Does anyone actually love their in laws and extended family?

[Anonymous]

My MIL/FIL are just ok, but DH has several aunts/uncles/cousins I really like spending time with.

[Anonymous]

I like my IL’s and my SILs and BILs. My IL’s are incredibly non judgemental plus they are off the charts generous. My husband and his sisters are very close and I really feel a part of their family. I guess I’m lucky!

[Anonymous]

Yes. They are good people and they are where dh came from. How could I not love them?

[Anonymous]

Nope!




(I do, actually, I just always think it's funny to respond with a cheerful 'Nope!' like Olaf when they tell him he much not h ave much experience with heat.)

[Anonymous]

Curious to those who are saying that they love their extended family whether you actually feel love or whether its just something you say if you like them and enjoy being around them -sort of like saying I love chocolate. I think there is difference between liking your extended family and having a close enough relationship that you would call it love.

Anonymous wrote:Yes, I love my in-laws and my wife loves my family. Our families are very, very different and each has their own quirks and issues. We have family stress due to those issues, but we genuinely all love each other. I think there are many people who love and get along with their in-laws but you don't hear as much about them because most of us don't have in-law issues to post about. So you hear more from the people with complaints who are either venting or need advice about how to cope with their in-laws.

I am PP. Yes, I truly love my in-laws. After being together for 20 years and being married for 17 years, they are a part of my family. They are related to my children and they adore my children. I have more in common with them than my own flesh and blood cousins who live in another country (my parents emigrated to the US 60 years ago). And I would drop anything and everything to do something they requested of me. And they have been known to do the same for me.

I think we have genuine feelings for each other. My wife's brother's sister visited recently and she said that she was so happy when I joined the family (she has been married about 30 years) because I brought out a lot more love in my in-laws family. They are a more reserved family and they try very hard not to impose on anyone else. As such, they feel much more distant. My SIL said that when I joined the family, they began showing their love and concern for each other more. I made sure that we visited the family more and interacted with my in-laws more (my family wears their hearts and emotions on their sleeves). She said that she really appreciated that I brought out the love in the family and that all of them shared more love after I married into the family. I was very touched that she said this to me.

[Anonymous]

Yes and I live with mine! My sister in laws are my best friends and I love my mother in law too. My husband is Asian and his family has been so supportive. His family is so involved in our daily life. I love the close knit relationships Asians have. My stress levels went 100% down when I got married. I feel like I am gliding through my life because we have so much support.

[Anonymous]

This thread makes me sick. I hate my in laws. They're damaged broken mean people. I feel so utterly alone and so stressed out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This thread makes me sick. I hate my in laws. They're damaged broken mean people. I feel so utterly alone and so stressed out.

I feel like this about my own extended family, PP. So, cheers. Take comfort that you're not alone.

[Anonymous]

I do. My husband is an only child but he comes from a large extended family (5 aunts and uncles on both sides of his family). I have two siblings but both my parents are only children so I have no cousins and all my grandparents are dead. DH's family is the family I've never had myself. Even my siblings think so - my sister has stayed with one of his aunts for vacation two years in a row.

[Anonymous]

No, I really don't love them. I have reached out to them over and over and tried so hard to make friends with them, to invite them into our lives, and they have repaid me by being as nasty as possible to me as often as possible.

They are horrible people, and I cannot believe DH is their son!! How did such a great person come from such awful people?

They are working class, and I am from an upper middle class family. They resent everything about me. They dislike that DH is a professional, that we live in a nice neighborhood (we're not rich), that we shop at farmer's markets and eat healthy food, not from boxes and cans. I can't understand why they extend their nastiness to our children, for God's sake!! What is wrong with these people??? DH's brother is worse. He is a bartender. He is so completely resentful of DH, even though DH tries very hard to connect with him.

NO, OP, NO NO NO, I do not like or love my in-laws!!!!

[Anonymous]

I'm so jealous of you people who love your ILs!!

I was just visiting a friend who just had her first grandchild. My friend and her DIL get along so well, and my friend is so grateful and loving and supportive of her son and his wife. They live nearby and she babysits every week. The grandchild is as adorable as can be, nobody fights, they just get along! They have each other over for dinner all the time!

It astonishes me. They are so, so lucky. My ILs have never once babysat, not for a second. DH and I have been married for 30 years, and our kids are in college now, but the ILs never visit.

I can't imagine being that way!! When I'm a grandma, I'll offer to babysit as often as possible. I pray I have good relationships with my kids's spouses. Who would want it any other way (my ILs, of course. they didn't even come to my kids' high school graduations!!!)? You folks who love your ILs, please know you are so, so lucky!!

[Anonymous]

Nope. I tolerate them and like them sometimes.
Mostly because in my eyes you don't treat family and those you love the way they have treated me.

We get along now and don't fight but i can't say I feel love towards them at all.

[Anonymous]

No. Much like their mother's funeral I suspect I will only see and speak to them 1 more time (elderly father's funeral) and that's it. H is closer to my family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: With mine, what you see is what you get. They are 100% real, kind and loving. I’ve known them more than 20 years now and they have always welcomed me with open arms. I don’t have to second-guess their communication or their behavior. They put their grandkids first and are very nurturing.

+1 My MIL especially has taught me so much about being a mother and a good person. I won the IL lottery (but honestly, liking my DH's family was part of the reason why I married him. You don't just marry a person, you marry the family!)