AIBU to feel I should have been invited? ***edit by MNHQ to say this is a reverse***

[checkeredboards]

I get along well with my in-laws and I always feel included and part of the family. We live about 3 hours away from my family and about 20 minutes away from my PILs. We have a great marriage. Been married for 8 years now. I recently had my PILs and SIL over for cake for my husband's 30th birthday. Well MIL presented him with concert tickets for his birthday and said out loud, "I bought you, your dad, me, and your younger sister concert tickets so we can all go see this band that we all love together in concert yayy." I'm thinking in my head MIL prob just forgot to mention me by name because surely there's no way his mum forgot to include me in this as I would be the only family member left out and we don't have a rocky relationship we get along very well and it would be way out of character for her. But nope she didn't include me. She went on to say how excited she was to do this for the four of them.

My husband was like thanks mum I'm super excited. Which I was pretty pissed at him that he right away didn't stand by me and immediately ask what about my wife. I told him later on that I was pretty pissed because I felt like it's one thing for his parents not to think of and include me but it's a whole other layer of hurt when husband doesn't even think of me. I couldn't help myself and muttered pretty loudly so I could make sure they heard, "thanks for including and thinking of your son's closest family member you know his wife the woman he married." I mentioned that this is very clearly a celebration centered around the four of them and I was going to leave them to it. His mom said how of course I'm part of the celebration and I said well right now it doesn't really feel like I'm part of it. That's the time I felt like my husband should have supported me. I'm the one he married and lives with. He just stood there like a dumb man shrugging his shoulders. Not literally speaking but figuratively speaking.

I felt like if they couldn't afford 5 concert tickets ok fine but there was so many ways around that where I wasn't completely left out. They could have given my husband money towards the concert ticket based on what they could afford and said, "hey for your birthday I want to go to a concert as a family please put this money towards you and your wife's concert ticket." Or they could have made it just a mother son night or a father son not that way not everyone in the family is included but his own wife! Especially like I said this is sooo out of character because his parents are not the type at all to not consider others feelings or how things may look or come across.

AIBU to feel hurt and left out by the actions of my MIL and also even more hurt that my husband wasn't immediately like what the hell what about my wife? I mention MIL specifically because I know she is the present buyer for the family and she is the one who presented the tickets during the celebration. If FIL was the one who bought the family presents and presented the tickets I would have said him instead of MIL.

I feel like MIL was going back in time where their family was just the four of them but now her son is married and family functions should include his wife.

Sorry OP but you are wrong on this one. I can see why it might have been upsetting at the time of presentation with you being there, but it’s not unreasonable to have a one-off parents and children event. If it was your husband, the parents, and your own children, I would definitely feel excluded. But with current set up, it’s OK. You did ask in the forum, so take on board some of the comments.

OP you need to be careful that your DS doesn't start excluding you from his life altogether as much as I understand you're a family of 4 she is now part of your family chosen by your own DS and seems to have done nothing overly wrong, it must have been upsetting for her to watch you excitedly announce you've bought tickets for all the family to attend a gig then pretty much say except for you DDIL, you're not coming.

He's already told you he's a grown adult and doesn't like seeing his wife excluded, so why disrespect him...
You write that you really like her then in the next breath say....
So what should I do about the fact that my son married a controlling needy womanchild?

Hardly a way to describe someone that you think is a sweet person that you really like and it's not her that sounds either needy or controlling.

If your DS and his wife ever have DC of their own I'm sure you'd be upset if DIL didn't see you as being part of her child's life.

It's a reverse

I think mil has tried to paint herself in a better light seeing as it's a reverse.
I also think announcing in front of her daughter in law, who invited them over, is very tacky and she did it deliberately to make a point.
If mil wasn't selfish she would have told her ds in private.. The whole set up is just odd..

Very odd.

I think whatever POV OP has written from, she’s made herself sound terrible.

When it was from the DILs POV, she made herself sound like a spoiled little brat who didn’t want her husband to spend time with his family.

When writing from MILs POV, she made herself sound horrible, suggesting when buying the tickets, DIL was intentionally left out because she is a controlling needy womanchild.

