S/O Is it rude to tell my MIL she can't look at my phone?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"Give me my phone back. Now. If you can't do that you're never seeing your grand kids again."

I wouldn't tolerate this at all.

Holy shit. You’ve got...issues.

[Anonymous]

"But MIL, DH sends me a new dick pic every Wednesday. I'd hate for you to have to see that."

[Anonymous]

OP here. Glad to know I'm not alone in thinking this is nuts.

I agree it was partly just a generational misunderstanding on her part. However, she has always been really nosy about my life and not just as it relates to my kids or even my marriage. Like she regularly asks me really nosy questions about my obstetric health, my job, my friends, and my own family. I always deflect -- it's just how she is and I'm used to it by now (and my DH always backs me up, though he does encourage me to go easy on her). But I think part of the reason it made me think that she's nosing around other places is because she consistently refuses to acknowledge my privacy or discomfort around a topic. The fact that she'd just go cruising through the photos on my phone (which, for the record, neither her sister or husband chose to do -- they are the same age and seemed to understand implicitly that you don't just go flipping all the way through) does make me wonder in what other ways is she breezing right past conventional boundaries on the hunt for info about my life.

[Anonymous]

She was rude. Inappropriate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Glad to know I'm not alone in thinking this is nuts.

I agree it was partly just a generational misunderstanding on her part. However, she has always been really nosy about my life and not just as it relates to my kids or even my marriage. Like she regularly asks me really nosy questions about my obstetric health, my job, my friends, and my own family. I always deflect -- it's just how she is and I'm used to it by now (and my DH always backs me up, though he does encourage me to go easy on her). But I think part of the reason it made me think that she's nosing around other places is because she consistently refuses to acknowledge my privacy or discomfort around a topic. The fact that she'd just go cruising through the photos on my phone (which, for the record, neither her sister or husband chose to do -- they are the same age and seemed to understand implicitly that you don't just go flipping all the way through) does make me wonder in what other ways is she breezing right past conventional boundaries on the hunt for info about my life.

Yep. She gets zero chances and zero trust. Your gut is right.

[Anonymous]

She's rude and nosy. It sounds like you already know that OP, and this is yet another confirmation.

Next time, I like the idea of planting a dick pic of dh where she will see it. Or maybe a rude MIL meme of some sort.

[Anonymous]

She was rude... and nosey. What someone has on their phone is personal. It didn't have to be nudes--you might have taken a picture of some documentation that was medical/personal in nature. I would have been annoyed, OP. It makes it a little tricky that it's your MIL. With anyone else I would have walked over and taken it from them.

[Anonymous]

No you did the right thing, that was really rude of her. I wouldn't be handing my phone over to her again.

It doesn't matter what the photo's were of, they are personal and its up to you if you want to share, its not up to her.

She can moan about it all day, it says a lot about her that she can't just accept that she was in the wrong and move on. Leave the problem with her, you didn't do anything wrong.

[Anonymous]

My mom does this, too. It drives me crazy. My niece, her granddaughter (age 22) calls her out on it, too. My mom doesn't get too offended though when told she's only supposed to look at the one picture, not scroll through all of them. Does she listen? No. So, every time, we say "just look at this one picture and don't swipe."

[Anonymous]

Next time she brings it up, level with her. Explain to her that phones AREN'T like photo albums, and even if the photos are fine, you have personal info on your phone... texts, emails, etc, and so when ANYONE takes your phone and won't give it back, it feels disrespectful.

If she keeps pushing, tell her if it's really about wanting to see more photos, then you'll start sending her more. But if it's just about feeling like you don't have a right to ask for her phone back, then she needs to agree to disagree.

[Anonymous]

"Sure! Sending now." Phone goes back in pocket. Big, shyt-eating grin.

[Anonymous]

Pp here, another approach, if you don't want to shut her down by telling her to agree to disagree, you can play along. "Oh Barb, there you go again showing your nosy side! Haha, yeah, she's upset I wouldn't let her snoop through my phone. " Big eye roll. " Haha, Carol look, Steve left his phone on the table, quick let's look at all his pictures! "

[Anonymous]

I’d intentionally throw some dirty pics in there just to teach her a lesson.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:She just doesn't understand - she thinks of it as a photo album she's looking at digitally. We think of it as "but I talked to Alicia about my period!" and "I have a copy of that meme with the f-bomb on there!" and "my banking info is there!"

She was wrong. She's not exactly a nosy bitch. You and DH did not overreact.

+1

[Anonymous]

I had once shown a co-worker a photo of my kids on my phone and then he for some reason swiped -- I'm positive it was just without thinking -- and there was a "glam" selfie of me in a mirror that I took to text new mascara to a friend. It was nothing risqué, but it was funny to see the "deer stuck in headlights" look on his face as he realized that he could have swiped to something more personal. I gently took my phone back from his frozen hands and we never discussed it LOL.

Back to your post, I agree with everyone else that your MIL was in the wrong. It also took me a SUPER LONG time as a young adult occasionally visiting home and having my laptop open to get my own mother out of the habit of just coming up and looking at my screen.