Moms and Maids

I can't take my Fiances family!

I'm new here, but I'm not entirely sure where to go on from the point that I'm stuck at.

My fiance proposed in June. Our engagement got off to a rocky start, with his family not really understanding or accepting what being engaged really meant. His sister even told us she cried for several days after finding out because he did not tell her before he proposed. From the start its been hell. His sister's first sit down with my FI after the engagement news began with her telling him that we'll probably get divorced. His mother seemed alright at first, but has steadily gone downhill.

We live with his parents (I pay rent, he does not) and have always had a hard time with it to begin with, but its gotten significantly worse. We finally decided on a date, changing all wedding plans that I ever wanted to accommodate what his family wanted too. When we told them, his mother told us that we would no longer have a home if we chose to get married when we wanted to (this October). We're in graduate school, so we had no choice but to change our date and save to move out, but we cant afford it for another few months (if they'll even let us go then, they've stopped us from moving out before). She made such a huge argument out of this that we cancelled our engagement party and my family refuses to see her anymore. Since we live with her, she's since pretended that nothing ever happened and refuses to acknowledge that she was out of line.

Living with them is killing me, I don't know how to overcome my anger for the entire situation. Since the fight, we're stopped planning our wedding and no longer have anything to look forward to in regards to our engagement. She's effectively ruined the experience and is now part of our every day life.

I was so excited about marrying my fiance, but now I'm not so sure. Having these horribly selfish people in my life seems like a death wish. My fiance has a hard time standing up to his family, and we dont seem to have any allies within them. They've effectively made him chose between me or them and he has just been silent and straddling in the center.

Re: I can't take my Fiances family!

  • JaxInBlue said:
    In all honesty, I'd start with your FI.  Does he want your situation to change?  Does he want to stand up more to your family so that you two can move ahead with your relationship?  Because you said he's unclear, I think you need to consider his answer might be family over fiancee.  However, if he indicates he wants to support you and your relationship, then I think talking with someone outside of the family is a good step.  Your graduate program should know of campus-based resources he can use to develop an action plan and communication strategies, and that you can use to support him.  You may even want to talk with someone together about the stress this has caused in your relationship.

    Then, I think it's about breaking your plan into actionable steps.  The first is committing to moving out and getting your own place.  Presuming that you are both adults over 18, you don't need permission to go.  Look at your finances; understand when you will be able to go.  Don't tell anyone your plan right now.  In fact, I wouldn't tell anyone until the very last minute if it were me.  Then, support your FI as he tells his family "We are moving out tomorrow/next weekend/at the end of the month.  We've already made arrangements for housing.  This is not something we can negotiate.  This is what is best for us." 

    After you move out, then start saving for and planning the wedding.  Yes, you may wind up with a longer than usual engagement, but since you are both in school and then may understandably want some time to focus on your jobs, it wouldn't be unusual for your engagement in be two-plus years.  In addition, once you are free to plan on your own, you may rediscover your excitement.  As long as your FI's parents aren't paying for the wedding, you do not need to include them in the decision making.  Call their bluff if they threaten not to come because they don't like part of your plans.

    At the same time, I think you need decide for yourself what your breaking point if.  If your FI is not interested in or ready in learning to stand up to his family, where do you draw the line on your relationship?  Is there someplace in the short term you can go while you decide if the relationship is worth salvaging if he feels differently than you?  Do you have family or friends with a spare room for a month or two while you get your feet back under you?

    Be clear with FI about what you need and want - I need more support from you when your family talks negatively about our plans; I need us to commit to moving out in October/November/between semesters.  I want us to stay out of the house 2 nights a week so we can have time to talk without other people around.  I want us to talk with someone who might be able to help. 

    I hope things get better for you.
    All of this.  If your FI expects you to always do what his family wants because he's not willing to stand beside you and establish for them that you two are a serious and independent couple (and yes, you need to be able to support yourselves under your own roof to do that), then I think you need to seriously think things through before you go ahead with marrying him.

