I posted an epic thread on here when I first started MNing regularly. I have no idea how to find it now but the upshot of it was that I was NBU in my issues with my MIL.
On paper we should get along just fine. We have quite a few interests and hobbies in common for example. I can see her good points as well as her faults and if I am honest we share a few of both of those too.
For several years I felt like I was involved in some sort of strategy game with her, trying not to be walked all over while also trying to keep her happy and not all out. We had our moments when we did fall out, we also had our good times, but she was hard work from the start and only got worse.
I did wonder if it was me being overly sensitive and I don't like to cause conflict or upset people, but increasingly I felt MIL was behaving badly on purpose because she had been allowed to get away with the smaller things and they eventually became massive things.
In the beginning it was petty things that I thought I was over-reacting to and so ignored. She would pretend to have forgotten my name and the names of my parents etc. She was still pretending to not remember our names on my wedding day to her son. She had known me for eight months by that point and met my parents many times, had meals with them etc. We had been married for over a year before she stopped calling us by the wrong names. Sometimes she would pretend not to recognise us at all.
She opened cards and gifts at our wedding before we could, so we had no idea who gave us what and didn't know what to say in the thank you notes etc. She rang our guests without our knowledge and changed the date of our wedding because she thought we had got it wrong.
She would also say silly things and then pretend not to know they were rude or offensive. Things like calling me a slapper because she thought it was a name for someone wearing flip flops. She called a stranger a whore one day and then tried to claim she had really said "ooh-er" at something that surprised her. I had some of my writing published once and she was jealous so she made several nasty remarks about how I had only been published because they thought they could make money out of me. Stupid things like that, that you couldn't really get upset about or claim to be offended by but which were still annoying.
They would make demands to come and visit us at a moments notice. If we said no then MIL would cry and FIL would shout. They would manipulate and bully to get their own way. Once they had left our house after staying for several days, they had done a long drive of several hours to go home and within half an hour of getting there FIL rang to say they were on the way back because MIL was upset and needed a break.
She ruined several Christmases because nothing was good enough, she was jealous if we spent time with my family or our friends or even time alone, the gifts we gave were never what they wanted or as good as BIL gave, we didn't come to visit for long enough or pay her enough attention while we were there.
They borrowed money they never paid back, they told lies to us about other family members (mainly their other DIL) and lies about us to them.
When they moved nearer to us they would drop in unexpectedly several times a day. They would be offended if we passed their house and didn't call in. They would ring DH's siblings and MIL would cry and say we thought we were too good for them and then FIL would leave a message for us accusing us of breaking MIL's heart and being selfish. Then she would ring and cry, then he would ring and shout, then BIL1 would ring and call us cunts for making MIL cry and then BIL2 would ring and ask us to ring her because she was upset, then she would ring and cry and then FIL would shout. And then we would come home from the shop with the milk or the bread we had just nipped out for and find world war 3 on the answer machine.
And then finally we lost our baby to stillbirth and just three days later MIL was demanding to know when we would be trying again, she argued with me about the time he was born and then asked me if it still hurts to give birth if your baby is already dead.
She had waited until DH was outside so she could quiz me about it all.
She then hijacked our sons funeral by shouting at DH because when she rang him the day before she thought his tone of voice was off. Of course it was off, we were burying our first child the following day and we were totally destroyed by his loss. She thought we could at least sound happy to hear from her.
She made other nasty comments over the next few months about our loss, then I became pregnant again and we lost our daughter to prematurity following a road accident. I was very ill and nearly died too. MIL blamed me by announcing "I know what's wrong with you" and it turned out she had been discussing all she knew of my medical history with a midwife friend who diagnosed me without ever having met me.
She told me our daughter didn't count as her first granddaughter and that both our babies were not grandchildren in the same way as BIL's children were.
She asked for some of the few very precious photo's we had of our daughter and then promptly lost them, finding them again months later "in a box of rubbish we were throwing away."
By the time she found the photo's we were estranged. I had just given birth to our third child, thankfully with him being fit and healthy and alive, and we were talking about who in the family he might resemble. I said that sometimes he looked exactly like his sister and MIL looked at the photo in our living room and said "so was she born with all of her face then?" You could see her whole face in the photo.
MIL then took offence because we were upset by her remark.
Things deteriorated badly and although I was still seeing them after that remark, she and FIL made things much worse. They told more lies about me, they tried to split up our marriage, they have called me names and wished DH had never met me. They have bombarded me with calls and letters and even parked outside the house to stare at it and followed me along the street in their car when I walked back from the shops. They have held some of our belongings to ransom and told me that if I wanted them back I would have to do as I was told.
They have disowned DH more than once and than wondered why he wasn't going to visit them.
And all I have done in return for all of that was to be upset at the way they spoke about my children and told them that their behaviour and comments have to stop. I think I am the first person in MIL's life to take a stand with her and she has not liked it. And even I allowed her to behave badly towards me without rebuke for over eight years before it became too much.
I didn't even cut them out of my life after the final comment about my daughters face, but I did say then that I wanted DH to be with me when I saw them. And for that they have stalked and bullied me to the point of illness, I was diagnosed with delayed, grief related depression and panic attacks after a barrage of telephone calls ordering me to do as they said and calling me a bitch.
So yes, I am sure that the majority of the problems I have with my in-laws are caused by them. I'm not saying I am perfect, but I tried very hard to stay friendly with them and not cause upset until they started to be so cruel about our children. At best those were casual cruelties and at worst they were deliberate. About her own grandchildren. I won't ever forgive her for that, or FIL because he supports her in every single thing she says or does.
Had they not been so cruel we would still see them but I would at least like to be able to go to the shop without drama and not have them call in three or four times a day, every day, and stay for at least an hour each time. We sold the house and moved in the end, the pressure was too much. I've always gotten along with boyfriends parents before this and when I broke up with my ex it was his mother I felt most sad about leaving. I know it's not me that has caused the majority of the problems, it's MIL. She is manipulative and vindictive.
As it is, I worry every time I leave the house that they will by laying in wait for me somewhere and I dread the rare times feels he should visit them. I feel too ill to go with him and he feels depressed both before and after.