My in-law’s
house is so dirty

Dear Tita,

My baby boy is just three months old and is cute as a button. The entire family is crazy about him. My mother loves him to death and keeps borrowing him every week. When my mother-in-law found out, she said she too, wants to borrow the baby and have him in her house . My husband Pol is all for it.

The problem is, my mother-in-law’s house which is big and has four bedrooms, is in disarray all the time. She does not supervise her maids on how to keep her house clean. Whenever I visit her, I see dirty dishes piled up on the sink. Her bathrooms are so dirty and full of soiled clothes.

The bedrooms are full of dust and dirt with big holes on the screens where mosquitoes can enter. I don’t want to put my baby on their bed as the bed covers are so soiled and smelly. I can’t understand why she doesn’t teach her maids how to keep her big house and garden clean.

All she does is play mahjong or watch TV. I try to do some cleaning when I’m there, but the amount of work it entails is so much that I get exhausted at the end of my visit. I can’t say anything as I know it would hurt her feelings (she is very sensitive). So I just keep quiet.

This is why I don’t want to let my baby stay with her as he might get sick (or acquire some skin disease). Pol keeps telling me to let his mother enjoy our baby too.

I have run out of reasons why I don’t do this. Should I tell my husband that I consider his mother’s house too filthy? It might hurt his feelings. I’m really in a bind. Please help.

DAUGHTER-IN-LAW

Dear Daughter-in-Law,

You should tell your husband the reason why you don’t want your baby to stay too long at his mother’s place. After all, I’m sure he wouldn’t want his baby to get sick. But tell him in a way that he won’t get hurt. Surely by this time your bond is so strong that you know how the other would react to certain things.

Your channels of communication should always be open to avoid misunderstanding. I hope your mother-in-law would realize that even if she has a retinue of servants, she still needs to know how to supervise them to keep her house clean. What good is a big and beautiful house if the lady of the house doesn’t know how to keep it clean?

TITA