Getting to know (prospective) in-laws

In My Humble Opinion
21

My personal advice is to sit the hell down and STFU, based on how the conversation people are advocating went with my mother. She had the same sort of concerns you do–we don’t really know him well, but he acts all awkward and weird around us and he says smart-ass things to you. Without something more concrete and/or more damning than that, it just comes across like you’re talking shit about someone who, if it came right down to it, she would choose over you in a heartbeat. That’s not going to endear you to her, to put it mildly.

I mean, think about how you’d feel in her shoes, with someone treating you like you don’t know what you’re doing, insulting someone you care about without really knowing them or the situation–all based on social awkwardness and a couple smart-ass comments. You’d be pissed. And if that person was in point of fact married to someone who acts the way you describe your wife’s behavior, who has had the sort of strife you’ve said you guys have had…you’d think that person knew dick-all about picking out spouses and has a hell of a lot of nerve criticizing your choice.

And for the record, his smart-ass comments are one of the things I love about DoctorJ, just as my smart-ass comments are one of the things he loves about me.

22

Very valid concern, but my understanding, from what they have both said on various occasions, is that it is very much a joint decision.

Yeah, STFU is generally a pretty good default position.

Entire fambly other than me is off on a re-enactment this weekend. May be new developments to report when they get home. The prospective SIL and his family are very much into the same re-enacting as my family, so we do know their entire family kinda sorta well.

He’s probably not anyone I would imagine marrying, but they seem to care for each other quite a bit, he’s certainly decent and smart enough, and is gainfully employed. I mean, he’s not an unemployed ex-con druggie or anything.

Probably as much as any certain thing(s) he has done has been what we are learning about my daughter since she moved out. She’s been - um - a little critical of her mom and me. I’m sure some of it is valid, but I think at least some of it is a part of her exercising her new (semi) independence. I hope she is not hooking up with this guy mainly to distance herself from us. And if she is currently negatively disposed towards us, I’m concerned that she might be encouraging this guy to think unkindly/disrespectfully of us as well.

No worries, tho. I’m sure I’m overstating my petty little concerns as usual. And life will go on. :cool:

23

I wanted to comment on this, because this exchange could have happened between DH and I, when we were that age.

DH came from a very passive-aggressive family, and if I had brought up how I’m waiting for him to ask me to marry him,* in front of my parents*, he would have seen that as p-a bullying, and would have snapped something like that at me. So there’s a distinct possibility that either a) your daughter was being p-a, or b) he took it like that.

I think at that age, and with a relationship of only 1.5 years, you spend more time interacting with each other like you’re part of each other’s family (in terms of motives, etc.), rather than as the two individuals you are. Time is pretty much the only remedy.

24

And frankly, if they get married and it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work. She wouldn’t be the first, or last, “marry my college boyfriend and it doesn’t work out” story.

And you don’t need to like your in laws. My father in law (of fifteen years) and I are in the same room for two hours once a year, where we are pleasant to each other. I know I don’t like him…I suspect he is not fond of me. But he really doesn’t get a say in his son’s choice of wife.

25

How do you “intend to get engaged”, anyway? If you’ve decided to get engaged, then you’re *already *engaged.

26

For some reason, I thought I had talked about my experiences with being, and marrying, the person the in-laws had some concerns about.

My family was worried because I was marrying someone in poor health. I was in my mid-20s, it was a first marriage for both of us, and he wasn’t likely to live a decade. It caused me some resentment to have people telling me their concerns, though I know that it was done out of concern and not out of meanness or spite, and I know that everyone ended up liking my husband well enough. Still, it made me feel slightly cut off from my family when there were problems that I needed support on. I didn’t feel like I could turn to them because I didn’t feel they could wholeheartedly support me.

My husband’s mom hated me. I can’t remember now if we knew the extent of it before we married, but it was an uncomfortable relationship at least and it became something very ugly. The pettiness of the disputes kept it from having much psychological impact on my husband, but I felt it like crazy even though she lived in another state.

So, that’s my experience with how things voiced from the prospective in-law side can affect the couple.

Oh, and I’m meeting my boyfriend’s mom this weekend, and he considers this a meeting of prospective in-laws. I’m excited. :smiley: But if it goes like my meeting with Steve’s mom went? Urk. I don’t know if I can go through that again.

