Devious mother-in-law throws away couple's furniture and sentimental belongings and redecorates their home without their permission while they are away on vacation: "[I'm] pretty sure she bought out our local dollar store"

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    AITA blocking my MIL after she re- decorated my house while on vacation?

    "Why is my couch outside?"
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    I (27F) have been married to my husband (Mike) for 6 years. We have a daughter (4F) and I am pregnant with our second. This pregnancy has been absolutely brutal compared to my first. I am
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    nauseous ALL the time and have to take meds just to keep what little I can eat down, it has taken a tole on my body and I struggle with just basic house work (stay at home mom), not to mention keeping up with a 4yr old.
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    Mike and I decided to take a mini get-away to just rest and take some time for ourselves before baby comes. Mikes mother (Ann) approached him and asked if she could do some cleaning for us while we
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    were gone, like vacuum and do the dishes. Ann told Mike not to tell me so it would be a surprise, but he's not stupid and asked me if it would be ok. I was hesitant, but the idea of coming home to a cleaned house sounded so nice, and I said yes...
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    Before we get into it, here's some info on Ann: Ann wasn't too bad as far as MIL's go, probably the worst thing she would do is drop by unannounced and come in without knocking. She would always
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    comment on changes I should make to my house or ways I could decorate, but I would always brush it off, saying I was happy with how it was. She would cancel at the last minute when we had plans for her to babysit, small things like that. Ann is one of those people who is ALWAYS the victim in a situation, and complains about her life/job every chance she gets.
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    Back to the story. Mike made his mother promise not to do anything except basic cleaning before he gave her a key to our house, she promised. We dropped off daughter with my parents and went on
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    our 3 day trip that was about 2hrs from where we lived. I tried to enjoy the trip but it was hard with not feeling well, and I had this crazy strong feeling of wanting to go home. We ended up checking out a
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    day early because my husband felt the same. Mike texted Ann to let her know we were on the way back so she wouldn't be there when we got in. Surprise Surprise, she was there when we pulled into our
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    neighborhood. Mike and I had been told by a neighbor that she was there the day before as well and I got such a sinking feeling...it doesn't take 2 days to vacuum.. I told Mike to go park down the street as I didn't want to confront her and he texted her and told her to leave. She did.
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    As we are circling back the first thing I notice is our 2 trash cans out by the road, they were empty when we left so there was no reason for them to be taken out... The next is sitting in the driveway is my small loveseat with flowers on it. W WHY IS MY I ง
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    COUCH OUTSIDE LIKE ITS ABOUT TO BE HAULED OFF. That's when I started to lose it.. I was trying to hold it together but started having a full blown panic attack. I was crying and couldn't get a breathe. After I was calm enough that Mike felt safe to leave
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    me he went into the house to see the damage, I could not bring myself to go in. I sat outside on my little flower couch and called my mom and sobbed. Mike came back out and just said "it's bad". I immediately blocked MIL. I felt numb. I went and sat at my best friends house while Mike started fixing the worst of it..
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    THE DAMAGE: Where do I even start.. Ann had touched EVERYTHING. Furniture had been moved, my pictures/art taken down and replaced with stuff she had bought, fall decor had thrown up on everything. Pretty sure she bought out our local dollar store. Ann had gotten into closets and re-
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    arranged all my stuff. There were new sheets on my bed and nails and command hooks everywhere... bathrooms bedrooms living-room kitchen... It. Was. Insane. She had started putting up wall paper in the living-room. There was a can of paint in the bathroom, thank god we came back a day early. She was going to paint my daughters pink flower
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    bathroom GREY. There were baskets and piles of laundry all over the floor (I had washed put away everything before I left) After Mike had gotten the worst and shocking changes somewhat fixed (taking down the wall paper and moving furniture back ect) I came back over with my friend. I just absorbed it
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    and started throwing stuff in trash bags. Everything that was not mine. After 4 hours the 3 of us had most everything taken down and put back how it was supposed to be. There were TEN stuffed full 13gallon trash bags of crop. I felt so violated. How
