(Former user, resurrected by account with a new username today).
Really just want to vent about my PIL. Married to DH for 8 years, together 14. PIL are retired, wealthish (biggish house, second home abroad, expensive holidays, inheritances, final salary pension schemes). DH and I have probably done the best for ourselves of all their children and are comfortably off, but have worked hard for it. My parents are dead. Children didn't happen for DH and me.
Anyway, PIL and BIL (married to DH's sister) are increasingly rude to me. Mainly FIL AND BIL but MIL can have a go too. Mainly seems to revolve around making scathing comments about my occupation (I'm a professional but gave up practise to run my own related, very successful business), my lack of children and what I happen to be doing at that particular time (once BIL had a go at me for being on my phone when relaxing after a family dinner). BIL is clearly an arse, and he seems to have brought out all the arsi-ness in FIL. So basically I refuse to visit now, due to the rudeness.
The problem is that I bump into them in public, and they have a go at me then. I was recently on a cross channel ferry, a business related trip, and came across FIL in the duty free shop. I was really surprised to see him, him less so, but anyway I greeted him warmly and we asked each other why we were travelling. When I said "for work", he immediately bawled out "but YOU don't work Incandescent", in the most scathing way possible. It was quite crowded, people turned round, it was designed to embarrass me and possibly cause a scene (it didn't, I just walked off, telling him he was being ridiculous). Then bumped into MIL, who was overly pleasant, possibly having heard the exchange. She then proceeds to regale me with how they could only manage 3 weeks in their holiday home abroad this trip, because they had to rush home to fly off to their Caribbean cruise. Anyway, that was a fairly pleasant exchange in comparison, but I actually felt a little bit shaken from FIL having a go at me on a cross channel ferry, of all places.
SIL, married to arsy BIL, is also bitchy towards me. I used to be a very competitive runner, and now older and with damaged joints, I still like to do a park run when I can. I was in their area, and SIL is one of these people who likes to be the expert on health, fitness and nutrition (despite being overweight and a non-exerciser) and she has got in with her local park run committee, and was one of the timekeepers that day. When my time arrived by email later that day, I was 3 minutes slower than I had actually been and recorded as finishing behind people I knew by name and had beaten. Thats the sort of thing she does.
The whole family are obsessed with money, and talking about it. FIL asked for money for Christmas one year from DH. FIL and MIL constantly go on about how I don't work hard enough (because I gave up practising to run my business). Its their common theme. I will never be good enough because I no longer work 16 hour days making money for someone else. FIL of course gave up work at 56 when he took early retirement and left MIL to continue working for the next 10 years. They criticised me for not earning more money because I decorated my house myself and DH fixes our second hand cars himself when he can, rather than putting them into a garage, or buying new cars on finance. I went to a better university than all of them (Oxbridge, sorry), so I get "jokes" about how I "pretended to go to Oxford but actually went to one of those colleges that uses the name". They all hate animals (except MIL) and I have committed the cardinal sin of not only having animals but my own small farm on which to keep them. I had to ask FIL one year to stop making nasty comments about how "all animals should be killed because they were dirty and a nuisance" just before midnight on Christmas Eve (a nativity scene on tv set him off) and of course then you get into the "Why should I?" "Whats wrong with saying that, I'm just speaking the truth" dialogue thats more like speaking with a juvenile delinquent than an adult male.
So anyway, I don't have much of a relationship with them now and I have told MIL its because FIL and BIL are rude. DH has slightly more contact with them, but only really at Christmas and sending cards for birthdays. Its a bit of a shame really. But what on earth do I do when I bump into them in public and they try to cause a scene? It totally ruins my whole day. I never do that park run any more because I don't want to bump into SIL and have my time made slower. It seems so ridiculous to have to avoid them so that they're virtually strangers now when there hasn't even been a massive falling out, but they are so rude to me, that I won't put myself in that position. I can't even have a conversation with them now because it quickly slides into verbal abuse. How do other people manage it?