I’m engaged to a lovely 30-something who lives with her aging 70-something mom. Their setup is mutually beneficial financially, and over the course of our relationship, it’s become evident that they have a close bond. As we embark upon marriage and a life together, my fiancé has been reluctant to move in with me and leave her mom behind. Her mom is on government assistance and doesn’t have many great living options. Furthermore, their home life reveals a codependency and occasional toxicity when her mother becomes disgruntled about something. Boundaries are broken, tears are shed, voices are raised, etc. While we could likely find somewhere close (enough) that is safe for her mom to live, my fiancé and her mom maintain that a life alone in such a place is sad and lonely... no way to spend the final years of her life. While I am sympathetic to this, I am terrified at the alternative: living together. I’ve made it clear that a life together under one roof isn’t ok with me, so my fiancé continues to pursue a detached mother-in-law suite as the solution. I’ve heard horror stories about this, particularly with new marriages, and I don’t want mine to cave under this pressure. My fiancé keeps trying to convince me that it’s perfectly fine and normal for her mom to live with us. This is my moment to put my foot down, but I desperately fear my fiancé will choose a life with her mom over a life with me. Help! Any experience or insight?
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If you unwillingly go along with her wishes now and are “desperately fearing” her decisions at the beginning, you are sentencing yourself to a life of “Yes, dear. As you wish, dear.”
Mom may be in your lives another 20 years. Think carefully about that! And think even harder if you intend to start a family.
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You and your fiance need to have an honest heart to heart talk about this before you say "I do".
In my opinion, two adult women under the same roof with a new marriage is a mixture set for trouble. Has she ever heard of leaving one's parents and cleaving to one's spouse or it that a boundary issue for her?
Some people do pull this kind of situation off beautifully. But living with one of the parents is normally something that happens when the parent is ailing, and AFTER a couple has had time alone to build their life together as a unit, and make their relationship strong. In this way, they learn to present a united front. You won't even have a chance at that. And it's not like marrying someone with a child and becoming a stepparent. Taking care of aging parents is not remotely like raising kids, even when they are in their childish dementia phase. Because kids grow and develop, become better humans, become more independent as the years go by, and eventually leave home. Aging parents become sicker, forget things they knew how to do, sometimes become worse humans, become more dependent, and don't leave till they go in a care home or die, to be blunt.
Personally, as someone who is staying with my mother (I won't say "living with," because I'm still maintaining my own home, and I wouldn't call this "living," either), I would never bring a new partner into this situation. I don't think it would be fair to that person AT ALL. For one thing, my mom and I have had decades to work on our dynamic together, and it's not all roses and sunshine for ANY mother/daughter. Once my mom started getting dementia, it went straight back to the unhealthiest aspects of our dynamic. How is a new person supposed to even navigate through that? For another thing, it's an obnoxious amount of work once a parent's health and/or mind starts to go, and that's just unfair on the new person, plus that parent likely won't be able to live on their own in an in-law suite forever.
Your fiancee has basically said she and her mother are a package deal. You want your fiancee to change for you. That's the problem, I think. We can ASK for change, but we can't expect others to change for us. We can only change ourselves.
To put it bluntly, her enmeshed relationship with her mother is covert emotional incest and is a bond that is not easily broken without much work in therapy. There are books written about this and this is what they call it.
As long as she is enmeshed with mom, she will not be able to emotionally bond with you and thus your marriage will lack the intimacy that it could have had otherwise. When I speak of intimacy, I am not talking about sex. The intimacy that a married couple can have goes far deeper that sex itself, but enriches one's sex life as a couple.
She's 30 in terms of years and yet has never really left mom emotionally. That is a really deep enmeshment. Some men are likewise emotionally enmeshed with their moms and can't really bond with a wife.
I suggest finding someone who has their own identity with healthy boundaries in relation to their parents instead of someone who is grown, but is emotionally still their mommy's little girl.
When I was little we had 4 generations under one roof for awhile and it worked great, but, I don't think that is the norm. I'm not sure how old her mom is, but, depending on this, the arrangement could be a 30 year deal. I'd get it straight before the marriage though. Once, mom is included in the arrangement, I suspect it would be hard to change it.
It seems to me that finances may be the biggest codependency. Seek information from your office of aging about senior housing. Low income senior housing brings an abundance of benefits. Socialization for the resident as well as access to other needed services can help your MIL now and even more so as she ages. There may be a waiting list, but get her on it now.
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