Leave me alone!

You need to learn boundaries. You are in this spot because you allow it.

you have to choose your battles. at my house the washer and dryer are located in the bedroom closet. the clothes come out of the dryer and are tossed into one of two open fronted bins. i really dont care if a towel or washrag has wrinkles in it. thats just one small example. im sayin work smart. stop doing traditional dumb sh#t..

Hey, wait a minute. YOU know you are not neglecting a darn thing except your own sanity, right? On the other hand, I know you need to rant, so rant away!

But if you actually want a handle to get a grip on anything, lawyers don't start at 10K, though I'm not sure one would come help you do dishes and run the vacuum which is what you really need. I was about to crack a joke about fixing onions for dinner so you could have a good cry (multitasking!) with no one the wiser, but better still, go to Subway and get some halfway healthy fast food instead of "falling behind on meal preparation." People you are cooking for can just eat peanut and butter sandwiches if you - or they - can't pony up for Subway, until they decide they are going to pitch in instead of pitch fits. If there is anything to document, snap a cell phone pix of it.

If MIL really needs - not just wants- so much from you that you can't even begin to get it all done, she doesn't need to be trying to pretend she can maintain a house while making it impossible for you to maintain yours. Lowering standards may work, to be sure, but only to a point; you have to have some. I would lower standards for MIL home a little more than for your own home, as long as you are keeping it above Dept-of-Health-stepping-in level. (Unless maybe you decide you WANT them to step in...now DON'T go looking up their anonymous reporting number, you may be too tempted to use it!) And you'd be suprised how many wrinkles you can get out with a spray bottle, for example...or maybe your iron has cobwebs already, which is fine; lots of working women just wear knits.

Its not your fault and you don't need to work yourself to down to a bare frazzled last nerve left to make it be not your fault. No one should be alowed to make you feel bad for doing what can reasonably be done. Don't just keep trying to do what can't be done, however heroic it may seem...there is just no way to come out ahead on all fronts, and you will have to pick the things that REALLY matter most, not the things that will get Family In Law off your case, because for people like that, there will always be SOMETHING they can find fault with.

The sad part is I really try to do the least I have to. MIL has diabetes so I prepare the meals and put them in the freezer so all she has to do is microwave. It saves me about 2 days a week traveling and also is kind to the budget the FIL haunts me with. I keep her numbers down that way and she has been losing about 2lbs a month since I started. We don't fold laundry it goes too quickly. I'm just tired and lonely. Being surrounded with half done, never ending stuff is exhausting.(kitchen, bathroom, rugs, floors, windows, yard, garbage, dog, dusting, paperwork, medical claims, insurance claims, kids {singing lessons karate, college tuition} car insurance, church demands, bathing, dentist, doctors) I don't want to nag about this to family so I'm venting here...you all... well, most understand. Plus, I just finished the book I was reading....figures the only thing I didn't want done.

To be brutally honest, this is happening because you are allowing it to happen.

Get help for yourself and tell the husband (and his siblings if available) his parents are his responsibility. Give 2 weeks notice that other plans have to be in place and stick to it!

I am sorry but you have got to get out of the slave mode. Some counseling may be in order for the whole family. Best of luck!

YOU READ A ***WHOLE BOOK***!!! While I feel guilty about just working the crossword in the paper??? Ha! I can use the stack of books and journals I want to read to put my coffee cup on while I go to bed and fall asleep with my reading material open to the page I was still reading yesterday. Life really is too much sometimes. I have decided to put a comment to the effect of The Do List Is Finally DONE - God says so! on my headstone. :-)

I miss my support group!

I agree, you need to set some boundaries. Just say to the people next in line, that you are taking a long vacation and they can do the work, then do it.