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Sign up with Google Sign up with FacebookQ: how do i deal with a MIL that spits everywhere around my home
do u live with Chinese MIL that spits everywhere? would have sent her packing if nit that she helps in taking care of my 2 kids. in her eyes the bathroom and kitchen are not important so she spits everywhere.i fear for my kids health. And for me to eat well at home i need use earphone with loud music so as not to hear that loud spit noise.kids are just 4yrs and 2 yrs. my wife don't like it too but its her mum and she always ask me to get used to it.
9 years 38 weeks ago in Family & Kids - Beijing
if its your house... I guess you are the boss...
confront her ..constantly nag her... you cant just let someone doing anything disgusting only bcoz she is a senior citizen or your MIL...
Tell her not to do it.. either the spitting will stop or she will move away..
I am not married but my partner's parents already stayed in our home as they are living in Northern China and we are in Guangzhou, they won't come for only one day. They are nice people and have absolutely no problems with the fact that their only daughter is dating a foreigner, but as with every peasant background families they have nasty habits.
Don't let her do it, the first time I caught her mother spitting I said (in Chinese): "this is my home, if you stay here you abide by my standards, next time you spit here I kick you out." she never did it again for the month they stayed with us, and never did it again at all in front of me.
This is how things work with Chinese people, if you don't say anything they will push the limits again and again to see how much they can get away with. If you are strict and don't let anything pass from the beginning they will respect you.
Scandinavian:
This is good advice. Be firm, very firm. If you say "Oh, it'd be nice if you could do that less" then the point that comes across is "stupid foreigner can't even keep his own home", and this will be remembered each time you bring up the topic.
Tell her to stop. You should speak to her about it and if your Chinese is not good enough put pressure on your wife to make her. If this fails build a barn for her to live in.
Tell her to stop, and explain that it's disgusting to you, that a clean home means a lot to you. Say it everyday, every time. You have small, small chances to see improvements.
I had almost the same problem
Last year I was taking care of a parrot while it's owner was on extended holiday. I got sick with a bad cough for a week and the bird started making these gross hacking/cough sounds. So I had this big stupid (though to be fair very lovable) bird coughing all the time, people would ask "is that thing dying?" and I'd have to explain that the bird was a fraud and just faking illness to get sympathy head scratches/pumpkin seed treats. It was really a terrible, humiliating situation.
The owner said the best thing to do is get a recording of more pleasant sounds/words and play it while you're at work. With luck the new ones will replace the bad hacking sounds.
You can try this solution as well.
Today my MIL confronted me about why I had boiled some water yesterday that I didn't use. OK, so the water boiler in the kitchen is full and Mrs Sherlock Holmes has deduced that I have boiled 1,5 liters of water without using it. She is in fact correct, and she is right that this is a massive waste of electricity. However. The women is incapable of closing doors. We have ACs on and windows open. I am pretty sure the waste from this equates, in CNY, a lot more waste each day than the water boiling.
However. ACs were not present in her childhood home, but water boilers were. She cannot be reprogrammed from the fact that a "water boiler uses expensive electricity" to "and AC uses WAY more power than a water boiler"
In a curious side note. She never closes the lid on said water boiler, meaning the heating element will be on for a lot longer for the heat sensitive switch in the handle to click off.
The morale of the story. Throw her out. You will have kids who spit and crap everywhere.
I'd give a more nuanced answer to a non anonymous post.
Scandinavian:
Oh. Remember to get your kids inoculated against Tuberculosis and such, so they are only at risk from dying from Ebola
expatlife26:
Yeah I can't take the advice of anyone who thinks it's not healthy to run the AC with the windows closed seriously. That would give my dad a heart attack.
Frankly as long as you're the one paying for the electricity it's really not her place to lecture you about it. If it's not a big enough deal for you to get upset about it it's none of her business.
Scandinavian:
Yes. But you have to remember. In the mind of a Chinese MIL. My house, is her daughters home, thus it is her house. My MIL has no concept of this separation.
expatlife26:
Yeah I had the same problem with that bird. Thought he owned the place always pooping everywhere too.
DrMonkey:
Did you try rebooting ? And did you flash the BIOS with the latest firmware for your MIL ?
Every time you hear her spit put on rubber gloves, a surgical mask, safety glasses and follow her around cleaning up her mess with powerful smelling bleach and a scrubbing brush. She might get the point then.
Eorthisio:
Or she might think "I'm such a alpha woman, I boss that foreigner around.", it would be closer to the Chinese mindset.
If all else fail, buy her a spittoon and tie it around her neck. Maybe then she will get the message. Nasty habit.
That is fucking disgusting... she needs her face to be honored, though... so you can't do anything but come honor face.
mike695ca:
hahahahahahahahaaha I for one am not above any low brow humour. This is right in my wheelhouse man. Keep it up. ! come honor face haha brilliant.
coineineagh:
But she's just a MIL without the F. You need to give a F to come honour face.
For any negatives this website might have, it cannot out weigh the huge positive being that this website constantly makes me appreciate my wife more. She has done an admiral job of shielding me from any of her families nasty traits. If they even have any other than saying some dumb shit once in a while. They have never actually done anything to frustrate me. I am very lucky.
Scandinavian:
This makes my bitching feel appreciated. Good for you. Take your wife out for a nice dinner.
expatlife26:
props to you not putting yourself in a shitty situation.
mike695ca:
@ expat. I cant take any credit for this one man. Just pure blind luck. My wife has impeccable manners, but I just figured it came from anywhere BUT her parents. By the time I even met them, i was in to deep to get out anyways hahaha. * wipes brow*
expatlife26:
hahaha dodged a bullet.
oh man I could seriously NOT cope with that at all I would get seriously hostile right away
Having a bad MIL day, so here is another sing at "the MILs"
Spitting, sure it is disgusting, it is very obvious, but this is most likely not the biggest "threat" to your children. Spitting is easy to correct as a parent...... But what about all the shit the MIL tells the kids.
Don't drink cold water, thunder is dangerous. Endless crap that will make your children as disconnected from the real world as a kid who've grown up on a movie set for a movie about Santa. Superstition upon superstition, piled up in the kids formative years. Your kids will get a "no can do" attitude because there is always some superstitious reason not to do things.
Today I just told my wife about Fan Death
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fan_death
How f'ed up is that right.... everything your MIL believes is equally f'ed up.
After many years together, my wife is now able to spot bull like this, at least most often. if I told my MIL about it, she'd not be able to figure out if she is in danger. She might deduce she isn't as Chinese bodies are different from Koreans (that one is for you Pogger34)
mike695ca:
ahh yes, the good ol' " our bodies are different" excuses. I have heard this alot. And when I say " What about the millions of chinese people who immigrate to Canada?, they dont get shang huo. And they dont stay in bed for a month after having a baby. What about them?
And they say " the weather is different"
And I say " oh but you do realize that there are literally billions of people that live near the equator in semi tropical climates in many countries and many continents. They dont get sick.
And then they pull out the trump card. The one reason that our puny foreign minds can make no reasoning for. " The water is different here."
Oh ok, well in that case. Dont eat that.
Burak43:
This. A soon as my gf (then wife probably) is pregnant I'm loading her up on an airplane and out of China we go.
Scandinavian:
@mike. Actually, the water is different in China, it's not potable.
My MIL lives faaaaaar away . But she's cool anyway haha.
Get yourself a T shirt printed 'No spitting on the floor' if that doesn't work think about rubbing her nose in it. Filthy habit.