Second marriage etiquette...AIBU??

Its not nice sometimes is it silverfrog. Lucky for me though DPs family hate his ex so arent hostile to me.

foureleven -exactly. it was dh's second wedding, but it was also the start of our future - a new beginning for us.

anya - oh, I'm with you all the way - dh's family don't even accept me as I am the second wife, let alone half his friends (and I wasn't the OW either!)

I dont like getting a wedding list without having asked for it first. Dont care whether this is first or forty first marriage.

On the whole when people marry when young the gifts are to help them set up home for the first time. Hence the traditional toasters and towels. Once the bride and groom are older they should have managed to deal with all of these things for themselves. Therefore if bride and groom are older I think that it is a bit rude to send out a gift list. They should be tending towards the presence not presents line.

Of course this is just an opinion and this is the first time I have expressed it in public as I normally just bite my lip!

silverfrog, i have sometimes thought that I would like to start a thread of gripes of second wives, because I so hear you! (Don;t ge me started on the friends of DH and 1st DW who refuse to even acknowledge me... despite me not being the OW!).

mini hijack over, wearied, sorry.

This is something else that has popped up to make me sad about being the second wife (not that im married yet but we will be one day, she says, hoping)

I do hope that all our family and friends on both sides look at it as a first wedding and not begrudge buying a gift. Not that Id care if they didnt get us a gift... but not for that reason.

It was 10 years ago... not like it was year or so... or shes on her 5th wedding.

Judging by some of the responses here wedding gifts are a 'payment' so you can attend the wedding and eat the free food.

Agree with minipie and nice reasoning .

D

as a second wife, I would like to give my perspective.

when dh & I got married, we did have a list - only handed out if asked.

it was pretty clear that a lot of dh's friends had a similar attitude, which I still, to this day, cannot understand.

MOst of them did not bother with a present at all, presumably becaus ethey had "already" given dh a wedding present.

I do find this odd, and it did leave me feeling that, somehow, they did not see our wedding as "equal" to his frst wedding.

or maybe they weren't expecting htis one to last either and so thoght they wouldn't waste their money.

Seems bizarre to me. wedding presents are not really about what the couple need anymore (since many live together and hvae most household stuff, etc) but to me, they are, like birthday presents, about saying "congratulations, have a lovely day, all the best" etc.

why would anyone not want to say that?

Why do you buy a wedding gift?

Is it because someone is owed one wedding gift during their lifetime, so you fork out once and then you're done?

Or is it as an expression of goodwill and support towards the newlyweds?

Personally I'd go with the second. So, YABU.

(Mind you I think that gift lists should ALWAYS come with the caveat that presents are not expected.)

I think you are maybe being a bit U to be honest. Her first wedding was 10 years ago, and I don't think gift lists are requests or expectations for gifts, more like suggestions for those who don't know what to get.

Buying a gift is part of a guest's recognition and celebration of the start of new couple's life together. Therefore for me it would be kind of irrelevant whether I had bought a gift for a previous wedding.

I buy a gift for Christenings of second, third and fourth children as well, it's really much the same thing - celebrating something new and wonderful for a friend.

D

Ignore the gift list if you like and buy her a lovely rose bush or something.

I am DH'ssecond wife. The first time around they had a huge glitzy and expensive wedding, because that was the first wife's style. For us, we had a very small wedding, with no gifts, because that is my style. (Not judging, just different approaches). Some people gave us plants and vases, which I loved. But, DH felt really guilty because we did not have the huge registry etc, he thought people would interpret it as me not meaning as much as the first wife, if you know what I mean? I have no idea how people interpreted it, did not care. My (badly made) point is, that it is the groom's first time... maybe your friend does not want there to be any suggestion that this marriage does not mean as much as the first one, or somehow is different from the first one. To say 'well I gave a gift the first time' means that you think the groom is irrelevant or interchangeable. I think I am not explaining myself well, but do you see what i am trying to say?

sorry that should read "refer to her first wedding" not "your first wedding".

My husbands first wife died 11 years before we got married.

It never crossed my mind to not have a gift list because he had been married before.

My PILs were very odd about our wedding though. They had paid for all their sons evening receptions and the drinks during the wedding breakfast. They never offered to pay anything towards our wedding...which was not a problem until MIL started showing me all her childrens wedding albums (including DHs first weding) and then pointed out the RECIEPTS she had kept showing exactly what she'd paid for

Not quite sure what my point is...I think I'm saying that it's a shame second marriages are seen as second best.

Anyway I think YABU, just buy them a toaster and be done with it

So as you ate all the free food & booze ten years ago, I guess you'll be sitting the wedding breakfast out too?

I'm in exactly this position now, getting married in August for second time but DP's first. We are asking for optional donations to charity (have included a list of the charities and what they do in the invitations). I think ALL wedding lists are optional, some people always buy a hidious lovely ornament type thing anyway.

It is entirely up to you whether you buy a gift or not. Is your friend really going to go down her guest list marking who gave and who did not? I doubt it.

YABU.

Firstly, perhaps her exDH ended up with the gifts from first time or she didn't want to use her first wedding china with her new DH.

belly- I think you can't expect her to refer to your first wedding in the invites to the second so "opting out" due to a previous wedding would draw attention to that.

Its been 10 years since her last wedding, she's hardly being greedy.

My DH is my 2nd DH, but I am his first wife. I could hardly say "due to the fact I got married 14 years ago, no need to get either of us gifts this time" Why should DH miss out?

Just be happy for your friend. You don't know why she had to split up from DH1. It might have been awful for her.

Reverse AIBU Reality?

A gift list is a suggestion of things people could get if they want to give you a present. It is not specifically a request for gifts. Because we would all (I assume) rather give a present that was wanted than have to guess.

When I got married the first time we had a gift list. When I got married the second time (7 years later) we didn't have a gift list and expressly said to anyone who asked that we didn't want any. That said a few people did give gifts, we were rather surprised and most guest had been to either my first or dh's first weddings.

Possibly different because we'd both been married before, but I would have felt very grasping asking for gifts.