I just feel so sorry for the poor husband/son 🙈

So posting on here that this is a reverse has made zero difference as people don't RTFT they just respond to the OP
This is why reverses are shit and imvho should be banned

What’s a reverse? Is it the MIL pretending to be the wife??

Yes.

🤣

I would also find it odd to be given 4 tickets to something as a gift to me, at the same time as being told who the other guests were and that my spouse definitely wasn’t included. That wouldn’t feel like the gift was actually for me. It would be quite different if I was just being invited along to something and had the option to decide about going.

This. Entirely.

The gift is for husband/son (depending upon who the OP actually is) at all. It's for MIL who is determined to get what she wants, without discussion.

4 tickets would have been a gift.

1 ticket with guests picked by MIL and deliberately excluding the birthday boy's own wife!!!, is not a birthday gift. It's rude as fuck.

YABU Your husband is allowed to spend time with his family without you. They probably do like you but they just wanted to spend some time with just him, which is perfectly normal. Honestly you sound either very young or just very immature. Try to think from others perspective, it’ll help you understand things and generally make you less exhausting to be around.

You didn’t need to be invited. My Father turned a milestone age last year & just me, him, my mum & siblings went for a fancy dinner…my
husband / siblings partners’ weren’t bothered in the slightest! It was lovely to be ‘just us’ as it used to be…we’re a VERY close family & my DP & father are very very close but he wasn’t fussed.

And if, instead of it being your dad's birthday, it was YOUR birthday - would your husband have been at the fancy dinner celebrating your birthday?

Yes…but it doesn’t sound like the concert is on his actual birthday as that has already been which is when they gave him the tickets?

So you are the MIL who did this on purpose despite knowing your son’s view but think it was his wife that has pushed him.

YABVU!!!!

Have you considered the child you raised to adulthood is this way because of how he was raised by you and his father? Maybe there is a reason he doesn’t want to leave his wife out and expecting him to do so for a band they both enjoy is spiteful.

I'm late to the thread so I've got the benefit of knowing already that it's a reverse, and I get that the OP has to some extent manipulated the responses that she got, but I just want to say that I'm completely mindblown by the tone of most of the responses. No way is the MIL in this picture being reasonable. The DIL could have been more diplomatic but not unreasonably was totally wrongfooted by such a huge snub. And the DH, like so many others, seems to know his mother is a problem but is a complete wet wipe in her actual presence. I honestly don't know what's wrong with these MILs. Wanted to recreate a time when her children were little and it was just the four of them? What, by being incredibly unkind and competitive towards the person her adult child loves and has chosen to spend his life with? How totally toxic. I hope the whole thread is a work of fiction, but it sounds all too real tbh. At least the DIL knows what she's dealing with before kids come along, I suppose.

Bloody hell the way you talk about your DIL is plain nasty at times. There is a "needy womanchild" in this scenario, it just isn't her.

I agree! I’d be fine about DH going out with family if it was something I didn’t want to see. But being left out of the invitation is hurtful.

Why have you posted when you argue with everyone who disagrees with you, you have decided you are right so leave it as that. I do things with my siblings and parents a lot without my husband of 20 years and without our 2 kids, it’s nice. that’s our original family and it’s nice to do things with them. Everytime I see my mum or dad I don’t want my husband there and the same for him

I think you have every right to be hurt by this. I have a son who has a gf of 4 years. They’ve lived together the last 2 years. I wouldn’t dream of buying tickets to something for him and his sisters without at least checking if his partner wanted to join. They spend a lot of time independently of each other too with separate friends and colleagues and they are not married. I think it would be rude and disrespectful to his relationship not to include her. As a married couple even more odd/thoughtless of them to do this to you.

Honestly, it's got to the point where Mumsnet HQ have posted, pointing out that the thread is a reverse, to give everyone the heads up, and people are STILL replying directly to the OP. 500 odd messages in!!

If you're not gonna read the bloody thread, at least filter by the OP's replies to get the gist of a thread that's been going for three fricken days!!

Your husband can go with his parents and siblings without you 🤷🏻‍♀️

If the siblings partners were invited then I'd understand BUT if none of you have been I don't see the issue.

Nice for them to spend time together.