I know I'm far from the first to post about future mother-in-law woes, but I am completely at a loss as to how to handle the situation I've found myself in.
Very long story short-ish (yes, this is the short version), my fiance's mother called my mother to talk about the guest numbers and she ended up yelling and hurling insults at my mother when she didn't get what she wanted. My parents are being SO fair and have given them an equal number of guests, and we're having the wedding close to my fiance's family b/c they insist that no one will travel to our home state and my family and I don't want to have a wedding where my fiance only has his immediate family as guests. While nothing would justify anyone yelling or insulting my mother, it's especially horrific given that my parents are being so generous to them.
I'm a forgiving person and don't hold grudges, but this is one thing I don't know how to let go. My FMiL is already a pretty unpleasant person to be around and has been unkind (unintentionally, in fairness) to me and her other daughter-in-law on countless occasions, but this is just the last straw and I'm so full of anger. Her husband has apologized to me, but I can't even bear to be in the same room with this woman at this point and am filled with a kind of anger I have never before experienced. My fiance is on my side all the way, and has tried to reason with his mother to no avail. He admits that she is a child and unkind and is behaving horribly, but she's still his mother.
Please help--how do you put up with an unbearable in-law? Especially an emotional, irrational, reactionary, and childish one who lives in town and expects her children and their spouses to treat her with nothing short reverence? My fiance's sister, who I am very close with, says that things do get better after the wedding, but the MiL also treated her parents horribly and the sister-in-law is still furious a year+ later, while the MiL acts like nothing ever happened.
Thanks so much for any guidance you can offer!