Not invited to DSis big birthday

read the whole thread

Stick with the nice auntie and visit your dad one to one.

Be careful here. I am not sure that there is much more to know - they are bullying and enjoy discharging their toxicity on to you and your family for sport.

When you change the dynamic by carefully withdrawing - it will eventually frustrate them and the 'flying monkey's' (your DF and possibly DA) will be dispatched to lure you back inot punching distance or some 'health' crisis with your DF or DM will be fabricated to trigger your reaction / response / return.

Also having been in this situation I had a to have boundaries with 'neutral' family members that I didnt want info about the others or to discuss the rift - and I was very careful what info I shared from my life as I knew this would get back. It hurt to hear about them out of context - so I always shut down any info coming my way. Its a very painful place to be - but fine if you are very intentional with building out your friendships based on reciprocal kindness and respect. My own mother was also the black sheep of her family but always turned up to family events she was invited to out of a sense of duty (she was exluded from most) but at these she was always treated with PA comments - I dont know why she continued going out of some sense of family 'loyalty' - and I vowed if this ever happened to me I would have no hesitation in not attending,

I've just read the rest of your posts. My god, distance yourself from these awful people! Stick with the nice auntie and visit your dad one to one.

You can't express your political views, you have to people please all the time, your kids are considered second best to their cousins, they're snobby, materialist and your brother let you down when it really mattered. Ugh!

Anyway it's not about me but I do understand how hurt the OP feels.

It is crap when you realise you're a "second rank" person to your own family.

Yes, I have been excluded from a number of events where my parents were invited and my mum shows me pictures of them and says how nice they were!

Well try reading all the posts over the last couple of days to understand the context.

I agree. If you go nc without asking why, you’ll always be left wondering. But be preheated for some evasive answers.

I don't think confrontation would be the answer but I really feel Op you should voice your hurt, for your own piece of mind. Your family has let you down repeatedly. I mean baby rushed to hospital and family not rushing to help and support. Wow. I think if you didn't want closure you wouldn't have posted which is why i suggested speaking out. Leave no 'maybe'.

Were you the only excluded family member though? I do think it's okay to have separate celebrations with friends and family and I wouldn't always expect to include my siblings in all my socialising, or for them to include me. But the OP has been excluded very specifically, more than once, when her other family members haven't. It's so mean.

This happened to me with my sister's 40th. I'd thrown a tea party for her the week before because I thought she hadn't organised anything. Then I found out her DH had, but not invited us! (I get on perfectly well with him).

I was really hurt! It would never have occurred to me 10 years ago to leave her/them out of a significant event.

10 years on and we've got a perfectly cordial relationship but it showed me very clearly that we weren't as close as I'd thought we were, so I distanced myself a bit and prioritised friends more.

It's them, not you. Really thoughtless to share pictures like that.

Just remember it when making future decisions.

So sorry for your situation OP. Please try to let them go and you will find it helps clear the FOG (fear, obligation and guilt) from your mind. They are banking on you will meekly not saying anything. I'd post on the group site saying it would have been nice to have been thanked for the present you had organised and contributed an equal share to and that you're not sure what you have done to deserve being left out of family events nor how they can all be complicit in excluding you which is bullying behaviour. I would then remove myself from the group so I didn't have to see their crappy responses. No point asking why they've done this as you will just get BS excuses. If anyone really didn't know about it and does actually care, they will contact you directly. Don't expect this though.

I wouldn't recommend calling your "D"Sis or "D"M. If you need to say something then face-to-face is best as they can't hide their reactions and don't have time to give a measured response the way they can over the phone or when messaging.

I'd be ignoring them after this and getting on with my life and investing in other family members from your partner's side and friends.

It isn't you, it is them. You are a good person, they just need a scapegoat and they won't be able to ever admit that.

For all those saying confront, that just feeds this dynamic and causes tons more drama and will get thrown into her face every time she sees them.

I'm big on confrontation. But not where there's no chance of anything at all positive coming out of it. And there is no way for OP to win anything. It will make things worse. This is where inaction is the best policy. Don't return calls and texts, if anyone tries to force contact just say things are busy. Be the greyest rock in a sea of grey rocks.

One thing. The mom may be the narc but the dad could be the enforcer. He might be the one to really beware of. When things don't go the narc's way, the enforcer can try to impose the narc's will and be really harsh about it.

