How can I be more forgiving with MIL

Maybe think about internalised misogyny. She might not have had the opportunities you did, and a lot of her nastiness might have been fear or jealousy. Unlike today, she wouldn't have had the option of therapy-or even Reddit or Mumsnet-to help her to challenge this. Women her age probably faced horrendous sexism, even if she was allowed to work, casual sexism at work was the norm.
None of this makes it ok, before anyone points out that most women her age are very loving to their DIL.
By treating her well, you're demonstrating love and care to your sons. You MIGHT get something from developing some sort of relationship with her (I don't mean money, I mean a meaningful friendship). And you could keep thinking that without her, you wouldn't have had your husband and sons-remember they're all a quarter of her.
And carrying hate hurts you. Choosing to let it go, and be the bigger person, is no longer putting you at risk of being a doormat, but being powerful.

@Brunchatstephanies You are correct - the hurt doesn’t go but you have to let it go. Or worse follows! You stay unhappy. We deserve better and @menopausequeen you could well be doing enough right now. You don’t have to be best friends with her. I do think strong feelings relent and I’d build bridges rather than get too embroiled in the past.

@menopausequeen , my in-laws were absolutely beastly to me; if I went into detail it would make your hair curl. When they became beastly to our children my husband cut contact with them. For many years I begged him to get back in touch and eventually he did. I did this because I just don’t feel comfortable with myself if I behave in a way that is not natural to me but more importantly I thought it was important for my husband and boys to have a relationship with their dad/grandad (my MIL is not my husband’s mother).My husband eventually relented. My in-laws lived abroad and we had second weddings for our sons in their country because they couldn’t travel, we made peace with my FIL and he thanked me which was quite a moment for me. My husband and boys have some good memories and I am at peace with the way I deported myself it would certainly have been really easy to encourage the estrangement but what is easy is often not what is right.

I understand why you need this @menopausequeen . I thought my feelings towards my MIL would disappear when she died but they didn't, her death didn't negate the awful things she had intentionally done and the hurt she relished causing.

I think you need to rid yourself of the anger to protect yourself, not to forgive or build a better relationship with your MIL (which can be faked with grey rock and in your head bingo).

Making a decision not to be angry with her any more sounds weird and impossible but sometimes that sort of random "I'm not angry with her anymore" thought could be a turning point in enabling you to move forward. I'm not saying that meaning that you should 'move on', it's not something I would ever say, more that throwing a curveball into your mind's normal thought processes can sometimes take you down unexpected routes.

Good luck to you

Totally agree, you have decided your actions are forgiveness as you define it.

Clearly you still remember your MIL and DM’s actions and clearly you still have feelings on it as they came straight to your mind as you gave your perspective.

I definitely think if the OP changes her mindset on what forgiveness looks like and stops being so hard on herself she can see that actually engaging relatively positively with a person she doesn’t particularly like and behaving kindly towards her is still a perfectly good version of forgiveness in her circumstances.

She's being nice to you because she needs a carer.

@Brunchatstephanies I felt it had to be the answer, or you end up like the op! Is she happy? It would appear not. You don’t forget but you bury it because moving on is more healthy. I’d advise the op to have a go at this and accept people can regret things and change.

I was really struck by our two posts one after another. I think this is a lot more common than a lot of us think or realise - that for older generations being stuck or trapped in an awful marriage led to some women demonstrating horrible behaviours to others. I think these sorts of personality changes when an abusive spouse dies or goes into care aren't really all that uncommon.

It's not an excuse for being abusive to others, but it can help to offer an explanation for the behaviour and why it has changed - and maybe foster a little more understanding and forgiveness.

OP, you talk about your feelings of resentment and that's totally justified. But I think it's worth asking yourself what those feelings are buying you.

MIL's past behaviours are causing you misery today. She has moved away from those behaviours - but they're still eating you up.

So I think you do need to find a way to process it and make peace and move on from them as something that happened in the past. Because right now the person they're hurting worst is you - so Past MIL is still holding the power.

