What the hell?!

We went for dinner at the in-laws' house this evening, and I thought that we had a nice evening. However, on the way home hubby told me that his Mom had been mad at him over something that happened when they came for dinner last Friday! Basically, hubby's brother and parents came for dinner at our house and his parents are Jehovah Witnesses (JWs) so they say grace before meals. Well, last week hubby and his brother started eating while they said grace. I sat there quietly waiting for them to finish saying grace before I started to eat. I didn't think any more of it, nothing was said, nobody seemed to be the slightest bit bothered by it. Well, tonight after we ate at their house (and all observed their saying of grace) she took hubby into another room. I assumed they were talking about house stuff or something. She actually was telling him how offended she is that he didn't wait for them to say grace before he started eating. She said it's even worse because he did it in front of me, and he's basically showing me it's OK to disrespect his parents. If she'd actually paid attention she'd have realized that I waited for them, so hubby's actions didn't influence mine. Also, her other son did exactly the same thing as hubby and she said nothing to him. She told hubby that they don't want to come to our house again because of it. He tried to reason with her and told her that he didn't try to stop them from saying grace, because he wouldn't do that, but he didn't want to say it. Also, it's his right to not be religious - just as it's their right to be religious. She kept going on about how he was so disrespectful and how he should respect them, which by the way he does, and he said that they should respect our choice to not be religious. Of course she doesn't see it that way. Then she threw in his face that she doesn't like us taking our dogs to their house! This, after hubby's had Suzie for 15 months now and has always taken her with him when he's gone round for dinner which is usually once a week. When we got Gracie we called and asked if it was OK to bring both dogs and she said it was great! So now, she's completely changed her tune and apparently we're disrespectful for taking the dogs with us. Also, she said that we're only invited once a month now instead of once a week. Talk about blowing everything out of proportion!

When we got home, hubby called his brother to ask him if he'd been given the same talking to - no, not at all, nothing was said to him! Note that when we've all been over to my brother-in-law's house, the same thing has happened - hubby and BIL haven't observed grace. So why is it OK in BIL's house but not ours? As I said, nobody stopped them from saying grace. I do feel as though it should be optional, we're not in the least bit religious so when we're in our house we shouldn't be obliged to say grace.

Another thing that's pissed me off is that for the past 3 or 4 weeks, she's brought up my weight. It started when her brother and sister-in-law were in town and apparently her SIL said that I'd lost weight. Now bear in mind that I'd previously only met them once before - at our wedding - for that one day. So, the following week she brought it up when we all went out for a buffet - she asked me, in front of everybody, if I was trying to lose weight, because I didn't eat an excessive amount. She said that her SIL had said she thought I'd lost weight. I was really embarrassed by her saying all this, I could feel my cheeks going red. I said that I wasn't on a diet or anything. Since then she's brought it up a couple more times, including tonight. She said, "Have you lost weight?" and I said "I don't know, we don't have any scales..." and she said again that her SIL thought I'd lost weight - I said, "She only met me once before" and she said "Yeah, she'd only seen you in your (wedding) dress before, not normal clothes" - I was having to bite my lip because to me that sounded like she was saying I looked really fat in my wedding dress. Gee, thanks a fucking bunch! Then, she added that she didn't think I'd lost weight. The whole time I was just wanting to say, "Why the hell is this even up for discussion? Just because I'm not skinny doesn't mean that my weight is a topic of debate for anyone to get involved in! What are you trying to say, exactly, when you repeatedly bring this up? Are you trying to make me feel like shit?"

Of course, I didn't say any of that. I hadn't even told hubby any of this, and as I said it's been going on for weeks now. When he told me all this about how she thinks he's so offensive etc. etc. I told him and let's just say, he's not very impressed with her.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not skinny by any stretch of the imagination, but I'm also not morbidly obese. I have some meat on my bones and I could do with losing some weight, but not too much. Anyway, the whole time she's known me I've been about the same size - so why is it an issue now? I don't like to be too touchy about things like this but when someone repeatedly says something like this and it's completely unwarranted - i.e. she brought up the subject, not me - it starts to feel a bit personal and to be perfectly honest I am getting offended now. So, rightly or wrongly I've asked hubby to tell her how I feel about it next time he speaks to her, whenever that may be. We won't be going round in the foreseeable future, because frankly even if they do invite us over neither of us would feel very comfortable there at the moment. It would be really awkward.

Regarding the dog situation - I really think she was grasping at straws, because hubby made a valid point. If she really was pissed off with us bringing the dogs with us every week, I'm sure she would've at least hinted about it sometime before now. Also, my father-in-law loves the dogs to bits and I'm sure he looks forward to seeing them every week. They have loads of different dog treats in their cupboard - and they don't have a dog! And we're seriously supposed to believe that they honestly don't want us to take them round there? I can honestly say that my FIL would be very disappointed if we stopped taking the dogs with us. Anyway, either way, we won't be going round anymore so I guess it really doesn't matter.

I would like to hear my FIL's take on the whole situation, though - she made out that it was both of them who were seriously offended, but he said nothing and acted perfectly normally the whole night - and he's not the kind to keep his mouth shut if something's bugging him. In fact, I think he would likely have said something at the time. The fact they stayed at our house a couple hours after dinner says to me that it wasn't as big a deal as she's making out. But, if she wants to push her son (and me) away, then so be it.