Stress when living with in-laws

I’m 29 years old, my husband is 27 years old, got to know each other for a year and then got married. Gentle, hardworking husband, positive personality, optimistic, interior designer, income 10-17 million VND depending on the month, can develop more in the future. I am small, good-looking, introverted, loved by everyone for being gentle and hardworking. I work in an office, recently the work is difficult, so the monthly income is just over 10 million dong. I like to be clean, tidy, like to live a minimalistic life, less important in material and money, high on emotions.

My husband and I are compatible in terms of life views, respect for each other, and the same level of education. Parents on both sides of the family are old. My mother-in-law had a stroke almost two months before we got married. He and his brother took turns taking care of their mother during that critical time. The two families urged marriage because the mother’s health was weak, so the wedding still took place. The Covid epidemic and the mother-in-law were still sick, so we organized an announcement, registered marriage, and then moved in together.

>> Too stressful to live with in-laws

The husband’s family has two brothers, the older brother and his wife have been married for two years and have rented a separate house. I have been married for five months now and am quite shocked with this new life. The current mother-in-law has just recovered from the accident, eats by herself, and my husband takes care of her personal hygiene and bathing. I just help cut nails, do laundry, clean my mother’s room, take care of all the meals and clean the house. Since Tet until now, I have been busy with cooking and cleaning. On normal days, I cook ready lunch for the whole family from the morning, at noon everyone just takes it out to eat. At night, before I could change my clothes, I cooked again, then cleaned and prepared for the next day. After finishing work, I stopped by my mother’s room to talk, watch movies, and spend time with her because she didn’t go anywhere all day. The same thing is repeated every day, running out of time for individuals and spouses.

Not to mention the family’s eating is also complicated. Father-in-law gout should limit many dishes. Mother-in-law can’t eat fish or beef. Husband is allergic to shrimp and seafood. In general, to save time, I will eat according to everyone. Every day I want to cook for my husband, I have to cook separately for my parents and cook another dish for us. I came home from work at six o’clock in the evening, half an hour later my parents had dinner, so I made up my head every day and quickly cooked food.

Houses of three or four floors are only cleaned by me. When I had Covid, I had to be isolated for a week, the house was moldy, the toilet was dirty because no one cleaned it. The house has a yard but is closed, very dark and gloomy. My husband’s parents stay at home but often lock the gate, every time I come home from work, I reach out and unlock the door for a long time. Right at the garbage collection gate for the whole family, it looks very suitable for the yard, I want to buy a big trash can or remove old things but I can’t decide anything in the house. When the moldy wooden chopsticks arrived, I changed the set of chopsticks to a new set, and my mother got well again and wondered where the old chopsticks were.

>> Living with my husband’s family is never quiet

The mother-in-law is easy-going in many ways, but she still considers her son to be the best and the best. Having a house in Hanoi, I am lucky to marry him. While my family is similar, my husband and wife’s form is also suitable. I don’t care about the property of my husband’s family, my grandparents only have a house to live in and a pension. On my wedding day, I was not even given a gold thread by my husband’s family. My birth family sympathizes because her mother-in-law is sick, and friends also wonder. I still think that I am older than my husband, so my husband’s parents and relatives don’t respect me?

Many times, hearing my mother-in-law praise my son makes me feel worse, like this marriage is a favor for me. Mother is a traditional woman, father-in-law does not have to cook and do housework. Mother likes to take care of children, taboo many things. The father-in-law is quite patriarchal, goes to the newspaper to return to the newspaper. In the five months after marriage, I went to a friend’s birthday once. At 9:30 pm, my father-in-law came in and asked my mother to call me back. My wife and I have not been able to go out comfortably every day, wherever we go, we quickly return to the toilet for my mother and food. The life of a newlywed couple is as boring as being married for 20-30 years. I do not have children yet, but I always look messy, even though I do everything quite neatly, quickly, not slowly.

My biological parents are divorced, my mother has only me. Before, I wanted to find someone who could sympathize with my situation so that I could take care of my mother, now both husband and wife do not have many conditions to care for their mother. My mother also has many old age diseases that make me worry and feel guilty for not taking care of her more. I love my biological mother, thinking about the scene where my husband’s parents are served with rice and water, but my mother is still running away. My father had his own family, was taken care of more than my mother, my father was less worried.

These days my work is more stressful, neck and shoulder pain has lasted for two weeks, every morning lazily waking up rice makes me very tired. I can’t leave my parents-in-law, who are old and weak, and not be able to support themselves. Living with my husband’s house makes me suffocated, tired, lose my freedom, life is very boring, husband and wife’s feelings are mixed, husband is awkward in the middle. The husband and wife don’t seem to want to be close to their parents, if they can avoid it, they sometimes come back to visit for 15-20 minutes, or celebrate the New Year’s anniversary. Please share, am I doing too much? How do I balance my new life?

Fate

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