In-law Hell Before Marriage

Laranya wrote:

I know you have answered in-laws question before too but I am getting married in few months but before my wedding I have got to know my in-laws for past eight months they seem okay at occassions when everybody is around but with me they don't mind giving comments.

They don't like anything I wear or choose ... they simply make fun and say its cheap and that I didn't have a sense of class that includes my wedding dress and jewellery. They say you can choose your wedding dress but as soon as I select something they reject it 'openly and choose something else which I don't like. We havent got onto a conclusion but chances are they will end up choosing something for me.

Their comments hurt me and I end up having fight with my husband going to be ....especially my hubby's sis who's married thinks she knows everything.

They also planning to live together at same place after wedding (for now everyone lives seperatly but they planing to live together after my marriage at my husbands house). I know that will jepordize my privacy but I haven't talked to my fiance as yet about it.

There are other little issues too which are little for now cause I don't talk but if i would it would lead to serious fight.

I am going to start a new life, I need advice so I can handle things before its too late. I want advice on how to behave in such situations and how to handle something that I don't like. I get hyper and start crying when they say somthng my mom says you show them you are weak.

Please tell me what to do and also what's my husband's role should be in these matters and how to convince him without fight.

Thanks you are doing a really good job I never saw anthing like this site before your advices are very realistic and mature keep up the good work

Dear Laranya

I could give you long lectures about being calm and assertive, and even teach you how to drop hints they won't see the grandchildren if they don't back off - but we have to be realistic. You are what you are, and you cannot change your personality in just a few months.

What you have to realise is that nothing will change - ever - unless you make it change.

Is this a marriage of choice, or arranged?

If it's an arranged marriage, then it's not so easy; but I do know that many, many women have found themselves trapped in this way, and have come through successfully. I don't mean they've rejected the whole system (though some have), I mean they've found the ways that make life liveable and successful.

If that's the way it is, then you need to spend serious time with your mother, and every woman you know who has had an arranged mariage; many will have faced similar problems, and most will have got past them. The system would not have survived for thousands of years unless it could be made to work - your people would have become extinct! Seek wisdom from experience. You are not alone.

If not an arranged marriage, then you need to be saying to your husband-to-be that you are simply not prepared to be treated like an idiot for the rest of your life, and if he doesn't show that he's going to stand by you - and listen to you - then the wedding is off.