Mother-in-Law HELL

My DH and I have been married for 3 yrs and in that time there have been 5 major blowouts between MIL and I and DH. Luckily DH is on my side…but these last two times have been really nasty, we live with DH’s Grandfather in his home because his eyesight is very poor so we help him out with things and he generously gives us a roof over our heads. She thinks that because I am hispanic and was not brought up in a wealthy household that I’m a gold digger, which she has called me to my face. That sparked a blowout between DH and her which resulted in her getting the cold shoulder from DH and her eventual departure in June 2009. Fast forward to November 2009 DH calls her, the dog has become unpredictable and has gone after our 19 month old son, so he requested that she take him to CA where she was then living, she gave him a sob story about how sorry she was and that she had done a lot of thinking about things and she realized how wrong she was and that she really did like me, but that she couldn’t take the dog because she was running out of money and couldn’t find a job and that she was just days away from ending up living on a park bench and asked if she could come back to live with us and that she would take care of the dog and help with our son, watch him if we wanted to do anything, and be supportive during the rest of my pregnancy with our second son. DH talked it over with me, I was against it from the get go, but she got on the phone with me and gave me the same sob story that she was sorry blah blah blah…so she ends up coming to live with us again. Well she’s here about a week and she starts demanding things, we had already told her that we didn’t have a TV in the living room because if it was on our son would only want to watch TV and not play, she knew our reasons and she continued to whine about it until we agreed that as long as the TV wasn’t on when our son was in the living room. That agreement lasted about a week. Christmas got closer and she was buying stuff left and right, the same woman who just a few weeks ago was days from living on a park bench. Christmas comes and goes, even tho she was not asked to she bought DH and I a new bed, split the cost of a new camera, and bought our son a number of toys. After Christmas things got nasty, she started accusing us of taking advantage of her by tricking her into buying us things, and that we treated her like a slave by making her do the dishes and that I never did anything around the house. Mind you by now I’m 7 months pregnant, dealing with a 21 month old toddler, cooking for DH, our son, and her, helping shovel snow, and trying to get the house organized and ready for a new baby. Before Christmas we had asked her if she could watch him so we could take some classes at the hospital that would help us prepare for baby #2 she agreed, but when the time came for her to watch him she pitched a fit, she also hurt her finger before that and used that to get out of watching our son, which left is scrambling to find a baby sitter. When we notified her that we had hired a babysitter she pitched another fit because she didn’t want anyone else in the house. We had the babysitter come anyway but she forced our son and the babysitter to remain in his room the entire time we were gone. When we’ve tried to watch TV she gets upset and makes crude remarks about what we watch, so we started watching TV in our son’s room, one night we had the tv changer for the cable box she came up and demanded the clicker and when asked nicely to return it she responded with “no, I don’t think so it’s mine now” when DH went to get it from her to adjust the volume on the TV she had a fit and started yelling at us in front of our son and called us lunatics. Since then we have been avoiding her as much as possible, DH, myself and our son are now basically living out out our room and his room which are on two different levels of the house while she stomps around the house and slams doors. She continues to call us names and yell at us if she doesn’t like something we do. She’s resorted to locking her bedroom door when she leaves but has come into our room and taken things out of our room without asking and without us being present. The latest thing was the vacuum which we purchased when DH discovered that it was missing he went to claim it and she started immediately yelling at him saying that it was hers and that we were devils because we were taking everything from her. We’ve been keeping our son from having any contact with her because of her nasty attitude towards us and her attitude in general. However she is now opening our sons bedroom door at night and in the morning when we bring him up from his room to our room she waits on the landing between the flights of stairs and grabs him and forcibly hangs on to him and talks to him, all of which affects his whole attitude. Maybe it’s a coincidence but anytime he has contact with her his whole demeanor becomes very hateful and aggressive. We don’t display any aggressiveness towards her in his presence at least we try not to, we just ignore her like she’s not even there.

I am so frustrated and stressed out, I am now 8 and a half months pregnant, DH has found a job and is looking for a second so that we can move to another state as soon as son #2 and I are ok’d by the Dr. in the mean time I am at a loss as what to do, when I talk to DH about how stressed I am he gets totally stressed out so I try not to let my stress show so much, but it’s all really starting to take a toll on me, I never feel good, I either don’t want to eat or can’t stop eating which isn’t good since I’ve been diagnosed with gestational diabetes, I can’t sleep. I’ve thought about involving the state as from what I’ve been reading could be construed as emotional and mental abuse and harassment which would fall under domestic violence, but I am afraid of what might happen to our son, I don’t want to loose him and have him end up a ward of the state.

We’d move out but right now with me not working we can’t afford the nearly to pay nearly 2000 in rent plus utilities…We were also going to bring a friend out to help me with the boys after the birth but because she pitched a fit DH’s grandfather has requested that we not bring our friend out which leaves me to recover on my own while handling a newborn and a toddler on my own, I know many woman have done it before I’m just not sure how I’m going to be able to handle it.

Any tips or advise as to how to keep my sanity with the looney bag or handle two kids on your own after giving birth would be much appreciated, and sorry this was so long, I just don’t know what to do anymore I feel as if I can’t cope with anymore stress.