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    could the 3 and a half years of work I had put into our home be erased in two days? I spent the next several hours picking up the mess she had left. Oh and had she actually done any cleaning? Not a chance. She took what was mine and made it hers.
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    It wasn't until the next day when I started to find things missing. The bl had actually thrown away my nice rugs and replaced them with cheap dollar store crop. (no hate on the dollar store but they
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    were an ugly brown) My daughters toys, sentimental items, a handmade children's rocker from my great grandfather.. She had absolutely no intention of replacing anything, she was "helping me" by throwing out stuff that wasn't "pretty" or looked
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    "old" or "broken". To know she had gone through my home and passed judgment on things she didn't feel was worthy to be displayed or even kept.. that she took my things and hauled them down to the road for the trash truck to take.. It broke something inside me.
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    When Mike went to confront his mother she said she was sorry for upsetting me, but still to this day does not see anything wrong with what she did. She was actually upset with me for immediately taking everything down and not "Even giving it a chance".
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    Our relationship is de d to me, but she keeps harassing my husband wanting to know when things will "go back to normal" I will never trust her again.
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    It took me months to fix everything like the closets and cabinets. Honestly, it was kind of impressive how much she did in 2 days (she stayed the night at our house and probably didn't sleep). I kept my daughter from her insanity for 3 months, but at my
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    daughter from her insanity for 3 months, but at my husbands request, have let her go over there for short visits. He wants her to know his parents and I respect that, but I don't feel comfortable with it. I did not invite her to my baby shower and other family supported this decision.
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    Did I overreact and make too big a deal out of this? Is it even a big deal? Should I just brush it under the rug and pretend it never happened like Ann wants?
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    If you made it this far, Thank you very much for reading my story. I started listening to the podcast about a month ago and it gave me the push I needed to put it all out there, sorry it was so long, but there was just so much....I know I left things out.
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    Will do my best to respond to comments. I would genuinely appreciate feedback on this situation. Thank you all again. I hope getting it out will help me not lay in bed and think about it at night.
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    -Val Update to answer some questions (wow there's a lot so it may be tomorrow before I get to all of them, thank you guys so much for the support)
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    *Disclaimer: This occurred while I was 7months pregnant (October 2024) but at the time of writing I have a happy and healthy baby*
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    Equivalent-Tree-9915 You're not overreacting, but you need to go over to her house asap. You need to collect all of her remote controls.
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    slendermanismydad Scatter some Legos around.
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    uhohohnohelp And glitter. Shakers and shakers of very fine glitter, hit the whole house. Especially textured fabrics, along baseboards, cushioned furniture, and on flooring with lil cracks. Don't forget drawers-linens, clothing, silverware, junk. If you've got the time, put some in the cleaning supplies. Gonna be hard to wipe the glitter off the counters with that sparkly 409.
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    Redditress428 Save the 10 trash bags of her crop and give them to her as a holiday gift.
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    LissaBryan If anything, you're vastly under-reacting. You should be talking about calling the police for the items she STOLE from your home.
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    Dimerella NTA. I would be NC forever.
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    apocketstarkly I could not forgive this kind of boundary stomping. I feel you're entirely within your rights to never see her again, and to never let her see your children. Your husband should also be limiting his contact with her, because she violated his home, too.
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    Green Act2076 NTA at all, and frankly I can't believe that your husband hasn't cut her out of his life yet, too. This is an insane thing to do, and an even worse thing to show no remorse for.
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    exscapegoat I hope he doesn't ever leave your kids alone with her when he takes them to visit. You don't want them coming back with grandma's makeovers.
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    You're not overreacting. Especially with the rocking chair. My dad made one for me and then my brother to use. My mother gave it away. I didn't have kids, but it would have been nice if my brother's kids could have enjoyed it if he and his wife wanted it.

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