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AIBU?

To feel slighted by this?

30 replies

GreatJoanUmber · 03/05/2014 22:01

DH's cousin is getting married this year. I found out today that she is inviting DH's brother and his wife, but not us.
I feel offended as I think if you invite one brother/cousin, surely you'd have to invite the other as well?
In fairness though, we didn't invite her to our wedding - we didn't invite any of DH's cousins as he has more than a dozen and that (and partners) would have bumped our numbers up too much; whereas my BIL and SIL invited her to theirs.
Still, we get on well and I just think it strange to selectively invite cousins - or am I strange/OCD for thinking you must invite 'fairly'?!

OP posts:

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Whitewaters · 04/05/2014 11:45

I think maybe it'd be easier to look at this from the bride's point of view. IMO there are two etiquette 'rules' involved*:

Inviting 'evenly' as you put it. I.e. If you invite one cousin you should invite all.
If someone invites you to their wedding you should reciprocate and invite them to yours.

When you got married rule 2 didn't apply because you were the first to get married. So you just had to apply rule 1 - invite all cousins or none.

Rule 2 trumps rule 1. So as you didn't invite her to your wedding she doesn't have to invite you. You're BIL and SIL did invite her so she should invite them.

It's nothing personal against you. If your DH's cousin had been the first to get married she may have decided to not invite any cousins, the same as you chose. But as she has now attended your BIL and SIL's wedding she may feel she should invite them to hers. She doesn't feel that with you because you didn't invite her.

*Obviously in reality a bride & groom can just invite whoever they like. But in the context of this particular dilemma!

Purplepoodle · 04/05/2014 09:35

Sounds fair enough but do you not get an evening invite?

Only1scoop · 04/05/2014 08:37

Maybe they felt 'slighted' when not invited to yours.

Don't take it personally though....

Weddings eh

Standinginline · 04/05/2014 08:29

Think you've answered your own post. You didn't invite them to your wedding ,so they didn't invite you to theirs. Simple as.

Revengeofthechocolatebunny · 04/05/2014 08:28

My cousin didn't invite me to her wedding but she invited my ex.

JRmumma · 04/05/2014 08:25

Just to add, we invited cousins we know well (more like friends) to our wedding but not the ones we only really know because we see them at other family events IYSWIM. If we had invited all of them it would have been close to 80 people IIRC and there would have been no room for our friends. We thought that was fair but you can't please everyone. 2 years on and we are still slagged off by certain family members about it, but luckily they are the ones that we couldn't give 2 shites about anyway and would have only come for the free food and drink

Tiptops · 04/05/2014 03:10

Interesting use of 'OCD'

BillyBanter · 04/05/2014 02:31

My default starting position is if you invite one cousin you invite them all. But everyone has to keep an eye on numbers so your decision was to invite none. Bill's decision was to invite all and cousins decision was to invite the one whose wedding they had been invited to.

MagicMojito · 04/05/2014 02:11

Agree with everyone else, its probobly a case of "so and so invited us to their wedding, so we need to invite them to ours" so glad dh and I eloped with just 3 other family members! Can't be doing with wedding politics lol. It's a minefeild

AgentZigzag · 03/05/2014 22:46

Ah, I missed it saying your DHs brother invited them to his, that must be it.

It's nice you're bothered about what they think of you though, if you didn't care about them you wouldn't give a bollocks about what they did.

GreatJoanUmber · 03/05/2014 22:26

And I suppose we are much better friends now than when DH and I got married, so that probably added to my disappointment.

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GreatJoanUmber · 03/05/2014 22:25

Ha ha, ok, point taken. No need to burn me please!

I just wish I'd have known this many many years ago for my own wedding; I really thought you have to invite 'evenly' if that makes sense!

Anyway, good to have a reality check. For the record, I don't feel horribly offended, more shocked that she broke THE RULE of inviting evenly

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JRmumma · 03/05/2014 22:22

Don't read anything in to it. As you know, you have to make decisions on invitees when dealing with a wedding budget. Whichever way you cut your cloth you will end up leaving someone out/upsetting people and you just have to deal with it as best you can. You didn't make the cut, for whatever reason, probably nothing malicious just one of those things.

Lilaclily · 03/05/2014 22:21

Your DH didn't invite her to his wedding, but his brother did. Seems fair enough

This is why!
If you were close you should have invited her to your wedding, like your BIL did when he got married

MomOfTwoGirls2 · 03/05/2014 22:18

Nope, you only need invite favorite cousins... At least, that's is what we did many years ago. We considered those favorite cousins as friends.

And it is normal to invite people whose wedding you previously attended.
So don't feel slighted.

AiryFairyHairyAndScary · 03/05/2014 22:17

YABU I don't think you should feel slighted by this at all. They really can and should invite who they want.

lessonsintightropes · 03/05/2014 22:17

Thereby earning the wrath of MN!

DoJo · 03/05/2014 22:16

For some people inviting 'fairly' would be inviting the cousin that had them to their wedding and not the one who didn't. Your version of fair doesn't trump hers on their wedding day, and I'm sure it's nothing personal, especially if it's a really big family.

CoffeeTea103 · 03/05/2014 22:16

Er.. Your DH didn't invite her to his wedding, but his brother did. Seems fair enough.

lessonsintightropes · 03/05/2014 22:15

It's not a slight. I did have to invite all 12 of mine after DM dropped me in it with an aunt which still pisses me off, as they'd probably rather not have come and we had to go no kids with our friends to fit everyone in.

EugenesAxe · 03/05/2014 22:15

I would not feel slighted although I take your point. I bet she's just desperately trying to keep expense down but has thought she should reciprocate to your BIL/SIL. She probably appreciates the fact you didn't invite her to yours.

TimeForAnotherNameChange · 03/05/2014 22:14

She's simply returning the favour, I don't think you can compain at all! You didn't invite her, why should she invite you?

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Goldmandra · 03/05/2014 22:13

When you get married, you're allowed to celebrate the day with the people who you choose. There will be a reason they didn't choose you and you may be better off not knowing it.

Just accept that you weren't high enough up the list and move on.

GreatJoanUmber · 03/05/2014 22:13

Not Irish

We get on well, I really quite like her and we were considering inviting her and her brother to our wedding, as they are my favourite cousins of DH, but then decided against it as I thought then we'd have to invite ALL the cousins Now starting to think maybe that wouldn't have had to be the case??

OP posts:

AtrociousCircumstance · 03/05/2014 22:12

It's not a slight at all.

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