Half brother feels left out.. Advice

bellanella3

Hi,

I need some advice. Our wedding is June 22, 2013 and as of now we have 8 bridesmaid and 8 groomsmen, 2 of which are my full brothers (my fiancé is close to them). One of my bridesmaid is my sis in law, who is like a best friend. Anyway I have another older brother who is my half.. We didn't grow up super close but as we got older I see him more and his son is my godson. When it came time to choose our wedding party, my fiancé decided to include my 2 full brothers and my godson as the junior groom. we assigned my half bro to do a reading at the mass. Now my half brother feels like are dissing him because he isn't in the wedding party. My fiancé has 4 siblings and 2 are in the wedding party and 2 are not. He also has friends he wanted to include and didn't because of size. We dont want to offend my bro or make him feel left out and we thought a reading and his son in the wedding was good enough. If we include him then we have more guys than girls and I don't want to include his wife because what would their 10 yr old daughter do? Sit with family in the church? Are we being offensive by having my 2 brothers as groomsmen and not the other. ?

bellanella3

It's not so much about the number of people being even, it's the fact that we feel he is represented and included .. Plus my fiancé chose his side already. Would it be worse to include him late and feel like a pity invite or should we stand our ground

0312syd1986

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_wedding-party_half-brother-feels-left-out-advice?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding BoardsForum:37Discussion:7fc27f61-e5a8-49de-bf07-803c4af3d3bdPost:e7253f18-eff2-4f21-8b6e-f594105d2dfe">Half brother feels left out.. Advice</a>:
[QUOTE]Hi, I need some advice. Our wedding is June 22, 2013 and as of now we have 8 bridesmaid and 8 groomsmen, 2 of which are my full brothers (my fiancé is close to them). One of my bridesmaid is my sis in law, who is like a best friend. Anyway I have another older brother who is my half.. We didn't grow up super close but as we got older I see him more and his son is my godson. When it came time to choose our wedding party, my fiancé decided to include my 2 full brothers and my godson as the junior groom. we assigned my half bro to do a reading at the mass. Now my half brother feels like are dissing him because he isn't in the wedding party. My fiancé has 4 siblings and 2 are in the wedding party and 2 are not. He also has friends he wanted to include and didn't because of size. We dont want to offend my bro or make him feel left out and we thought a reading and his son in the wedding was good enough. If we include him then we have more guys than girls and I don't want to include his wife because what would their 10 yr old daughter do? Sit with family in the church? Are we being offensive by having my 2 brothers as groomsmen and not the other. ?
Posted by bellanella3[/QUOTE]

I sort of had this problem myself, the only difference is that we aren't close to my fiance's half brother.  But you are not obligated to have him in the wedding party if you don't want to. The fact that you have him doing a reading or two is awesome and he should feel privilaged to do so. If he truly wants you to be happy, then he should understand and be supportive of your decisions. This is YOUR wedding, and you are allowed to do what you please. You can't make everyone happy. Hope this helped!

Peledreamsofrain

Normally I'd say to stand your ground because nobody has a right to manipulate their way into a WP. However, he's been excluded for an arbitrary and demeaning reason, and knows it. I would extend the olive branch here and let it be his decision. Tell him that you want him in your wedding, and didn't mean to make him feel excluded. Tell him he us important to you, and is welcome to join the WP if that's what he prefers. At this point, don't take the reading away either unless he suggests it. Even sides do not hold a candle to standing next to your loved ones.

Lisa50

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_wedding-party_half-brother-feels-left-out-advice?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding%20BoardsForum:37Discussion:7fc27f61-e5a8-49de-bf07-803c4af3d3bdPost:81d1cb60-68c8-4e49-9e23-8ee2e2c09d3b">Re: Half brother feels left out.. Advice</a>:
[QUOTE]It's not so much about the number of people being even, it's the fact that <font color="#993366"><strong>we feel he is represented and included </strong></font>.. Plus my fiancé chose his side already. Would it be worse to include him late and feel like a pity invite or should we stand our ground
Posted by bellanella3[/QUOTE]

I'm not sure how someone can be "represented and included" if he or she is not, in fact, included.   This is <strong><em>your</em></strong> half-brother, correct?  I'm not sure about the pity vs. stand your ground characterization is coming from, but consider this: YOU have always had the opportunity to include YOUR half-brother as one of YOUR attendants.  It has nothing to do with your fiance's choices.

