How Do Your In -Laws Treat You

[payak]

its very awkward as your wife must support them.

I had a problem like this with my ex, I told her to support them, get a job and take care of them because they are rude.

she chose to work and look after them but soon got tired of this and threatened to leave, I said go leave and she did.

she took off, now they are all living like paupers, they were fine under my set up.

my current wife's parents are polite and very loving and giving so I dont mind giving back, most times what they need, sometimes a little extra, they never ask.

if my parents were rude to my wife i would not ask her to give them anything.

[Chittychangchang]

Maybe they just don't know how to converse with you and just ignore you so they don't make themselves look stupid and lose face

Try pycho annelising their point of view.

They are probally poor, iliterate and unintelligent peasant farmers.

Most people would be happy to have no communication with their in-laws.

[DrTuner]

If all these posts here are legit, I do have to shake my head. For me it was completely clear from beginning that I'd marry into a family, not just make a single couple, if I were to do it in Thailand. So I did my research beforehand and used my senses to validate the idea of it before proceeding.

What did you lot do, barge in like a khwai on yaba ?

[CountSaintGermain]

If all these posts here are legit, I do have to shake my head. For me it was completely clear from beginning that I'd marry into a family, not just make a single couple, if I were to do it in Thailand.

Who or what made this point so clear for you?

Were you afraid that if you didn't "marry into a family", your little darling might have left you?

Since when was a marriage in Europe a contract to support the bride's extended family?

You have security issues. Resolve them.

You owe precisely nothing to anyone else's extended family. If you think otherwise, you are a fool with the words "fleece me" branded on your forehead.

Edited October 25, 2012 by CountSaintGermain

[DrTuner]

Who or what made this point so clear for you?

Having been married before.

[CountSaintGermain]

Who or what made this point so clear for you?

Having been married before.

You've got to live and learn, dude. Stay cool.

[DrTuner]

Who or what made this point so clear for you?

Having been married before.

You've got to live and learn, dude. Stay cool.

No worries, I did learn. Happy as a pig in shit these days.

[CountSaintGermain]

Who or what made this point so clear for you?

Having been married before.

You've got to live and learn, dude. Stay cool.

No worries, I did learn. Happy as a pig in shit these days.

Good for you, man.

[scorpio]

hang on a minute....do you speak thai ?

[DrTuner]

hang on a minute....do you speak thai ?

Who me ? Yes, I can speak basic Thai. Enough to understand the people around me.

[HeavyDrinker]

Was it just me of did anyone else read CountSaintGermain's posts in a Dracula voice?

[BigJohnnyBKK]

Was it just me of did anyone else read CountSaintGermain's posts in a Dracula voice?

Not only that but I completely disagree.

The "fleece me" label is of course worn by many, but IMO has nothing to do with a willingness to recognize the obligation to help support the wife's parents implied in Thai culture.

This obligation is IMO just as obvious and inherent as that to support the woman herself.

And what does our own back-home culture's practices have to do with anything? If you are here in Thailand and seeking to marry a girl indoctrinated in her own culture, and often with little knowledge of much less belief in your own, you're best served adapting to their cultural mores not trying to get them to understand or adhere to yours.

The "fleece me" problem is simply a question of scale and value.

Let's say my wife feels that she should send B5K per month to support her parents, and I'm happy to give her B12K altogether as her personal allowance, spending money whatever you want to call it. Perhaps I trust her to do the grocery shopping and pay the basic household bills, utilities etc, for which I allocate B4,000, so I give her control over a total of B16K.

Obviously the details and level of confidence will vary, so please try to keep focus on the principle being outlined here. And some of you marry wealthy girls or ambitious independent career girls etc, let's set those outlier cases aside for now.

To the extent she wants to give her parents more or less, up to her - it is ultimately her responsibility, so if she wants to give them more and therefore sacrifices some shopping money or whatever up to her. Or if she desperately wants to buy a new smartphone or whatever high-face item, she can choose to send them less - this is a good indicator of her own commitment in this area, as well as of her ability to manage money and perhaps gain my confidence to take an increasing role in this area in the future.

Now as long as things are going well, and I feel my B12K is well deserved, IMO everyone's happy and no problem. To the extent things start to go downhill in the relationship then of course it may be necessary to re-evaluate priorities.

None of which has anything to do with her sending her money home to help support her parents.

And IMO this type of arrangement needs to be explicitly established from the get go, basically as soon as you ask that a TG take you seriously as a potential long-term prospect - which IMO means with a "good girl" even before you begin having regular sexual relations, with one that's been involved in more transactional circumstances then as an explicit monthly "deal" substituting for per-session or weekly arrangements - and certainly long long before any legal or moral commitment is made.

