Why You Should Be Thankful For Your Sister-In-Law

A new year, a new post about my sister-in-law.

Honestly, I don't know what her problem is. Years ago she explained that her ongoing animosity was because I had gotten pregnant at the same time as her and she felt that I "stole her thunder" since everyone was happy for me and saddened for her.

Granted, I was 24, a college graduate, employed, married and a home owner. My husband was employed too and he was happy about the pregnancy.

She was 18, a high school graduate, unemployed, unmarried and living with her boyfriend's parents (my in-laws). Her boyfriend was also unemployed and wanted her to get an abortion.

So as you can see, the circumstances were really different. I tried explaining that to her when she accused me of basically ruining her life way back when. She honestly doesn't see why the reactions were completely different. That's a different story though.

Back to today - for the last couple of years, she and I have had pretty much no contact. We see each other a handful of times each year at family gatherings at my mother-in-law's house. While there, we don't talk to one another, we don't look at one another and if I walk into the same room as her, she immediately either turns her back or gets up and leaves. She will sit at the opposite end of the table as me if we are celebrating a birthday at a restaurant and she does not acknowledge my children.

Speaking of family gatherings, the end of last year was crazy. My MIL had something planned literally every 2 weeks for the last 3 months of the year. Besides that being over kill, she lives 1.5 hours away. So, in an effort to subtly start changing things, I put together a family newsletter. The newsletter outlines the holidays and what our plans are. I circulated it to the family via email. I texted everyone asking for email addresses if I didn't already have one. That included my SIL and BIL.

Surprise, surprise, they never got back to me. In fact, the text message never showed as being "read" either. A minimal amount of detective work later, and I figured out that they had blocked my phone number. So, I never sent them the newsletter.

Of course, they heard about the newsletter from other people in the family. My BIL actually had the balls to whine to my MIL about how they never got the newsletter. Awesome. So, my MIL texted me and wanted me to send it to him - she supplied the email address.

I said no! They blocked my phone number, so clearly they don't want anything to do with me and by extension, my family. They had the option of unblocking me, talking to me like a human and requesting a copy of the newsletter, but they declined. My MIL was also under the impression that I'd be sending them mean emails (which has never happened, by the way), so we suggested they set up an alternate email address. That too was unacceptable. So, I declined to send them the newsletter.

Ironic isn't it that they can exclude me and think nothing of it, but the minute I exclude them they get all butt-hurt and call my MIL.

So at the risk of ending this suddenly, I just want to say that no matter who your sister-in-law is, just be glad you didn't get saddled with mine. The woman is nuts and cannot function in normal society.

Where Did I Go?

If there are any loyal readers out there, you may be wondering where I went.


I'm working on transitioning over to Wordpress. You can find my new site - Mommas Madness - right here:  https://mommasmadness.wordpress.com/

You'll notice the new site has a focus on cleaning, cooking and basically all things homemaking-related. I hope you'll follow me over and join me at the new site!

XOXO

Handling the Holidays

If you've been following my blog, you already know just how much I hate December. It's not the holidays that bother me per say, but rather the obligatory travel, family gatherings and gift-giving to everyone under the sun. It takes the fun out of Christmas and is robbing my kids of the types of memories I had growing up.

No more!

For 2015, I'm changing things up. I've created a "family newlsetter" which is basically a nice way to say f-you to my inlaws and their overbearing ways. I'm giving everyone a quick year-in-review so they feel warm and tingly, then laying down the law.

In my newsletter I'm laying out all of the holidays for the next 6 months and what our plans are. I'm picking weekends for birthday parties and gathering email addresses for evites. No more paper invitations. No more "I didn't know" or "we didn't get ours". Bull! Also out is the tradition of attending 3 Christmas parties every year. I'll throw one and we'll celebrate with whoever comes, otherwise, see you in 2016! If people don't want come up here, that's fine, but I'm sick of going everywhere else for every holiday.

Have you ever put your foot down and told your mother-in-law it's time to pass on the party reins? I'm nervous about how she'll react, but at the same time, I feel FREE from all of the crazy obligations we've been dealing with and it's great. Every year new parties were added to our queue until this year, it just got to be too much. No more!

Wish me luck - I'm emailing out my not-so-subtle family newsletter tomorrow. :-)