Monsters-In-Law

To be completely honest, I don't remember how Boyfriend asked me to meet his folks. It seems like one day we were eating at a really expensive restaurant, and he was doting on my every whim, and the next, I was sitting in his living room, with my Ms. America smile on, trying to impress two strangers.

To answer the question of what nationality he is: he's half Arabic and half white. His mom is white and his dad is a full blown Middle Easterner (dark skin, hairy, large mustache, you get it). The results were a Greek God.

Before I go on, I must say that I'm back in another part of the Midwest, where the cows roam and my parents live, on Spring Break, and I used to go to a high school entitled Valley High. So, in grand tradition of the Valley girls, I'll tell the story in their fashion.

Soooo, I'm totally sitting on this couch across from his 'rents, and like, his mom is asking me a million questions! I mean, like, everything! But she's totally interested in my what my parents do, and like, I felt like I should have totally gave her two copies of their resumes, you know? And the dad is this TOTALLY non-concerned guy with a big mustache who's just sitting there, you know? Like, hello??? Is anyone there, lurking behind the facial hair??? And, I'm soooo good at telling when women don't like me, right? So, I look at the mom, she looks at me, and I. Just. Know. Swear to God. I just know! She's hates me! I haven't even, like, DONE anything wrong, and she totally hates me! And Boyfriend? He's just sitting there with a big ole smile on his face, totally not realizing that I'm being GRILLED by his fake-smile-wearing mother. Ugh! OH MY GAWD!

Yeah, the mother definitely had some issues that any woman could have figured out. She was jealous of this girl that her son had brought home. Turns out, Boyfriend was (and still is) the lackey in his family. He was the sister's best friend (because he really didn't have any friends of his own), and the mom's...this sounds weird, but it was like the mom needed attention. And since the dad wasn't all the receptive, she depended on Boyfriend. He really didn't have a social life, and this made it easier for the parents to keep track of him. And they were very used to telling him what to do with his life and how.

Thus, when I came along, things were turned upside down. After about 6 months of dating, we exchanged promise rings, much to the parents' horror (my parents were curious and amused, but not outraged like his). Around this time he started saying "I love you" to me on the phone when his parents were within earshot. After 9 months of dating, his mother went through his things during one of his breaks and found condoms. I was then bumped up from being the "threat" to the "whorish threat".

During the 2 years that we've been together, I've heard of some of the things his mom has said about me, including one time when Boyfriend had used the family's van to take me out. The next day, the mom got in the van, took one look at the driver's side window, and said, "Oh, here's a grease spot...was Girlfriend in the car?" Ouch. They refuse to call me his girlfriend, opting for "visitor", "guest" or "friend". She's made more backhanded racist remarks than I care to admit and Boyfriend has eventually stopped telling me because it makes me upset. They fought before I arrived on the scene, but now Boyfriend has a new motivation when an unfair remark is made about me, and they don't like it.


All in all, most people ask, "Why are you still with him?! I would have ______ [fill in the blank: killed him, killed the parents, left and wrote hate mail, ect]!" I have no clue. I just love him. And I'm tough and smart. That's the #1 reason the mom hates me. She may have had the upper hand with Boyfriend when he was single, but he has a new woman in his life that supports him in what he wants to do, respects him, and provides killer orgasms. She has a snowball's chance in hell....