27

You don’t get to judge which of her complaints are valid. You don’t get to choose what she airs to her fiance. You don’t get to control their opinion of you. Perhaps neither of them will “like” you for years to come, or ever. Accept it and move on.

I would strongly advocate AGAINST saying anything about your concerns to your daughter. There is approximately 0% chance saying such things will improve your relationship, and an almost 100% chance of making it worse. I also think it likely that your opinion does not interest her at this point, based on the above.

28

Its that state where two young people know they want to get married, but they don’t have a ring, haven’t announced it as an engagement, and aren’t yet booking florists and photographers. Its pretty normal. If the engagement never happens, there is nothing to call off - so its sort of a low pressure pre-engagement where you’ve decided you are heading towards marriage, but aren’t committed to it yet.

I reached that state with both my husbands. Unfortunately for him, one of my boyfriends decided to actually “pop” the question - unfortunately for him because if they would have checked with me first, he’d have discovered that I wasn’t ready to get engaged to him (and had little intention of marrying him at all).

29

It could mean a great many things. My current SO and I both think that, if things continue to go well, if things work out when we briefly live together this summer, if nothing relationship threatening pops up, we’ll probably get engaged sometime next year. That is the tentative “plan” to the extent there is such a thing. One could say that we intend to get engaged, but it’s a far step from actually being engaged. So it might mean even less than Dangerosa’s suggestion.

30

I can’t help you from the parental side of things - but I can help you from your daughters side, as you sound EXACTLY like my parents.

I met my husband quite young. We ended up engaged at 18, married at 22. Too soon to tell if it’ll last, but we are within months of our 10 year wedding anniversary, so I don’t think it was an obviously bad decision :wink: I don’t for a second think marriage at 22 is a good thing - both my husband and I have changed a lot from when we were 22. Partly through good luck/chance, and partly through a lot of love and respect, we’ve ended up growing closer, instead of further apart, during our 20s when we were figuring out who we were - but the stats were against us.

My parents did not like my then boyfriend / fiance at all. It was “stupid little things” too.
Like not taking his cap off at the dinner table (he was 17-20, and his family were quite different, so the idea that there was a hat/table issue had never been exposed to him).
Like not wanting to hang around getting to know my parents (hello - he was 17-20, he wanted to be getting hot and heavy with me, not being measured and found wanting by my parents).
Like not having a sense of humour (he did, it was just a little different from theirs, and again, he didn’t feel comfortable displaying it in front of people who were measuring him up disapprovingly).

On one hand - yes, their observations were correct. And yet, they didn’t see the things I saw in him. Things I found way more important than whether he’d learned a certain etiquette point. Things that have made my life immeasurably happier. Since they didn’t see the things I saw, their concerns held little weight for me. I heard them, and dismissed them as they were irrelevant - the “stupid little things” didn’t matter in the big picture.

And even if they were correct, and the relationship was doomed, well I would’ve learned a good lesson about myself, wouldn’t I? It wouldn’t be the end of the world. And if they had’ve been more direct in their concerns, believe me I would’ve pulled away from them in an instant. Because I was trying to establish myself as an adult - and adults make their own decisions instead of following their parents wishes.
Becoming an adult and pulling away from your parents is a process, and invariably the parents and the adult child disagree on where on the continuum they are! Also, believe me that you do not know your daughter as well as you think you do. She has her own internal world, where her opinions and values have been developing, influenced but not dictated by yours. My parents were convinced my husband and I were ill-matched, mostly because they had their own pre-conceived notions on who I was and what my future would be - notions which I did not share - though I did “try them on for size” at one time or another.

So, in case you haven’t figured out my advice :wink: don’t say anything, and do your best to not let her know you have misgivings. Stupid little things aren’t important in the big picture. She will find her way - trust in the great job you’ve done raising her! Don’t give her reason to pull away from you. If you’d seen genuine red flags that could endanger her it would be a different story, but these are only “stupid little things” that bug you. Everyone bugs someone with stupid little things!
Also, my parents poor opinion of my then boyfriend (that they hid badly) had another effect. Instead of slowly exploring my own opinions of what was best for me, with parental support and input, the fact that they disapproved of my boyfriend when I knew he was a good match for me, made me pretty much decide they had no idea about what was best for me, and therefore I disregarded their opinions on a huge range of unrelated issues (to my detriment, I might add!), after all, if they were so wrong on this important issue, how could I trust their opinions on other issues? You don’t want to push your daughter away, so respect that she sees something in him, suck up your mild misgivings and give him a break :slight_smile:

31

It sounds to me like this is more about your feelings towards your daughter’s serious boyfriend than about her feelings or her longterm happiness. In that case, I’d say there is no discussion you need to have with your daughter; maybe one thing you can do is try to trust your daughter’s decision-making skills more. It really is time for her to become more dependent and you and your wife to butt out more and let her make her own mistakes/have her own learning experiences.

