Newbie needing to vent

[Motherhen39]

I'm new to Mumsnet but really need both to vent a bit and some totally impartial advice.

3 months ago my brother announced his engagement to his girlfriend of 10 years. Then let us know the wedding date for us to keep it clear. After my Father spending yesterday with them (after a large, but nice hint from me as Dad mentioned he'd not seen them on Father's Day for 4 years).

Dad then arrived on my doorstep this morning very upset as my brother mentioned to him in passing that my two daughters will not be invited to the wedding. Which he has contributed a fairly large amount to. My brother had not previously mentioned that the girls would not be invited so I stupidly told them about it 3 months ago, as we were all excited that they were finally getting married. My girls are aged 14 and 5 and both very polite and well behaved.

They aren't the only children not to be invited but girlfriends son who is younger than my eldest is obviously going.

I feel very hurt that they're not invited and although I understand that it's not my decision to make, I feel it's very short sighted of them. The wedding is 130 miles away from us and involves an overnight stay and as my Dad will be there we obviously can't ask him to have them and DH's parents have recently booked a holiday so won't be available to care for them overnight. I am not willing to leave them with anyone other than Grandparents.

My brother regularly forgets my girls birthdays totally but on one occasion (two days after giving birth to my daughter) I had a call from him saying that his girlfriend was upset that I hadn't remembered his girlfriends sons birthday! (Which i had never done previously or since). He has never sent my husband a birthday card despite knowing when his birthday is. I understand that the card thing may sound a bit petty but I feel it's all a bit too one sided.

In short what the bloody hell should I do?

Thank you for reading.

OMG Just seen your update. Great news. I would have put money on the bride to be being responsible for all this but it just goes to show...

Sounds like he's been a knob and I hope he gets a bollocking! I think perhaps he's very lucky to have her!

So nice to see a happy resolution in AIBU.

Penelope portrait, it's possible, I may have to think of a way to test that theory and then possibly use it to my advantage.. (Evil laugh)..

Good decision.

Oooo he sounds like a groom zilla . :)
I would be tempted to book weekend away and say bloody tough to him ! Your family so should all get an invite .
My step mum in law did a similar thing by sending an invite to my darling father in laws bithday bash and I sent reply saying yes dh , dd and I would love to come , she then messaged me to say dd was, nt invited :( ffs its her bloody grandad and she has known him longer than step mum . She, s in her 20, s fgs Grrr
Hope all get sorted op :)

Just had a text from SiL asking if I'm ok now. She said she's had very stern words with my brother and said he's not ready to call me yet, not sure whether it's because he's got a huge guilt complex or if he's cross with me for telling tales! How is it that at age 40 (me) and 35 (him) we're still fighting the same way we did 30 yrs ago?!

hmm i think there has been a plan and someone else has been givibg them grief about kids not being invited or some ofthe 'first cut' guest list can't come.do the gracious thing now, draw a line under it and move on

So glad your sil called. I know it is up to people what they do at their weddings but I would be upset and so would Dd if she wasn't invited to her uncles wedding. That is very poor.

Does that mean sil wasn't part of the decision?! Your brother is being a total cunt!

And of course you should be upset and you should not once consider leaving them anywhere to attend! He is such a knob!

It's tricky. We had a kid free reception (all welcome at church), with just our siblings' children invited to the evening do. The reason is that we are in our mid thirties, I have 11 cousins all married and mostly with kids, and most of our mates are also in mid thirties with children. If we'd invited all of them from cousins and friends we would have lost (no kidding) fifty places for friends out of 150 invites. We did however give everyone over a years' notice and one couple with a toddler whilst still BF a 5 month old brought their parents with them to stay in the hotel - which we felt awful about, but if we'd made an exception for them, we would have had to make one for a lot of other people too and tbh would have made our wedding a) very different and b) not the day we wanted.

In the end one of my DSis brought her two and another decided not to bring her son as he's ASD and would have found it pretty hellish, so he stayed with his DGPs and had a much nicer time than being stressed out by all the people and noise. Not trying to excuse your DB's behaviour at all - he seemed to have dealt with it terribly badly, not to mention not discussing it with his wife to be (!!!!!!) and treating your DF badly too. Just trying to say that sometimes when choices like these are made it is for a reason - we would far rather have had good, close friends of ours there than the children of cousins who we are not in contact with (all the cousins came in the end for the whole thing, and arranged childcare for their kids together, youngest of whom was three).

I reckon they're worried your dad will take his contribution back!

Yes 'lessons' but you invited siblings kids - he didn't want to!