MIL ate my birthday chocolates

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am Team OP here. I would be livid and would never forgive MIL this outrageously childish behavior. The audacity to open someone’s mail, steal from it, and then gloat about it is just unreal. I cannot believe some apparently ill-mannered PPs think this was a defensible action or just no big deal.

Agreed. This is about as socially clueless as going to someone else’s house and taking a dump with the bathroom door open. Then acting surprised when your host gets uncomfortable.

Oh! I posted earlier in this thread. My FIL once entered our house, walked past the powder room, up the stairs, past the dedicated guest bathroom in the guest room they stay in, into our master bedroom and took the smelliest most disgusting toilet clogging poop in our master bathroom. Hours later when we tried to go to bed the stench was still lingering. After it happened multiple times that visit, we fitted our master with a lock and he had the audacity to complain that he couldn’t enter our bedroom.

Does he have dementia?

No. Just an a**hole. This was 15 years ago. He was perhaps 60 at the time.

I remember you posting this. Strolling through the house, to master bath, to sh!t. All the nerve.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That's rude of her but you are overreacting. Surely she left some for you, right? And wouldn't you have offered to share since they were at your house anyway?

DA FUQ!
That takes nerve!

OP was about to go away overnight. What makes you think she would have opened them immediately? I might save special chocolate for when I’m having my period and NEED chocolate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That's rude of her but you are overreacting. Surely she left some for you, right? And wouldn't you have offered to share since they were at your house anyway?

DA FUQ!
That takes nerve!

OP was about to go away overnight. What makes you think she would have opened them immediately? I might save special chocolate for when I’m having my period and NEED chocolate.

OP here. As I already explained, this happened in Friday while DH and I were at work. We did not depart for our night in the hotel until Saturday morning. And yes, I always share, which is how she knew from the name of the company on the mailing package what it was, and knew they are great because I have shared it before.

[Anonymous]

Unless the package says that it contains temperature-controlled perishables and needs to be open right away, it's pretty much never okay to open someone else's mail. And that goes extra if you have some reason to think that the mail contains a gift for that person. Like, how is this remotely defensible?

[Anonymous]

I would have loads of fun with this the next time I went to MILs house. No package would be safe.

[Anonymous]

I was prepared to open this and think she found them in the pantry and was all ready to say that OP needs to get over it. But this is really messed up. I would be livid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was prepared to open this and think she found them in the pantry and was all ready to say that OP needs to get over it. But this is really messed up. I would be livid.

+1 yeah the former would be slightly annoying but an innocent mistake and no big deal. The latter is bizarre behavior.

[Anonymous]

My MIL also has a major lack of boundaries. I also have hidden things I don’t want her to see or take (including food). Like this favorite food of mine that my mom makes just for me, that everyone knows I love. I get annoyed by MIL but don’t make a big deal out of it.

But I can’t imagine her opening a package addressed to me. That’s on a whole new level of inappropriate. Team OP all the way.

[Anonymous]

I would be mad if my DH did this, I can’t imagine a guest in my house doing it.

Watch this woman around the holidays or your family might come downstairs to all the gifts unwrapped and used under the Christmas tree!

[Anonymous]

I think I would have said:

"you opened my mail?"
long pause
"you opened a birthday present addressed to me?"
long pause
"you ate some of my birthday gift?"
long pause

Walk away. Done.

But yeah, I don't think I'd allow her in my house without me there ever again. That is such a huge imposition. Time to vet a reliable baby sitter!

[Anonymous]

If my MIL did this and did not apologize I would hold it against her forever. Not in a severe way -- I wouldn't treat her any differently (I'm always pleasant to her) and I wouldn't do anything to harm her. I would just remember she'd done it and it would continue to annoy me for the rest of her life.

My MIL said something thoughtlessly unkind to me right after my DC was born and it is burned into my brain. I'll never forget it and it colors my perception of her. It was just deeply selfish and hurtful, and really demonstrated the degree to which she doesn't really see me as a person, more like an idea.

I think this is common in the MIL/DIL relationship -- I think it can be hard for MILs to see that DILs are just people, that we aren't trying to take anything from them or compete with them (at least I definitely am not). I just want to be treated respectfully. I don't get these weird boundary violations or oversteps that seem designed to get a rise. My mom does some of this stuff too. I don't understand and do my best to ignore, but it really impacts the closeness of our relationship. You just learn not to trust someone when they do things like this all the time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m going to guess it’s chocolates from somewhere like Malleys in Cleveland. Good enough that you buy it all the time when you’re local, and get nostalgic for it when you’re far away, but not good enough that you’d rave about it to people who had no emotional connection to the product.

OMG I love Malley's. I grew up in Cleveland.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If my MIL did this and did not apologize I would hold it against her forever. Not in a severe way -- I wouldn't treat her any differently (I'm always pleasant to her) and I wouldn't do anything to harm her. I would just remember she'd done it and it would continue to annoy me for the rest of her life.

My MIL said something thoughtlessly unkind to me right after my DC was born and it is burned into my brain. I'll never forget it and it colors my perception of her. It was just deeply selfish and hurtful, and really demonstrated the degree to which she doesn't really see me as a person, more like an idea.

I think this is common in the MIL/DIL relationship -- I think it can be hard for MILs to see that DILs are just people, that we aren't trying to take anything from them or compete with them (at least I definitely am not). I just want to be treated respectfully. I don't get these weird boundary violations or oversteps that seem designed to get a rise. My mom does some of this stuff too. I don't understand and do my best to ignore, but it really impacts the closeness of our relationship. You just learn not to trust someone when they do things like this all the time.

What did she say? My MIL, while holding my newborn daughter, looked at me and asked, “So when’s the next one?” I didn’t find out the gender and she already had 3 granddaughters. I had had a stillborn son the year prior.

[Anonymous]

I will never, ever forget my MIL throwing away my gourmet granola when I was a few days post-partum. It was summer, and I had gotten the granola as a gift from a friend, and crunchy salty sweed granola on top of cold yogurt was exactly what I was craving.

When I went down to the kitchen and asked where it was, she said "It was expired so I threw it out." ?? This from a person who once tried to talk me into giving her the RAW chicken I was throwing out because it was several days expired. She was going to take it home 1 hr away and cook it at her house.

All I can assume is that she believed I shouldn't be eating carbs because I needed to lose my babyweight.

So yeah, she has some issues. However, I came to just accept her eccentricity because she's my kid's grandma.

[Anonymous]

What did your husband say?
Mine would have gone off.