Any problems with such an arrangement, especially signals that she feels a sense of entitlement to frequent payments much more than the amount agreed to before, and even more critically more than what I can actually afford and keep a sensible budget for the family unit on track - are signals that this person is not a suitable long-term partner.

Of course those of us with greater means may have set our sights higher in terms of tall white-skinned well-educated girls from higher socio-economic backgrounds, and should adjust their proportions accordingly.

My point is that "fleece me" has to do with these variables - can you afford to meet her fair expectations and are you getting good value for your money?

And nothing to do with whether or not she chooses to fulfill her very real culturally-mandated obligations to support her parents.

In 99% of cases you are willing to support her financially, and supporting her to-you-extended (to her immediate) family just goes with the territory.

If she agrees they shouldn't be getting any money to me that's a big red flag - either she really is a "bad girl" by violating a basic moral obligation of her culture - or she's planning on somehow getting her hands on a big jackpot, maybe playing you, and everyone's just playing along with pretending to follow your foreign ways as part of the long con in the meantime.

[geriatrickid]

If all these posts here are legit, I do have to shake my head. For me it was completely clear from beginning that I'd marry into a family, not just make a single couple, if I were to do it in Thailand. So I did my research beforehand and used my senses to validate the idea of it before proceeding.

What did you lot do, barge in like a khwai on yaba ?

Sometimes, the children of jerks turn out ok and are decent folk. I went to school with kids with families that were just plain nasty. The kids in many cases were decent and did well despite their respective families. You know what gold is and how its mined? Sometimes you have to put up with the toxic crap to get to the gold. I'll let you ponder the analogy.

Edited October 26, 2012 by geriatrickid

[robblok]

You always marry into a family, my wife did too. Supporting and respect is a different matter altogether. I would not support them without respect. Actually i am not supporting them, they did ok before the farang came along. They do ok now.

I speak enough Thai to converse with them and im accepted, they tried the money angle. It did not work they respect me still. Just like love respect is not something you buy but earn. Buying it only leads to problems and expectations.

If i need work done, ill pay her brother to do so. He works as a handyman and when he does something for me a whole day he looses money so i compensate him. I have no problem with that. I even thought about buying him some tools so he could do his profession better and make more money (making people self sufficient not dependent) However the gf did not agree about this saying he would not take care of them. Case closed she knows them better.

[h90]

I wouldn't help them.

Why not? Do you know them?

why help someone who isn't friendly to me?

Its called respect, you may not really know them you may not particularly like them but at the end of the day they are your wifes parents and she probably loves them dearly, for that reason alone they deserve a little help if needed. (in my opinion).

My in-laws dont say much, they do try, I speal a little Thai so we do communicate a little, a nice smile can say it all at times, they often buy me little treats from the local market and if something is needed I take care of them, we get along fine and have mutual respect.

Before anyone jumps on it, NO I dont and didnt give them any huge amounts of money, they never even got a sinsod. BUT if they need something or have health issues I'm there, as I would be for my own parents, why ? because they are now my family too.

If they don't show some respect to me, they don't get some respect from me and no money.

Respect is a dual thing.....

[GarryP]

You folks with in-laws keep harping on about how they talk to you, albeit a little, recognize you as their daughters' husbands, use sign language, etc. and as part and parcel of this you help them out. This is a totally different scenario to the OP. The OP's inlaws ignore him, act as if he did not exisit, and have nothing to do with him. They clearly do not like or even respect him, and probably hate the fact that their daughter married a foreigner (face?). If you say in all fairness that you would still fork over dosh, because - after all - they are the wife's parents, you are nuts.

[theslime]

lol man....

You treat people how they treat you.

If I got a mate anyone who is an asshol_e to me, I treat them like an asshol_e.

Simple problem here.

Why didnt they go to your wedding? Was it a legitimate excuse? Or was it like "sorry I have to go watch so and so on tv"

I would have thought the Viewing Idiot Box a Legitimate Excuse, Fair Go.

[inthepink]

I don't even understand why these people of a much lower socio economic and education level than my origins are so full of themselves.

If socio-economic class and education matters to you, why did you marry somebody from such a family? I don't understand why so many Westerners restrict themselves to the bottom of the barrel class-wise when they look for a partner in Thailand.

[kevvy]

they did not come to the wedding as they had to look after the grandchild .. well that what they told us.. i will not get screwed as i dont give them enough to let this happen , all my assets are in my company name

[kevvy]

i speak a liitle thai , enough to be polite to them

[thaibeachlovers]

I don't have a problem with my MIL, but my BIL and SIL, nephews are another thing.

