Your Mother-In-Law Doesn’t Hate You... It’s Actually Sadder Than That
“She probably wants to like you ... that’s why her Facebook posts say that she loves you but her actions tell a different story.”
If you’re lucky, marrying someone offers you the opportunity to become a loved and loving member of another family. Your sister-in-law might become your go-to late-night text when you don’t know why your baby’s poop looks like that. Or your father-in-law might drop by because he noticed your mailbox looked crooked and he wanted to fix that for you. You might love taking your mother-in-law out for a chatty girl lunch every so often because your relationship is just that good. Unfortunately, not everyone hits the in-law jackpot.
But TikTok creator Janelle (@heyjanellemarie), who frequently posts about having a difficult relationship with her mother-in-law, wants to reassure those who might find themselves on the receiving end of their partner’s mom’s ire.
“Your mother-in-law doesn’t hate you,” she says. “She hates herself.”
We’re intrigued. Because I’m sure some people have often found their MIL’s attitudes toward them... hard to confuse with anything but hatred. But Janelle elaborates...
“She may not realize that she hates herself, but that’s often what it is,” she explains before continuing, “It could be anything: She hates the way that you feel empowered to say no to things that you don’t like. She hates the way that you have such a good job and she never had that. She hates the way that her son treats you so well and she never had that in her own partnership in her marriage.
“She might even feel conflicted about it. She probably wants to like you. She does. And that’s why her Facebook posts say that she loves you so much but her actions tell you a different story.”
Janelle hypothesizes that these situations often come to a head when that deep insecurity finds any little thing to latch onto. “As soon as you do the slightest thing that they can say ‘Ha! See! You are flawed! You aren’t as perfect as this idea I have in my head! Now you’ve done this thing that I can tell everyone makes you the devil and that’s why I don’t like you!’ ... the reason why so often it seems like you’re the only target for your mother-in-law is because you’re the only person that she can perfectly project those insecurities or those unfulfilled parts of her life onto.”
Janelle concludes with some words of wisdom: We can recognize what’s going on and feel empathy for it, but that doesn’t mean we have to tolerate poor treatment.
The comments are full of folks who can absolutely relate to this content and are quick to commiserate.
“Mine doesn’t like me because she can’t control me,” writes one. Janelle replies that this is very likely due to a perceived lack of control in the mother-in-law’s own experience.
“I needed this tonight,” replies another. “Mine just sent my husband a long email about how terrible I’ve been and how much I hurt her…all because I stopped putting up with her boundary stomping that’s been going on for years.”
“It took me a while to grasp this. I overheard my mother-in-law and sisters-in-law making certain comments about other women and it reeked of insecurity,” recounts a third. “That’s when it all made sense.”
Ultimately, this comes down to advice I’ve offered my children when it comes to peers that don’t treat them nicely: You don’t have to tolerate people treating you with meanness or disrespect, but understand that often those people are telling you more about how they feel inside than anything. Accusations are often confessions.
