What should I do about my monster-in-law?

@Shababy (140)
United States
January 23, 2007 10:21pm CST
About 4 years ago I got married to my now husband. Jon has always been wonderful to me. Right before we got married we were making wedding plans and he had called and invited his mother and step-father who lived in Iowa (we lived in Texas at the time) to the wedding. He told me I had to meet his family before we got married to make sure I wouldn't run. I assumed he was just kidding and that if he wasn't that many people are embarrased about their family from time to time. I was so wrong. Jon and I were already living together and before they drove down to Texas I cleaned like there was no tomorrow had gone out to get different foods and beverages and tried everything I could to show them great southern hospitality. Long story short my husbands step father use to be a corrupt small town sheriff that was at the time of the wedding being investigated for a hit and run and had been in loads of legal trouble before that after he was no longer the local sheriff in the small town they lived in in Iowa. There behavior was so bad that they had to be asked to leave the wedding. My family is very large and we are all very close. My husband only sees his mother every few years and i could not belive how she acted she got angry and we never knew why threatened my life and offered my husband money not to marry me and started breaking things and even threatened to have her husband hurt me. She was a nightmare. I was told that she did the same thing to my husbands brothers wife when his brother got married. After that we never spoke again and she has never met our children. She knows about them because my husband called to tell her about them when they were born. I was nice to her at Christmas and I sent her photos albums filled with the kids pics each x-mas with nothing in return. Just before x-mas this year she and her husband got in an argument. He held her against the wall and shot her in the back of the head. This was her 8th husband. She did survive the shooting. Apparently she struggled and the bullet hit just right. My husband and his brother grew up in extreme poverty and had one step-dad after another and they have a horrible relationship with their mother. After the shooting my husbands brother would not even contact her to see if she was alright and stated he wanted nothing to do with her. My husband and his brother both have broken free of the lifestyle they grew up around of drugs and other crime. My husband will finish his masters degree next semester and is a consultant for a fortune 500 company. We now live in Iowa and I always read the paper online and was very shocked when I read their names in the newspaper and the news of the shooting. I notified my husband and called her. Since I offered to help her it has been a nightmare. She has not cursed me out or threatned to beat me up or kill me this time but she enjoys putting people down and likes to start things where she makes people fight and that has already started. She is out of the hospital and her husband was her sole source of support she can no longer afford where she lives and I have helped her with everything to getting food stamps to trying to get her into a shelter and even an apartment with low rent and offered to pay for her to get into them. One day she sais no I want to stay here until I get thrown out the next day she demands that I find her an apartment where she and her 3 dogs and cat can all live. The problem is I can't find an apartment that will take 3 dogs and a cat. Especially since one of the dogs is over 200 pounds. I even offered to buy her a travel trailor until she could get something more permanent. I have tried to help her and one day she wants something and the next day something different and I have found her job interviews she could go to she promises to go I get ready to take her and she makes an excuse not to go. I have spent most of my days trying to get her help and nothing works because she agrees to something and then the next day no that is not what she wants. My husband wants nothing to do with her and she has already been putting him down telling him college is stupid and why is he still going and is putting him down because he is thinking of continuing for his PhD. I have suggested that she come here and he won't hear of it and neither will my family they can't belive I have helped this much considering what she did to our wedding. I have been neglecting things I need to do and I am ready to be rid of her. What should I do should I keep trying? She has already started with the different mind games she does trying to make my husband and I fight and she told my son she would take him to Chucky Cheese last friday and she called the night before and said she didn't want to anymore. The reason my brother-in-law wants nothing to do with her is she would promise to take his kids different places they would get ready and wait for her and she would never show up which is really bad to young children. Should I give up on her or is that really a bad thing to do. I am just use to growing up in a family that family means something. There is no way my family would ever behave this way but if something bad happened to one of us we would all be there. What do you think? Sorry for the long post.
1 response
• United States
27 Jan 07
Don't appologize for the post! Hopefully it helped a bit just to vent. My advice? Run. As fast as you can. Hooray for your husband, it takes a strong person to overcome those obstacles and get where he is now. I believe you have gone above and beyond anything that is expected of you. Don't let her make your children's lives chaotic. It does sound like she might benefit from psychological therapy tho! But if she refuses your help, there really is nothing you can do. She sounds like she won't be happy unless she drags you down to her level. Don't let that happen! Good luck.