I think in your shoes I'd quietly remove myself from the family group. I'd message my Dad to say I'm really hurt by being excluded again from a big family event particularly as the family organiser of the 50th gift, that I value my relationship with him and it is in no way reflective of how you feel about him.

I'm not sure I could be bothered to meet up with DM in the holidays. For what? More implied criticism? I'd be tempted to suggest only meeting in places she'd hate but I'm petty like that.

I'm really sorry for you, OP. It hurts like hell once you realise your place in the family. You've had good advice here, and you sound strong. I wish you well.

This made me laugh, I would do the same. 😆 🤣

My husband has 3 sisters and this thread has reminded me that they all went to the ceremony of his nieces wedding .
About a week before the ceremony we were sent an invite to the evening do only.We were hurt to not be invited to see them marry .
We didn't go.
When our son got married everyone was invited to the ceremony , wedding breakfast and evening party.

@50FreezeOut1 can I just say that you sound absolutely lovely and that they are the ones missing out by not including you as part of the family. I’m sorry they’re treating you this way but it sounds like it’s definitely an issue with them, their personalities and their snobby attitudes, rather than you as a person.

It’s brought it all back to me. I spent my life trying to make my parents proud of me. Waste of fucking time, she causes me of showing off if I try to share an accomplishment with her. It’s not you, it’s 100% them.

My mum slags me off to anyone and everyone so they’ve built an impression of me sometimes without even meeting me! No doubt your mum is doing the same.

You have to stop hoping they’ll love you. It’s so painful but it’s the only way to survive. Mines a double whammy because mine is from my adoptive family! I feel like an unwanted orphan times 2! (And yes, I know there were completely valid reasons my bm didn’t keep me, but that doesn’t change the facts).

A

Glad you are coming to some important realisations and can protect yourself better from now on.

Can you phone your sister and ask if they all had a nice time ?
I am so sorry this has happened, it is very unkind.

Well exactly

so all the suggestion to confront seem odd

They’ll end up chuckling amongst themselves at the next family bash to which the op hasn’t been invited to

I’m so sorry OP, I think you’re finally seeing the truth and it’s horrible, they’ve decided you’re not good enough for them. From everything you’ve said they sound incredibly shallow and superficial and you sound lovely.

At least now you’re seeing things clearly you can stop wasting any more of your precious time and energy on them. I agree with others about not saying anything about it to them, you’d just be giving them ammunition to use against you. Just quietly slip away and focus on better relationships. It’s often said that friends are the family you choose, and it sounds like you’re not short of friends.

Can you arrange to see your dad without your mum? That does sound like a relationship worth preserving. And you clearly already have a strong bond with your aunt. Just let the others go. You might find they try to reel you back in once they notice you’ve drifted away. Not that they’ll suddenly develop a new found respect for you, but that they want to keep you hanging around on the periphery to make them feel superior.

My guess would be that it's more passive thoughtlessness than maliciously excluding you. You don't quite fit in in the ways you've described, you live further away, you (perhaps?) don't have as much chatty contact in between meet ups, and for all those reasons you don't really jump to mind when they have an impromptu gathering. Even a planned gathering requires somone to have remebered that you need inviting, so it doesnt always naturally happen if the organsining wasn't on the family group. It still hurts feeling on the peripherary in that way so I'm not saying it to diminish the significance of feeling pushed out. It sucks. Its just that's my guess to the reasoning behind it playing out in this way.

It sounds like you've made a much healthier paradigm for your own family, so congratulations there. That's hard to do when you come from something with a more dysfunctional vibe. Your own little family being more healthy also separates somewhat from them, meaning you actually can't play such a pivotal role in the big family dynamic. It's another reason there doesn't seem to be a place for you in the centre of it all, but I'd say that's a good thing. It's probably.not really possible to have a healthy marriage and relationship with you kids PLUS be a big part of a dysfunctional wider family.

I am so sorry that you have been treated so appallingly OP. It doesn’t matter what differences you have, what you may have done in the past, where you live or who is the more favoured adult child - to exclude a single family member from a family celebration when everyone else was invited is inexcusable (unless you are estranged which you aren’t). Your family had plenty of opportunities to invite you yet not a single did - and I’m sorry to say this but that also includes your dad and all your in-laws.
i agree with pp that if you bring it up you will be scapegoated for ruining sisters special birthday. But aren’t you already the scapegoat anyway? It will be Christmas next and then you will be blamed for ruining Christmas if you bring it up then.
im glad you have your aunt - she sounds like the only decent one out of them.