Said with all love, of course. :slight_smile:

32

Well, I happen to think you should just stay the heck out of it, altogether. No heart to heart, no getting to know him one on one. Accept that you are on the sidelines for this show. You have raised a, no doubt, wonderful child. I think it’s time you have a little faith.

It sounds to me like you will surely have exactly what you’d like to see, by just standing by and watching. One, or the other, is pushing the marriage, he sounds resistant, they are young and living together, he may have a jerkish streak. This sounds like it will play out, on it’s own, to me. Without some real maturity, this ship will surely crash, on the rocks, before the wedding day, I think. Don’t rescue her, don’t rush in. If she’s to avoid this trap, she has to come to knowledge on her own, that he’s not respectful, can be kind of a jerk, is in no rush to actually marry her. Also,do not rush in, and slam him, at the first breakup, when it comes, either. Big mistake. This kind of thing can take 2 or 3 breakups to stick. Bite your tongue! Seriously, that’s going to be the hardest part of this and the only thing you actually have to ‘do’.

My advice is stand back, bite your tongue, and wait it out.
I find someone who cannot look me in the eye, very disconcerting, I am sure it won’t be easy, good luck.

33

If you do anything at all, I would discourage her from having children to early: make it clear that you certainly aren’t impatient for grandchildren. Or have your wife make it clear, if she’s better at this sort of delicate advice.

If this is a bad choice and they don’t have kids, she’ll figure it out in under 3 years and it will be painful and messy and then over.

If this a bad choice and they have kids, they will stay married for 10 years, 8 of them miserable, and then go through a painful and wrenching divorce with lingering pain for all involved–most especially your grandchildren.

Do NOT assume she isn’t planning on starting a family. Biological clocks often start to ring at points of major transition–such as graduation.

ETA: You don’t even have to mention the boy in this conversation. Tell her teaching gets MUCH MUCH easier after three years, and it can do permanent damage to her teaching skill if she divides her attention in that period. Much better to get the teaching down and then have babies. I’ve seen this many times.

34

I actually think this state of ‘‘pre-engagement’’ shows a bit more maturity and foresight than just rushing into engagement. The idea is the couple can sit on this idea for a while–as long as necessary–to get used to the idea and see how it feels, without the actual pressure and expectation of a speedy marriage. Sr. Olives and I began discussing marriage pretty much from the moment we started dating, but we did so in a very, ‘‘yep, we’re probably going to get married once we graduate college’’ sort of way, and it wasn’t until three years later that we actually made things official. There was never any period of shock or doubt or cold feet or anything, because we’d gotten comfortable with the idea long before we actually made it happen.

As far as the OP I’m definitely in the MYOB camp. I think those who honestly believe they would have changed their minds about marriage had someone raised a concern may be engaging in a bit of revisionist history (which is understandable, considering they feel they made a mistake and would have liked to avoid it.) It’s extremely unlikely that saying to your daughter, ‘‘We don’t want you to marry this guy because X and Y,’’ is going to get a reaction of, ‘‘Why, I never considered X and Y before. Clearly I’m not ready! I’ll cancel the engagement post-haste.’’ A more realistic expectation might be, ‘‘Why do you treat me like a child when I’m an adult and capable of making my own decisions? I’ll show you how grown-up I am! MARRY’’

35

But marriage is intended to last for a lifetime. In order to do so, though, it helps if it isn’t being done because it’s in some laundry list of Things To Do. Moving together is still part of the tryout stage but, whether they happen to be happy together or not, marriage is not compulsory and it does not have to happen before she becomes an old maid of twenty-six.

I’ve seen several of my American friends get so blinded by their goal of Happily Ever After that they ended up announcing a divorce about six months and a ton of expenses later than my Spanish friends would have. Marriage isn’t Happily Ever After and a wedding isn’t a goal, it’s an announcement. I don’t think you have much say one way or another, not when she’s this age, but you may want to consider your own notions about this. Do you expect your children to get married? Will you feel bad if any of them doesn’t? If any of them does get married but doesn’t want to have children? If (s)he wants to but can’t? At what age (yours and theirs) would you expect it to happen? When did you get married? My parents were moaning that Middlebro was marrying too young, when he and SiL were the same age Dad had been, therefore 2 years older than Mom had been and 4 and 5 years older than her own parents.

