With every interaction my MIL and I grow further apart.

[trophywife26.2]

Every time I see my MIL she becomes more and more aware that I am not the same as I once was. I can see her distancing herself from me in many ways, but maybe I am seeing it wrong and I am distancing myself from her too. This week has been especially hard as one of us voted for Trump and thinks Hillary is a "baby killer" and a criminal and the other one of us is me. More and more things are more obvious about our situation with the church and the political heat is not helping.

I have been thinking about you guys in a mixed faith marriage and I am in awe of those of you who make it work and I am feeling a morsel of empathy/understanding for the mountain of pain you and your spouses go through.

This is a reminder to myself that there has got to be a way sort through the garbage and find a connection between us to keep this relationship in tact. I'm afraid her respect and love for me has been conditional all along. Obviously it is conditional somewhat, in regards to my relationship with her son remaining a good one, but also conditional based on my relationship with the church.

Here's to looking through the haystack to find a needle of common ground and understanding.

[Red Ryder]

With every meatloaf my MIL and I grow further apart!

[Corsair]

Yes, mixed faith is a mixed bag. I give a lot of credit to my wife and for winning leadership roulette (so far).

But I also have kept my ideas to myself for the most part and I do still serve in a calling on the Scout Committee and keep a current temple recommend. I also foresee a day when I have to finally turn down a calling due to my non-belief. That will be a very revealing day to my bishop when he tries to call me as a Ward Mission Leader or to an Elders Quorum presidency.

My wife does not try to demand full LDS obedience to Sabbath Day restrictions. She is not happy about my complete non-payment of tithing, but she does not bring it up either. Still, it does bother her that I continue to claim I'm a full tithe payer to the bishop. I'm still facing a future confrontation where my wife would like to go on a senior mission but I certainly do not. But we are still happily married.

I cannot at all claim that I have magically found the right way to have a mixed faith marriage. I have not. I have stumbled into an equilibrium that I cannot replicate in any other married relationship. I'm sure that others on this forum will talk about their mixed faith status with less enthusiasm.

[glass shelf]

My relationship with my mil has been similarly stressed by me leaving the church.

This is totally passive-aggressive on my part, but it cracks me up and probably confuses the hell out of her. When she posts things on FB that are clearly meant to chastise her wayward family members, but that could be taken either way with a little confirmation bias, I go ahead and "love" those things. Probably not helpful, but whatever. 80% of the crap she posts is about the LDS church, so I have to have my fun where I can.

[deacon blues]

I believe if you are motivated by Love, things will work out. Maybe not the way you want, but things will work out.

[GoodBoy]

Sorry for the cracks in your relationship. I mourn my own cracked relationships.

I can see her distancing herself from me in many ways, but maybe I am seeing it wrong and I am distancing myself from her too.

I think we do distance ourselves from TBMs as much as they distance themselves from us. Neither needs to happen.

I stick to the "don't talk about religion or politics" and if it get's brought up I just smile and nod. Nobody is going to convince anybody on either of those two things and it is pointless to discuss them. It takes a lot of self control sometimes to keep my mouth shut... let me tell you.

[Korihor]

With every meatloaf my MIL and I grow further apart!

Oh my God, my MIL makes the absolute worst meatloaf. Once she made a snowman meatloaf by shaping globs of meat in 3 balls stacked on top of each other then covering it in pre-sliced swiss cheese. Then she lined a cookie sheet with tinfoil and placed the blob on it. After cooking it was swimming in a pool of grease. Absolutely disgusting. This was before Pintrest. That dish was proof Satan has influence on the hearts of men.

My MIL is one of the worst cooks I've know. She doesn't cook but simply combines pre-made side dishes into a new entity.

NOTE - I like a good meatloaf dinner.

[trophywife26.2]

With every meatloaf my MIL and I grow further apart!

Oh my God, my MIL makes the absolute worst meatloaf. Once she made a snowman meatloaf by shaping globs of meat in 3 balls stacked on top of each other then covering it in pre-sliced swiss cheese. Then she lined a cookie sheet with tinfoil and placed the blob on it. After cooking it was swimming in a pool of grease. Absolutely disgusting. This was before Pintrest. That dish was proof Satan has influence on the hearts of men.

My MIL is one of the worst cooks I've know. She doesn't cook but simply combines pre-made side dishes into a new entity.

NOTE - I like a good meatloaf dinner.

Thank you for getting me to google meatloaf snowman

[Korihor]

That snowman meatloaf looks waaaay better than what I had.

[Raylan Givens]

My MIL is getting closer to me than ever....DW and her are no longer on speaking terms. I am her new information line. I am currently doing my best to make Parent Trap like arrangement post haste.

Perhaps your relationship with MIL isn't getting further apart, just changing into something different. My MIL wants a mom-son like relationship, I can't do that. The job is already filled nicely . Raylan loves his mom.