Hi Everyone!

Where do I begin? Well here's my story:

I'm in the Air Force and was married to my highschool sweetheart for approx. 6 years. About 3 years into the marriage we both knew it wasn't working but were trying to hold on to what ever we could of the marriage. I ended up gettig sent to Korea by myself for a year and prior to me leaving we both decided that it wasn't working out and to separate. We still talked to each other while I was in Korea, but decided that once I got to my new base that we were getting a divorce.

While I was in Korea, I fell in love with an amazing guy who was everything that I had been looking for my whole life. My equal in all respects. I was truly happy for the first time in my life...but I had to settle my old life first. So we ended up going to our separate bases, me to the UK and him to Nebraska. We kept our long distance relationship strong while I finalized my divorce...which is a true testament to how stronlgy we loved each other. But all the while in the background was his mother...whispering negativity and doubt in his ear.

His Mom has always played a large role in his life...she raised him as a single mom and basically revolved her life around her two boys. He never really had any girlfriends while he was in high school, and in fact I was/is his first true relationship. He told her everything about me (including all about my past) which in retrospect may not have been a good idea. She didn't like me from the beginning...the fact that I had been in the midst of a separation/divorce when we met was all she needed to know. She felt that I was immoral and a bad person from day one. Well, time passed and we got married...of course she refused to attend the wedding; and soon after my DH moved to the UK and we began our new life together.

At first things were fine, I mean how much trouble can the woman do when we are already thousands of miles apart...but then on Halloween 2006 she decided to call and drop the atomic bomb on my DH. She proceeded to tell him that she had never approved of our relationship/marriage and that she felt I was ruining his life. She was upset that he was not following the life course she had planned out for him (join military+get job/education+leave military+come back home and live by mommie), and she wanted him to know that she was not happy about it. Well, my DH flipped and went ballistic on her...telling her it was his life and that if she didn't like it she didn't need to be a part of his life anymore. They didn't talk for over a year after that...and it ate away at him and at our marriage. He was angry at how things were and felt like our marriage wasn't how he wanted it to be. He missed his family and without trying to...began to blame me and our marriage for his unhappiness and the overall situation. It was a very rocky year.

In November 2007 my DH decided that he was going to go home and try to mend things with his Mom. When he gets there she tells him that it's all my fault that things are the way they are because I didn't call her and try to get to know her from the beginning. C'MON!!! She hated me from the beginning...who would want to call and be friendly after that? She basically didn't acknowledge that she did anything and blamed everything on me. But she told him, that she would support him if he was happy.

Yeah WRONG! My DH came home and left for the desert a week later...he was happier now that things seemed to be ok with him and his mom. That was enough for me, because I don't need for her to like me...as long as her relationship with my DH was good. I can handle whatever crap she throws at me, i'm a big girl. Well, a month into his deployment and she starts bad mouthing me to him in emails and IM chats. On top of that my DH now wants to move to CO (where he is from and where MIL lives) when we get out of the military! WTF? He still sticks up for me and tells the MIL to mind her own business...but it doesn't stop her from bad mouthing me whatever chance she gets. I am mad worried that my life is going to SUCK really bad if I live within any close distance to her. This woman will NOT be happy until I am out of her son's life. I just hope that I can be stronger...and that my DH continues to be supportive.

CRAZY MIL's Suck! (I am so frustrated)

I can SO relate! My MIL was nasty from the beginning, too. I tried on many occassions to get to know her, but she ignored me (at best) and refused to speak to me unless forced.  She has tried in her own passive-aggressive way to keep us apart, but it didn't work.

Here's a bit of a reality check: You absolutely cannot let that woman come between your marriage! My sweetie and I used to fight constantly about his mother. We finally realized that she is NOT worth it!

I think moving too close to the MIL would be dangerous, but perhaps living in the same STATE would be ok, so long as you limit it to an hour away or MORE!

I guess it helps to ignore as much of her BS as you can, and get your hubby to put some boundaries on things.  What I mean by that is, he needs to get to the point where he lays down some "ground rules", such as: If you cannot say positive things about my wife, then please do not discuss her at all with me.  Then, whenever she "slips" and starts badmouthing you, your hubby needs to have the strength to immediately stop her in her tracks and say "Mom, hey, remember, we agreed that we'd not discuss my wife unless you had something positive to say".

That will be hard for him to do, but once he learns how to shut her down, I think life will become much easier for you.

Again, I'd really caution against moving TOO close.  Being 12,000 miles away from my sweetie's mom is just fine by me. It's as simple as not picking up the phone and letting emails go by a week or so before replying (just like she does to me).

i love how mils find excuses to blame us for bull shit...i think my mil thinks i caused the hole in the ozone layer. lol.
and when given the chance to manipulate things they just blame it on the newest addition.
i agree with mainegirl, we fought abot il issues and it just caused our probs, i had to realise hubby couldnt change/control these crazy ppl. from that point we were much happier and united.
i would also want ur hubby saying stop talkin about u full stop...not just to him.

Yeah, he has told her that "if she doesn't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all". But she still finds ways to throw in a jab or insinuate something about me...and about how his life would be SO different blah blah blah. My MIL is insane...she always wants to meddle and control everything. I've been strong and thankfully my DH has finally put his foot down, but I know eventually this will come to a head again and there will be another HUGE argument between the two of them about me. I don't think she will ever be happy until I am out of her sons life.

Yeah, if you can possibly avoid it, try to not live too close.  We have had quite a few issues to do with them living close to us, partly his fault though, cos mummy and daddy were always close enough that he could go and ask for help (a lot of it being financial), I can understand the financial help thing, however sometimes they seem to find a way to weasel into whatever is going on in our lives, in fact they have just gone to England (where i'm from) for a holiday and they decided to go and invite themselves to have dinner with some good friends of mine, and when my friends tried to put them off, they bent over backwards to prioritise to go and see them!  (it's ridiculous), sorry to go off the point there, but I guess I can relate to some of what you are going through!