My wife said she was upset with her sister because she complained that I wasn't giving them money.

I have spent hundreds of hours working to make the SIL's house and surrounds better, upgraded the electrics etc, but have yet to receive a single word of thanks. I'd have done the work for us anyway, as we live there, but it's the lack of gratitude that hurts. A simple khop khun doesn't cost anything.

I wish the BIL wouldn't talk to me, as I don't understand him, or visa versa, and he always insists on chatting to me endlessly. Very awkward and pointless.

The nephews are typical spoiled brats, and totally inconsiderate.

Luckily, we only have the "pleasure" of their company briefly and rarely.

However, my wife has a strong commitment to her family, and I dread the day that something catastrophic happens, as my wife will ask me for money to give them, and I will not, so I don't know what effect that will have on our marriage.

I don't understand the posters that say they feel obliged to give the family money. Would they feel the same way about relatives by marriage back home, particularly if they didn't get on?

[somtumlion]

They treat me fine - thanks for asking.

[thaibeachlovers]

If all these posts here are legit, I do have to shake my head. For me it was completely clear from beginning that I'd marry into a family, not just make a single couple, if I were to do it in Thailand.

Who or what made this point so clear for you?

Were you afraid that if you didn't "marry into a family", your little darling might have left you?

Since when was a marriage in Europe a contract to support the bride's extended family?

You have security issues. Resolve them.

You owe precisely nothing to anyone else's extended family. If you think otherwise, you are a fool with the words "fleece me" branded on your forehead.

Well said!

<Since when was a marriage in Europe a contract to support the bride's extended family?>

Can you even imagine a thread like this if it was a man married to a western wife?

The number of farangs that buy into the whole "it's Thailand so I have to buy them a house, car and support the entire family financially" boggles me.

By all means do so if you want to, but please stop trying to say that it's compulsory for all farangs to do so. It's not.

[DrTuner]

Sometimes, the children of jerks turn out ok and are decent folk. I went to school with kids with families that were just plain nasty. The kids in many cases were decent and did well despite their respective families. You know what gold is and how its mined? Sometimes you have to put up with the toxic crap to get to the gold. I'll let you ponder the analogy.

Good analogy. Let's extend it a bit, how do you go about if you are a prospective miner. Well, conduct a survey beforehand, no ? Or you can get your arse on a train next day to Alaska and try your luck with thousands of others. It is indeed a good analogy.

It pays to check out the family, not only in-laws but everything within 3-4 connections, that includes cousins and so on. Those are the people the wife grew up with and it's highly likely she's got same traits as them, as well as the obvious connection you will be having after married. I got lucky there as the FIL is German and had done the surveying two decades ago already, he's the original khwai who did the house-car-buffaloes routine

[ThailandBert]

I get on great with mine. MIL, FIL and sister treat me as one of the family. had a bit of lack of respect from the BIL but he is just a head strong young 17 year old and the wife soon sorted him out and he is now fine. They paid for the wedding and the FIL gave me a family Buddha amulet valued at 150,000 Baht. On our 1st anniversary he also gave us 6 Rai of land to build our retirement house on. I have never been happier. I look forward to going to visit them and when they come stay with us here on Samui.

[BigJohnnyBKK]

You folks with in-laws keep harping on about how they talk to you, albeit a little, recognize you as their daughters' husbands, use sign language, etc. and as part and parcel of this you help them out. This is a totally different scenario to the OP. The OP's inlaws ignore him, act as if he did not exisit, and have nothing to do with him. They clearly do not like or even respect him, and probably hate the fact that their daughter married a foreigner (face?). If you say in all fairness that you would still fork over dosh, because - after all - they are the wife's parents, you are nuts.

So I'm nuts. Suppose you marry a girl with a retarded brother who needed full-time care. Before you married her you were fully aware of the fact that she feels obligated to send home a certain amount of her income in order to help support him.

Would you require him act appropriately according to your "normal" standards in order to allow her to fulfill her obligations?

Can you even imagine a thread like this if it was a man married to a western wife?

The number of farangs that buy into the whole "it's Thailand so I have to buy them a house, car and support the entire family financially" boggles me.

By all means do so if you want to, but please stop trying to say that it's compulsory for all farangs to do so. It's not.

The question of getting scammed is 100% I agree a question of scale.

I completely agree that cars and houses is looney tunes, unless that's a tiny fraction of your assets and of no serious consequence to your immediate nuclear family unit's long-term security, see it as a gift or donation to charity or part of the bride-price whatever, in that situation I don't think it's any of my business as to what some rich guy wants to do with his money.

