I’ve asked she not give her any because I can track it better. It’s a fight. She lies. I picked my daughter up and she had yogurt on her face. When confronted she claims I am “Looking for a reason to be upset” this happens anytime we ask her to do something and it’s always a fight. My spouse thinks she is trying and we need to be more forgiving. But she thinks it’s ok to do something as long as we don’t find out. We have a “talk” just about monthly about respecting our rules. I don’t feel like this should be a regular conversation. I feel like if she cannot respect our rules maybe she should not be helping once a week. It has become unhelpful. I want her to have a relationship with our kids, I just think since we can’t get her to follow rules maybe we stick to regular visits and we them every holiday and special occasion, as my family is not close. This always ends in a fight with my spouse, he thinks I am too hard on her and he believes her when she says she didn’t do something. But I’ll have witnessed her not following rules or she will do it and ask my older daughter (12) not to tell me. Or the evidence will be there (yogurt on the face). I am tired of fighting with my spouse over her. I’m not sure how to get her to follow rules or respect boundaries. She thinks she should be allowed to stop by our home whenever she wants, unannounced. My spouse agrees. I think this is not appropriate. Just call first. Is it me that is really being too hard or is she just out of line? How do I handle this without damaging my marriage?
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