His mother treated him badly after he got married

One year ago I got married to my neighbour and Allaah knows that the girl whom I married is of good character, well mannered and respectable. She came to live with my family in the same apartment. There are five young men in my family and a girl who is 17 years old. Since I got married, my mother has started to change completely. She has started to insult me and swear at me in front of my wife and in front of my siblings. I am the oldest of my siblings and she insults me for the silliest reasons. If I try to speak to my brothers she comes and creates a reason to insult me. She has thrown me out of the house a number of times. I do not know why this change has come over my dear mother, despite the fact that I am not stingy towards them in any way. I am not of the type that prefers his wife over his family, but my mother is very irritable. I hope that you can explain things to me because I am not able to rent an apartment as my salary is barely sufficient. I hope that you can advise me, may Allaah bless you.

Praise be to Allaah.

We ask Allaah to help you to honour your mother and treat her kindly, to set her straight and to reconcile between you and help you both to obey Him and please Him. 

What you are suffering may be caused by feelings of jealousy on your mother’s part, or because she feels that she has lost you after you got married and someone else has taken possession of you. Some mothers have these feelings when their sons get married, but they are inappropriate feelings and she should strive to rid herself of them. 

You should try to help her to go back to the way she was before. You can do this in several ways: 

1-     Strive to treat her kindly, by honouring her, taking care of her and making her feel that you still care about her as you did before and are still keen to respond to her wishes.

2-     Avoid praising your wife or paying her attention in front of your mother, but still give your wife her rights to good treatment and respect, doing that out of your mother’s sight, until your mother’s situation  improves and things go back to normal.

3-     Encourage your wife to get close to your mother, by speaking to her, taking care of her, giving her gifts and so on.

4-     Be patient with her insults, swearing and throwing you out, for you are commanded to honour her, and it is not permissible for you to respond to her bad treatment in kind. If you bear that with patience, then you will find a way out, for good consequences are for those who are patient, and support comes with patience, and with hardship comes ease. Allaah says (interpretation of the meaning): “Repel (the evil) with one which is better (i.e. Allaah orders the faithful believers to be patient at the time of anger, and to excuse those who treat them badly) then verily he, between whom and you there was enmity, (will become) as though he was a close friend” [Fussilat 41:34].  Every time she mistreats you, you should hasten to be kind, honour her and treat her well. That guarantees that the negative feelings in her heart will go away, in sha Allaah.

5-     Pray for her, that Allaah will guide her aright and set the situation straight. She is the person who most deserves your du’aa’s and kind treatment. No matter what you do, you can never repay her for her kindness and previous good treatment.

6-     Strive to be a good example to your siblings, so that they may learn from you the best way of dealing with this problem which may happen to them too after they get married. Be an example of patience, good treatment and respect. Beware of letting the shaytaan gradually make you scorn her or be rude to her or rebuke her, for you will never find any good in such things. Allaah says (interpretation of the meaning): “say not to them a word of disrespect, nor shout at them but address them in terms of honour” [al-Isra 17:23].

7-     You should discuss the problem with one of your siblings, for perhaps there are other aspects of the problem that you are not aware of, or you have done something that has made your mother angry without realizing it. Finding out the reason will make it easier for you to deal with the problem. 

We ask Allaah to guide us and you. 

And Allaah knows best.