From the author: My article on the Interfax portal. The desire to establish a warm and trusting relationship with the mother of your beloved husband is natural and understandable. But not all women succeed in this. People react to failure in different ways. Someone, having made a certain number of attempts, shrugs their shoulders and, without mental anguish, reduces communication with the unapproachable and cold “second mother” to a minimum. Some daughters-in-law have been trying for years to woo their mother-in-law. Is it worth going out of your way in such a situation? A columnist for the portal interfax.by asked the opinion of psychologist Irina Panina (Moscow). – Irina Nikolaevna, why for some women a good relationship with an unfriendly mother-in-law becomes, without exaggeration, an obsession? – Two are enough for love. When loving hearts unite in a fit of sexual passion, no guests are invited to such a spectacle. In these minutes or hours the whole world will “wait” - there are only two, without social status and naked. But the formalization of social relations between lovers is not complete without the participation of other people. A wedding, a “painting”, a wedding – all this is an open signing of an agreement for cooperation “in sickness and in health, and so on, until death do us part.” Their relatives usually participate in this social contract between the bride and groom. Each spouse acquires not only his beloved, but also his “roots” - his family. Society welcomes it when a newly-made husband and wife find a common language with the relatives they received “as a burden.” And if the favor of others is important for a young wife, then she strives to “win” love, or, in extreme cases, the approval of her husband’s mother. However, this is only one of the reasons; each specific case must be examined individually. – What recommendations do you give to women who suffer because they cannot win over their mother-in-law and are perplexed: “You can’t please her with anything, even though smash yourself into a piece of cake”? – There is a general rule that applies both in the natural science paradigm and in the humanistic one. If something goes wrong, the error should be looked for at a previous stage of the process. Let's say the car doesn't start - that means there's a reason for it. It’s strange and, most importantly, useless to complain about a stalled engine and try to drive a tow truck all your life, persuading the car to start. As a rule, the car is taken to a service center and the engine is repaired, after which it starts successfully. If diabetes mellitus has developed, the cause could be poor nutrition or stress. The same is with the mother-in-law: if for no apparent reason she does not greet her daughter-in-law, it means that the mother-in-law herself has a reason for this. And it’s not a fact that she will fall in love with some other daughter-in-law. Perhaps this fate awaits all potential companions of her son. “Let’s say the daughter-in-law understands this intellectually. But resentment, anger, and disappointment still overwhelm her. What to do in this case? - First of all, admit that you cannot change another person and what you don’t like about him. The only way to influence the situation is to start working on yourself. Return to the previous version of your development and find out the reason for your expectation of love from your mother-in-law. Many stubbornly want to receive the love of this woman, although, as you can see in practice and you don’t have to look far for examples, some mothers don’t even love their children, otherwise that strangers. In order not to be disappointed, do not be enchanted - do not console yourself with the thought that your mother-in-law will welcome you with open arms. Remind yourself that you are not a piece of gold that everyone will like. And someone’s mother’s “dislike” for you does not make you worse. It may not be about you, but about someone else's mother. - Is it true that most often the mother-in-law who behaves coldly or openly hostile towards her daughter-in-law is the one who perceives the young woman as a competitor in the fight for her son's love? - This is a stereotype. The reasons for dislike and coldness towards you can be very different, sometimes very bizarre. For example, my husband’s mother, in principle, does not like women. The main point to understand is that no one owes you love. This woman's son fell in love with you/1224912