Divorced parents at wedding

[Animallover87]

Me and DFiancee getting married next month. My parents are divorced 12 years and not seen nor spoken to one another in this time. Mentioned it to my mum and she is furious that I've invited him and said she will ignore him all day and won't be in any photos etc with him. Anyone else had this situation and it been ok?

It's not bollocks. If the mother in this scenario felt that her daughter really properly understood what she went through, then i bet she could more easily accept that her daughter having made peace with her father wasnt minimising her experience of him. And then she could attend the wedding knowing that her pain wasnt an insignificance.

You may call it bollocks but to me it looks like working with human nature not against it.

I hear you. A lot of adult children will never understand. Some will. Now i wouldnt care if my dd invited her father to her wedding day, but there was a time when i would have had to have bowed out. It would have been so triggering. Luckily my dc know who he is. Over time, they saw for themselves. not luckily i guess. Wish they had a decent man as their father, but im glad they see through his manipulations.

Jesus Christ. Mum has been HEARD (almost hope this turns out to be a fucking acronym rather than the overwrought nonsense it appears to be).

Your dad sounds like a bit of a dick, tbh, but she seems to have been ok with him when they attempted a reconciliation. Did she ask you what you thought about that, btw? Were you HEARD then? So she can dig deep now. She must have anticipated you'd invite him.

She's told you she doesn't want to sit with him or have photos with him. Fine. Fair. But that's where it ends. Don't make any more concessions and don't worry about it any more. You shouldn't have to consider eloping, especially as your spouse wants a 'do', just because of this. Ludicrous.

Has she been heard though?
Instead of dismissing this as overwrought nonsense (which OP has not done) think about what the goal is. For the day to go smoothly.
Presumably the OP does love her mum.
It's worth a try id say. To sit down with her once and make it clear that the pain her mother suffered isn't nothing.

That's what id do if this were my mother and my wedding.

It depends entirely if there was abuse.

For those tone deaf posters saying she should grow up - I am a survivor of dv and serious SA. CPTSD from years of the abuse would make it impossible for me to attend if my ex was there.

It's far more common than people realise

Fortunately my children would never seek a relationship in the first place.

FFS, is she 12? Tell her she’s not invited if she’s going to act like a petulant child.

To be fair.

Mum just said she doesn’t want to sit with him. Talk to him. Or be in group pics

that's fine

Yeah but like me you don't have bruises
It doesn't count

I think you've messed up. He cheated on her and he was violent to her - and probably a whole bunch of awful things you don't know about because you're her child and she did her best to shield you. As far as she knew, this douchebag was out of her life forever, and out of yours - and you just casually mentioned you now have a relationship with him.

You should have told her 7 years you were trying to build a relationship with him, not now. And not by just 'mentioning' it. This is a much bigger deal than you originally suggested in your opening post. She's had no time to get her head around the last 7 years of you deliberately lying to her by omission.

She's your mum, so she'll forgive you, but wow, the poor woman must be in absolute bits over this. Really, really thoughtless behaviour.

I think you should be less concerned about your mum ruining your big day by being miserable, and be concerned at how much you've hurt her. I also don't think that a child should necessarily have a relationship with both parents if one of them is abusive, and you don't know the full story. If someone was nice as pie to me and did something unspeakable to someone else, I wouldn't have them in my life. When selecting your inner circle, you need to look at how people treat everyone, not just how they treat you.

I don't mean to make you feel bad, but I do think you need to speak to your mum on neutral ground when you're both calm, and to have an honest discussion about what concerns she has about your dad being in your life (not just your wedding). Given she was always there for you, and the strength of her reaction to the news, I think you owe her that chat.

Well said @alltheteeshirts

I was in a similar situation. My mum was similarly incensed. I told her I wouldn't change my mind.

She got over it.

Being the child of divorced parents when it's been acrimonious, is really difficult, it isn't just the wronged partner who suffers when marriage breaks down. The impact on children from parents who cannot be civil can be huge. And especially with regards to navigating events like this.

For years and years my mum behaved like this, and made me and my brother feel guilty for attempting to have some sort of relationship with my Dad, in very similar circumstances to the OP. Absolutely accept that if there had been violence that is relevant, but as the OP had mentioned several times, her Dad was a good Dad to her, plus her mum attempted a reconciliation with him many years later, so in these circumstances, I think it's unfair to suggest the OP had messed up.

Of course you want both of your parents at your wedding. Unless they divorced because of abuse or similar, they should behave themselves and suck it up - they don't have to speak to each other, and you can make sure they're not sitting next to each other either.

My ex partner is a photographer and comes across this scenario frequently. At one wedding, he got so mad with the warring parents that he sat down on his camera case and refused to take any more photos unless they behaved ! Seriously though, why don't you say to both parents that it's your special day and you really want them both there so please will you just comply with the photographer when he is doing the special family photos. If you have a chat with him and delegate a guest to point out both parents, he will get them done very quickly, then your parents can ignore each other for the rest of the day! Make sure you have a pic done with just your Mum and one with just your Dad...I am speaking from years of dealing with wedding clients here!! Good luck !

If I had bruises to show the abuse i experienced at the hands of my children's father maybe your husband would make a different judgement call? Sometimes i think it would have been so much easier to have been battered.

I've attended a family wedding where the parents and the grandparents were divorced. Divorced parents sat at each end of the top table (both remarried and their spouses were with them), the grandparents I didn't see them speak to each other during the day and they were seated separately a considerable distance apart No fuss and no scenes caused, just polite avoidance which is fair enough. Can't remember what they did about the photos tbh. If there are a lot of family members around then it's easier to avoid each other or keep busy.

Hope it goes OK OP, enjoy your day.

This happened in the run up to a close family members’ wedding. To be honest, it was absolutely fine on the day, despite mother of groom threatening to be difficult. She liked the attention and compliments and forgot her head had been up her arse for months. Good luck, OP ❤️