Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Op here. My fiancé has a lot of respect for the hard work his mother put into raising the children alone, but finds her to be annoying and does not have a close relationship with her. He also supported me 100% regarding the comment, he was more angry than I was. He's not one to hold grudges, and I'd like an apology from her, but whatever. I'm really not terribly angry about the comment. What I am really struggling with is how to have any respect for someone who is so publicly vile. You wouldn't know it unless you saw her Facebook page. She spouts far right hate speech and blatent lies. My partner and I do not see eye to eye on many issues, but it isn't a big deal. She is out there! I want to have a healthy, friendly relationship with her. I'm just disgusted by many of the things she has posted on Facebook and don't know how to move past it.

If her own child finds her annoying and doesn't have a close relationship with her, don't expect to have a healthy, friendly relationship with her. Just don't. Hope for a distant, civil relationship where you can manage to enjoy each other for brief, infrequent visits. That's what your F-DH has now, right? So more of that. If you can accept her for who she is and act accordingly, that's your best chance of having things go smoothly.

Grieve what you would have wanted in a MIL, be sad for that, but don't expect her to be what she isn't. It will only bring you pain and hurt your marriage.

Thanks, this is what I needed to hear. My family isn't near and it would be nice to have a differnt relationship with his, but it is what it is and I just need to accept her for who she is, which is a person I wouldn't really care to have a friendship with. Could be worse!

Anonymous wrote:This is your MIL - are you such a freaking left wing ideologue weirdo that "the principle" is worth more than having peace with your MIL and husband? For goodness sake, everyone has different political views, just agree to disagree and don't engage her conservative or annoying FB posts. Your marriage is more important than being the "winner" in a political debate or over-analyzing her political views.

OP here. Certainly didn't say anything about debating politics or religion with her, I have zero interest in that. My partner and I both fall near the middle leaning in slightly opposite directions, usually leading to a different vote. Your view seems to be a bit toward the extreme.

Anonymous wrote:Op here. My fiancé has a lot of respect for the hard work his mother put into raising the children alone, but finds her to be annoying and does not have a close relationship with her. He also supported me 100% regarding the comment, he was more angry than I was. He's not one to hold grudges, and I'd like an apology from her, but whatever. I'm really not terribly angry about the comment. What I am really struggling with is how to have any respect for someone who is so publicly vile. You wouldn't know it unless you saw her Facebook page. She spouts far right hate speech and blatent lies. My partner and I do not see eye to eye on many issues, but it isn't a big deal. She is out there! I want to have a healthy, friendly relationship with her. I'm just disgusted by many of the things she has posted on Facebook and don't know how to move past it.

Frankly, I don't think you need to have respect for her or move past it. She's a bigot. Period. I don't respect bigots. I don't see why I should.

You can simply be polite to her when you have to see her, and otherwise let it go. You might want to have a healthy, friendly relationship with her, but you need to adjust your expectations based on who she actually is. Your fiance isn't close to her. She makes inappropriate and negative comments about you, while pretending to be "kind and open" in person. You certainly won't want any children you might have to have to be exposed to her bigotry and lies on a regular basis, do you?

Anonymous wrote:Op here. My fiancé has a lot of respect for the hard work his mother put into raising the children alone, but finds her to be annoying and does not have a close relationship with her. He also supported me 100% regarding the comment, he was more angry than I was. He's not one to hold grudges, and I'd like an apology from her, but whatever. I'm really not terribly angry about the comment. What I am really struggling with is how to have any respect for someone who is so publicly vile. You wouldn't know it unless you saw her Facebook page. She spouts far right hate speech and blatent lies. My partner and I do not see eye to eye on many issues, but it isn't a big deal. She is out there! I want to have a healthy, friendly relationship with her. I'm just disgusted by many of the things she has posted on Facebook and don't know how to move past it.

If her own child finds her annoying and doesn't have a close relationship with her, don't expect to have a healthy, friendly relationship with her. Just don't. Hope for a distant, civil relationship where you can manage to enjoy each other for brief, infrequent visits. That's what your F-DH has now, right? So more of that. If you can accept her for who she is and act accordingly, that's your best chance of having things go smoothly.

Grieve what you would have wanted in a MIL, be sad for that, but don't expect her to be what she isn't. It will only bring you pain and hurt your marriage.

This is your MIL - are you such a freaking left wing ideologue weirdo that "the principle" is worth more than having peace with your MIL and husband? For goodness sake, everyone has different political views, just agree to disagree and don't engage her conservative or annoying FB posts. Your marriage is more important than being the "winner" in a political debate or over-analyzing her political views.

