The story of how unconditional love backfired with user attitude and rudeness.
I realized that I was destined to become a mother-in-law on the day I gave birth to my daughter. True, the image of a typical heroine of numerous anecdotes did not warm my soul. I imagined myself as a completely different mother-in-law, far from imposing my own everyday standards, the one who does everything in her power so that peace and happiness reign in the family of my beloved child.
Alas, nothing worked for me. However, in order.
I raised my daughter alone: my husband died tragically when she was barely five years old. She endured this loss hard not because of her age: she constantly cried, remembering her father, missed her, fell asleep with his photograph. From this sight, my heart was breaking: looking at how a small child yearned, I pushed my own grief into the background and tried to do everything possible so that my daughter regained peace of mind. Masha got used to the fact that I was always there, and literally did not let me go. From kindergarten, handing over my daughter to teachers, I ran away in tears, because her desperate cry was in my ears. And after work, I rushed to kindergarten in order to quickly see and hug her baby. “You are my air,” I whispered trustingly to my daughter. “I can’t breathe without you.”
So we lived, tied to each other like a thread and a needle. Each Mashkin’s smile was for me the embodiment of happiness, and the slightest discomfort caused panic horror. Even a trifling cold I perceived as a real drama, I began to imagine diagnoses one more terrible than the other. I tried to predict every desire of my daughter, if only her face always shone with a smile. Friends and relatives periodically said that it was impossible that I would spoil Masha, but I didn’t want to hear anything like that. “You can’t spoil a person with love,” I retorted, absolutely confident that I was right. “Because love generates reciprocal love, and not selfishness.”
This slender theory began to burst at the seams a few years later, when I had a beloved man, a work colleague, a very smart, delicate and kind person. For the first time since the death of my husband, my heart fluttered again from the fact that I was loved and loved. I so wanted to have a family again, which I really missed all these years. My chosen one did everything possible to win over Masha. However, to our general despair, the daughter categorically did not accept it. The reason, in fact, was not at all in him: she would not accept anyone, since the presence of a third person destroyed her familiar world. I tried to convince Masha, who at that time was already ten years old, that a man in the family is necessary and we will be under his reliable protection, but from these attempts of mine she generally fell into depression. The help of a child psychologist was needed to make my daughter herself again. Naturally, for the sake of the child’s sake, attempts to arrange a personal life had to be forgotten. Now I understand that in an effort to provide my daughter with a serene existence, I, to put it mildly, overdid it.
While Masha was growing up, there were a lot of alarm bells, but like any mother who loves to unconsciousness, I ignored them. Although it was hard not to notice that my daughter in any situation tries to insist on her own, not caring too much about my opinion.
Last year, she hastily made me a mother-in-law, although at the age of 39 I was completely unprepared for this status. Having barely entered the first year of the university and having taken a student freeman, Masha acquired a boyfriend-fellow student and brought him to live with us. Like, I love – I can’t, we’ll get married soon. I did not object: love is a good thing, the main thing is that the daughter is happy. However, even if she objected, it would not be interesting to anyone but me.
Masha and Pavlik really soon got married and healed cheerfully and carefree. Indeed, what worries: in the morning – for classes at the university, in the afternoon – home to have lunch, and then hang out somewhere. From time to time, our apartment became the place to hang out. Of course, girlfriends had come to Masha before, but their communication always took place outside the door of her room, and each of us had our own personal space. Now the number of visitors has grown (Pavlik had his own friends!), They did not fit in one room, and I often had to stay up late with my friends so as not to interfere with the youth to come off.
In the end, I got tired of it. I invited the young people to coordinate with me their activities in the apartment. Pavlik glanced meaningfully at Masha and retreated to his room. And my daughter began to indignantly reprimand me that I could enter into their position: they have a lot of friends, but little money, there is not enough for clubs, but where then to meet? When I asked where to rest for me, she asked in surprise why I was so tired.
Strange, but Masha, reveling in her happiness, did not seem to notice that cleaning, washing, shopping, cooking (by the increased, by the way, the number of family members) is exclusively my business. Okay, I thought, in the future she is still pushing herself and getting ready, I will pamper her for now. But what I thought was pampering, my married daughter (and her husband!) Took for granted. Actually, I did not expect to be grateful, but I was not ready for open dependence, and even more so for claims.
The conflict, which aggravated our relations, arose unexpectedly. One evening I was conjuring a turkey stew. Pavlik looked into the kitchen, smelling the aroma of roast: “Oh, what smells so delicious?” Hearing that there would be a turkey with vegetables for dinner, my son-in-law “killed” me with a question: “Could you somehow diversify the menu? Why is it all the time fish, chicken, turkey? You can cackle with such a diet, but I’m a man after all. “
From such an application, I was simply numb. Well, I say, since you are a man and you crave meat, which I myself do not eat, everything is simple: go to the store, buy what you need, and I will cook it. Pavlik said nothing to me and silently left. But five minutes later, an agitated Masha rushed into the kitchen and announced that I had to apologize to her husband, because I “reproached him with a piece of bread.”
On this basis, my daughter and I had a very impartial conversation. I finally found the courage to voice what was haunted. Why did two young healthy people, having started a family, not take care of what means they will live on? Why on earth should I support two fully functional people? “But we are both learning!” – Masha was sure that this argument was enough to stop thinking about her daily bread at the moment. “I was also a student at one time,” I reminded. – And studied, unlike you, for free. But at the same time she worked as a tutor in order to have her own money and not ask her parents for her entertainment. And your dad and I created a family when we realized that we could support ourselves. And they lived, by the way, not with their parents, but in a rented apartment. “
“Oh, so we need to move out to a rented apartment?” – Masha just choked with anger.
“It would be nice,” I tried to contain my emotions. – Not right now, of course, but when you decide on the sources of income. I’m sorry, but your education is a rather serious financial burden for me, and it is not at all easy for me to support you and my husband. Does it bother you that the three of us live, and all expenses are exclusively mine? But you are not children, but grown-up family people. “
“Have I ceased to be your child after marriage?” – asked the daughter defiantly.
“Well, dear, you will be my child until my last breath,” I assured her. – But after your wedding I have another child, which I did not plan. And I am not ready to perceive your husband as my child. As a family member, yes, but not as an incapacitated son. And since you are adults, stop acting like little foolish children. “
And now for a couple of weeks we have had a cold war at home. My daughter and son-in-law do not talk to me, do not respond to an invitation to the table and defiantly eat instant noodles and other semi-finished dregs (however, the food from the refrigerator mysteriously decreases anyway, and the washing machine is regularly filled with their clothes). I, of course, do not feel pleasure from such tension, but I do not consider myself to be guilty either. Although, if we are to be objective, what happened is primarily my fault. If I had not raised my daughter in the unconditional realization that she is the center of the universe, and my interests are not worth the slightest attention, Masha would hardly have been distinguished by such emotional infantilism and chose her likeness as her husband. I understand that at the moment my daughter is looking at the world through rose-colored glasses of great love, and everyone who disagrees with her husband at least in something is by definition an enemy. But I hope that the mind will still prevail over emotions and she will correctly assess and understand everything. She’s a smart and kind girl. And, whatever one may say, I still need like air, but now it is literally difficult for me to breathe.