My mother-in-law is driving me crazy

I am 29, my husband is 31, and we live in Hanoi with our eight-month-old son. I come from a laid-back, optimistic family on the outskirts of Hanoi. We’re not ones to overthink things. My husband’s family, however, is the complete opposite. Though they’re originally from the provinces, they’ve lived in the city for years. Both his parents were teachers, and my mother-in-law is especially meticulous and anxious, particularly about anything related to health.

The trouble started after I gave birth. Every weekend, my mother-in-law visits to "help" with the baby, but we constantly clash over parenting. She questions how often I feed my son, insists my phone shouldn’t be near his crib—even though I keep it far away—and disapproves of pacifiers and teething toys. She wants to hold and rock him to sleep, while I prefer letting him self-soothe and fall asleep on his own, something that has always worked well for us.

Things got worse as she demanded I give away our cat, convinced it would harm the baby. Even though my husband and I prepared carefully—buying a litter-cleaning machine and keeping the cat clean and out of the bedroom—she keeps pushing. She’s messaged me, spoken to my husband and even my parents, and sent articles through my father-in-law about how dangerous pets are for babies. But my son is healthy, and the cat has caused no issues.

Then there’s my son’s weight. Since he turned four months old, he’s been slightly under or just at the lower limit of the WHO weight chart. I’m not overly worried—he meets every developmental milestone—but my husband and especially my in-laws are constantly anxious. We’ve had checkups, done micronutrient tests, and followed medical advice, but my mother-in-law keeps pressuring us to do more.

She criticizes everything I feed him. If I cook dashi broth and store it in the fridge—she says that’s not good. If I make porridge the night before to save time in the morning, she says it must be freshly made. She even says pork and chayote aren’t nutritious enough, and market-bought lotus seeds aren’t safe. She tries to force-feed him when he doesn’t want to eat, even after I’ve told her it only makes things worse. Once, I stopped feeding him when he refused, and she picked up the spoon and tried again—even when he kept his mouth closed.

Over the past eight months, I’ve often felt like I’m going to lose it. But I let most of it slide because we live separately and she only comes on weekends. Normally, I just nod along to her comments. But the other day, I was exhausted and finally snapped—I messaged her saying that I’ve carefully researched everything I do for my baby and only follow what I believe is right. Since then, she’s been ignoring my messages.

My husband, who’s also cautious like his mother, sometimes disagrees with me too. But at least we argue respectfully and try to understand each other. His mother, on the other hand, is more controlling.

To be fair, she’s not all bad. She’s clean, hardworking, helps around the house, and always cooks for us when she visits. When I go to my husband’s hometown, she and my father-in-law do all the chores—I don’t have to lift a finger. But even so, no one has ever made me feel this uncomfortable, upset, and stressed before.

I’m seriously thinking about telling her directly that her constant interference is stressing me out and that I want the space to raise my child my own way.

Should I go ahead and have that conversation with her? Or is there a better way to set boundaries without causing more tension?