My husband is a “Junior”, named after his dad. When we had our first child, a boy, we gave my father-in-law a great deal of teasing about what his name would be, but we ultimately agreed that our boy would be named “[Father-In-Law] III”. It suits him well.

A couple of years later, we had twin girls. My father-in-law suggested “Iris” and “Lily” for the names, and we particularly liked those. They worked well with our last name and were relatively easy to spell. The family name is a little difficult, so we wanted to make at least part of it easy.

I’m now on pregnancy number three. We’re having a girl, but only one this time.

Father-In-Law: “I like Violet. That’s a nice name.”

Husband: “That does sound nice. Violet [Surname].”

Me: “NO!”

Husband & Father-In-Law: “What?”

Me: “We will not be that family!”

Father-In-Law: “What does that mean?”

Me: *Sigh* “Did you ever meet a family who had kids named Dave, Dale, Darrell, Dean, and Joe?”

Father-In-Law: “Oh. But Iris, Lily, [Son], and Violet don’t sound anything alike.”

Me: “IRIS. LILY. VIOLET. Notice a pattern?”

Husband: “Ooooh. Nope, not doing that.”

We settled on Vivian. It suits her well!

I am expecting my first child and am at my baby shower. One of the gifts I receive is cloth diapers. I am in the middle of thanking the person who gifted them when my mother-in-law interrupts.

Mother-In-Law: *Making a face and tutting* “You’re cloth diapering?”

Me: “I’m going to try.”

She frowns and crosses her arms.

Mother-In-Law: “I won’t babysit if you do.”

Now, if she had phrased this in a different way like, “I’m not sure I’ll be comfortable using them when babysitting,” I would have happily let her know that the original plan was to cloth diaper at home and use disposables when leaving the baby with grandparents.

Me: “That’s fine. My mom said she’s okay using them, so I guess we’ll just ask her instead when we need a babysitter.”

Based on [Mother-In-Law]’s expression, I don’t think that’s the answer she expected.

This is a story from back when my husband and I first started dating. We were in our early twenties but each still living with our families. He and I had plans to go somewhere the next day, so we asked his parents if it would be okay for me to sleep over so he wouldn’t have to drive to the next state to pick me up. Since we were just dating, his parents said we couldn’t share a bed. Fair enough. Their house, their rules. My boyfriend offered me his room, and he slept on the fold-out couch.

His family lived in one of those cape-style houses. The bedrooms upstairs had those slanted ceilings, and his bed was pushed up under one of them.

I went to bed, and everything seemed perfectly normal.

Then, the next morning at around 6:00 am, my poor sleepy self was brutally woken up by the most obnoxious rock song I have ever heard playing at top volume. I sat up in a panic and slammed my head against the ceiling. Panicking, I started banging on his CD radio, trying to turn it off. (I think I only managed to mute it.) Throwing the thing out the window seemed like an option at the time.

After I silenced the screeching monster, with adrenaline and heart racing, I ran down the stairs and leaped onto my boyfriend, grabbed him by the shoulders, and started screaming while shaking him:

Me: “What the h*** was that?!”

I ended up waking up his family, who were used to his alarm by now, but he was just dazed and confused. He’s a deep sleeper, thus why he needed an obnoxious alarm. His mom started laughing and told him:

Mother-In-Law: “You deserved that.”

She then led me into the kitchen with an offer of coffee and waffles. To this day, I refuse to listen to that song. Ever. Even if I like the band’s other songs. He and I still laugh about it today. We’ve been together for twenty-five years.

I’m on a cruise with my husband’s family. They are used to sharing everything, whereas I prefer private time and personal hygiene.

My husband and I almost shared a room with his two younger brothers — ages fifteen and seventeen — but I put my foot down and said that since we were paying for the room ourselves, we would not be sharing. If the boys wanted to kick in half the price, we would upgrade to a two-bed suite. My mother-in-law didn’t understand why I didn’t want to foot the full bill to share a king-size bed with my husband and two minors.

I am in the shower when I hear the bathroom door open. 

Me: “Honey?”

No response.

Me: “[Husband], what are you doing?”

I open the door to see my fifteen-year-old brother-in-law looking through my toiletries bag.

Me: “Excuse me? Get out!”

Brother-In-Law: “I need a Q-tip. [Husband] said—”

Me: “GET OUT!”

He leaves, and I step out to lock the door. Before I’m even dry, there’s a pounding on the bathroom door.

Me: “What?”

Mother-In-Law: “Why would you tell [Brother-In-Law] that he can’t have a Q-tip? Are you so selfish?”

Me: “Get out of my room before I call security.”

Mother-In-Law: “This is a public cruise!”

Me: “Get the f*** out of my room.”

I hear two doors slam before I carefully step out of the bathroom to find that I am alone. After I have dressed, I go to find [Husband].

Me: “Why were [Brother-In-Law] and [Mother-In-Law] in our room?!”

Husband: *Genuinely confused* “[Brother-In-Law] wanted a Q-tip; I told him you had some. Do you not?”

