I hate my Future MIL. What can I do?
Problem/Goal:
I’m a 28-year-old woman and I’m honestly scared for my future because of my future mother-in-law. I feel like she is extremely narcissistic and controlling to the point that she wants to control everyone in the family — her husband, children, and even me. I want advice if I’m wrong for setting boundaries and refusing to live with them anymore after marriage.
Context:
My fiancé works abroad, so several months ago I decided to stay at their house to help take care of his elderly parents. They are still functioning and can walk, but there was really no one consistently taking care of them whenever they got hospitalized or needed assistance. Since I work from home and my fiancé has also helped me a lot before, I genuinely didn’t mind helping their family.
I also plan to work abroad soon because I support my siblings’ education and help my family financially.
At first, everything was okay until I slowly realized that I was doing almost everything in the house. Even though I only eat once a day there, I became the one washing dishes, cleaning the house every single day, doing everyone’s laundry, hanging and folding everyone’s clothes — even the clothes of their eldest son. I even carry heavy gallons of water around the house while her eldest son is there doing nothing.
I honestly started feeling more like a maid than a future daughter-in-law.
Then I started seeing how toxic my future MIL really is. She verbally abuses her daughter because she is part of the LGBT community and has a girlfriend, which eventually pushed her daughter to leave the country. She also constantly fights with her husband because she wants control over all the money he earns. She gets his salary but still asks the children for household expenses. They barely talk anymore and don’t even sleep in the same room.
Their eldest son also separated from his wife because my future MIL kept interfering in their relationship and constantly monitored the wife whenever they visited. According to my fiancé’s sister, their mother has always been this controlling.
What scares me more is how possessive she is toward my fiancé. Before, she already disliked me because my fiancé would spend a lot of time visiting me at my family’s house. She hated feeling like she was losing his attention. Since she and her husband barely communicate anymore, it honestly feels like she emotionally depends on my fiancé instead.
Whenever I leave their house for errands, document processing, or even just to visit my own family, she reports it to my fiancé if I don’t update her immediately — not because she’s worried, but because she gets angry that I’m not home serving them.
One night, I finally broke down emotionally. I cooked breakfast, lunch, and dinner for everyone while also doing other household chores the entire day. Then that same night, my future MIL started throwing things around because some dishes weren’t washed immediately — even though I didn’t even eat. The kids she treats as her grandchildren were the ones who ate and left the mess, but I was the one indirectly insulted.
She also got angry because I didn’t personally invite everyone to eat. Every single day, I already cook, prepare the table, call everyone to eat, then clean everything afterward while they leave their plates behind. I barely get rest.
That was when I finally told my fiancé everything. I said I refuse to live in that environment anymore once we get married. I told him I can already see my future if nothing changes. I told him directly that if he cannot stand up for me and protect our future family from that kind of setup, then I’m willing to walk away.
I genuinely tried my best to respect and care for them, but now I feel like she never really liked me as a person — she only liked the fact that I was serving her.
Am I wrong for feeling this way and wanting boundaries before marriage?