Gallery: You Can't Stand Your Husband's Family. 5 Ways To Cope.

Your mother-in-law is coming to visit for the weekend. Quiet as it’s kept, you’d rather have a pap smear than spend more than 30 minutes with her. 

Why is that? Several years ago Today published a piece on whether or not women are wired to dislike their man’s mom. According to a study cited in it, “60 percent of mother/daughter-in-law relationships — compared to just 15 percent of son/mother-in-law relationships — are strained.”

You don’t have the time and we don’t have the copy space to get into ALL of the reasons why this might be the case. But a semi-obvious one is because you and your husband’s mother are (usually) the two top women in his life. Naturally, there tends to be some jealousy associated with that. Then, if your mother-in-law—and the rest of your husband’s family—doesn’t respect the boundaries the two of you have put into place, that takes the irritation to a whole ‘nother level!

We’d hate for you to go the rest of your life smiling through gritted teeth while secretly wondering how you can fake your death so you never have to see your husband’s family again. 

How about trying some of these tips? Ones that just might take you from merely tolerating your in-laws (and the rest of the folks) to actually (gasp!) liking them.