In the months leading up to the wedding, when my girlfriend's younger son's fiancée was still living in her home country and her son was making plans on how they would take my girlfriend's extra items stored in the younger son's bedroom in her own dresser to make space for his future wife's clothes, my girlfriend said to me on the phone that she was appalled by how nonchalantly the kid was making these plans, and yet that she could not show the kids the door because they would not be able to afford renting a place of their own. So yes, she enables them, but she is also being realistic in that she cannot kick them out in an area with such exorbitant rental prices.

My girlfriend is an excellent cook who makes elaborate and visually appealing French cuisine dishes and as a rule uses animal protein. Her son "warned" her that his then fiancée had just become a vegetarian, expecting the mom to cook something separate for her daughter-in-law when she arrived. At that my friend balked, suggesting that the young woman cook for herself. I do not know how this all developed in actuality after the wedding; I suspect that the newlywed woman cooks for herself but my friend is left with dirty dishes from all that cooking. But at least my friend stood up for herself and did not take on yet another obligation.