Hey, cms39, I hear ya.

You know, I was married for 16 years. I used to think that my in-laws loved me to death, but as time went on, the ignoring got worse. Some of the things that would happen were that they would speak Spanish (my in-laws were Mexican) in my presence knowing I didn't know what they were saying. They would tell me to come into the kitchen and not sit alone in the living room and then proceed to speak Spanish. This was quite disheartening. Then there were the times I would be ignored unless I actually pitched in and helped with the house work. Although it was something I would have normally done, there were times that my mother-in-law would look at me with this look as she asked me to help out...kind of like she was saying "you never clean up do you?"

As a result, I slowly stopped wanting to visit them. And, while I thought I was a catch as well for my ex (I had a college degree, came from a pretty good family, etc.), it just didn't seem to make a fit for them. They would either not be pleased with me because they thought I was being snooty (please, I never had a snooty bone in my body), or I wasn't doing enough to be the "good little wife and mother". In their eyes, I just wasn't doing what they expected me to. They just couldn't get past the fact that we are all raised differently and we all have our good points and bad. The point is to be accepted for our good points and to be able to over-look what is perceived to be bad points, and not ignore the person. I mean our spouses marry us for who we are, and that should be enough for our in-laws to accept us.

Lastly, if your spouse has also always had this problem of being ignored, then I guess that's just the norm. Just go with the flow and do what you would normally do in any social gathering. Your in-laws seem to be doing just that anyway.

Hope your New Year is a happy one