My MIL is like this. She's a very kind, nice person to me, but I know that she is incredibly bigoted. If we're watching Say Yes to the Dress or something and a lesbian couple comes on, she'll change the channel and call the show trash. I basically just say nothing 99% of the time. It's hard. I get really sick of her politics (and I'm a moderate or maybe even conservative myself!) I hate hearing about the tea party.

Op here. My fiancé has a lot of respect for the hard work his mother put into raising the children alone, but finds her to be annoying and does not have a close relationship with her. He also supported me 100% regarding the comment, he was more angry than I was. He's not one to hold grudges, and I'd like an apology from her, but whatever. I'm really not terribly angry about the comment. What I am really struggling with is how to have any respect for someone who is so publicly vile. You wouldn't know it unless you saw her Facebook page. She spouts far right hate speech and blatent lies. My partner and I do not see eye to eye on many issues, but it isn't a big deal. She is out there! I want to have a healthy, friendly relationship with her. I'm just disgusted by many of the things she has posted on Facebook and don't know how to move past it.

Anonymous wrote:OP here. My SO doesn't get too bothered by people's bigotry and he'd rather just ignore that aspect of his mother. I try to do the same, so I don't think he knows how much these comments bother me. The behavior is only on Facebook, in person she appears very kind and open.

Her negative comment was directed at her son for an engagement he and I had, preventing him from attending a last minute invitation. A "Johnny could attend if it not for HER" type of comment.

Nope. This is who she is. A rational person doesn't adopt a repulsive FB persona just for the fun of it.

If your future MIL is at the age to be around for a long time and your future DH does not already have a sense of what a horror his mother is and does nothing to run interference for you (his future wife). I would really think hard about whether it was a marriage I wanted to pursue.

That sounds dramatic but really think about the kind of person your BF is, what he prioritizes, how much he values you, how he would handle his mother when kids come along, how he would handle THE KIDS when they come along.

I echo pp and suggest premarital counseling.

Consider yourself lucky your MIL has shown her cards early.

How's your fiance's relationship with her? How much does he see her, call her, etc?

1) F-DH may not have a problem with her attitude, but you sure can, and you need to make it clear that you're not going to be persuing a friendship with his mom, but rather a civil, cordial relationship where you follow his lead. "His lead" means that he does all calling, all scheduling of visits, and some visits by himself. Distance will help. You've tried playing nice friendly DIL, and you see where that got you, so take a step back.

2) But it also sounds like F-MIL is being snippy about your marriage, so you also need to say that you expect him to stand up for decisions the two of you make together. Stupid comments like "he would come but for HER" on Facebook just make her look bad, but anything said in person to your or him needs to be addressed right at the moment.

3) Talk about future kids, that there's certain behavior that you won't allow in front of children, and that if she continues in this vein, she's not going to be the grandmother you trust for babysitting and other outings.

You might consider having this conversation with a counselor or the person who's going to officiate your wedding.

As someone in a marriage like that- your choice is to live with a mil that treats you like crap and you can't respect or to get out while you easily can. Unless your husband is beautiful at standing up to his mom, always siding with you, and laughing at or shielding you from her crazies. Personally my husband isn't good at that stuff and ALL our fights are about his parents. Not sure I'd make the same decisions.

OP here. My SO doesn't get too bothered by people's bigotry and he'd rather just ignore that aspect of his mother. I try to do the same, so I don't think he knows how much these comments bother me. The behavior is only on Facebook, in person she appears very kind and open.

Her negative comment was directed at her son for an engagement he and I had, preventing him from attending a last minute invitation. A "Johnny could attend if it not for HER" type of comment.

Curious what her negative comment about you was. Do tell.

Agree with polite and distant advised by PP. The bigger problem is when/if you have children. . .

You don't say what your partner feels about his/her mother, and about your distaste for his/her mother.

But I don't think you need to build any sort of relationship with anyone you don't want to. Be polite and distant. Pretend you're a WASP when around her.

I have always been kind to my partner's mother, and tried to build a relationship with her. We became friends on Facebook and she is disgustingly vile! I always knew our political and religious views were different, but her hate speech on Facebook is so far over the top! I defriended her as I have zero interest in seeing this, though things do occasional pop up on my newsfeed. She also had a negative comment geared directly toward me that I recently saw and kindly called her out on. Overall, I now have negative feelings toward this woman, whom I was really hoping to connect with. How to I let go of my disgust?