Anonymous wrote:I know I’m going to get mean comments about how I should have known better as the signs were always there. My husbands family is very attached to each other in a way that to me seems to be codependent at best and toxic at worst. I guess I can’t relate as I love my family very much but I’m an immigrant so my parents live overseas.I call them every few days and we do family video calls but by all purposes I am my own person and independent. My parents love and respect me and let me put my husband and our little family first.
My husbands family is sort of toxic(IMO). They are very cliquey and my MIL is always going on about family first, blood is thicker than water, and has instilled in her adult children a strong desire to always be together. My MIL was unhappy when my husband started dating me seriously and did not want us to get married. She also did not let her daughter get married until this year and her mother’s disapproval was such a hindrance that she broke up with her fiancé many times until finally deciding she can’t give him up due to her mom. Any major holiday or days off we have we are expected to go to my in laws house. It’s not enough to visit, we must sleep over! My husband wants to do everything his mom wants him to do. I don’t have a say.
He texts her and sends her pictures of everything we do. Dinners we make, trips we go on, purchases we make. She’s also his confidant regarding his business and financial decisions. She has also advocated for ensuring that I “pay my share” as I shouldn’t be using much of “his” money.
It’s sort of creepy. Long story short, I feel like my husband is devoted to his family or origin and I am just an add on.
Have you posted about this before? It sounds familiar. In any case, very hard dynamic to live with. Your husband already has a fever wife. He is enmeshed with his mother. Do you have children?
Am I overreacting?