Anyone in your family you are not too fond of?

[sugary]

Is there anyone in your immediate or not so immediate family you are not too fond of? Will you invite them to your wedding and hope they will not come? Or what can you do so they do not spoil your special day?

Since there is no way I cannot invite my dad''s brother and his family, I am just hoping they will not come. My uncle is extremely loud and obnoxious and his wife is not friendly whatsoever. They are always saying the wrong thing and I am afraid they will offend my FI''s family. We see them as little as possible and even my dad does not go out of his way to see him. But my grandmother (dad''s mother) will insist. Even now they are complaining behind our backs to my grandmother that they were not invited to my parents for Christmas.

 

[wannaBMrsH]

Yup, I have one of my Dad''s sisters that I can''t stand...but we are having a destination wedding and if she pays for her flights, hotel, etc. then she will be received with open arms and a very chic OOT welcome gift! Hee!

I honestly doubt that people who don''t absolutely love us, will make the expense especially in this economy.

 

[Haven]

I dislike my father's family, including his parents, sister, and nephew. I really didn't want to invite them to our wedding, but I had to do it, and it was fine.

My father's father wore a baseball cap to the entire formal event, he told bizarre stories to my friends, and he was generally his very embarrassing self. My father's mother is a mean woman, but she was on very good behavior at our wedding. My aunt and her felon son were fine, too.

It was a bit frustrating to have to spend some time with these people, as I do not have any relationship with them whatsoever and I do not consider them family, but in the end it was absolutely fine. My only memories of my wedding are filled with love and excitement. I'd focus on the positive, especially because it sounds like you must invite them.

ETA: I should add that I didn't even recognize my father's father at our rehearsal dinner. He came in with one of my sisters and I said to my mother "Who is THAT?" Just a little illustration of how distant we are.

 

[musey]

Date: 12/22/2008 7:00:19 PM
Author:sugary
Is there anyone in your immediate or not so immediate family you are not too fond of? Will you invite them to your wedding and hope they will not come? Or what can you do so they do not spoil your special day?

Oh of course. There were a few extended family members that I find rude and was not looking forward to seeing on our wedding day. None of them came. Their excuses for not attending were interesting. One was on a 6-month sailing trip in the South Pacific (a mid-life-crisis meets divorce mess adventure), an aunt/uncle/cousin set said they "don't like to fly" (not "we can't afford to travel," or "so-and-so can't handle flying physically"--just "we don't feel like it."), and another aunt/uncle/cousin set said that they "don't think weddings are a big enough deal to warrant traveling" (it should be mentioned that this group is the only family within comfortable driving distance of our wedding location).

So it all worked out in the end. All the family members that I was iffy about having there flaked out anyway. Lucky me.

On the other hand, even though our wedding was on the smaller side (~60 people including the two of us), we barely saw a lot of the people there. Honestly, unless you expect them to go out of their way to bug you, you probably won't have a bit of trouble avoiding them

 

[emeraldlover1]

We have decided not to invite my moms brother and my fiance''s dad''s brother and his family. It was a decision that we decided on with our famiilies. I''m sorry you have to deal with this and I don''t really have any more suggestions.

 

[iheartscience]

Oh there are definitely family members I''m not so fond of! However, I''m inviting them all except for one person-my great-aunt. And don''t bother getting the picture of a cute little old lady in your head, because she is anything but. She''s not old, for one, and she''s straight up bossy and rude. I can''t stand her. She''s not at all close to my immediate family so I doubt it will be perceived as a slight, but yeah, she is definitely NOT invited.

 

[elrohwen]

I absolutely feel you on this one and I even posted about it a few months back. My mom has a mother and two brothers (not married, no kids) who we don''t talk to. She''s gone through periods of time talking to her mom, but in my life she''s spent more time not talking to her than talking to her. They''re not nice people and they''ve always treated her horribly. They haven''t tried to have a relationship with me and I haven''t even met one of the uncles (and only met my grandmother twice).

I''m not inviting most of my dad''s family because the budget is tight and I never speak to them (though I have nothing against them, we''re just not a close family). They''ll understand because we didn''t go to their kids'' weddings either. Anyway, despite not inviting some of my dad''s family, I feel guilty for not inviting my mom''s family because they helped to pay for my high school and college and they will probably disown me if they find out they''re not invited (by disown I mean probably write me out of the will and never speak to me again).