What I'm talking about is a proportional fraction of the amount I give to my partner(s) for discretionary spending money, which she has they authority to give or withhold as she sees fit.

Say I make USD $2000 a month total income. I give my partner $400 a month for her to spend on clothes, tech gadgets whatever, and if she chooses to send them $100-200 of it every month, that's perfectly fine with me.

I'm not saying anything is "mandatory", but IMO if you don't take her culturally-programmed obligations into account - and therefore only give her say $250 altogether, there will most likely be problems as a result.

It's a very rare honest girl who doesn't have such obligations, if she doesn't express the need to fulfill them as part of our "deal" negotiations, that (to me) is a red flag that she may well be the kind of immoral person I wouldn't want as part of my household.

[thaibeachlovers]

You folks with in-laws keep harping on about how they talk to you, albeit a little, recognize you as their daughters' husbands, use sign language, etc. and as part and parcel of this you help them out. This is a totally different scenario to the OP. The OP's inlaws ignore him, act as if he did not exisit, and have nothing to do with him. They clearly do not like or even respect him, and probably hate the fact that their daughter married a foreigner (face?). If you say in all fairness that you would still fork over dosh, because - after all - they are the wife's parents, you are nuts.

So I'm nuts. Suppose you marry a girl with a retarded brother who needed full-time care. Before you married her you were fully aware of the fact that she feels obligated to send home a certain amount of her income in order to help support him.

Would you require him act appropriately according to your "normal" standards in order to allow her to fulfill her obligations?

Can you even imagine a thread like this if it was a man married to a western wife?

The number of farangs that buy into the whole "it's Thailand so I have to buy them a house, car and support the entire family financially" boggles me.

By all means do so if you want to, but please stop trying to say that it's compulsory for all farangs to do so. It's not.

The question of getting scammed is 100% I agree a question of scale.

I completely agree that cars and houses is looney tunes, unless that's a tiny fraction of your assets and of no serious consequence to your immediate nuclear family unit's long-term security, see it as a gift or donation to charity or part of the bride-price whatever, in that situation I don't think it's any of my business as to what some rich guy wants to do with his money.

What I'm talking about is a proportional fraction of the amount I give to my partner(s) for discretionary spending money, which she has they authority to give or withhold as she sees fit.

Say I make USD $2000 a month total income. I give my partner $400 a month for her to spend on clothes, tech gadgets whatever, and if she chooses to send them $100-200 of it every month, that's perfectly fine with me.

I'm not saying anything is "mandatory", but IMO if you don't take her culturally-programmed obligations into account - and therefore only give her say $250 altogether, there will most likely be problems as a result.

It's a very rare honest girl who doesn't have such obligations, if she doesn't express the need to fulfill them as part of our "deal" negotiations, that (to me) is a red flag that she may well be the kind of immoral person I wouldn't want as part of my household.

I'm not looking to get into a fight over this, but why can't she go get a job and use that money to support her parents? If she can't get a decent job, support her to go to school and get the qualifications to get a decent paying job. That's what would happen in the west. Why is it different because it's Thailand?

[ThailandBert]

You folks with in-laws keep harping on about how they talk to you, albeit a little, recognize you as their daughters' husbands, use sign language, etc. and as part and parcel of this you help them out. This is a totally different scenario to the OP. The OP's inlaws ignore him, act as if he did not exisit, and have nothing to do with him. They clearly do not like or even respect him, and probably hate the fact that their daughter married a foreigner (face?). If you say in all fairness that you would still fork over dosh, because - after all - they are the wife's parents, you are nuts.

So I'm nuts. Suppose you marry a girl with a retarded brother who needed full-time care. Before you married her you were fully aware of the fact that she feels obligated to send home a certain amount of her income in order to help support him.

Would you require him act appropriately according to your "normal" standards in order to allow her to fulfill her obligations?

Can you even imagine a thread like this if it was a man married to a western wife?

The number of farangs that buy into the whole "it's Thailand so I have to buy them a house, car and support the entire family financially" boggles me.

By all means do so if you want to, but please stop trying to say that it's compulsory for all farangs to do so. It's not.

The question of getting scammed is 100% I agree a question of scale.

I completely agree that cars and houses is looney tunes, unless that's a tiny fraction of your assets and of no serious consequence to your immediate nuclear family unit's long-term security, see it as a gift or donation to charity or part of the bride-price whatever, in that situation I don't think it's any of my business as to what some rich guy wants to do with his money.

What I'm talking about is a proportional fraction of the amount I give to my partner(s) for discretionary spending money, which she has they authority to give or withhold as she sees fit.