    Also, if you do marry him, just as his family will be stuck with you for the rest of your lives, so will you be stuck with them.  You can't control or change them, only your own reactions to them.  Figure out which things are really important to you that you and he need to stand by no matter what, and which things you can let go of, and then follow through.  You and he do need to make clear to them, together, that there is to be no being snide and insulting to you, talk of divorce, or excluding you from the family, period.  Something else you should also consider is how involved they can be in the lives of any future children that you have.  If you and he can get couples counseling (or even if you can go on your own), I recommend it highly. 
  • edited June 2015
  • Definitely do not even THINK of planning the wedding until you have moved out and are financially independent from his parents!  And like PP's have said, no one can stop you from moving out- they may guilt you, threaten you, even say they'll disown you, but I think that in this case all of those options are preferable to continuing to live with them.  If your FI doesn't feel the same, I think it's time to let him go unfortunately because your relationship will never be successful living under their roof.  

    This is the time when your FI has to prove that he will put you above all others, no matter what else it costs him- that is the true meaning of being engaged and married.  I do feel your pain though- my FMIL also cried when we got engaged because FI didn't tell her he was proposing (because he knew she would be negative about it)... it sucks but it'll feel a lot better when you know that FI and you are on the same team 100%.    


  • Ditto PPs. Are you planning to live with them after you get married as well? Because if you can't afford to live on your own, it's not the best idea to be planning a wedding.  It doesn't sound like your fiance has any kind of fire lit under him to get out of his parents' house. 
    What did you think would happen if you walked up to a group of internet strangers and told them to get shoehorned by their lady doc?~StageManager14
    image
  • I'm new here, but I'm not entirely sure where to go on from the point that I'm stuck at.

    My fiance proposed in June. Our engagement got off to a rocky start, with his family not really understanding or accepting what being engaged really meant. His sister even told us she cried for several days after finding out because he did not tell her before he proposed. From the start its been hell. His sister's first sit down with my FI after the engagement news began with her telling him that we'll probably get divorced. His mother seemed alright at first, but has steadily gone downhill.

    We live with his parents (I pay rent, he does not) and have always had a hard time with it to begin with, but its gotten significantly worse. We finally decided on a date, changing all wedding plans that I ever wanted to accommodate what his family wanted too. When we told them, his mother told us that we would no longer have a home if we chose to get married when we wanted to (this October). We're in graduate school, so we had no choice but to change our date and save to move out, but we cant afford it for another few months (if they'll even let us go then, they've stopped us from moving out before). She made such a huge argument out of this that we cancelled our engagement party and my family refuses to see her anymore. Since we live with her, she's since pretended that nothing ever happened and refuses to acknowledge that she was out of line.

    Living with them is killing me, I don't know how to overcome my anger for the entire situation. Since the fight, we're stopped planning our wedding and no longer have anything to look forward to in regards to our engagement. She's effectively ruined the experience and is now part of our every day life.

    I was so excited about marrying my fiance, but now I'm not so sure. Having these horribly selfish people in my life seems like a death wish. My fiance has a hard time standing up to his family, and we dont seem to have any allies within them. They've effectively made him chose between me or them and he has just been silent and straddling in the center.
    First, GET OUT OF THAT HOUSE!  You need to either move out on your own or move out with your FI.  They cannot stop you from moving out.  If they try to physically restrain you, then you call the cops.  Once you two get out, then begin living your life without your FILs weighing over you two.  Then develop a plan to get married.
  • My cousin lived with her husband in her parents' house. They got divorced in less than a year*. GET OUT. I understand saving money. I just graduated from grad school. My fiance has just started graduate school. Take out more loans. Live on your own, either with or without your fiance. It is clearly important for your metal well being and the survival of your relationship.

    *there were definitely other issues in their marriage/ relationship, but living with her parents was a terrible situation that often either caused or exacerbated fights and problems. 
  • I can relate to the living with the In Laws.  H and I lived with his mother pre-engagment and wedding, and if i was not for making the moving choices without MILs imput we would have been their forever.  Our plans of buying a house before the wedding fell through so we still did have to live there after the wedding for a few months, which was not ideal but we had a game plan and were constantly looking for house options. We gave ourselves a timeline and told ourselves if we cannot buy a house by this time, we will rent...and we did exactly that.  We knew in order to "buy" the house we wanted we had to save more so we could look at more options. So we opted to rent and put the buy option on hold. MIL tried to come up a reason every house we looked at "was not good because of a, or , or c."  So we stopped talking to her about what houses we were looking at and pretty much just said one night, we found a house to rent, we are moving on this date! Hooray!  

