Comparisons with SIL killing my relationship!

[ladyrunner21]

I need advice. Three years ago, I moved about fourteen hours away to be with my boyfriend and move in with him. We love each other very much and despite our own personal struggles, we are making it work. He suffers from Adult ADHD, while I suffer from bouts of depression. We both suffer from lower self-esteem as well, but together we're a great team and have grown together so much in the last little while.

 

My SO's dad died when he was twelve, so he is close to his sister and his mom. Last year, his sister (soon to be my SIL) came up to visit us and he joked about her moving in. She had been in a bad relationship for the last seven years, and her life was pretty much going nowhere. She had flunked out of her college program and had plenty of her own personal issues. She tends to have verbal diarrhea and not think about what she's saying before she says it. Cut to six months later and guess who has moved in with us? She moved out a few months ago because of the pressure she was putting on our relationship, into a small apartment, still in our small town.

 

Since she has moved up here, she has started seeing this guy who we're friends with and who my SO works with. He's having a bit of a hard time with it, especially since she brings him to everything now and talks about him constantly. But what I'm struggling with is this: my SIL has a good heart, but she never thinks before she speaks, swears constantly, and shares info that is TMI on a regular basis. Because of this, she doesn't have very many female friends, so she constantly turns to me for advice. Which, more often than not, means that she talks while I listen.

 

I'm dating her brother. He and I have a rock-solid relationship but it's not excessively romantic or touchy-feely by any means. It's taken a lot of work and a lot of sacrifices. But when she comes over, she's asking me things like if having sex six times in a morning is normal, because that's what her day was like (meanwhile that's pretty much our quota for the next three months). She asks if her brother ever sent me sweet love notes by text. She asks very personal questions about her brother and I. And worst yet, she's the only one of us who isn't in education. Which means in most conversation, rather than keep her mouth shut, she's repeating opinions that she's heard us or her boyfriend talk about, just so she can have something to say.

 

I'm trying my best to love her like a sister and to not put pressure on my own relationship by comparing it to the crazy love-sex-fest that seems to be hers, but it's getting difficult. Any idea what I should do? I've been working on building my own self esteem and trying to ignore her, but the day-to-day is getting hard to cope with, especially since we live in the same small town now. Any SIL survival skills and tips I should know?

[LydiaLong]

You are under no social obligation to answer any kind of personal questions, even though you like her and don't want to hurt her feelings. In fact, you might just teach her a valuable social lesson about what's appropriate and inappropriate to say in public.

 

When she asks you sex questions, you might just laugh and say, "I'm way too shy to discuss things like that." Try to deflect the questions with humor. Or if she goes on and on about her sex life, just say, "Time out!!! Too much information" in a joking way. Maybe she'll get the message eventually.

[BettyDraper]

The long winded speeches and lack of appropriate social boundaries make me wonder if your SIL is suffering from some kind of autism spectrum disorder. Let her know that you don't like to discuss such topics and ask her to keep the swearing at a minimum.

[LovingDelilah]

You really don't need to discuss your personal life and relationship with her. Tell her you're a very private person. I usually say I have had a very conservative upbringing which is the truth.