My MIL’s toxicity wasn’t some relic from the past. She was toxic right up through the last time we saw her 2 weeks before she died (she was not well but died unexpectedly in a flash). She was so toxic that we assigned a minder at my FIL’s funeral to keep her sidetracked and separate (even while she was in a wheelchair) from my FIL’s sister who she hated to the end. And of course she told DH that he should have been killed rather than his brother. There was no softening and she didn’t have an introspective bone in her body. I like your last lines @lookingforward - that sounds familiar