My MIL of more than 20 years is lovely, fun and generous - until some unseen trigger is pressed, and then she completely changes. She becomes unpleasant, negative, finds fault with everything you say and do, makes relentless snide remarks, pulls faces to indicate her deep displeasure about any single comment you make, no matter how seemingly harmless (taking vitamins, how to cook something). The preferred victims are my 17yo DD (her granddaughter) and me. My DD in particular really gets it when Batshit Mode is activated. If her father or I are not around, my MIL will be quite nasty and even insulting. In front of an audience, or to me, a grown-up with more rights to expect respect, we get the snide side more - petty digs, incessant questioning, pulling faces.
My husband watches this in deep distress and feels very sorry, especially for our daughter, who would love a loving relationship with her grandma. There is no question of him or me pulling his mum up on it, because he fears it would end in WWIII, and I agree. It wouldn't be worth it. I have a temper and if it goes the confrontation way she will end up being the victim, and I'm not giving her the satisfaction.
The question is, what then? I've already resolved to cut opportunities for future contact between DD and her to the bare minimum. I'm not exposing DD to this toxicity anymore. but what about DH and me? We don't see them often - they live a few hours drive from us - so we could go very low contact. We already are, particularly since Covid. That is what DH would prefer, but it makes me sad, though. Family is very important to me. I love my side of our family, but I've got very little left of it, and I have always had hopes that relationships with his side will improve. But the stress of fearing The Switch and watching it come on every single time at the most unexpected point, plus the frustration and rage of having to put up with it and not feeling equipped or able to deal with it, respond to it, defend us from it - it is all too much. We are staying with them at the moment and after a singularly fine display of batshittery yesterday, I've been awake since 5am fretting about it all.
Is little to no contact the only answer? Are there better ways of handling of this? Could I do better? Is there a way of asserting oneself that doesn't lead to conflict? The truth is deep down that I blame myself for not being able to handle it better. It is tough, isn't it?
Thank you for reading all this.