At this point I probably won''t invite them and just hope they don''t find out. If we had a huge budget and could invite tons of people I would be more magnanimus, but we''re already cutting people we really want to invite. We might change our mind at the last minute though and invite them hoping they don''t come.

It''s a really tough situation. It sounds like your relatives will definitely find out they weren''t included and make a big stink about it. Then again, I''m of the camp that says it''s your wedding day and you shouldn''t have to invite people that will make it miserable for you. I don''t think you should have to pay to feed people that will only cause drama on a day that should be about you and your future husband.

 

[Izzy03]

I am finding that this the worst part of planning a wedding. This is the only reason (besides money) that I almost had a destination wedding. It makes my stomach turn thinking about the $$$ we are spending to feed these people who I don''t want there in the first place!

 

[pennquaker09]

There are people in my family that I don''t particularly like, but I felt like I should invite them to share the experience with the rest of the family. In the end, they didn''t come.

 

[alli_esq]

Yep. I have a cousin I can''t stand, but she lives in NY and I know she''ll come (though she''ll b*tch about it nonstop). My wedding is on a Friday in NJ--she''s already started telling me how crappy it was for me to schedule my wedding at a time when many people will have trouble coming. My response was that I am giving people who need to travel over a year''s notice, and if they can''t come, I understand.

I wish she wouldn''t come, but I can''t avoid inviting her. I will have lots of people there who will be happy to be there, though, so I''m hoping that will be enough to allow me to ignore her completely. My mother actually wanted me to include this cousin in my wedding party, but there is no way I am going to do that.

 

[SarahLovesJS]

Where do I start?

I cut about 90% of my family. I am not inviting anyone who doesn''t want to be there or won''t be happy to be there.

 

[oobiecoo]

I have 2 half brothers. My oldest brother is divorced, living with his ex wife again and has been in and out of prison. He has a severe drug problem and is pretty sketchy sometimes. I really didn''t want him at the wedding... or his children. His kids are goth and rarely smile and just generally look mopey all the time.

My other brother has 5 beautiful children and has always managed to keep up appearances until recently. He has gotten into drugs really bad and has been abusive to his wife. I REALLY wanted him and his family there but he was in jail and his wife was sketchy so I didn''t get my 2 flower girls and none of them came.

My oldest brother ended up bringing his goth family and was an usher. He was so polite and even saved up so he could buy his family some nice clothes for the wedding. They bought us a really nice gift that we weren''t expecting at all. At the end of the day, I was glad he came and brought his kids and ex wife.

I think it just shows that the people who you fear may embarrass you or themselves may just end up surprising you!


On a side note, we did not invite any of my mom''s side of the family. We have never been close to any of them and they are all obnoxious. If we spoke to them more often then we probably would have invited them though.

 

[emilina22]

honestly there is only one person i am not so fond of and thats my FIs brother...he has a tendency to rub everything in our faces...and im just sick of it...i mean honestly we dont need to hear about the "details" of the last night of your honeymoon while out at dinner with our friends..

hes the one who got married to the girl he only dated a month... (began dating the beginning of jury, engaged by the first week of august and married by the first week of November, and no its not because he is with child either)he constenlt rubs the fact that he got married first in our faces, which we really dont understand, and all he ever talks about is how amazing and wonderful and perfect his wife is (i have never heard her speak more then a sentence in public) and i dunno its all just really weird and uncalled for...

but yea hes the one i dont like very much....

 

[Bliss]

Yes, and thank goodness they will not be there. WHEW! I have a cousin who has a young son -- very cute but Dennis the Menace. And they do not try to control him. He will run around the house and throw everything on the ground. They think it''s cute. So I am very relieved that they are not coming to the wedding. I can just see the cute lil'' booger screaming and running around the guests tearing things off of them and throwing things.

 

[DearBuddha]

Fortunately there wasn''t anyone I didn''t want to invite, but due to the size of our guest list (both sides of my family are HUGE) we had to cut back on family members we hardly ever see.

UNfortunately planning weddings with family members sometimes creates tension, and long story short, not only did my sister and her family NOT come to my wedding, I no longer have a relationship with her at all.

In explanation, my sister is not a huge fan of my DH (clueless as to why-he''s a great guy, obviously loves me, and gets along fine with everyone else in my family). I didn''t pick her as my matron of honor simply because we had drifted apart in recent years, but this one action on my part resulted in her going bat-sh*t crazy.

