Hello, looking for some advice on how to handle some drama going on over my wedding guest list.
Backstory: my fiancé and I both have pretty large (extended) families, some of which we are extremely close with and many that we are not. We also have a fairly large friend group who we are very close to and spend more time with than family. I am of the mindset weddings are not a family reunion and blood is not thicker than water due to several familial strains. We have been keeping our guest list pretty tight for budget reasons (~200) and have had to make some extensive cuts. I originally wanted no kids under 18 to chop the list easily and fairly but my fiancé’s closest cousins who we spend significant time with are 15 and 16, and our flower girl is 3 (though I think that would be an easy exception). The issue for me is that I have a large amount of first and second cousins, varying in age from mid-40s to infancy. My relationship with my cousins also varies on who I spend time with— closer with some second cousins than first cousins, for example. However, including all kids would have pushed either our guest list well over OR would have needed us to cut out friends who are like family.
Solution (in our minds): we decided first cousins were a for sure yes. This gave us a solution for the 3 on his side, and many on my side were the youngest first cousin was 6. However, on the topic of my cousin’s kids (second cousins), we decided to make cuts here. We allowed second cousins by blood or marriage (This is the important part). This gave us the ability to invite my second cousins who I am close with, but excluded several others who I very much so am not close with anyways.. which I thought was fair criteria. His parents agreed to our exclusions, my parents agreed to our exclusion and didn’t think it would ruffle any feathers. Our guest list was slightly over our limit this way but we agreed to make it work because it felt most fair for all sides of the family.
The Problem: Many of my first cousins are dating individuals with multiple kids from previous relationships. None of them are married, but one has her own child with her SO. This first cousin’s SO has 4 other children, besides the daughter shared between him and my cousin. They have been together for a few years, but they are not married, not engaged, and I can count on one hand how many times I’ve met him and fewer times his children. He doesn’t have sole custody or even primary placement. The exclusion list I made would exclude his 4 kids. My cousin has started a social media war throwing shade that step-kids should be included at weddings. She has made multiple Facebook posts about the topic, and has all but tagged me in them. She has also sent me very shady text messages about my “criteria” because “weddings are meant for family” and I should have “invited less of my friends to make room”. Given my strained relationship with a lot of my family members (her being one of them) and not wanting to make it a bigger deal, I have been the bigger person and have just ignored her tirades thus far. My fiancé and I are paying for our wedding ourselves, and gifts are not the point. However, at my sister’s wedding, this cousin gave very minimally and did not even cover cost of plate. If I added the 4 kids, she is not trusted to reflect etiquette, since that has already been proven, so the only “benefit” of giving in would be to just shut her up.
I am a high anxiety person so seeing all the attacks, on top of the stress of saving money and planning the wedding has left me a little on edge and feeling sick and like I’m a terrible person. I would love any and all advice on how others would handle this scenario.