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'Boyfriend's mother will not stop doing our laundry. I have asked her to stop. AITA?'

'Boyfriend's mother will not stop doing our laundry. I have asked her to stop. AITA?'

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"AITA - Boyfriend's mother will not stop doing our laundry. I have asked her to stop."

I have been with my boyfriend for almost 6 years now, and I have kids from a previous relationship. We all live together. His mother does not live with us, but is here almost every day.

Our work schedule is such that his mom helps out by coming over very early to wake the kids up and get them ready for school. I really love his mom, she is great. She also picks them up from school, brings them home, and stays with them until we get home. She usually eats dinner with us too.

She has a habit of helping out around the house when I don't want her to. Dishes is fine, picking up stuff - also fine. But she also does our laundry - which is the problem.

I bought a laundry separator, and have baskets. Everything is labeled by who's clothes/what goes in which basket. I do not like washing the kids things together because they are different sizes, but close enough I have to check EVERY TAG when I am putting them away to make sure they don't get mixed up.

I do not like mixing the loads together because it honestly makes it a nightmare for me to put away so many different categories at the same time. I don't go crazy. I don't separate colors or anything. Just per person loads, towels, sheets and blankets. I have a SYSTEM of folding things so that everything FITS where it is supposed to go.

When she does the laundry, she will just dump whatever in the washer while we are still at work. She will fold everything WRONG. Boyfriend's clothes are on the top shelf of the closet, and if the pants or shorts are folded wrong, the whole pile falls down and I have to refold everything. Same for the towels.

She doesn't check everything with the kids clothes, and when they get mixed up, the kids fight about it. When she hangs their stuff up, I have to check everything and put the wrong things where they are supposed to go.

I have asked her to stop doing the laundry. Many times. I have also asked her to NOT mix the baskets together. I've shown her how to fold the clothes so they fit and stay without falling. She also has a habit of starting a load of laundry, and leaving it in the wash, and telling me about as she's leaving in a hectic moment, and I usually forget about it and have to re-wash it.

I come home, washer is going. She's in the laundry room folding clothes. In the moment, I feel like I'd be an AH if I said something but I just want to be like "please put the clothes down and get out of this room!". I have to fix it every time she touches it.

My boyfriend thinks I'm being an AH about it because she's helping. He does not do laundry. He does not understand why it's making me so ungodly angry, because he does not have to fix it later after it has been "done". Is he right? AITA? I feel like I'm going crazy about laundry.

Here were the top rated comments from readers in response to the OP's post:

ThisOneForMee

INFO: What's the communication disconnect here? She thinks her way is better? Your way has too many different steps so she can't follow? What's her response when you tell her that you'll handle the laundry on your own?

(OP)

When I ask her I say as gently as possible, "Hey please don't worry about the laundry, I got it!" and she will say something along the lines of "Okay no problem" and the next day be doing it for us again.

We've also done it together a few times, and she asked me how I fold things, so I showed her. According to my BF, his parents always just ''threw stuff in the drawer and hung things up". I really don't fold things a crazy way - just in thirds instead of fourths.

ThisOneForMee

So you haven't been explicit with her about why this is actually causing more work for you. Maybe she thinks you're just being considerate when you tell her "don't worry about it".

You would know better than we do whether she would take that as criticism and how sensitive she would be. She's there to help, and any reasonable person who wants to help should be willing to change when they're told their help is actually causing more work.

Soft YTA. I'm torn on this. On one hand I can understand why you would be annoyed. Who likes someone messing with their things? On the other hand, she's not your maid or nanny.

Do you pay her? If you want the help of the village that comes with different ways of doing things. You cannot expect her to be a "professional" and follow all of your instructions exactly the way you want chores done.

Especially when you are not married and she's not even related to your children. I personally think she's doing you a huge. She's undoubtedly a net positive for you. Personally I think you have a good thing and shouldn't get worked up. If you want someone to come into your home, do everything you want the exact way you want then you need to pay someone for that.

SquishyBeth77

Soft YTA here. First of all, is MIL a paid employee? If so, you can critisize her methods, if not, NO. It sounds like she's going above and beyond to help out and that's a lot more assistance that most people get from grandparents. I would have greatly appreciated any of this help when ours where little and I would have kept my damn mouth shut about the way she folds the laundry, just saying.

I feel like NTA here - but, just, like: pick your battles. There will always be one person in a relationship who cares deeply about how something is done (Type A) and someone who doesn’t (Type B).

She’s providing you so much “village” help which sounds like you appreciate. Maybe you could loosen your preferences about laundry just a little bit during this time when your kids are so young and you need the help and just reframe your mindset. Good luck and I’m so glad you have such a warm, and supportive “village” around you.

So, what do you think about this one? If you could give the OP any advice here, what would you tell them?

Sources: Reddit
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