Crazy as in going so far as to email family members behind my back, ordering them "not to go to my wedding" kind of crazy. She was vicious to my mother (we''re half-sisters), and turned her children against me for "not being there" to help them in their proposed wedding roles (junior bridesmaid/ring bearer); I was living across the country during the entire duration of the wedding planning, mind you-how could I be there?

Needless to say, I don''t talk to her, now do I plan to for a long time.

 

[Mediterranean]

I am, unfortunately, coming to the conclusion that I''m not terribly fond of my fiance''s sister

I''m actually EXTREMELY bummed about this because I don''t have any sisters, and I enjoy my close friendships with women IMMENSELY (e.g., I''m honestly not one of those girls who ever has problems with other girls; I''m a real girl''s girl, if you will) so I was hoping we''d be close, like sisters.

However she''s done some odd things (like signing onto her teenage son''s e-mail address and facebook account to make snarky comments about my wedding) and I feel the need to distance myself, which is sad...

I do hope she comes to the wedding, though. My fiance''s family (including her) are all extremely nice people, and very classy so I have absolutely no worry of them raining on the parade, so to speak. It''s my own personal little problem, I just wish we could be closer...

 

[CrownJewel]

My dad has 8 siblings, and I dislike most of them. They drink, turn every social event into a gambling event, are loud, are mean to my mom and in general couldn''t care less about us. But I had to invite them to our wedding (hoping they wouldn''t come) and they all showed up. They even brought 2 random people that were not invited!!!! They are in some of the photos, but we had an awesome wedding anyway. I just put them all in the same corner - you can pull off a very peaceful event if you are clever with the seating arrangements!!

Don''t worry, invite them and have faith that it will turn out great

 

[sugary]

Well, I have already decided not to invite them because of what happened over Christmas. My FI''s parents have been in town for the past week and my parents had them over to their house for Christmas. My uncle (dad''s brother) and his family were not invited. (They have never ever been invited for that fact). However, for the first time ever they just happened to drop in about 1 hour before we sat down for dinner. And yes, they tried their best to ruin the evening.

Turns out, my grandmother (dad''s mom) said something to them about my FI and his family being there so they thought, so why don''t we just make jerks of ourselves and ruin the whole evening. Well, my FI''s dad is cuban and his mom is not so there was a nasty comment about that and another one about FI being too cheap to buy a ring so actually we aren''t really engaged (ring is being custom made;why is it so difficult to understand that?!) We were extremely quiet about our plans ( pretty much decided to have the wedding in Florida and we are not even telling my grandmother until she gets off the plane... we''re telling her it is a vacation if she is well enough to travel -she''s 86). Uncle and family finally left as we were all pretty much ignoring them and did not say much to fuel the fire. We all just had a good laugh afterwards.

My FI''s parents were so gracious! They are amazing and said they understand how family can sometimes be and there are a few on their side they will not invite so they are happy we are keeping it fairly small because it will give them a reason not to invite them. My parents and FI''s parents got along so well immediately. Getting to know my FI''s parents better was so wonderful and I felt so comfortable being around them.

Hearing all your comments made me think about this seriously, but in the end it was my uncle''s actions that helped me decide.

 

[Nocturnius]

Yeah, my in-laws.

But I had no choice in them coming, it was kind of a necessity. And yes, they did manage to piss me off and upset me at every turn. One made my husband an HOUR LATE, one brought booze to the reception for which I could have been fined up to $25k for (only licensed vendors can serve alcohol - luckily my mom stopped them at the door and told them to take it back to their car immediately), one made the whole day a bitter competition over how I got married before she did, one overrode my music decisions when I was the one paying for what was being played. None of them would speak to anyone in my family (his family thinks they''re special because at one time, they were "worth about 500k" and so they turn their noses up at my never-higher-than-working-middle-class family, even though they''re just as poor now, too.)

I just try to forget how much I hated my wedding. I didn''t even order photos - I sent everyone the link to the photos so they could order theirs.

Hopefully everything will work out for you.

 

[frillylace]

Nocturnius, is that why you are planning a renewal sometime? (I think we both talked about how we are both wanting to do renewals). I had some unplesantries at my wedding as well which is part of the reason I want a renewal. My SIL pitched a fit about how she wasn''t a bridesmaid for example.