36

Thanks again, all. Report back was that things went well over the weekend. Who knows - the weekend before maybe he or both of them weren’t feeling well, had just had an argument, or any number of things.

As many have observed, the most important thing is that they love each other. And my wife said they were really sweet to each other over the weekend. But I admit I am a tad selfish in that my wife and I put a heck of a lot of effort into raising pretty decent kids who seem to be turning into pretty decent adults. I’m not close to all that many people, and I really do like and respect the individuals my kids are growing up to be. I sure would be disappointed if something or someone caused me to not have good relations with my adult kids.

Re: “pre-engagement” - As I’ve said, both of them have said they intend to get married, so I really don’t think it is my daughter pressing him. They said this before they moved in together and after. Over the weekend I understand they were really talking about it, saying things like my other kids would be the SIL’s in-laws and such. I tend to be pretty frank, and when I plan on doing something I pretty much do it. So their present situation is a little “confusing/frustrating” to me. But as so many have said, it is their choice. I understand they have a wekend trip planned in a couple of weeks. If I were wagering, I’d bet they come home from there engaged.

It really is an interesting experience - figuring out how you are interacting with your kids as they enter new stages in their lives.

One final point - re: starting a family early. No pressure here. My daughter wants to be a HS music teacher, so I would bet a lot of their planning depends on her ability to land a decent job. My wife and I had kids rather earlier than many of our friends. We were 25-27. At the time it distanced us from many of our friends who were travelling, partying, and spending money. But now at age 49 with the kids starting to move out, I sure don’t envy my friends who have grade school-aged kids.

37

You’ve talked, at length, about your marital struggles, and my impression is that there were a number of years where you and your wife were more tolerant partners than friends and lovers. If I am off base on that, feel free to ignore me. I have two questions:

  1. Is your marriage what you hope for for your kids?
  2. If it weren’t for the kids, do you think you would still be married to your wife? I understand that the two of you are solid NOW, but would you have stayed with her long enough to get to this point?

It’s not just about pressure: If the answer to both of those questions is no, I would actively advise her to put off kids for at least 3 years if you have any hesitation about the soundness of their relationship. As Dangerosa has so astutely pointed out, kids set their expectations based on what they see in their parents’ marriage, and your own marriage may have set your daughter’s expectations lower than you would want them to be.

38

Long engagements and pre-engagements are definitely a good thing for young couples. I understand the confusion, but your daughter making sure she’s making the right choice for her is worth the time of strange labels :smiley:

39

Wow! You really like to cut the the heart of things, don’tcha? :stuck_out_tongue:

  1. I don’t know. Tho we’ve been through rough times, overall things have been and continue to be pretty good. Perhaps I could have done better, but I also could have done much worse. I’d like my kids’ relationships to reflect the better parts of my marriage, and avoid the worse. But they’ll most likely have their own ups and downs. To the extent our rough spots were avoidable, sure, I wish I would have done some things differently.

  2. Probably not. And you know I’m not entirely sure if that is entirely good or bad. No question but that it is TONS easier to split up a childless marriage. So while tere are downsides to sticking things out “for the kids”, in another respect it may have been the final bit that kept us together. And you are right, tho our marriage still is far from perfect, in so many respects things are going great and our future looks really bright with tons of possibilities. So I can’t regret too much of what got me here.

Good questions, tho.

40

This is what I think it would be ok to talk to your daughter about. You don’t have to go into detail that you are uncomfortable with, but I know that a lot of the strength of my own marriage is directly attributable to a lot of long conversations I had with my mother both before and after I met my husband. They were never about him, specifically, but about what makes a good marriage and a good partner. These were not lectures, but meandering talks about how to structure a strong, supportive marriage, how to deliberately build a family. These are things many people never actually think about.

It always surprises me how little direct guidance most people are given in these things. NOTHING determines future happiness like one’s home life. Crappy job and happy home is much more tolerable than happy job and crappy home, and much easier to fix. But many, many kids get virtually no guidance in how to build a life with someone, or how to chose someone to build a life with.