Excited to bring you my first collaboration piece with the very talented and hilarious, Sara Sadik! We pulled together universal complaints about MIL’s and wanted to share them with you. Enjoy!

Mother-in-law’s, whether you have a great one or not, we can all agree that once grandchildren come along – the dynamic quickly changes. MIL’s somehow emerge as expert parenting know-it-alls and you become the clueless, incompetent mother. There’s an unspoken rule with moms that is somehow lost in the MIL – DIL translation and that is – when someone insults our parenting skills or our kids – we lose our sh*t. Period. No one is more defensive than a mom, and mother-in-law’s should know this. In fact, they tell us about their wicked MIL’s, yet turnaround and pull the same shenanigans on us.

I have to admit, I personally lucked out in the MIL department. My MIL tends to make suggestions verses just ramming her unsolicited advice down my throat, and she knows when I’ve hit my I can’t take this shit anymore limit, at which point she’ll offer me a cocktail as a truce – so I really can’t complain. We actually get along great, probably because we’re both a little crazy. The first time I met her she showed me a picture of herself giving birth to my now husband, and then commented on what big cajones he had as a baby. She was proud of her boy. True story. I died. Love her.

Most everyone else Sara and I know though, would move thousands of miles away just to escape their MIL’s if they could.

Clearly our mother-in-law’s raised great kids or we wouldn’t have fallen in love with their precious boys. Some of their actions prove their hearts are in the right place, and even some of their advice maybe valuable, but most of the BS – we could live without.

We are, however, convinced all MIL’s do and say things just to piss us off, and here’s ten examples Sara and I came up with to prove it:

• They buy the loudest, most obnoxious, battery-sucking toys they can find that take weeks to put all the million pieces together, only to have our kids play with them for a few days – and then move on. We don’t want that shit, nor do we have space for it!

• They do the complete opposite of what we ask them to do. If we ask them not to give our kids too much sugar, they take them out for the largest ice cream brownie fudge sundae known to man right before dinner. Awesome, thanks jerks.

• They tell our kids they can’t do something because “Mommy said no” to make us look like the assholes.

• They finish every sentence with, “Well I raised three kids and they turned out fine.” We know that, and we are trying to do the same with our own kids.

• They comment on your appearance. Non-stop. And never in a flattering way. “Yes, perhaps I should get a nose job but…hey, maybe I’ll get a discount when you go in for your liposuction procedure?”

• They are always shouting. On the phone, in the car, over Skype. We effing hear you! This is cute the first time – not the 50^th. Stop yelling.

• They question everything you do with your child. “Why daycare?” Or “Why not daycare?” Or they tell you what your child likes. I know what they like, I’m with them everyday! I’m not an absent mother.

• They buy the most horrendous outfits and expect you to dress your child in them. My advice?  Put them in the hideous puke-colored dress and snap a few pictures each with a different scenery so it looks like you actually let your child be seen in it.

• They are fixated on your weight. Both, pre-baby and post-baby. The obsession with your weight is only because, “she loves you,” or so your brainwashed husband likes to tell you. And then the fixation starts to include the baby. “She needs to eat more, she’s too skinny.” “What are you feeding her?” Ugh.

• They spoil your kids rotten, break all the rules, and then send them back to you to deal with the consequences – while evil-laughing inside. Payback is a bitch, they say. We deserve it, they say.

There are few things that quickly bond women together – talk of work, marriage, the weather, and what brand of jeans makes your ass look best. But absolutely nothing bonds two women together like bitching about their MIL’s – then deciding whose is worse.

Let’s all make a promise now that we won’t be like this and if we do, we give our future daughter-in-law’s the permission to punch us in the face.