To be irked by presence of ex wife

[Primadonnagirl]

...I think you may probably tell me to get over it but here goes.. DH rarely has anything to do with his ex..not acrimonious it's just as the kids are grown up there is no real reason for contact.However his parents are a different matter..in constant contact .They had a big photo up of her until recEntly . I should say we have been together 15 years. Anyway, this doesn't bother me but the " side effects " do...that is, every time we have a family event she comes too. It's all very civil but I think it's odd and TBH I feel very awkward. It's happening again soon...parents have a big wedding anniversary coming up and she's invited again.I can't do anything about it I know but it just makes me feel so uncomfortable..She's the mother of DHs kids etc.. I get that...but I'm his wife..I just feel "second best"...what do you think?!

[Davsmum]

My ex husband's family continued to invite me to family gatherings/events after we divorced.
My ex met someone and remarried and I was still invited but I always turned down the invitations because I thought it would be unfair to his new wife. I still saw his family on other occasions that he was not involved in.

[starfishmummy]

Its up to your pils who they invite to their parties and home.
Either get over it or decline their invitation op

[dunsborough]

Yanbu.

It's weird.

[SlimJiminy]

Sometimes the PILs can feel a huge sense of guilt when their DS and DIL split up. I know my GPs felt like they needed to provide some stability for their grandchildren when my uncle left his wife - make up for the damage he'd done iykwim - and it was no reflection on how they felt about his new wife.

They invited exDIL to family gatherings and it lasted from when they separated right up to when my GPs passed away 16 years later. No question about it - they loved my aunty as much when the relationship broke down as they did when they'd been together. And they couldn't have just switch off when the kids turned 18 or whatever - she was still the kids mum/our aunty - just not his wife anymore.

I really do think you should suck it up and play nice - your 15-year relationship is just 15 more years that she has been their mum. Their feelings towards her don't lessen because you've been in the picture for a long time. I bet they think it's great that you all get on so well/can be civil for the sake of the kids, who will always be their grandchildren, whatever their age.

[YoureBeingASillyBilly]

OP if not insecurity or jealousy can you pin point exactly what it is that makes you uncomfortable about her being there?

[MollyWhuppie]

I am surprised at the number of people who think yabu for feeling the way you do. I am amazed that people think it's fine to throw tact and diplomacy out of the window and ride roughshod over people's feelings in these situations.

I think they should think more carefully about how you, their DS's wife might feel about having to share your Christmas day with your husband's ex, and other such occasions. I find it quite frankly bizarre, and actually quite inhuman to suggest you are in the wrong for feeling the way you do.

I'd like to think that I would be more sensitive to everyone's feelings. That's not to say that they shouldn't have a relationship with his ex, but it's wrong that you should be put in uncomfortable situations for them to do so.

I think you'd have to have the hide of a rhino for it not to get to you just a little bit. Clearly there are a lot of rhinos on MN and I would take some of these responses with a pinch of salt.

[YoureBeingASillyBilly]

Really molly? So lets say your best friend who you've known and loved and shared these events with for 25 years and a family members spouse suddenly expresses their discomfort at your friend being so much in YOUR life do you just drop friend from family events because someone you arent as close to has some issue with her?

[YoureBeingASillyBilly]

Why is one family members (until this point unexpressed) feelings more important than another who has been in your life a lot longer?

[MollyWhuppie]

sillybilly Yes, if I had two important people in my life, I would try to be sensitive to feelings on all sides and would hopefully come up with solutions that meant no-one had to feel uncomfortable.

If I was the ex, I would also accept that I wouldn't be such an important part of that family anymore. I certainly wouldn't expect to have pride of place at any of my exes family gatherings, and I know it would be jolly uncomfortable for any current wives/partners.

It's totally insensitive to think otherwise.

[MollyWhuppie]

Not saying one person's feelings are more important than the other, but both should be taken into account. It does not seem that the OP's have been considered at all.

[YoureBeingASillyBilly]

I dont think anyone has side the ex wife should have pride of place!

In my aunts situation she has now been in my family for 40+ years, she isnt "uncle johnny's ex" to any of us and never was but to a new wife of his she would be. Her best friend is my mum's sister, they go everywhere together, they raised each others dcs, she babysat me and most of the nieces and nephews at one point or another. She visits my nana just as often as the rest of the family (on her own if that makes sense- not just tagging along) she also caters pretty much every family event we have. She is a sister just as much as he is a brother tbh and it honestly would be unthinkable that we didnt invite her to things if uncle re married to save awkwardness. No-one would stand for it and thats not to say second wives (or husbands) arent as embraced, they are, just like she was all those years ago. She poses no threat at all to any new partners of uncle, shes not hanging around in te hope he'll notice her, shes there because she loves the people and we are family to her like she is to us. The only person who could view her as 'surplus to requirements' would be uncle but to the rest of us she is family just like the other aunts and uncles.

[MollyWhuppie]

Your situation is totally different as your uncle never remarried. Who's to say things wouldn't have been different if he had had a new wife in the early days before the 'status quo' was set?

I still think people should be kind and considerate to other's feelings. If I had two friends who were divorced, I probably wouldn't invite them both round for dinner with their new partners unless everyone was happy with it.

