Vent - Mom's Guest List

psychbabe314

Sorry this is long.

My mom asked if she could have a sneak peak at the guest list that FI and I have been discussing. I sent her a copy, plus I figured it was a good chance to see if she had an suggestions. Well, suggestions she did have. She sent me a reply list that included my dad's side of the family along with a long email about why I should invite them. I told her that I'd discuss them with my FI and then asked if she could get me some addresses.

Basically, the email made me feel a bit guilty. I could see inviting one of my uncles and his wife and adult son, but... nobody else. I have an distant aunt who is always commenting on my Facebook posts, but I don't even know her. Besides my one uncle and his family, I have not seen my Dad's side of the family in almost 12 years. I have hardly heard from my grandpa/step-grandma or grandma/step-grandpa either. My biological grandma is a very cruel and manipulative person who I would rather not have in my life. And my Grandpa and step-grandma could not make it to my dad's funeral almost a year and a half ago.

Basically, there are some hard feelings. And, I can't even remember meeting any of my dad's cousins or other siblings. I haven't seen them since I was in elementary school! I don't think FI and I will be inviting them to our wedding and I'm not sure I want my grandparents to come either... Gah!!!

Thing is, I keep going back and forth. I discussed it with FI and he understands where I am coming from, but he does not understand why I wouldn't want to try and build a relationship with them if I have the chance. He has a point that maybe they have changed and then I counter with that if they had changed they would have reached out to me, and then he counters again with "Well, we are living in Japan right now and that may make it a little hard to get in a phone call"

I don't know where to go with this. Suggestions? How would I even decide who, if any, of my dad's family is invited.

Edited: Spelling

kmmssg

Stick to the ones with whom you have a relationship. Weddings aren't the pm or place to fix them, it doesn't work. This is the time to surround yourself with the people you are closer to.
If bio granny is toxic now she will be toxic at your wedding. I always caution people to think about what the ramifications would be in not inviting someone to your wedding , the long term effects. If these people haven't seen you since elementary school I don't think this will be an issue.

AddieCake

Who is paying for the wedding? If it's you, I wouldn't invite anyone you don't have a close relationship with. If it's not, you might have to compromise on some of that list of your mom's. Just because you share DNA with someone doesn't mean they have to get an invitation. We didn't invite my husband's maternal grandparents because of very bad blood between my husband and his grandfather.

[Deleted User]

If you're paying and don't want them there I don't think you should invite them. It's not like you really even have a relationship with most of these people so it's not like you have to worry about damaging it.

Tell your fiance a wedding is not a way to repair or build relationships. Do that separately from the wedding.

kvruns

psychbabe314 said:

Sorry this is long.

My mom asked if she could have a sneak peak at the guest list that FI and I have been discussing. I sent her a copy, plus I figured it was a good chance to see if she had an suggestions. Well, suggestions she did have. She sent me a reply list that included my dad's side of the family along with a long email about why I should invite them. I told her that I'd discuss them with my FI and then asked if she could get me some addresses.

Basically, the email made me feel a bit guilty. I could see inviting one of my uncles and his wife and adult son, but... nobody else. I have an distant aunt who is always commenting on my Facebook posts, but I don't even know her. Besides my one uncle and his family, I have not seen my Dad's side of the family in almost 12 years. I have hardly heard from my grandpa/step-grandma or grandma/step-grandpa either. My biological grandma is a very cruel and manipulative person who I would rather not have in my life. And my Grandpa and step-grandma could not make it to my dad's funeral almost a year and a half ago.

Basically, there are some hard feelings. And, I can't even remember meeting any of my dad's cousins or other siblings. I haven't seen them since I was in elementary school! I don't think FI and I will be inviting them to our wedding and I'm not sure I want my grandparents to come either... Gah!!!

Thing is, I keep going back and forth. I discussed it with FI and he understands where I am coming from, but he does not understand why I wouldn't want to try and build a relationship with them if I have the chance. He has a point that maybe they have changed and then I counter with that if they had changed they would have reached out to me, and then he counters again with "Well, we are living in Japan right now and that may make it a little hard to get in a phone call"

I don't know where to go with this. Suggestions? How would I even decide who, if any, of my dad's family is invited.

Edited: Spelling

Your wedding is not the place to try to repair family relationships. My mom suggested some more distant relatives as representatives of branches of the family that would have been invited had the matriarch/patriarch not been dead. I pushed back and said I understood where she was coming from but we were just going to include those family members who we were closer to and not these distant ones. My parents paid for a chunk of the wedding but I stood my ground there and they understood.

Don't be guilted into inviting someone - regardless of if it is family or friend or whoever. Invite he one Uncle if you want but don't invite the others for sake of trying to repair relationships.

Heffalump

Ditto PP's.  With all of the drama I've witnessed around weddings, that would probably be my last choice for trying to repair relationships.  There's just too much going on, too many people, complicated dynamics, and some people don't mix well with booze.

SP29

Do not be guilted into inviting anyone to your wedding.

Your wedding is a not the place to re-kindled relationships or try to mend fences, it is also not a family reunion. If your mom wants to get all the family together, she can host her own party some other time.

