I don't want to celebrate their wedding

[Murtaghjames]

Brother in law and his fiancee are getting married soon. Fiancee has always wanted a big wedding and has been planning it for years. However due to Covid they have decided to get the legal stuff out of the way and have booked a registry office. Parents and their own children are allowed to attend. Bil (DH brother) has sent a message in their family what's app group inviting close family over to their home the day of the wedding for some food. I really don't want to go, I've a difficult relationship with my in laws and don't enjoy their company. I have to take my children out of school early as wedding is on a weekday. DH has to take a half day from work. I really just can't be bothered. I suppose I still hold a lot of resentment from when myself and DH got married. Mil was a nightmare and his brothers didn't attend wedding as we got married abroad, which is fine but they never acknowledged it. There has been two other family weddings and of course mil has gone all out for them and always makes snarky little comments about my wedding. I just really don't want to go and put a face on and pretend Im happy to be there. I understand DH wanting to go and he really would like me to go but not in a pressurising way. How do I get out of it without being seen as an absolute bitch which they will think I am.

I would go because you would be snubbing your BIL and partner not your Mil

You will be sending a very petulant message if you don't go. You will be reinforcing your mil's view of you. Your dh wants to ho and your children do. Pull up your big girl pants and get on with it. Put a big happy smile on your face and don't sulk and get on with it. Sometimes we all have to do things for the sake of family harmony that we'd rather not. Be the bigger person.

@Murtaghjames

I'm not hurting anybody. It's not a case of I can't be bothered. I've repeatedly said I want to go but mils behaviour towards me has been deplorable and I don't want to deal with her.

Your original post actually said can't be bothered. So it is a case of can't be bothered. Go to the wedding Be at your husband's side with the kids Stand up to your mother in law

The more this thread goes on, the more you sound like the unreasonable one, OP. Just so you know.

You didn’t invite people to your wedding but are annoyed no one gave a card. If a family member didn’t include me in their wedding it’s a fairly clear message. I’d be gutted if my dc didn’t invite me to their wedding so without more of a back story you seem to be rather self centred. This may well not be the case but making someone else’s wedding all about you is a massive no no in my book. We have relatives on dh’s side who tried the dramatic bullshit and it was them who came across as petty and ridiculous.

I think this is one of those occasions when you just have to suck it up and go. Not really fair on DH, BIL and STBSIL if you don’t go. I’d recommend getting pissed personally! How about giving yourself a role as official photographer, then you might not have to talk to MIL too much.

It sounds as if MiL was put out that you got married abroad without DH's brothers present.
Tbh, I'd be upset if one of my sons did that. Choosing to have a wedding abroad knowing family won't be able to attend is making quite a statement."We are getting married abroad, no pressure to come" is not an invitation, quite the contrary. How did Dh address it with his family? Explaining that your wishes to get married abroad trumped family considerations would need to be quite tactfully handled.
Now you are saying that you can't even be bothered to turn up for his brother's wedding celebrations...if you want this split with DH's family to continue, by all means don't go.

When they go low you go high
You need to put a brave face on, and go and enjoy yourself, pretend the stuff in the past happened to someone else - just for the few hours it takes.
I don't blame you at all for not wanting to go but you need to rise above and go for the sake of your DH and childrens' relationships.

Your MIL may be unreasonable and you had every right to have a quiet wedding but people do tend not to send cards after the event, but you mention that your bils were all single so it might not have occurred to them.

I think you should support your bil as he's godfather to your dc. Keep out of MIL's way on the day.

Let DH go but you may feel unwell on the day.

You didn’t invite people to your wedding

@m0therofdragons To be fair, she very much did invite them. She just did so verbally because her MiL said paper invites might make people feel pressured, when the wedding was abroad so more expensive to attend. They were very much invited- why wouldn't they have been?
OP says she gets on ok with them.

I agree with her that a card saying 'congratulations' and maybe a present would've been a nice gesture.

It sounds as if MiL was put out that you got married abroad without DH's brothers present.

@DelphiniumBlue As OP describes it, that was entirely the brothers' choice, they were invited.

IDK if OP goes into detail about MiL's comments.

"We are getting married abroad, no pressure to come" is not an invitation, quite the contrary

IDK. Maybe it'd depend how it was phrased/the tone. OP describes it as her MiL's idea not to give paper invites, anyway, not one she would've come up with herself without MiL suggesting it.