[YoureBeingASillyBilly]

The status quo was that for 15 years before they divorced she was already a family member. Even if he had married a year after they divorced aunt would have been just as much aunt as she had been the previous 15 years. Do you honestly think that if a new partner had come along my blood aunts would have told her to toddle off now because they had a new SIL? She was their friend and sister and that will never change. Any new partner/wife he gets will be welcomed just the same. Her relatiosnhip with our family has developed so far beyond that of uncles wife that it would probably break all our hearts to end that. Well we just wouldnt.

[AmberLeaf]

YABU.

Its nice that everyone gets on.

mind you, wait till the DCs get married and that will be a whole other dilemma

What dilema?

[LoonvanBoon]

Molly, your example (inviting friends to dinner) isn't a great analogy because it doesn't even involve family.

The situation here seems to be to be much more similar to that of SillyBilly's family, in that the OP's husband's ex ISN'T primarily the OP's husband's ex within the wider family context. She's a much-loved member of the PILs' family: the mother of their GC, possibly a valued aunty, & so on.

Of course OP may not enjoy being in her company - that's natural enough. But to expect everyone else to cut out a family member is totally unreasonable. Why should one's person discomfort in the presence of another trump the feelings of all those who do want to see this woman - especially if we're talking about events organized by the PIL / GP.

And as OP herself has acknowledged, she needs to get used to all this because with older stepchildren she's going to be in this situation an awful lot in the future. Or do you think her DH's children should have to exclude their mum from future weddings, parties & so on, just in order to be "sensitive" to their stepmum?

We all want to be treated sensitively. We don't all expect people to write their loved ones out of important events just because our relationship to them isn't a comfortable one. There are people in my extended family I'm not keen on, but it wouldn't occur to me to expect them to be excluded just to make my life easier.

You said that you'd absent yourself from family events if you were the ex, Molly, but why would you do that? Tact & diplomacy is one thing, deciding that your ex's new relationship somehow invalidates several of your own relationships, & their history, is something else.

[LoonvanBoon]

Sorry, "one person's" not "one's person".

[2rebecca]

I love my brother's wife but the loyalty and love I feel for my brother is greater. If they split I'd keep in touch with her but I wouldn't invite her round at the same time as my brother without checking he was happy with the idea first, and if he had a new partner I'd expect him to check she was happy with the situation.
I find it odd so many people show so little consideration for their family members and seem to feel that people who have married into a family should have priority over the people whose family it actually is.
It sounds as though alot of the grandparents here have very little love or respect for the opinions of their sons.
And yes I do think the views of blood relatives should be more important than the views of people who were once married to that relative (but aren't any longer and need to get a life of their own)

[VegetariansTasteLikeChicken]

I am surprised at the number of people who think yabu for feeling the way you do. I am amazed that people think it's fine to throw tact and diplomacy out of the window and ride roughshod over people's feelings in these situations.

No, I just think the exwife's feelings matter too. And clearly so do OP's PIL.

[MollyWhuppie]

I don't think anyone on this thread has said the ex should be cut off - just that the person their son is now married to, for longer than he was ever married to the ex for, her feelings should be taken into account in terms of family gatherings, Christmas etc. and she not be made to feel like shit.

They can have a relationship with her - just not rub the OP's nose in it. That's what kind, considerate people would do.

Commenting to her that her DH should never have split up with the ex is just cruel.

[divisionbyzero]

yabu and yanbu: Ultimately, a mother of your children/grandchildren is just that for life, but it must be pretty hellish for you, the second you let it get to you.

The simple fact is that how you feel you need it to be, and how it is, are two different things. I know it is easy to say, but there is only one of those two things you can reasonably change.

[YoureBeingASillyBilly]

Molly you still seem to be viewing the ex wife only in relation to who she is to the OP. her being there is not rubbing OP's nose in it (in what exactly? She hasnt done anything to OP) she is there because she is family. Her feelings are just as important as OP's . The fact that the dh has been married to OP longer only matters to him and OP. To the rest of the family the ex has been family for 25 years.

[2rebecca]

She isn't "family" any more though. She is still her children's mother, but she is no longer any relation of her ex-husband and his older relatives to whom she is neither a blood relative nor a relative by marriage. That's what divorce means.

[YoureBeingASillyBilly]

Would you like to tell my aunt that shes not family then? Because she sure as hell feels like family. Family is more than just marriage or a name. At the very least she is my cousins' mother. She's family. And even if you cant get your head around that- she is lifelong friend of my mum and her sisters and like a daughter to my nana. That counts for a lot.

[YoureBeingASillyBilly]

"Oh hello auntie jane, just to let you know a stranger on the internet has decided you arent actually family so i cant call you auntie anymore. I'll just call you jane when i see you in future although that wont be very often as you are no longer invited to any family events. Dont worry, if uncle johnny gets divorced from current wife we can all stop crossing the road to avoid you. Till he meets someone else that is at which point you are once again surplus to requirements. We have a max limit of aunties you see. Talk to you soon. Maybe."

[2rebecca]

How many women here who are divorced would want their exhusband to be always turning up to extended family events and babysitting though? You decide you can no longer live with someone and your relationship isn't working and your extended family won't let you move on by forever inviting him round.
If my family had done this they'd have seen alot less of me. Some of them do see my ex from time to time (and I get on well with my ex) but that's completely different to inviting him to every family gathering and pretending the divorce never happened.
Divorces happen for a reason. Ignoring that will hurt the real family member who is divorced.