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Theresa626 · November 2009

So, I'm not Indian and I'm not in your situation but you don't have any suggestions so here's mine. Do you live far away from your parents? For example, you both live in CA and your family lives in FL. Does his family all live in a state far away from your parents? What if you had the wedding close to his family or close to you and then told your parents that you wouldn't be upset if they decided not to come? YOu could have a wedding that was mostly his side of the family.

Puja20 · November 2009

My situation was very close to yours. I also married a black guy. We dated 7 years before getting married and the main reason for that was to let my family get used to the situation.

It was difficult, yes. After we got engaged my mom didn't speak to me for 3 months. My dad tried to be happy but I could tell he wasn't. The beginning of the engagement wasn't the happy time that most engagements are. But my Dh charmed over my whole family. One of the biggest concerns with Indian parents in what other people are going to think and say. Once they saw that my family loved him and their friends loved him, my parents came around as well.

They were happy on my wedding day but even I know that my Mom was a little sad. She would've have been happier if I had gone the traditional route. But you know what, the wedding is over and everyone has gone on with their lives and me and my DH couldn't be happier.

Hopefully they come around, but even if they don't you still have to do what will make you happy. It will work out in the end.

Good luck! Oh and there quite a few brides on this board that have gone through this, you will probably get more responses on Monday as this board is busier during the week.

HisBelovedOne · December 2009

This is gonna be long. Sorry in advance.

My FI's parents majorly disapprove. His mother is the worst about it. I've never been married before, but her reasons are because I'm white and I had a child before we met. She always has disapproved, since the beginning of our relationship. Early on she told me she was hoping to arrange marriages for both her boys "the way my marriage was done, and the way it's supposed to be" in what (I'm pretty sure) was an attempt to warn me off and try to nudge me out of his life. She confuses me, though - most of the time she's a bit standoffish, but sometimes it seems like she's starting to accept me (she let me henna her hair before they went to India in June, and I've helped her with sewing projects).

We've been together a little over a year and engaged a little under a month, and she's only just now starting to treat me like anything other than an outsider. His parents moved to NY from India 21 years ago, but they lived in a pretty Indian-dominated area. They lived there till FI was 14, and then moved to this little white-bread Florida town (where FI and I met), and his mom is still having a LOT of trouble realizing and coping with the fact that her little boys (they're 20 and 17) aren't as Indian as she wanted them to be.

She told him growing up that he'd be disowned if he married someone who wasn't Indian, but she changed her mind about that in June. However, she tells him she still hasn't given up hope that one day he'll come to his senses and marry an Indian girl instead of this "white girl who will only take you for everything you have when she inevitably divorces you because that's how American girls are." (Yes, she actually SAID that to him). In fact, they were trying to set him up with someone else just a few months ago, even though it was plainly obvious that we were serious about our relationship.

My own parents haven't exactly been a dream either. Until recently, my mother preferred to pretend FI didn't exist, and my father refused to get to know him at all because he wasn't Christian (neither am I, but *YOU* try explainig this to a stubborn-as-a-rock Minnesotan who refuses to believe his little girl doesn't follow the religion she was raised in!). So we were catching hell from both immediate families, and his exteded family has been difficult. They haven't met me, but he's always been the "not-quite-black" sheep of the family and getting engaged to a white girl hasn't helped the situation regarding his older and/or more traditional relatives. His cousins (closer to our age and more "Westernized" than their parents) are happy for us, and our friends were (still are) a great support.

The best advice I can give you is to let your parents see how happy you are with him, how well he treats you, how well he gets on with the rest of your family. It's hard for parents to watch their kids grow up (believe me... my son just turned 4 a week ago!), and the natural reaction when they choose, even as adults, something that goes against the culture and traditions they raised them in is usually negative. Most often, with time they'll see that this is a good thing. I would still have the wedding and invite them - they are your parents and they do love you, and it would probably hurt them more if you didn't invite them. Also, you don't want to look back on your wedding in 20 years and regret not having them there.

WORKING BRIDES · December 2009

To all of you ladies, you have to do what your hearts tells you to do!! I am a wedding planner (interracially married) and I see the disapproving inlaws ALL the time. It is so hard to be the buffer in those situations, but at the end of the day YOU have to live YOUR lifes!! Go about your planning as best you can. Bring your spouse around as much as you can. Try to prevent any disrespect on either side, but if it gets unbearable you must look towards your future. I know how difficult it is to tell a desi parent that you are doing it YOUR way, but sometimes that is what it takes. If they think you are walking out of their lifes they most likely will behave a little better. You know that desi parents care about image a great deal, so tell them exactly that. When you lay the cards on the table and say this is about your happiness and not Padma Auntie & Rahul Uncle's view of you, they began to see a little clearer.

Good luck to all of you.

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