My SIL (31F) and I (26F) have never really gotten along. From the start, we rarely spoke, and after some wedding drama a few years ago, we stopped speaking entirely. I’ve tried to extend an olive branch in the past, asking her to hang out, but she always declined, so I gave up.
My husband and I have 1.5-year-old twins. When I was pregnant, my SIL made comments about how we were “too young” to have kids and how the 30s are the best age for children. Recently, she announced that she doesn’t want kids because they’re too much work and she’d rather focus on her dog. Fine by me. Initially, she wanted nothing to do with her nephews and rarely visited them.
However, lately, she’s been much more involved, which would be fine if it didn’t feel like she was crossing boundaries. For instance, she won’t speak to me directly but communicates only through my husband about the kids. If I’m holding one of my sons, she’ll either take the one my husband is holding or wait until I’m not around to interact with them. It feels intentional, like she’s avoiding me.
She has also been pushing for more time with the twins. She started calling my husband every weekend, asking to take them somewhere far away. We compromised on once a month, which she reluctantly accepted. She also requested weekly dinners at her house with her husband and dog, which we allowed. But then she posted a picture of them on Instagram with the caption, “Family Dinner ❤️.”
She frequently refers to the twins as her “sons” jokingly, but it bothers me. Once, when she brought them back home, they were wearing shirts she had bought that said, “Aunts are as important as Moms.”
The final straw was when she asked my husband if she could take the twins for a family photoshoot with her husband and dog to hang on her wall and post on social media. My husband initially refused, and she threw a tantrum, accusing us of being toxic and withholding her “family.”
At that point, I stepped in. I told her I appreciated her wanting to spend time with the kids, but I felt disrespected. First, she refuses to acknowledge me as their mother and doesn’t treat me with basic respect, yet she wants unlimited access to my kids. Second, she acts like she’s their mom, which she isn’t.
I also told her that if she wanted kids so badly, she should have her own. That sent her over the edge. She called me a psycho and hasn’t spoken to us since. Instead, she had my MIL call my husband to ask if she could take the twins to her house. My husband said no.
AITA? I don’t want to come across as a controlling mom or let my strained relationship with my SIL affect my kids, but I can’t shake the feeling that she’s overstepping. My kids enjoy spending time with her, but I feel disrespected and uncomfortable with how she behaves.
TL;DR: My SIL doesn’t like me but wants to spend a lot of time with my kids and treats them as if they’re her own. I refused to let her include them in a “family photoshoot,” and she threw a tantrum. Am I the problem?