Is there a way for you of getting some help to reframe how you view these events and therefore your MIL? Is there a path for anger and hurt to become pity, for example?

So you feel you need to forgive her for not knowing how to behave? Can you feel sorry for her? Or is she just horrible?

Well, you are a much bigger person than most of the population. How mature of you. That's lovely for your husband that you really are trying, even though she's been a cow to you for years.

This is actually very interesting. I’m not sure I can see much of a difference between this poster and the OP yet there is a clear difference in how this poster views herself compared to how the OP views herself.

Clearly this person views herself as a forgiving person and exhaults that as a virtue even though arguably her thoughts, feelings and actions are very similar to the OP.

Maybe that is the answer @menopausequeen be easier on yourself because you genuinely sound like a decent person.

My PILs were awful, FIL was abusive and MIL was manipulative. I'm not with their son anymore (who unsurprisingly was rather fucked up) but still aware of what goes on in the family. FIL died last year and since then MIL has had a noticeable personality change. It's clear her manipulativeness was the only way she could avoid being completely crushed by him. Is it possible something like this is a factor in how your MIL treated you, OP, and that since being widowed she's more able to be herself? I'm a bit of a grudge-bearer myself but since you're looking for a way to forgive her perhaps thinking about it like that might help.

My mother had very similar with my grandmother, her MIL.

My MIL was horrific to her for many years - actively trying to drive a wedge between my parents, favouring her other DILs over my mother, etc. It was odd as it really echoed the horrible treatment she'd had from her own MIL.

After my grandfather went into residential care and even more after he died, she totally changed and piecing it all together it's pretty clear that, at a minimum, he was very emotionally abusive and controlling to her and she (entirely wrongly) visited that on the "weakest" person ie the first DIL who joined the family in her early 20s.

I don't know if my mum ever really forgave her for her past actions, and she certainly never forgot. But she did manage to move past it and acknowledge that the behaviour had changed, and was able to meet my grandmother where she was in a positive spirit of moving forwards together.

It's a great example of how we can never know more than a fraction of what's going on with someone, and how even with those we're close to, we don't always know what's affecting them and influence their behaviour.

It sounds quite similar to your situation: your MIL is trying to show you through her actions and behaviour that she's changed and that she values you. You can make a choice about how you respond to that change.

I think it can be helpful to acknowledge to yourself that the past isn't something that you will ever forget or that you'll ever think is ok. But that you will also make space for someone's personal growth and change and that while you will probably always approach with caution, you can make space for who she is now, not just who she was.

Why do you feel the need to forgive your mil. for her years of nastiness?

@theresnolimits 👏👏👏

She lost both parents in her 20’s and at an incredibly vulnerable and sad time, her MIL treated her terribly.

Yes. Me too.

Now she’s old and widowed and presumably realising that she needs the OP, she’s being nice.

My MiL didn’t need me, was independent, stopped being a puppet and openly acknowledged she’d learned my worth (as OP’s is now doing which is some swallowing of pride).

Forgiveness is hard and we can't help how we feel.
People do change however, and my coping mechanism in similar circumstances was to treat the old relative as an entirely different person to the younger version.
Looking back, I'm not the same person I was 40 or 50 years ago. Maybe she isn't either and has genuinely changed for the better.
Clearly you don't want to be left with regrets so a healthy coping mechanism that protects your own wellbeing might be the best way forward

My MIL was pretty grim - I was referred to as ‘your wife’ when talking to my DH.

But over the years she saw I worked hard, made her DS happy and was a great mother to her DGC. I don’t think she ever liked me - we were too different - but she did respect me.

And I could forgive her because us being at odds hurt my DH and she produced him so she couldn’t have been all bad. And I got to go home with him every night so I was the ‘winner’ IFSWIM.

Let it go. Forgiving her sets you free.

Right, but the OP has posted explicitly because she does want to forgive, so I don't know how helpful it is for people to focus on telling her she doesn't have to. She presumably knows that.