How did you try to improve things with your in laws (assuming they aren't abusive or sociopathic, just a bit 'off')?

[Eyjafjallajokull]

I am rather fed up with mine. And they are with me. None of us is nasty or tragic, but I suppose we don't get along well.

I realised the other day that it's just quite a tricky relationship and nobody can really relax and be themselves - I have been myself, and it hasn't gone down terribly well. EG I make a sarcastic joke and they think I'm being horrid - dh takes it as a joke but he knows me.

Loads of people on here moan about their in laws, so come on, what makes it better and what can you proactively do to make things easier (if not deeper)?

I have the same relationship with my pil, we just dont like each other, never had a falling out, or argument or anything. I just know that they dislike me. strange cos im bloody lovely me

For us, it was making the effort, so inviting them for Sunday lunch, or for tea occasionally.
Special effort on birthdays/anniversaries etc, we go to the local carvery because we all love it there, and its neutral ground.

Other than that i have avoided contact with them and it makes the situation worse.

Its difficult, becuase i think that if i were not married to thier son, i would not have them as friends, because the relationship is just too difficult.

Also, i strongly believe that by bieng distant or difficult, it will affect their relationship with my child, their gc. I think it is SO important to encourage that relationship.

I kinda had a word with myslef and said "suck it up cupcake, it could be worse" sometimes its about shutting up & putting up i think. (only if there is no significant background that is)

I was the same as you, just had nothing in common with them and think that we just didn't understand each other at all. When dd came along it all changed as we had her in common and a source of conversation and all of a sudden the relationship developed in other ways as well. Its taken me a bit by surprise how well we get on now considering how we were.

Lol at you making a sarcy joke and them thinking youre nasty. This has happened to me a couple of times in new groups of people. You start a bit of banter like you would with your mates and they look at you as if you are horrible in stunned silence - v awkward!

Have you known them long. It took a good while (over a decade) to get to where I am with them now!

I know - it's not something I'd do with a new group of people, but dh and I have been together for over 20 years! They do "know" me quite well, holidays together and all that. Things have just kind of ground to a halt and I can't put my finger on anything bad that's happened, so I guess it's just that we've kind of got things as far as they'll go, which is to say, we have a superficial relationship.

I found that things did get a lot better when the children were born, and were small. Now they're older and we're back to how it was years ago. So it feels like both 'sides' are withdrawing somehow.

It's quite hard to go back to formal Sunday lunches and a tour of the potting shed. It's worse with BIL and the SILs. I want dh to kind of steer things with them, but he's leaving all the birthday cards and keeping in touch to me. If I make a big deal of it, he'll be hurt - but it is his responsibility.

But yes, 'suck it up, cupcake'. It could be a lot worse, instead of just a bit of a grind.

If you think they are basically decent people but just very different to you, I think you could change things quite a lot by just coming out and saying that you'd like things to change. Something along the lines of "I've been thinking and I'm pretty sure that you might have the wrong idea about me. I'm aware that because you don't know me as well as your DS you might think I mean some of the comments I've made when really I've been joking. I really hate to think you might have a bad impression because your opinion matters to both of us. Although nothing terrible has happened and we all get along ok because we're all decent adults, I was hoping we could start again, get to know each other a little better and hopefully make things a bit nicer for all of us. We're going to be in each other's lives for a long time after all." Then follow it up with an invitation to dinner, or a family activity day somewhere (so that you don't have to do too much forced talking to begin with).

IMO, only the sort of ILs determined to hate the S/DIL could fail to warm to that. You've not accused them of being responsible for the poor relationship and you've extended an olive branch and a solution. It would take guts to say it but it could go a long way. If it doesn't, well what have you lost?

Ok, scrap that. It's obviously not going to work if you've been their DIL for more than 20 years.

No, it's a nice idea! I was just thinking it over. But yes, I think basically we're different and there are faults and little prejudices on both sides, and it wouldn't be really practical.

It is sooooo hard OP, and I feel your pain. Your post could have been written by me. My silly sense of humour in the past has really irked them, when no malice was ever intended by me. I feel completely awkward in their company.

At the moment I am at loggerheads with them (see my related post) but I need to sort it out for DC's sake. I don't have much advice but will be watching this thread with interest.

I think I've come to the conclusion that there's not much else to do but to submit.
They are older, they are less inclined to change or be flexible, nothing massively BAD has happened, and if in 20 years I haven't managed to impress my personality on them except in a negative way, maybe I need to think about that.
Maybe it just has to be superficial.

We moved 200 miles away.

Well, first thing, keep being yourself. Don't compromise, because then the net result will be that you resent them for mentally 'impinging' on you. When it's not really their fault, as you say, you just don't gel.

Secondly, they really should be your DH's responsibility. Personally I'd be a lot more sanguine about submitting to the dreary reality if I wasn't feeling that I'm also being taken advantage of a bit and being made to be more affected by the situation than I needed to.

'If you want to buy cards then do - there's no real impetus for me to do it, sorry, it's not as if we're great friends, the reason we're buying is family duty, and it's your side of the family, so why is it down to me?'

PS your username - have you been there? :)

I think its very hard as you dont pick your inlaws you are just given them though loving your DH.. I get on with FIL and most of the time with SIL but MIL is a totally different story and its for things she said/wrote inwich I will never forgive her. Calling DH stupid for us getting engaged, wanting me to abort our first child yet when other people are around wants to play doting granny. To start with DH never saw what I saw but the more he steps back and looks the more he realises just how much she trys to rule the roost with everything as far as giving DH a book to write his finances in when we have a system that works for us and ringing up to check he has made dentist appointments asking what doctors the kids are at even though she never has them unsupervised unless special reasons..

Ive got a feeling our relationship will only get worse when MIL gets older and expects lots of help from us, but im not her daughter and its not my job to look after her or cater to her whims.

I class my family as me, my DH and my children firstly then its myparents,inlaws etc which my family understand but MIL expects to be right in the centre of our lives