AT WAR WITH MY MOTHER-IN-LAW

Mel Fallowfield, 50, and her husband’s mum have never seen eye to eye

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Six in 10 women admit to having a strained relationship with their mother-in-law, a study by Cambridge University found. 

My mother-in-law Irene and I couldn’t be more different. She believes a woman should be a domestic goddess and ‘look after their man’, while I’m a feminist who thinks life’s just too short to scrub skirting boards and make Yorkshire puddings from scratch.

I love my mother-in-law. Without her I wouldn’t have my husband Brian, 51, or my two teenage boys, 17 and 13. She’s tough, bright and, at 80, still has more marbles than most people start with. But she also drives me insane. She talks incessantly, criticises me at every opportunity and is always right. The only time I remember us agreeing on anything is when we watched the film Monster-in-Law, starring Jane Fonda and Jennifer Lopez as warring daughter and mother-in-law. We both howled with laughter and admitted that things could be worse.

NO PRETENCE

From early on, I could tell she wasn’t my biggest fan. She didn’t like the fact that I’m career-orientated, which I find odd because she’s always worked herself. There were caustic remarks whenever she came round for supper and Marks & Spencer had taken the strain of making it. But I’m a terrible cook and often worked late. When Brian and I got engaged after eight years together, I expected her to at least pretend to be pleased. Instead, she asked to wear black to our wedding and told me she didn’t feel she was gaining a daughter, but losing her son. When I said I thought she’d got it the wrong way round, she told me, firmly, that she hadn’t. On our big day, she looked like she’d swallowed a wasp.