I must be missing something here ...

Peledreamsofrain

In Response to Re:Half brother feels left out.. Advice:[QUOTE]What's a junior groom?

If youve already asked your WP, I'd just let this go. I find it odd that a grown man is pouting over this tbh. Posted by jcbsjr[/QUOTE]

I thought so too at first, but I'm getting the feeling he was originally told about even sides being important as an excuse. That would make me seriously angry too.

GoodLuckBear14

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_wedding-party_half-brother-feels-left-out-advice?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding BoardsForum:37Discussion:7fc27f61-e5a8-49de-bf07-803c4af3d3bdPost:b4fdde38-51ff-4386-936b-5cce232294d6">Re:Half brother feels left out.. Advice</a>:
[QUOTE]Normally I'd say to stand your ground because nobody has a right to manipulate their way into a WP. However, <strong>he's been excluded for an arbitrary and demeaning reason, and knows it</strong>. I would extend the olive branch here and let it be his decision. Tell him that you want him in your wedding, and didn't mean to make him feel excluded. Tell him he us important to you, and is welcome to join the WP if that's what he prefers. At this point, don't take the reading away either unless he suggests it. Even sides do not hold a candle to standing next to your loved ones.
Posted by Peledreamsofrain[/QUOTE]

Been in this position before and it really does hurt. OP- If he asked you to be Godmother to his son and you didn't even think to include him in your wedding, it probably hurts even more.

bellanella3

I appreciate all your posts but unfortunately some of you think the only reason i didn't include him in my party is because i wanted even sides. I dont care about that at all, in fact, I wanted one of my other brothers to be my man of honor (so i'm not worried about traditional look of WP). My reasoning like i said before was because 2 out of my fiance's 4 siblings are not in the WP, as well as 4 of his nieces and nephews. Therefore, our reasoning was trying to balance out how the families were represented in our WP. We didnt want my side to consume the entire wedding party, because my fiance has childhood friends that he wanted also, just so happens i have 3 brothers. So we thought well lets include my 2 brothers that we are both closest to, and 2 of his siblings that he is closest to, then for those who arent groomsmen/bridesmaids, we will have one of their children play a role, or have them do a toast, reading, bring the communion to the alter, etc. This way it allows room for his childhood friends. Right now we have 8 each and really didn't want to go bigger than that, hence, involving the siblings in other ways. Apparently, my brother in law's wife called my dad to explain how my brother SHOULD be involved because the other 2 brothers were... not sure if she understands he is invovled just not as a groomsman. Now we feel obligated to ask him and think it's even worst asking late.

QueenOfTheSea

I have 1 sister and 1 brother.  My FI has 2 half sisters, 1 full brother, and 1 step-brother.  Here is what we did.  My sister is my MOH and my brother a GM.  My fiance's sisters are invited to the wedding, but not involved in any other way for the following reason.  They are both 10+ yrs older than us and were born, raised, and still live in WA, my fiance was born in HI after his dad and the girls' mom divorced and his dad remarried, and my FI has only seen his sisters once in his whole life, and they quite honestly don't want anything to do with him and his brother because they are still bitter upset over the fact that their mom and dad divorced and dad remarried, we live in NE and they have even as much as stated to FFIL that they don't even know if a trip out here for our wedding is worth anything since they aren't "really family."  My FI brother is in the Army and will be deployed for our wedding, unless there is a miracle, and so he is being included on the program as the "honorary best man," and my FI's BF will be his BM.  If FBIL isn't deployed, he will stand next to FI, but if he is deployed, he is still apart of our wedding in memory.  My FI's stepbrother wants to be involved, but because they aren't super close, he isn't a GM; because our church parking lot won't accomodate to all of our guests, a business across the street is lending us their parking lot for the day, and the step-brother is literally thrilled (he is only a high school freshman) to direct traffic to the 2nd lot, help park cars, if needed, and greet people (and I really do mean LITERALLY THRILLED!)  He just wanted to be thought of in some way, even something small like this!

My advice is, don't make exceptions because feelings were hurt, and don't feel obligated because he's family; I feel like the closest people should have the biggest "jobs."  Ask him if there is anything else that he would be willing to do, even if its small or a "chore job," he may be willing to just because he wants to be involved, considered, and thought of!