Inviting guests to your wedding is about sharing the moment with people you are close to, whom you care about, and who care about you. It doesn't mean you need to invite every single person you've ever met.

Myself, I would push back on this strongly, because I am strongly against the notion that *anyone* needs to be invited BECAUSE.... the only reason is because you want them there. Mostly because we were guilted into inviting a few guests and I disliked how that felt.

We were sort of guilted into inviting a bunch of DH's extended family members on his mom's side, by his grandmother. I had similar thoughts as you. Most of these people DH hadn't seen in 10 years+ and it's not like when we were in town anyone ever said, "Hey! Lets get the family over for dinner!". I was strongly against inviting them, but we gave in as DH's grandmother was not in good health (she soon passed away), so it's not something I was going to argue about. Most of them didn't end up coming, so that saved us money in the long run....Oh, and I got guilt tripped by my grandma to invite an uncle that I've met twice in my life (haven't seen him since I was 8). Yeah, I caved to grandma. It wasn't a hill to die on, and it didn't affect our budget or space. Fortunately he didn't come either (which is a terrible thing to say, you shouldn't look forward to your invited guests not coming). But anyway, I don't recommend inviting people because someone else wants you to.

What we did do, was ask each of our parents (both of our parents are divorced) who they would like to see invited. My dad and mom only had one request each. DH's dad gave us a list of 3 couples, but DH's mom gave us a list of near 10 (although this did include DH's grandmothers requests too). We told them (mainly MIL), that we would consider their requests and invite who we thought appropriate, not that we would for sure invite anyone they wanted. The couple my dad wanted to invite we didn't initially consider for the guest list, but I was glad we did invite them. Mom's guest was a given. We invited 2 out of the 3 couples on FIL's lists, and about 4 or 5 on MILs list. Both FIL and MIL were understanding and accepted our decisions on who we chose to invite.

Jen4948

Tell your mom and your FI, "I'm sorry, but these people aren't being invited.  If we already had warm relationships, then I might do it, but planning and executing this wedding is going to be stressful enough without trying to repair relationships that are either toxic, like with Bio Grandma, or distant, like with everyone else. I don't appreciate attempts to make me feel guilty about not inviting these people, so please consider the subject closed."

MyNameIsNot

psychbabe314 said:

Sorry this is long.

My mom asked if she could have a sneak peak at the guest list that FI and I have been discussing. I sent her a copy, plus I figured it was a good chance to see if she had an suggestions. Well, suggestions she did have. She sent me a reply list that included my dad's side of the family along with a long email about why I should invite them. I told her that I'd discuss them with my FI and then asked if she could get me some addresses.

Basically, the email made me feel a bit guilty. I could see inviting one of my uncles and his wife and adult son, but... nobody else. I have an distant aunt who is always commenting on my Facebook posts, but I don't even know her. Besides my one uncle and his family, I have not seen my Dad's side of the family in almost 12 years. I have hardly heard from my grandpa/step-grandma or grandma/step-grandpa either. My biological grandma is a very cruel and manipulative person who I would rather not have in my life. And my Grandpa and step-grandma could not make it to my dad's funeral almost a year and a half ago.

Basically, there are some hard feelings. And, I can't even remember meeting any of my dad's cousins or other siblings. I haven't seen them since I was in elementary school! I don't think FI and I will be inviting them to our wedding and I'm not sure I want my grandparents to come either... Gah!!!

Thing is, I keep going back and forth. I discussed it with FI and he understands where I am coming from, but he does not understand why I wouldn't want to try and build a relationship with them if I have the chance. He has a point that maybe they have changed and then I counter with that if they had changed they would have reached out to me, and then he counters again with "Well, we are living in Japan right now and that may make it a little hard to get in a phone call"

I don't know where to go with this. Suggestions? How would I even decide who, if any, of my dad's family is invited.

Edited: Spelling

I think everyone has covered the main point: invite people you actually have a relationship with.

I wanted to comment on the bold. I've gone through this quite a bit with my husband, except in reverse. I'm very close to all of my family, and they are generally all good people. When my H and I were dating, I thought it was odd that he had little to no relationship with his father for seemingly no reason. I did the same thing your FI is doing: I encouraged him to reach out and invite his father to things or to visit while we were in his town. I truly didn't understand how you could just drift away from a parent the way you drift away from your high school friends. 

It's taken a while for me to understand, but I get it now. Not every familial relationship needs to be saved, just like every friendship doesn't need to be saved. There's a reason there is no relationship and there's a reason you haven't built it before now. 

To get to the point, it's good that your FI is supportive of you, but someone who doesn't have strained family relationships might not understand why you wouldn't want to build a relationship with family. But that doesn't mean there isn't a good reason.  

psychbabe314

Thanks for all of the awesome reply's! This really helped to settle my mind and become a bit more firm in my decision to not invite them. I am sure that my mom will argue with me on inviting my grandparents, and then we will discuss it further, but I plan on holding my own. She is contributing a bit to the wedding, which I know may entitle her to some opinion on who to invite, but I know for sure that my biological grandma is not someone I want around. I am sure she will understand in the end.

Thank you ladies!