TL;DR: My FiL is a little too friendly in his affection and it creeps me out, though I'm certain it isn't meant in a creepy way, looking for a gentle, curteous way to ask him to knock it off.
I(34F) have an issue with my FiL. He is a very charismatic man. He walks into a room and he's everyone's friend. He raised an amazing son with whom I'm madly in love with for more reason than I can write down. He is an extreme form of extrovert, people person, and such a family man, he let his adult daughter, his adult son, his son's wife and their baby and cats all live in his house together for a year. My problem is, he is very intimate in his way of showing affection. It really freaks me out and I don't know how to say something. I come from a background of abuse and no family and this family is so far from any of what I was used to, like they raised my bar so high I don't know how I ever got along with less. So I really love everyone, including him, like the family I didn't have. So I just don't know how to approach this gently, I didn't have a family other than an abusive mother and my feelings were never considered.
Like, sometimes when I go over there, I help cook dinner and I help with dishes. He'll come up behind me, give me a hug around the waist and kiss me on the neck, and he does the neck kiss when facing me too. Just once he hugged me then bent the fuck over because he's taller than me and patted me on the butt. In front of his wife who wasn't actually looking but still. I've seen him do the neck kiss thing with his daughter, his sister and his mother. I just think that's his way. I've been willing to put up with the neck kiss even though it makes my skin crawl and I have a total mental lapse when it happens. I want to snap but I bite my tongue because I don't want to cause any ripples. I don't think he's trying to start anything but my instincts go bananas. But the butt pat thing, that got me a little more than the other. I was like, are you for real right now, bending your ass down to my level? My man is the only one in this family of giants who should be bending over for butt touching.
Now, I told my husband about it. I told him it doesn't sit well with me, everything I wrote here and more. He told me to pull his father aside one day when he does it and just tell him how I feel. He thinks it would be a lot more inappropriate for him to say something since he's never there and there's no polite way to just bring up "stop touching my wife." He agrees his dad shouldn't be doing that and is willing to back me up, but he thinks I should be the one to say something. I don't know how to say it nicely. I don't know how to say it in a manner that is not accusing of anything. He does it so fast, a hug, a peck, gone. Hug, pat, gone. He's a very animated person, cannot sit still for long. Usually there's a house full of people when he does it, so it's not invisible, it's not creepy no-one-is-around, he's-trying-to-hide-this status. That's why I hesitate because I don't want to blurt anything out in front of everyone, but he's gone so dang fast and I'm dodging people, tripping over dogs and kids trying to chase after him. So maybe if there's a way I can bring it up when we are just sitting alone, not like "Hey, so, um, can you stop kissing my neck, it makes me feel really creeped out? And don't touch my butt either."
I want a nice way to bring it up and/or a gentle way to confront him, if anyone has any ideas? I know he will care, he has cared about me and my feelings way more than my own mother ever did, I'm just scared to death of making him feel accused of something or somehow causing an issue in the family dynamic. I appreciate any suggestions.
Submitted August 24, 2019 at 10:21PM by Chocobojitters https://ift.tt/30vayve
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