First off, it's great to have found this sub! Now to the point, I'm sure everyone can understand mother-in-law issues to some degree. Even if you have a great MIL, you've probably heard of someone who has a crappy one. But you probably haven't heard of one like this ...

  • When I proposed to my wife, she drove to a lake and threatened to jump in and kill herself. The cops had to come and talk her down.

  • She sincerely believes that "children, obey your parents" is a biblical mandate and since childhood tried to convince my wife that this command remained true no matter how old the child is or if the child gets married. Fortunately, I was able to convince my wife otherwise, but my MIL still thinks my wife is living in sin every time she disobeys an order. Obviously this also means my MIL bosses my wife around all the time.

  • Most MILs are covert manipulators, employing passive-aggressive techniques. Not my MIL. She flat out says, "If you don't do what I'm telling you, that means you don't love me. Do you love me or not?"

  • She's literally the epitome of the "all or nothing" extremist. When we had a new baby, she wasn't holding the baby properly, so my wife suggested she change her arm position to support the 1-day-old baby's head. Result? "If you think I can't hold a baby right, I'll just never hold your baby again." That lasted for 2 years - never once touched our son the entire time, despite seeing him about once every 3 weeks.

  • She has serious health problems. So, even if she only has a mild, mild cold, she tries to weaponize this with saying things like, "If you do anything to upset me, it's going to inflame my condition and you know that my body can't handle it and I'll probably die. So, go ahead and do that if you want, but know that if I get upset and end up dying, it's because you killed me."

  • She repeatedly cites "honor your father and mother" in the context of insisting that she never go to a nursing home, and that if we try to make her, she will steal one of our cars and drive it into a brick wall to kill herself before going through the shame of being in a nursing home (interestingly, she put her mother in a nursing home).

  • She has literally never apologized for a thing in her life, nor has she ever admitted that she was wrong or that she's done something wrong. From a theological standpoint, she admits she's a "sinner" in the general sense, but says she's never committed a sin that she's consciously aware of - only unconscious ones.

I seriously wish I was exaggerating this. All of these things are as close to exact quotes as I can remember (I spent more time trying to remember the verbiage before writing this post than I'd be willing to admit).

Now, I adore my father-in-law. He's a great man. But he's about as weak and beta as they come and she just walks all over him. So, I'm 100% not going to get any help from him at all.

At present, my MIL is staying with us 5 days/wk while our newborn is too young to go to daycare and my wife and I both work. I can deal with her antics. I laugh it off and it has no effect on me, personally. What I'm getting upset about, though, is that my MIL has changed targets. She realizes that she can't manipulate and control me directly, so she fakes-friendly to my face, but then trash-talks me to my wife behind my back. I insist repeatedly that my wife ignore it and laugh it off too - that it's just the rantings of a lunatic. My wife agrees that her mother has legitimate mental health problems, but her mom believes psychology is an invention of the devil and told my wife she was going to go to hell when she sought therapy after being mugged ... so getting her mental help isn't going to happen. My wife also doesn't have the emotional stability to handle her mother's horrific behavior and the constant stress and pressure she puts on my wife. So, she ends up crying her eyes out most nights.

I've tried insisting that we draw a clear boundary and not invite her mom back in our home and to put our kid in daycare rather than have her mom care for her. But we both agree that daycare would be detrimental to our daughter at this age. Specifically, one of our other kids was in daycare at the same age our daughter is now and he got sick repeatedly and it caused long-term health problems that haven't fully gone away yet, now almost 6 years later. Our pediatrician recommended that our kid not be in daycare until she's at least 6 months old to avoid the same issue recurring. I'm almost ready to take that risk, but something tells me that it's our responsibility as parents to shoulder the frustrations rather than put our child at risk, given that the child can't stand up for or defend herself. We tried in-home care through nannies, but the 2 people we've worked with in the past both ended up stealing stuff from us and one flat out neglected our kids (we had a nanny cam), so we're really not willing to try that again. We asked our church for a reliable recommendation, but the two people referred to us said they couldn't meet our needs. All of our other adult relatives and friends work and would not be able to help. In short, the MIL is the only option right now.

Now, any time I've tried to address the conversation directly, she just walks out of the room and then reams my wife about how I'm such a horrible person for having suggested she do something different, which stresses out my wife and gives her panic attacks. Given our current work schedules, my wife cannot handle any more stress or deal with these conversations. She's already working 90 hours/wk (temporarily). I can't get my MIL to engage me directly.

I told my wife this morning that I intended to tell my MIL tomorrow: "Your daughter can't handle when you talk about me to her. If you have a problem with me, I'm happy to address it directly with you. But when you talk to her about me behind my back, you're not hurting me - you're only hurting your own daughter. If you love her or care for her at all, leave her out of it and address your beef with me directly because I can take it and I can engage in that conversation without getting overwhelmed, emotional, or upset. We can talk about things like adults."

My wife aptly points out that her mother is incapable of understanding that speech - that it will only result in her saying, "Fine, if you don't like what I'm doing, then I'm leaving and you can take care of your baby on your own." My wife then explains, "I know that you're your own man and if you want to do that, you're going to do it. I'm not going to stop you. But if she walks off, you're taking the baby to work with you everyday for the next 3 weeks." With my job, that's not a realistic possibility at all - and she knows this.

Vent session over ... what's your take on how to handle a situation like this? Just appease my MIL for the next 3 weeks so she leaves my wife alone? Or address the issue directly and head-on, knowing that my wife will have to deal with the backlash and not me?

Most RP subs will tell me to just do what I want to do and what I think is best and not to worry about how it affects my wife. But I don't think that's a biblical attitude to take either. My wife is good to me and I want to use my strength to be good to her in return. I'm just not sure how to balance this.