Mother's Day pressure from MIL

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I get your point, OP. She is ignoring your choice to skip Mother's Day. But for her it's important, and maybe she feels her day is threatened by your treating it as insignificant. She's also steamrolling your decision to have your kids skip it, and she's interfering with your parenting by announcing that for their sake the kids should celebrate the day.

Who is the holiday for: you or your kids? Are you against the idea of the kids learning to take a day to honor you and show they love you? Or do you think the holiday is silly and made up? Did you grow up celebrating Halloween, for example? If not, do your kids still participate in Halloween?

Thank you for understanding how steamrolled I feel! Yes my kids do Halloween and Xmas, and I didn't. They do some other things that my DH did not grow up with. We pick and choose. I love Halloween and Xmas because it is all about the children and they are so excited about it. Mother's Day was a non-issue when the kids were small because they were too young to know and I genuinely didn't give a hoot when I got flowers etc. Now they are bigger of course. But they have a good understanding of our cross-cultural household and they don't care one way or the other that it is a meaningless day for me. They are happy to celebrate their grandmother and do so enthusiastically.

[Anonymous]

Just curious OP. What do you do/say about the Mother's Day stuff your kids make you in school? My kids always come home with something the teacher planned. Do you pitch it because you don't do this holiday? Fwiw Mother's Day is very low key in my house. I get a card and whatever the kids made and we go about our day. It's not a big deal, but I would not tell my kids I don't celebrate it outright.

[Anonymous]

It's fine if they make something in school. Of course I don't pitch it. We just have never done anything on our own.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I come from another culture and Mother's Day is meaningless to me. Why try to force it on me? It feels like she wants to Americanize/whitewash me.. or something like that.

But your kids are American, right? She might look at it as training the kids to be appropriate and respectful to their mother on a day that most Americans celebrate, for better or worse. It's not a religious holiday, so it's not like it would go against your beliefs.

For my part, I'm always happy to add in new holidays in my life. I understand that it might be different for an immigrant, who could feel a bit more protective of your own holidays and less interested in adopting American holidays. But I know that if I moved to Japan, where they celebrate Children's Day, I'd want my kids to get to celebrate, even if it's not our own family tradition. We've lived in a couple of different countries, with and without kids, and because of those experiences, we've added additional holidays into our family calendar. The more, the merrier.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am from another country and have no connection to Mother's Day because of this. I am married to an American, and DH's mom is into Mother's Day. His parents were with us this year for the holiday. MIL took my daughter for a walk, and asked her whether she had a gift organized for me. My kids know Mother's Day isn't important to me, so DD told her grandmother a version of this. MIL bought her a box of chocolates to give to me. I didn't love this because it felt like she was imposing her views on our family - but was going to let it slide. We took her to Mother's Day lunch, and she asked my kids if they had made cards for me. I responded and said that we don't really do Mother's Day. She said pointedly, "Well, its important for the children". There were other things like this. Am I over-reacting to be upset about this sort of thing?

You guys took her to lunch to celebrate Mother's Day and she wanted you to be honored also, She sounds like a good MIL.

Agree. There is no issue here, OP. Let it go and be gracious.

[Anonymous]

I'd say that showing love and appreciation to mothers is important everywhere in the world. Mother's Day is one of the ways we do it here. So in your heart you don't care about this particular date on the calendar. That's fine. Others do, though. Take the sentiment behind what your mother-in-law did and accept it, OP. Otherwise it just sounds like you're a control freak and have personal issues with your mother-in-law. Is it so evil that she has your kids show you appreciation and get you a gift? I bet she means well. And your kids are growing up in this country, where the day means something to many people.

[Anonymous]

It's Mother's Day, not religion. What is the big darn deal?

[Anonymous]

Re Mother's Day, I think you are overreacting. Your kids will be doing things at school for Mother's Day every year; there's nothing wrong with MIL encouraging them to make things to show you that you are special and appreciated, since this holiday is part of our culture and so are they.

Re her visiting without pre-approval, that's the battle to fight, right there. Maybe you are fixating on the Mother's Day thing and deflecting from the real issue?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Re Mother's Day, I think you are overreacting. Your kids will be doing things at school for Mother's Day every year; there's nothing wrong with MIL encouraging them to make things to show you that you are special and appreciated, since this holiday is part of our culture and so are they.

Re her visiting without pre-approval, that's the battle to fight, right there. Maybe you are fixating on the Mother's Day thing and deflecting from the real issue?

This is not a religious holiday, but a cultural one that is very important in this country, like Thanksgiving. Your kids will want to honor you on this day, not just your MIL. Your indifference will make them feel different from their peers. Perhaps you should consider making more of an effort to include yourself and not just make it your MIL's day in the eyes of your children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Re Mother's Day, I think you are overreacting. Your kids will be doing things at school for Mother's Day every year; there's nothing wrong with MIL encouraging them to make things to show you that you are special and appreciated, since this holiday is part of our culture and so are they.

Re her visiting without pre-approval, that's the battle to fight, right there. Maybe you are fixating on the Mother's Day thing and deflecting from the real issue?


This is not a religious holiday, but a cultural one that is very important in this country, like Thanksgiving. Your kids will want to honor you on this day, not just your MIL. Your indifference will make them feel different from their peers. Perhaps you should consider making more of an effort to include yourself and not just make it your MIL's day in the eyes of your children.

That's just silly, PP. Mother's Day is not a "very important" cultural holiday in this country, certainly not nearly as important as Thanksgiving. Plenty of people don't celebrate MD. Celebrating a holiday you don't wish to because it makes it might make your children "feel different from their peers" is also silly.