Explaining that your wishes to get married abroad trumped family considerations

Some people do get married abroad, it's not unheard of. It's their wedding at the end of the day. I think most people would just've thought 'ah ok, that's what they're doing for their wedding.' Maybe been a bit disappointed if they couldn't go, but accepted it.

this is your chance to get revenge on the MIL, I would take it!

@C3SC

this is your chance to get revenge on the MIL, I would take it!

It's not revenge on the MIL. The people she'll be upsetting are the bride and groom, her husband and her children.

MIL will just gloat at the power she has to keep OP away and see OP's relationship with the rest of the family deteriorate too.

Why on earth would you give her that power, OP? It makes NO sense at all.

Not even sure what MIL has done this that is so 'deplorable'. Aside from her being upset that you didn't have a big wedding (and therefore a lot of the family couldn't go) what specifically has she done that is so bad?

Because you are very much coming across that you are the problem here...

Saying that, whatever she has said and done, it's not her wedding, and you apparently like the people who are getting married, so you should suck it up and go IMO.

Your dh is fine with you not going so don't go.

It was so liberating for me when I decided not to go somewhere for lunch and nothing bad happened. I go when I genuinely want to now which is 99% of the time.

@Dunairbeanat,thank you. Stick together

@SoulofanAggron,thank you, got it in one

@Babyboomtastic I'm not getting into everything about mil. All I can say is DH has gone nc with her numerous times and he calls her out on the way she treats me. I had to get counselling coming up to a big event for my DD as I didn't know how I would cope with mil. This is a very serious issue.

You chose to marry abroad, with a half hearted invitation to BIL. Now you're not wanting to attend his wedding, when him and his fiancée are godparents to your DC. I think wether or not you attend their wedding could be the tipping point in family relations. You've given umpteen reasons why you don't want to attend, but personally, I would go.

@Justmuddlingalong,Do I not have the right to choose where I get married? Should I have had the big wedding to appease my mil. Trust me when I say this bils couldn't have cared less about the wedding whether it was here or abroad, 20 something singletons. BIL was invited personally, nothing half hearted about it.

@Murtaghjames

That's fine. You don't need to tell us, but you'll just have to accept that without any context, it very much is going to come across that you are in the wrong.

None of that matters though, because it's not your Mil to hers getting married, and it's not fair to punish someone else because you don't get on with her.

We married abroad too, and didn't invite anyone. We did so because this was the wedding we personally wanted, and the reasons driving that were quite other than that my in-laws like to create trouble and would have found something to disapprove of whatever we did (even though this is undeniably true. But we certainly expected nothing: cards, acknowledgement, or otherwise. This is where we differ.

The in-laws, predictably, took gratuitous offence and blamed the woman as normally happens. We figured they were bound to disapprove anyway so we might as well do what we actually wanted. There's no pleasing some people.

Your situation differs in that you and MiL clearly have longstanding issues but none exist between you and your DH's siblings. (With me, it was the other way round and only belatedly did the PiLs become involved with that).

I wouldn't not go if I had a decent relationship with BiL; although I do get how annoying it is to have someone making passive-aggressive digs at you every time you visit. But this might be just what she hopes for so she can drive a further wedge in, isolate you from the rest of the family, then innocently make out you are to blame. (You know they always blame the woman. They just do).

I personally wouldn't play into her hands. I'd go, and grey rock her every effort with a sickly smile on my face and play internal bingo about her every strike.

If she wants to look for trouble, the thing that will annoy her the most is if you don't let her find it.

@Babyboomtastic,she told us our wedding was a joke. Constantly comments on my appearance, accent, parenting, my home.. Everything. I have seen a counsellor to learn how to deal with her. Obviously my counsellor has more details. Counsellor told me that she us threatened and jealous of me. She can lord it over the other sils but she can't with me. She wants to be top dog. She can't accept that I'm more educated, attractive and out of her league. Everything I am she aspires to be. This is from my counsellor. Mil has notions. I'm from a well of family, there is family money, I'm educated, I speak nice, my dc attend a lovely school and have their extra curriculur activities. I basically do the things she never did and I'm punished for that.

I'm sorry, this 'im more attractive and out of her league' stuff makes you sound awful. Perhaps she does have an issue with you, but your contempt for her, and how much better you seem to think you are (because of shallow things like family money and looks) is pretty distasteful.

@Babyboomtastic,I didn't say I thought this. My counsellor said this. I don't think I'm better than anyone.