12 year old wants to go to wedding where sister hasn't been invited

[Stuckinthemiddlewithnoone]

Essentially we have declined an invitation to husband’s nephew’s wedding in the summer as he has not invited my 15 year old daughter (16 by the time of the wedding) from a long ago relationship. We simply declined without saying why.

Sister-in-Law asked if we were on holiday etc. so I told her the truth. She seemed very embarrassed as did mother-in-law. We were told that she would ask, well that was a month ago and we haven’t heard anything. Husband all along said he wouldn’t go anyway even if they changed their mind.

Now here is the AIBU! 12 year old wants to go. She has completely lost it saying that she has a right to make her own mind up and that elder sister isn’t related to cousin.

I have lost it back at her saying she needs to support her sister.

However, husband thinks we should let her go and we shouldn’t put her in the middle of this.

So, what would you lot do?

I think a lot of posters on here have gathered that already.

But clearly not within the thoughts of the Bride and Groom.

My point is that in saying that the 12 year old should go we aren't saying that what the bride groom did is ok.

I agree the 12 year old should go, as said it's not her fault that her sister hasn't been invited.

But this could all be discussed between the Nephew and OP's Husband only then will they find out the reasoning behind not inviting the elder child.

Not this case but on another one like this where the step child wasn’t invited. It was because inviting this one step child meant they would have to invite something like 16 extra step children to their wedding because of multiple families.

The line was drawn. Who knows why the line was drawn here this time as op hasn’t been back to explain anymore.

All we know is the 15 year old is sad she isn’t invited. The 12 year old is angry her mother and father won’t let her attended just because her sister isn’t invited, the 12 year old feels that her sister is not her families family when it comes to this wedding.

The op could standby her 15 year old by not attending herself and also support her 12 year old by facilitating her attendance at this wedding. She doesn’t need to let it cause a rift between her children.

In blended families often siblings are doing different things purely because they do have different families. It’s not the 12 year olds fault her sisters dads side are shit, in a normal world the older would of been off at times often doing things the 12 year old may well of been jealous of and been told basically it’s tough shit we are a blended family and sometimes that means you’ll both be doing things the other won’t as you have us a joint family and then you each have dads sides doing things too. Because dad is shit it’s led to a false sense of security in always being invited to dh’s side for the older one.

12yrs olds are selfish. Let her go if she really wants to, I think it’s disgusting they invited parents and 12yr old and left out a 15yr old. I’m glad your DH is taking a stand with his family. I’m sure your 12yr old might feel differently if she was the one with a different father and beinf excluded

Yes, it’s this attitude that makes me struggle to sympathise with the OP. I completely get why she’s mad about the invitation, but her vitriol seems to be aimed not at those who issued it, but her own daughter for wanting to accept it.

If it was a case of “I’m so mad with them for upsetting both my daughters” and “for putting my younger daughter in a difficult position”, that would be one thing. But no - it’s a 12 year-old being punished for not failing into line (and not doing it willingly enough). If it’s really about the rudeness of the bride and groom, she should save her ire for them.

People on here can have really weird expectations of this age group, whether it's treating them like small useless children or expecting adult levels of empathy and unselfishness.

I agree with you @Stuckinthemiddlewithnoone
It's terrible that they've invited all of you with the exception of your elderly DD. Did the invite actually goes as far as to specify all three of your names and omit your DDs? That's scummy!

I would say you need to put on a united front, or the relationship between your two DCs will be impacted massively. Your younger DD is at an age where she doesn't understand how selfish it is to want to go, so I would sit her down and explain.

In our family, we have a DCs who are step children, one who is adopted in (and knows this), and I would never consider not inviting them.

Your poor older DD. That's just so rude and she must be so upset to be demonstrably excluded. The nephew sounds like a total prick to do that. I would also question how he feels about you being in the family having been in a relationship before that resulted in a child. What a throwback snob.

What does the rest of the family think on nephews side?

Older DD not elderly, not sure why my phone changed it

I wouldn't want to exclude my 12 year old from a family event she was keen to go to. I would tell her why I wasn't going and leave her to make up her own mind.

There was a post on here, not so long ago about a grown child who had been made to sit out of family events because her half / step sisters weren't invited and the impact on her was huge. She felt that she'd been made to miss out on family gatherings and her sisters needs / feelings were always put first.

Life can be sad and unfair, I would be honest with the 15 year old and ask what she would like to do that day instead.

I think the argument that she isn't his family is weak. She is as much their family as you are. You married into the family and DD with you. Why are you invited and not her?

