My fiancé (31 M) ended no contact with my future sister in law (29 F)
My future sister-in-law and I have been no contact since my daughter was born. Before that, I had only met her 3 times, but every interaction I saw she was extremely rude to her family and treated them poorly. I was always kind to her and never had conflict with her directly.
When my daughter was born, everyone got the TDAP vaccine except her. That was her choice and I respected that, but she handled it badly. She told my fiancé his ex “would’ve never made his family get vaccines,” and when he explained it was a mutual decision between both of us for our newborn, she said he was “delusional” if he didn’t think everyone saw how toxic our relationship was. Which was honestly crazy to me because my fiancé and I have a very healthy relationship. He never had a close relationship with her either for her to really know how our relationship was.
A few months later, she asked my fiancé to dinner to “make up” but instead spent the entire dinner insulting me and our relationship. She told him I was controlling, toxic, and would eventually leave him homeless and “take everything he has.” She also said I was hiding him because I never posted him on Facebook (I never posted on Facebook in general). He got up and left.
I later reached out to her kindly to clear the air, and she said she had no interest in reconciliation with him so she sees no point in speaking with me. She also said she just saved two seats at her wedding for people who actually care to know her. After that, she continued making snide comments in family group chats and even commented rudely on one of my public Facebook posts. We were not invited to her wedding (obviously, lol)
Now, 5 months after the wedding, she’s getting divorced. Supposedly she cheated on her husband, and he wants nothing to do with her. She’s now reconnecting with family members she previously pushed away (including my future mother in law). On Monday my fiance sat down with her and apparently she took accountability for her behavior. She said she regrets how she acted, blamed a lot of it on backing her husband. She said her husband was the one who felt strongly about vaccines, and she also said that her husband isn’t close with any of his family so she didn’t care to be close with hers. So she was just following his lead. Now she says she realizes how important family is and she wants a relationship with us and with my daughter who is now 18 months old who she has never met before.
Tonight she’s coming to my house and honestly I’m dreading it. My home feels like my safe space, and she caused me a lot of stress while I was freshly postpartum as a new mother. I don’t want to get in the way of her relationship with my fiancé or eventually her niece if she truly has changed, but I also don’t trust her yet and would need a very slow rebuilding process.
I’m not sure how to handle this. If she tries discussing the past with me, I am not sure whether I should be honest about how her behavior has affected me or if I should just more forward peacefully and act like water under the bridge. How would you navigate this?