Me: “I do, but I do not want your underage brother helping himself to my personal effects, particularly while I’m naked!”

Husband: “I didn’t know you were in the shower! I just gave him the key and told him where to look.”

Me: “Never. Again. If your family doesn’t start respecting boundaries, I will leave.”

Husband: “Okay, I get it. I’ll talk to them. I’m sorry.”

[Mother-In-Law] accused me of being some kind of pervert if I was not comfortable being naked around her family. (Because that’s the most logical explanation?)

In the end, she was given an ultimatum: respect my limits or we cut contact. She decided to make passive-aggressive comments about how I was never taught to share, so we haven’t spoken to her in months.

Related:
Why Does No One Understand Personal Space?! Part 2
Why Does No One Understand Personal Space?!

Back in my college days, I had a girlfriend who I had been dating for just shy of a year and a half. She invited me to join her family for Christmas during the break. I didn’t have any other plans (my own parents and I did not, and still do not, get along), so I agreed.

My girlfriend is the oldest of seven children, and as her parents are fairly well-off, they have quite a large house, but there were two sets of aunts and uncles also visiting, with six kids between them, so the house felt very crowded when we arrived. My girlfriend was going to share a room with her sisters upstairs, while I was relegated to a cot in their garage.

Honestly, that cot was the best part of the trip, as the kids weren’t allowed in the garage, and it was actually pretty well-insulated for a garage, so I had a nice spot to retreat to if things got too much.

Probably the first sign of problems I had was with the bathroom arrangements. To make things “easier”, each person was assigned a bathroom for the stay. The bathroom I was assigned was the one right next to the garage. The problem was that it was the “half” bathroom out of their “four and a half” baths, meaning that it had a sink and a toilet, but no tub or shower. I tried asking her mother where I was supposed to shower.

Me: “Can I use the master bathroom?”

Mother: “No, that’s our private space.”

Me: “What about either of the upstairs hall bathrooms?”

Mother: “No, the little kids shower there.”

Me: “The downstairs guest bathroom?”

Mother: “No, that’s totally full with [Girlfriend]’s brothers and sisters.”

Nope, I was just expected to deal with it by… not showering the entire time.

Well, I sucked it up and did my best to wash up in the sink. We’d arrived the day before Christmas Eve, and things went… okay through Christmas Day. I got a few looks for the fact that I’d “only” brought presents for her parents and siblings — I hadn’t been informed about the aunts and uncles and cousins — but other than that, things were fine.

Then, on the twenty-sixth, they announced that they were having some annual outing to a nearby winery. This was apparently a tradition for the adults, but my girlfriend had never gone before, as she’d been picked to watch all the kids. So, now the parents, aunts, uncles, and my girlfriend all loaded off to this wine-tasting event.

Notice who was left out of that list? That’s right. I was explicitly not invited.

Mother: “Oh, I forgot to get you a spot. So sorry. You’ll just have to stay here and watch the kids?”

Uh-huh, and what was the plan if I hadn’t come?

Anyway, I come from a large family myself, so wrangling the kids wasn’t too difficult, especially when they had a bunch of new toys they were playing with and they were still somewhat sluggish from the sugar highs they’d had on Christmas. But, talking with some of the older kids, they let slip that the adults would usually go off and do things the day after Christmas every year. Hmm, suspicious.

I talked to my girlfriend and her parents after they got back, asking about the plans for the rest of the break. There was a bit of hemming and hawing, but eventually, they admitted that they had some adult excursions planned: a winter hike, some Christmas concert, etc. And, as I’d suspected, they’d “completely forgotten” to arrange things so I could go. So sorry.

Me: “I didn’t give up my break to be a free babysitter for you. Thank you for opening your home to me for the holiday.”

Then, I headed to the garage to see about arranging a cab and plane ticket back home. Oh, yeah, I forgot to mention. My girlfriend’s ticket was paid for by her parents, but I’d had to pay for my own. Maybe that should have been the actual first red flag?

Anyway, I did actually manage to rearrange my plane ticket, though there was an upcharge. Still, I headed out. The kids all cheerfully said goodbye, her parents looked sternly angry, and my girlfriend seemed to have no emotion about it whatsoever.

I ended up enjoying myself just fine once I got back home. After the break, my girlfriend came over and we had a talk.

Girlfriend: “I’m so disappointed that you couldn’t stick it out for the entire break. I had to deal with my parents all growing up, and you couldn’t manage to deal with them for two full weeks. I’m not sure if this relationship will work if you can’t help support my needs.”

Things got heated after that. There was plenty of shouting, and we were very much an ex-couple when everything was said and done.

But the cherry on top of all of that was when I got a call on December first, eleven months after our breakup. It was [Girlfriend]’s mother.

Mother: “I’m calling to see if you plan to join us this year for Christmas. Are you going to stick around and help out properly this time?”

I just ended up repeating the word “Ha!” over and over again at louder and louder volumes before hanging up on her.