Mother and son (my ex-husband) too close???

[Hope Shimmers]

I've been divorced for several years so this isn't an emergency by any means, but it's something that led heavily to our divorce (in addition to his mental/verbal and ultimately physical abuse) and something that I think about. Ex-husband has always told me that I was a nutcase for feeling the way I do, and I still don't really know if I put too much emphasis on it or not. Certainly I don't think my ex-husband was sexually intimate with his mom.

 

He is from a "good" family, an only child, and very, VERY spoiled. We married when he was in his 30's and he had never lived with another person other than Mom and Dad before that (Red Flag #1, I know that now). His mom didn't like me on sight (thought I was too career-oriented and wanted to change ex-H, when he was the one who wanted a career and I resisted more college years... another story).

 

He resisted any connection I could have had to his family from the get-go. For instance, he would not let me sign birthday cards to his parents after we were married, saying they were only "from him". I was devastated at the time... why would he exclude me? He said his parents were for him only.

 

His mom bought him sexy boxer shorts on Valentine's day and the fact that she continued to give him a subscription to Playboy magazine as a gift, even after we were married for many years, just seemed creepy and weird to me. What kind of mother gives her adult son a subscription to Playboy magazine after he is in his 30's and married???

 

After we divorced, I found e-mails from my ex-mother in law to her son (my ex-husband) saying that she thought I was too "opportunistic" and "progressive" and such for him, and how she hated me. She hated me because I had a career and at first she hated me because she blamed me for HIS wanting a career, even though that was all HIM. (Now that he has a great career, all of which I paid for financially and emotionally, she takes all the credit for it).

 

Now that ex-H and I are divorced he and his mom are SO much closer. She hasn't had sex with her H in years as he weighs about 400 pounds and can't move (this was the case 20 years ago when I first knew him too). Now ex-MIL calls her son like 3 times a day (he lives 800 miles away) and her Facebook page is a photo of her arm-in-arm with her son.

 

Guess I'm just wondering if any of that was normal or if I was just making mountains out of molehills at the time. It would help to know (for future) if I was out of line - maybe I was, but it was so different than how I was raised that it's hard to know sometimes.

Edited July 30, 2014 by Hope Shimmers

[GH3]

From what your saying, your mother in law ruined your marriage before it even started by raising her son that way. You definitely had the right to know what was going on, giving your son playboy magazines and man lingerie as a gift is not normal and very suspicious. Your instinct could or could not be wrong, but either it is what you think or she has quite a strange way of poising her son against not only you, but women in general I bet. Did he ever explain why his mother did such inappropriate things? If he just accused you of being a "nutcase" without further explanation than you definitely had something to worry about.

[Hope Shimmers]

From what your saying, your mother in law ruined your marriage before it even started by raising her son that way. You definitely had the right to know what was going on, giving your son playboy magazines and man lingerie as a gift is not normal and very suspicious. Your instinct could or could not be wrong, but either it is what you think or she has quite a strange way of poising her son against not only you, but women in general I bet. Did he ever explain why his mother did such inappropriate things? If he just accused you of being a "nutcase" without further explanation than you definitely had something to worry about.

 

Thank you for your reply. He didn't call me a "nutcase" but he did make sure I knew he thought I was completely overreacting.

 

From his point of view I was - he was raised in that environment.

[gaius]

She hated you because you were competition. =/

 

It's a weird thing whenever one parent turns a kid into a surrogate spouse. But you certainly weren't overreacting on any level.

[Hope Shimmers]

She hated you because you were competition. =/

 

It's a weird thing whenever one parent turns a kid into a surrogate spouse. But you certainly weren't overreacting on any level.

 

Thank you. That validation means a lot, after a lot of years of being told I was wrong.

[Raena]

What's weird is... I had a similar experience with my "momma's boy" ex-husband many moons ago. She didn't buy him sexy underwear and playboy, but she DID hate me because I "took her boy away from her". It caused so many problems in our relationship because she could not keep her nose out of our business.

 

No, you are most definitely NOT wrong to think that their relationship was... well... bizarre.

 

I agree with the other poster... she saw you as competition and wanted her baby all to herself even though he was a grown ass man. He was used to it and obviously wasn't bothered by it. He wasn't going to tell you that it bothered him, because he was allowing it to happen. He had to deny it because he allowed it and didn't discourage her. All it would have taken is for him to tell his mother that her gifts were inappropriate and that he loved his wife and wasn't going to listen to her bashing you, but he didn't do that.

 

Nope... be happy you are done with him. Yes, it's important for a man to respect his mother but not to the point that their relationship is "too" close, if you know what I mean.