    Now our situation was not horrible considering MIL was gone a lot, we all worked a lot and she did not invade our privacy (for the most part) so it worked, but let me tell you it was the happiest day when we signed that new lease to be in our own place.  H set boundaries so I never felt it was her over me.  H I am sure would have lived rent free forever, but he knew it was not an option and that we had to do this for US.

    In your situation, it still seems like there are no boundaries. Your FI needs to establish that ASAP, and you need to make sure he is aware of how uncomfortable you are.  His family is putting him in a tough spot, and that sucks, but he has to stand up to his family.  He should not have had to get their permission to propose, so they need to get over that.  They should never put him the place to pick, but if he has to, he should pick YOU, or it is time to re-think this marriage all together.

    Sorry you are going through this.  I know it is tough.  While I was not exactly in your shoes, I can relate to many aspects of it.  Talk with your FI and make a plan.  Let him know how you are feeling and that you need his support.  If his family is not supportive then it will only get worse. 

    We were fortunate enough that my family hosted our wedding, while MIL gave us free rent to support getting our business established so we could save money.  If that was not the case, we would have had a longer engagement and would not have gotten married until we were in a place of our own.  It was temporary and we always treated it just as that. We are forever grateful for our supportive families so I know our situation was different, but in your case I would not rush into getting married until there are first boundaries, and then a timeline of when you are moving out.  Since you are not in a supportive environment, that needs to happens sooner than later.
    image

    Anniversary
  • I feel like I'm in a similar situation except thank goodness we live about 2 hours away from my future MIL.  She did (and still does) all of the same things you talked about.  She has truly sucked a lot of the fun out of our engagement when it comes to her part (she is the only parent still alive between both of us, so not having any parent happiness or support or anything was pretty devastating).  I agree with PP about putting off the wedding.  Stay engaged.  Make goals.  Make plans and don't tell anyone.

    The best advice I got was from my fabulous soon to be cousin in law.  Her husband is marrying us, and they are doing our premarital counseling.  They planned their entire wedding before they even got engaged.  She bought her gown, they set the date, they booked everything, and ordered invitations.  He proposed about a month before the wedding, and when they went to announce their engagement, they gave everyone invitations for their wedding in a month.  Some families are just REALLY REALLY hard to deal with, especially when you're the new one marrying in.  I'm there too girl.  My fiancé and I have decided to make plans as best we can and really narrow down choices before we get anybody else involved.  Like we can't involve his mom in the initial venue choice because she has a completely different idea of what she wants.  Once we have it narrowed down to two, we will invite her to come see them with us and give her input.  The same will go with food.  We will pick the caterer and just invite her to a tasting.  Some people who are used to having complete control over everything simply don't know when they are crossing a line... or that there even is a line.  BOUNDARIES ARE KEY!  I wish I had known that prior to getting engaged.  We are setting them up now though.  You can do it!  I believe in you!  Good luck!
  • So what's the plan here? Once you two get married are you still going to be living under her roof? If you can't afford your own place, can you two afford to get married? You guys need to priorities getting your own place first, get financially stable and then think about a wedding not the other ways round. Honestly this situations sounds like an absolute nightmare I hope you can figure it out
  • Ditto all the PPs above. Getting your own place is priority #1! I love my family dearly and see them quit often (multiple times a week) but could never ever live with them again! Just moving out could completely turn this situation around!

    I saw a family member live with their fiancee and then wife for over 2 years at the parents house while they were saving up, and you know what happened after 2 years? They got divorced! (Same thing as a PP said... many things were involved in the divorce but living with the parents so long didn't help at all!)

    You can't expect his family to treat you as adults when you're both still so dependent on them. No one else mentioned this but to me it's odd that your fiance is ok living rent free while you pay...
    image


    Anniversary
This discussion has been closed.
Choose Another Board
Search Boards