Problem at home

Hi All ILs,

I thought of sharing this in IL since long time , but did not due to hesitation.Anyway I want to unload the burden.

I am married since 2004. Mine is a love marriage . My husband was my yearmate and we met during early days of college. We are from diff. caste and community.
As usual Love is blind and I liked and love him so much and showed interest in him that initially even if he was not interested he started loving me.
5 years of love and finally we got the permission of our parents and got married. Before marriage my only dream was to be near him , marry him and live with him. I did not think anything abt the post married life,(for which I feel sorry now) . Though my parents were not fully convinced for my marraige since mine was the first marriage in my family , they said ok purely because of my interest and adamance. My father who loved me a lot than my mother was totally shocked when i told abt my love to him, and he strongly warned me to take time and think since he was not happy with the caste in which I am going to go.....I threw all his advices in air and firmly said I want to get married only there What my poor father woudl do ,,,,,he simply did what was compelled by me.....

I gave up eating Non-Veg and changed my food habits completely only for my hubby .
My post marrried life is something new to me . I did not get any formal advice from my mother or from my relations how I shd behave there. I had a very good opinion abt my MIL .My MIL is widow and My husband has a elder brother married with two children settled in Hyderabad. I came to "pungundha veedu" believing I will get "only" good feelings and expericences. This turned out to be completely wrong, My MIL did not tell me anything abt my daily day to day activities since the culture was entirely different between the families , even same language ascent differed, but she expected me to do things perfectly right from day one (My husband himself does not follow such habits ).She used to scold frankly if I do something wrong in such habits. She did not have any thought that I am new to that culture and don't know many new things and she shd alteast give a clue of it to me since there is none in the house other than MIL, we two and one servant maid staying with MIL years together.
Whatever she scolds , I would not say anything back (becos of respect and good impression on her). Later she started complaining abt this attitude to my hubby that I am very stubborn and adamant with headweight ......
What I did and how it turned out............

Initial days , she did not allow me to cook ...she preferred cooking whatever it is, even if she is ill , she would atleast keep one rasam and nobody in house shd do anything without her permission . The cooking style differed in my mom's and MIL;'s place. She never bothered to even teach me her way of cooking and several times my hubby and myslef have asked her to allow me cooking for atleast one day ,,,,,She simply said she would not allow me to cook ..........
Believe after 2 yrs of marriage, I don't know cooking ......Once co-sister happened to stay in our house and she taught me cooking their stuff and thanks to that I know cooking better than before.......Still my MIL never realises what she has done to me , how her activities would make others feel. All the house hold responsibilities right from getting provision till paper bill she wants to do by herslef without getting anybody's help.....we just give an amount and stay , that's it she never allows us to do any of these things though I have expressed my wish several times that I am interested to know all these things ....even she would not allow me to grind the batter..........If she is ill , she would prefer somebody's company to take to doctor rather than her DIL's company .......

Initial days of marriage , I bought few furniture and utensils for home and presented them as a surprise to her and she was having a complaint that I did not ask her before getting and she passed hurting comments to one of her relative abt these things which I came to know later and really felt upset.......

My hubby told me to reply whenever she talks like this since MIL interprets my silence for headweight ....After that I started replying whenever she talks badly / complains abt something when my feelings are badly hurt.................She used to shout back and when I leave to work she would share her burden of fight with me / my hubby with her relative ........So right now , I do not have good image among any of her relatives.

Briefly, she wants to dominate house at this old age with greater independency.

We have tried several times to explain to MIL that we are here only for her , we do not want to leave her alone and neither my hubby wants to leave his mother alone with servant maid nor I want to separate them till she is there I would prefer her son with her.....Though we have made this point clear , she has told several times that my hubby loves and cares for me than what he has for her.

After nearly 4 yrs of marriage I know abt her well and her complaining nature and I don;t involve much in talking to her , I just answer the question she asks me and go away and has tried to limit my involvement which I showed in initial days and my dependency on her.......

Day by day , her dominance is increasing and I really don't know how to tackle this problem neither we can go alone nor accept her dominance and commands sicne I am alos of independent nature like her and do not want to loose my self -respect now which I have lost initial days of marriage.