A newly married, pregnant woman says her mother-in-law has pulled away since the engagement. Karamo tells her the husband needs to call his mom directly and ask what's wrong, not the wife. He emphasizes the husband should lead the conversation and keep any feedback between them.
Chapters
I have a mother-in-law. I just recently got married in July, and so I'm pregnant also, but— Congratulations!
Thank you.
Thank you. But we were, we're having relationship issues now.
Okay.
And I'm not sure how to like go about it. Like I'm a family-oriented person. My husband is very close with my parents. Like, they love him, he loves them. Like, my dad and him work together, so like, they very close. But me and his mom mainly, you know, with me having a girl and her— my due date is very close to her birthday, I want to try to get things back to how it used to be. Like, we used to go out, we used to go have drinks, like, we used to have fun. And like, I think once— I think her son got serious with me and was like, yeah, this is serious, like I wanna marry her, I wanna have kids with her, our relationship changed completely. So I don't know, I don't know how to go, I don't know if I should talk to, and I've tried talking to her, I've tried calling, texting, being the bigger person, but I don't know, like I wanna support my husband 'cause I know he wants his mom, you know, with our child and everything.
Well, I'll tell you this, first of all, congratulations on the child.
Thank you.
Secondly, the willingness to want a relationship is the most important thing. 'Cause that was gonna be my question to you. So I'm glad you answered that. Because if you were just saying, I feel like I need to have a relationship 'cause she's my mother-in-law, then that's a different story. That way I would've encouraged you and told you, you don't need to have a relationship, you just need to set clearer boundaries. But since you want a relationship, which is really important, and the relationship was once good, I have to tell you, it's actually not your job to be texting her anymore. It is now your husband's job, not your boyfriend, your husband's job to say, Mom, my wife would like a relationship with you. And I need to know from you what is the issue so that I can broker this relationship. See what you've been doing right here, which is what I try to teach people all the day, you've been filling in the blanks. You started filling in the blanks saying, well, maybe she don't like me because I got serious. Maybe she, things have changed because of this. When we fill in the blanks, we keep ourselves in a cycle of confusion and not understanding what's going on. So you need to get clear answers, but you've already tried, so it's not your job anymore. You gotta release it. The person whose job it is, is the person who made a vow to support you in happiness and health. It is his job to say, Mom, I need these relationships to be good. I need you to step up and talk to my wife. I need you to tell me what the issue is so that we can work together as a family to make this work better. So I would tell you right now, is your husband in the audience with you?
Yeah, he's here.
Where he at? Hold up, don't try to— No, come over here. No, come on, cousin. Come over here. No, no. Okay, what's your name? Dion. Dion, Dion, grab the mic. Okay, Dion, did you realize that your wife wanted to have a relationship with your mom? Yeah. Okay then. And so how old are you? You're young. 21. See, you're young. I know. So let me tell you something. At 21, it's kind of, It can be uncomfortable to say, let me get in the middle of something. Let me speak up. But you're at a point now where you're a husband now, you're about to be a father. And so what you have to model is the strength to say, if there's communication is ever lacking in my home, I gotta step up and be the one to fix it. And so right now communication is lacking. And the best thing you can do as a man, as the father of your house, is to make sure that everyone is communicating in harmony. So when you get home, you need to say, hey mom, don't do this over the phone. Do a FaceTime. Is she near y'all? You can close by? No.
About an hour.
Okay, then we can do FaceTime. Usually I like you to say face-to-face so she can see the seriousness in your face. And I need you to say to her, Mom, I need this relationship to be better. I need y'all to communicate. And then ask her directly, what is your issue? Now I'm gonna give you this one pro tip. Whatever she say to you, don't come back to your wife with. Okay. Okay.
Good.
Yeah. Because again, Your job is to make sure there's healthy communication, not to be a gossip, okay? So because your mother might have feelings that she's still processing and you go tell her, now she pissed and now they, uh-uh. Give people an opportunity to process their feelings. This is a tip to you as a man. By saying, what is it? Once she tells you, say, okay, if it's something that you know is like far-fetched, say, process that, I'll help you, but get over that so we can connect, all right? This is your job now. And I believe you can do it. You think you can do it?
Yes, sir.
All right, there we go. There you go. You picked a good one.
Good. Good.
All right. Good luck. I need y'all to— I need you to email me and let me know how it goes, all right?
I definitely will.
All right, good, cousin. Thank you. All right, perfect. Thank you so much. You're welcome.