OP, if your kids want to appreciate you with gifts on MD, then by all means be gracious and thankful, but if you don't feel it's important, it's likely they won't either. Your MIL does think it's important and while she was a little tone deaf to keep bringing it up and forcing gifts on your children to give you, cut her a break this time and next time MD rolls around, kindly tell her you don't celebrate MD but is delighted that she does and she is kind to think of you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Re Mother's Day, I think you are overreacting. Your kids will be doing things at school for Mother's Day every year; there's nothing wrong with MIL encouraging them to make things to show you that you are special and appreciated, since this holiday is part of our culture and so are they.

Re her visiting without pre-approval, that's the battle to fight, right there. Maybe you are fixating on the Mother's Day thing and deflecting from the real issue?


This is not a religious holiday, but a cultural one that is very important in this country, like Thanksgiving. Your kids will want to honor you on this day, not just your MIL. Your indifference will make them feel different from their peers. Perhaps you should consider making more of an effort to include yourself and not just make it your MIL's day in the eyes of your children.

That's just silly, PP. Mother's Day is not a "very important" cultural holiday in this country, certainly not nearly as important as Thanksgiving. Plenty of people don't celebrate MD. Celebrating a holiday you don't wish to because it makes it might make your children "feel different from their peers" is also silly.

OP, if your kids want to appreciate you with gifts on MD, then by all means be gracious and thankful, but if you don't feel it's important, it's likely they won't either. Your MIL does think it's important and while she was a little tone deaf to keep bringing it up and forcing gifts on your children to give you, cut her a break this time and next time MD rolls around, kindly tell her you don't celebrate MD but is delighted that she does and she is kind to think of you.

Yes. Be gracious but no, you do not need to make this into a big deal in your family.

And to the pp, you shouldn't worry about children's perrs re: Mother's Day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Re Mother's Day, I think you are overreacting. Your kids will be doing things at school for Mother's Day every year; there's nothing wrong with MIL encouraging them to make things to show you that you are special and appreciated, since this holiday is part of our culture and so are they.

Re her visiting without pre-approval, that's the battle to fight, right there. Maybe you are fixating on the Mother's Day thing and deflecting from the real issue?


This is not a religious holiday, but a cultural one that is very important in this country, like Thanksgiving. Your kids will want to honor you on this day, not just your MIL. Your indifference will make them feel different from their peers. Perhaps you should consider making more of an effort to include yourself and not just make it your MIL's day in the eyes of your children.

That's just silly, PP. Mother's Day is not a "very important" cultural holiday in this country, certainly not nearly as important as Thanksgiving. Plenty of people don't celebrate MD. Celebrating a holiday you don't wish to because it makes it might make your children "feel different from their peers" is also silly.

OP, if your kids want to appreciate you with gifts on MD, then by all means be gracious and thankful, but if you don't feel it's important, it's likely they won't either. Your MIL does think it's important and while she was a little tone deaf to keep bringing it up and forcing gifts on your children to give you, cut her a break this time and next time MD rolls around, kindly tell her you don't celebrate MD but is delighted that she does and she is kind to think of you.

It is important but you can choose to be indifferent about it, like OP.

[Anonymous]

Thanks everyone. Of course some of you are spot on that Mothers Day is standing in for other tensions, namely, the way MIL ignores our wishes on many (more important) things. I think part of her point is indeed what one poster mentioned - that not honoring me will make kids feel different. I think DH and I are fortunate that we are raising racially and culturally mixed kids in an environment where being different is OK. I think this is hard for MIL to fathom, partly generational and partly where she lives. But that aside, this discussion has helped me think through what I am actually upset about.. So thank you everyone!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thanks everyone. Of course some of you are spot on that Mothers Day is standing in for other tensions, namely, the way MIL ignores our wishes on many (more important) things. I think part of her point is indeed what one poster mentioned - that not honoring me will make kids feel different. I think DH and I are fortunate that we are raising racially and culturally mixed kids in an environment where being different is OK. I think this is hard for MIL to fathom, partly generational and partly where she lives. But that aside, this discussion has helped me think through what I am actually upset about.. So thank you everyone!

For what it's worth, my three siblings and I were raised in such a family (racially and culturally-mixed) and it was uncomfortable not fitting in, although we didn't complain to our parents to avoid hurting their feelings. It's stressful when your friends ask you if your family did so-and-so and you either fib or tell them that your family doesn't do that. A little accommodation really helps.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thanks everyone. Of course some of you are spot on that Mothers Day is standing in for other tensions, namely, the way MIL ignores our wishes on many (more important) things. I think part of her point is indeed what one poster mentioned - that not honoring me will make kids feel different. I think DH and I are fortunate that we are raising racially and culturally mixed kids in an environment where being different is OK. I think this is hard for MIL to fathom, partly generational and partly where she lives. But that aside, this discussion has helped me think through what I am actually upset about.. So thank you everyone!

For what it's worth, my three siblings and I were raised in such a family (racially and culturally-mixed) and it was uncomfortable not fitting in, although we didn't complain to our parents to avoid hurting their feelings. It's stressful when your friends ask you if your family did so-and-so and you either fib or tell them that your family doesn't do that. A little accommodation really helps.

Do you think things have progressed though since you were young? Genuinely curious. Our children's classrooms in DC are filled with kids who are from mixed backgrounds of all kinds. They don't at all seem to be anomalous.