In blended families often siblings are doing different things purely because they do have different families

And that’s fair enough. X is going on holiday with her dad, Y is spending the day with her aunt. But this is not an invitation that has been specifically issued to this 12 year old child; she’s been invited as part of her dad’s family unit. So it’s bizarre to suggest that she goes on her own when her dad isn’t going. I was invited so my BIL’s wedding. Why? Because I am the wife of his brother. Last minute illness aside, it would have been incredibly strange for me to accept the invitation if my DH couldn’t go. Because it wasn’t an invitation for “me”, it was for DH and his wife. And, given the OP has said the kids don’t know the 30 year old groom well, this is likely to be the case here; the 12 year old is invited as “uncle’s daughter”. Would she even be welcome on her own? Where are they going to seat her? I know I’d have been a bit nonplussed if my cousin had said at my wedding that he was sending a pre teen child on her own; apart from anything else, someone needs to look after her and it becomes a faff (and - and I suspect this is at the very heart of the original problem - an extra expense. I bet the 15 year old was excluded because they thought they could save money on her dinner. On that basis, they’re hardly going to be thrilled at stumping up for a dinner for an unaccompanied family child and having to arrange a seating plan specially for her!). The 12 year old may well find that, in reality, she’s really not as “invited” as she thought she was…..

There was a post on here, not so long ago about a grown child who had been made to sit out of family events because her half / step sisters weren't invited and the impact on her was huge.

If this question had been about an adult, my answer would have been different. An adult should be allowed to make their own decision and not be bullied into doing what others members of the family want her to do for reasons of their own.

But in this case we are talking about a 12-year-old. She isn't independent and she doesn't get to make decisions because, you know, she's 12, and therefore her decisions have an impact on lots of other people too and require other people to take her into account. As @WimpoleHat says, she hasn't been invited on her own, she has been invited as part of a family – a family who have decided they aren't going to this particular event. Therefore the 12-year-old can't either.

Do you know if the bride and groom have other step cousins. The groom could easily have some on his mums side and the bride also has some then maybe it’s too many and they chose to exclude them all rather than try and make an assessment as to which ones had been in the family long enough versus those that hadn’t

Have you read and understood the thread?

there is no “elder girl’s father side”. Her stepfather is her only father - he raised her as such since she was 2. So the first cousin, I would assume, has seen both girls together in the capacity of “his cousins” for the entirety of their lives.

im pretty sure if DD12 thinks of her cousin as her cousin, that DD15 does too!

I think it does to the 15 year old! And the 12 year old

When I used the expression 'gloating entitledness' it was supposition only, a suggestion that this might be the case. I was not accusing the 12 year old of anything and there was no name-calling.
Please read posts more carefully and don't be so ready to accuse others of hatred.

"and the gloating entitledness of the younger."

Who is the mysterious other "younger" then, if not the 12 year old?

Once again, you are taking what I said out of context.
Are you deliberately misunderstanding? Or are you just incapable of understanding?

You've been understood perfectly clearly, by many. Not nice when adults bite back and you can't have free rein to attack 12 year olds?

Quite! Am shocked so many what I'd presume to be adult women apparently enjoying being horrible about a child. @VainVillein so saying the 12 yo has 'gloating entitledness' what did you mean? How was it misunderstood?

Your post is nonsensical. I know that I didn't attack anyone.

This is ludicrous. You don't understand the importance of context. Think what you like. I did not attack a child.

It isn’t ‘a party’, it is the wedding of the youngest girl’s first cousin. It would be strange for a first cousin not to attend.

It really wouldn't.

It's a party, with a bit of a ceremony added on. I'm not sure what it is with Mumsnet and all this mandatory attendance at weddings, in which nothing short of deathbed-level illness is an 'excuse' for not going, and non-attendance is an unfogiveable sin worthy of nothing short of lifelong no-contact.

Ridiculous. It's just a wedding.

It would be strange for a first cousin not to attend.

But stranger still for a 12 year old cousin to go on her own, without her mum or dad (the uncle of the groom). And I come back to it - who is actually going to supervise her while she’s there? I have a 12 year old; she’s very good in adult company. But I think she’d feel a bit out of place on her own at an adult event where she didn’t have a “family base” to go back to/sit with. And I come back to it - whose table will she sit at? Who will take her and bring her home? Who will be responsible for her during the day? Presumably close family will be closely involved with the wedding and they won’t welcome the responsibility. I think the 12 year old may find that she’s not as welcome as she thinks she is when it comes down to it.