There’s a reason that mothers-in-law are the frequent topic of jokes.

When it comes to a child and their parent, the relationship can often be a bit messy and weird.

And then when a spouse comes into the mix, the relationship between the adult child and their parent should adapt – but all too often it doesn’t.

This leads to the spouse being caught in the middle, as was the case in this story.

Read on to find out how this woman’s mother-in-law was repeatedly ruining her life – before she’d even moved in.

AITA for banning my mother-in-law from my house after initially agreeing she could live with us?

I am 47 have been trying to be supportive of my 52-year-old husband whose mom guilted him to move in with us.

She said that she has no money or retirement savings, while we have the room to house her.

However, my mother-in-law is an elephant-grade boundary stomper.

Here are some examples of her behavior: she listens to private conversations and comments, while changing all the rules in our home.

She acts like matriarch in our home, and my husband lets her.

She goes through the laundry in our bedroom, and then leaves my undergarments unwashed in the laundry room, whilst washing my kitchen towels with her underwear.

She enters our bedroom without permission to talk to my husband or ask me where he is.

This is because she is so overbearing that he hides from her, so she harasses me instead.

She also goes into my en-suite bathroom to get our scale so she can weigh herself before and after every meal.

Yikes! Let’s see how this situation progressed.

The final straw?

She created an email list with my husband, his siblings and their spouses, and all their cousins listed – along with my husband’s ex who has kept the last name.

However, I am not included on the list, so it appears like they are the husband and wife pair.

This went on for a while and my husband did not say anything.

I finally pointed out it was disrespectful to me, and he said he wanted to fix it.

His fix?

To quietly ask his mother to add my name to the list, without letting her know she had disrespected me like I asked – as he didn’t want to hurt her feelings.

I didn’t want to be added retroactively to make it look like I was being whiny, and I did not want the ex removed because she hadn’t done anything wrong.

I just wanted my mother-in-law to know what she had done was inconsiderate and disrespectful, like she was engineering a reconciliation.

Uh-oh. Read on to find out how the mother-in-law responded.

I was ignored and added to the email list; I now co-existed with ex.

I felt betrayed by my husband, so I confronted him and then directly emailed my mother-in-law to ask to be removed.

She said “he said you wanted to be added”.

I realised that having her in my home would be a constant battle.

Since my husband cannot call his mother out, I wrote an email to him explaining my position and copied her into it.

I mentioned again that I wanted to be removed and to keep the ex there.

I tried to see if she would just listen and follow my boundary even if it’s not agreeable to her.

Spoiler alert – she didn’t!

Let’s see how the woman’s attitude towards her mother in law developed.

I told my husband that his mother can’t move in since she blatantly disregards my requests and boundaries, and he cannot confront her or shield me.

I don’t want my home to become my prison.

However, my husband has been afraid to tell her for over a year.

Instead he keeps saying that I “suddenly” changed my mind after we agreed to house her, and worries that she will feel rejected.

I think he is hoping I will change my mind but at this point, she is not even allowed to come stay for a visit – I am scared she won’t leave!

She has since done other things that make me believe she will claim our home or part of it if the opportunity arises.

My husband has a problem and he has started therapy.

This is helping him to see how she has been overbearing, and that he is afraid not to please her because of the wrath she unleashed when he was growing up.

I have banned her from my home, even though I previously agreed.

Since her son has not told her, she is still planning to move in with us.

AITA?

This wife has been put in an impossible situation, and it seems like no one is listening to her or taking her concerns into account.

She can’t keep having her boundaries crossed like this.

Let’s see what Reddit thought of this predicament.

This person agreed that this woman should not have to put up with her mother-in-law’s behavior.

While others encouraged her to set firm boundaries with her husband.

And some people thought that everyone was enabling the situation in one way or another.

It’s great to hear that this husband is in therapy.

He needs to set some firm boundaries with his mother, right away.

His wife doesn’t deserve to live like this.

If you enjoyed that story, read this one about a mom who was forced to bring her three kids with her to apply for government benefits, but ended up getting the job of her dreams.