Say I make USD $2000 a month total income. I give my partner $400 a month for her to spend on clothes, tech gadgets whatever, and if she chooses to send them $100-200 of it every month, that's perfectly fine with me.

I'm not saying anything is "mandatory", but IMO if you don't take her culturally-programmed obligations into account - and therefore only give her say $250 altogether, there will most likely be problems as a result.

It's a very rare honest girl who doesn't have such obligations, if she doesn't express the need to fulfill them as part of our "deal" negotiations, that (to me) is a red flag that she may well be the kind of immoral person I wouldn't want as part of my household.

I'm not looking to get into a fight over this, but why can't she go get a job and use that money to support her parents? If she can't get a decent job, support her to go to school and get the qualifications to get a decent paying job. That's what would happen in the west. Why is it different because it's Thailand?

Maybe Thaibeachlover doesn't wan't his wife to have to work ? My wife gives money to the temple. it is her money and she can do what she likes with it. Who am I or any of us to tell them different ?

[BigJohnnyBKK]

I'm not looking to get into a fight over this, but why can't she go get a job and use that money to support her parents? If she can't get a decent job, support her to go to school and get the qualifications to get a decent paying job. That's what would happen in the west. Why is it different because it's Thailand?

Almost everything else about life is different here, and I assume you accept that or you must be beating your head against a wall all the time.

Why would you make a fuss about that one thing, as long as you are aware of it, take it into account it's no big deal.

I am very pleasantly surprised when one of my gorgeous uneducated rice farmer's daughters turns out to be not only intelligent and ambitious, but actually as career-minded as a Western woman as well! Doesn't happen very often though.

You can't have everything, so I make sure to set my priorities in alignment with my preferences in choosing who to take into my household.

And from a practical POV, if she had to go out and slave away 70+ hours a week to make a pittance why the heck would she be with me?

[GarryP]

You folks with in-laws keep harping on about how they talk to you, albeit a little, recognize you as their daughters' husbands, use sign language, etc. and as part and parcel of this you help them out. This is a totally different scenario to the OP. The OP's inlaws ignore him, act as if he did not exisit, and have nothing to do with him. They clearly do not like or even respect him, and probably hate the fact that their daughter married a foreigner (face?). If you say in all fairness that you would still fork over dosh, because - after all - they are the wife's parents, you are nuts.

So I'm nuts. Suppose you marry a girl with a retarded brother who needed full-time care. Before you married her you were fully aware of the fact that she feels obligated to send home a certain amount of her income in order to help support him.

Would you require him act appropriately according to your "normal" standards in order to allow her to fulfill her obligations?

Can you even imagine a thread like this if it was a man married to a western wife?

The number of farangs that buy into the whole "it's Thailand so I have to buy them a house, car and support the entire family financially" boggles me.

By all means do so if you want to, but please stop trying to say that it's compulsory for all farangs to do so. It's not.

The question of getting scammed is 100% I agree a question of scale.

I completely agree that cars and houses is looney tunes, unless that's a tiny fraction of your assets and of no serious consequence to your immediate nuclear family unit's long-term security, see it as a gift or donation to charity or part of the bride-price whatever, in that situation I don't think it's any of my business as to what some rich guy wants to do with his money.

What I'm talking about is a proportional fraction of the amount I give to my partner(s) for discretionary spending money, which she has they authority to give or withhold as she sees fit.

Say I make USD $2000 a month total income. I give my partner $400 a month for her to spend on clothes, tech gadgets whatever, and if she chooses to send them $100-200 of it every month, that's perfectly fine with me.

I'm not saying anything is "mandatory", but IMO if you don't take her culturally-programmed obligations into account - and therefore only give her say $250 altogether, there will most likely be problems as a result.

It's a very rare honest girl who doesn't have such obligations, if she doesn't express the need to fulfill them as part of our "deal" negotiations, that (to me) is a red flag that she may well be the kind of immoral person I wouldn't want as part of my household.

If she could support the retarded brother before she married the foreigner, why couldn't she support him after. Or by marrying a foreigner are you saying she must she give up her occupation ? She has her own independent source of income by which she can support her brother. But you are comparing apples with oranges.

Why in the world should he suppoort people who don't accept him? At least the retarded brother has a valid excuse for not being able to show any respect. If the parents do not have the common decency to recognize the foreigner for what he is - the husband of their daughter - and treat him accordingly, they deserve diddly squat and that is what they should get. And, if the daughter had any balls (not TV jokes please) she would stand up to her parents and express disgust at their behaviour and have nothing to do with them either.