Stepdaughter and Daughter's Wedding

[WickedMotherofthebride]

Decided to become a member as it seems to be Stepchildren and wedding season on Mumsnet and sobbing uncontrollably to my sister isn't giving me the unbiased opinions I am after.
For the first time in our 22 year marriage my husband's ex invited him to dinner. We were very curious thinking she must be ill or something. I admit after a couple of hours I used my iphone to track him and he was at Charing Cross, then an hour later in the pub around the corner from us, he rarely drinks but came home the worse for wear and completely ashen.
Essentially if he goes ahead to walk my daughter down the aisle he can say goodbye to a relationship with his own daughter who is apparently devastated by this. Something that has been confirmed by his son.
I am one of those women who let a loser impregnate her, I thought the odd splif wasn't a big deal but he turned into an absolute stonehead who was in and out of my daughter's life until she was 8 when I married my husband. I don't know if her father's absence and my getting married was a coincidence but I think it was.
My husband is to all intents and purposes her dad.
At 15 a strange man arrived at the door wanting me to talk to him without my daughter present., obviously I wouldn't but my husband went out. It was the husband of my daughter's aunt to tell us that her dad had died.
She was given the chance to have a relationship with her family but chose not to saying that my husband was her dad.
Stepdaughter has a long term partner but there are no wedding bells.
My husband is adamant now that he can't give my daughter away something that I will not forgive him for. In fact I will divorce him if he doesn't.
The wedding is in 18 weeks.

Impossible situation for your DH. Can’t you walk your daughter down the aisle?

Id feel free to say plenty to my father as an adult if I felt he’d spent my childhood acting as father to another girl.

I assume SD objects to walking down the aisle as it’s a father of the bride role. Other stuff doesn’t have the same symbolism.

DD had a deadbeat dad, so she gained a dad. Which is great. But he wasn’t an unattached man, he already had a daughter. So DD gained a full time dad and SD lost one. And that is hella complicated.

As if it isn’t hurtful enough for the DD to already be facing the big fuck you of ‘my REAL daughter doesn’t want me to walk you down the aisle so I won’t be’. It’s really going to show DD exactly where she stands

Good! She didn’t bother to consider her step sisters feelings did she? Her feelings are no more important than the other daughters.

The poor girl has already been abandoned by one dad who is now dead, why isn’t anyone putting themselves in her shoes?

I was exactly in her shoes when I got married, my dad died when I was the same age and everything. I asked a friend who was also my friend’s Dad to walk me down the aisle, but I asked the girlfriend who was the same age as me if it would be ok first. That’s just basic consideration for someone else’s feelings. When she said yes and I asked her Dad, his response was rightly ‘Thank you for asking and I’d love to walk you down the aisle but I will only do it if my dd is t upset by it’. I was able to reassure him that I’d already checked, but still didn’t take it as a done deal until they had had a chance to talk to each other about it, and I would have graciously accepted a no if either of them had been at all uncomfortable with it.

He's NOT not stepped up at their big life event like a wedding. They're not the ones getting married.

If he acts as the OP's daughter's dad on her wedding that's it for bio daughter, according to the ex and bio son.

Maybe he should clarify with her just what's going on while OP steps back instead of issuing ultimatums herself

Your ultimatum doesn’t make sense OP.

Divorce your DH over this and a) your DD still doesn’t have him walking her down the aisle and b) she now no longer has her step dad in her life.

The alternative is he chooses his second wife over his own DD. Also not good.

He really needs to have an honest conversation with his DD about why this is so hard for her. Instead of being angry and flinging ultimatums around, a little understanding. Blended families rarely work. Your parents separating follows you for the rest of your life. Every major event in your life becomes fraught, as you are now discovering.

If this man has raised your DD as his own after you fucked around and found out with a stoner then he is a good man. You’d be mad to divorce him over something like this.

Those saying he was an awful dad for being a dad to his SD are missing the point that love can grow, him being a dad to another person doesn't stop him loving his other daughter.
Was he supposed to ignore his SD, treat her badly, put his other daughter on a pedestal and no one else can be loved?
Say his daughter tells him to never see his SD again, does he do that?
He is the father of 2 daughters!
I couldn't stand by a man who could drop a daughter at a whim of the other.

No, he’s a father to one daughter and a step father to a step daughter.

His loyalty lies with the child he created, not the one who had a mother he fell for.

Of course he isn’t supposed to ignore his step daughter but in the circumstances, he should have gone out of his way to make his daughter feel like she is still loved, and is still the most important little girl in his life. It doesn’t sound like he’s done that at all, or like OP has ever had any consideration for her step daughter’s feelings, so now they have to deal with the consequences. This man needs to do something to repair things with his dd.

If he's willing to let your daughter down because his daughter is bullying him, he's not the man you thought he was. I definitely wouldn't tolerate this behaviour from my husband.

On the face of it, SD sounds dreadful and unreasonable.

BUT all you have is a second hand account of her feelings. I reckon that DH should be able to handle this with diplomacy and tact if he is smart about it.
Has he even spoken to her directly? He should have a chat and really listen to her feelings and validate them and all that crap and then ask her directly about what her mum said and whether it is true she wants to blackmail him like this. Surely plan A should be to have a reconciliatory talk with her to get her to accept it rather than play her evil game of “you can only have 1 daughter”.

Also OP I hate to say it but I worry that you risk escalating the situation and making everything blow up worse than it needs to.

did your DD torment her step sister as a child? there has to be more to this.

So sorry to vote YABU as I can tell it’s an issue you feel strongly about.
But to actually DIVORCE your husband over one day, to decide to split home, finance, family over not even one day to be honest but five minutes is risible.
That poor, poor man.
You say he was ashen, that unusually for him he had a drink and speak very highly of him.
Yet for one day you will divorce him.
Hmmm OP is this simply a case that you needed a provider for you and your daughter and now she is getting married you can do without him???!
Because as I have typed out the above this is what it seems like to me.
Otherwise there is no other rational explanation for such grandstanding.

But you’d tolerate him making his own daughter feel like shit?

Glad my stepdad didn't feel that way. He was my and my sister's dad for all intents and purposes and he loved us like we were his own.

I would expect DH to talk to his daughter and ask her why she'd ask something so cruel of him. Maybe he can work on her. If that doesn't work then I think ultimately it is his choice what he does but it would be a real dilemma for me- vicious as she is being she is his daughter. As you what you do - encourage him to speak to SD, encourage him to think about how he'd respond if the situation was the other way round, would he think it would be OK to not walk his other daughter down the aisle? But ultimately I agree with others you walk her down the aisle. Or better yet she walks herself rather than be handed over like a piece of property (sorry - bit of a bone of contention for me that one, though I do appreciate why you'd be upset about the tradition not happening as you'd like).

He’s not making his own DD feel like shit. She’s making everyone else feel like shit, and tainting OP’s wedding, as a result of her own self indulgence.

I genuinely would feel proud that my dad had been asked to walk anyone down the aisle. He’s a good man who is loved by many and I would see this as a reflection of how kind he had been and how highly regarded he had been by the bride. Step, friend, colleague - whoever it was. I’m glad I was not raised to be as mean spirited and indulged as the DD in this thread.

I have very strong feelings about this.

No child asks to be brought into the world. Once you have a child that’s endgame to me they should be the priority including over romantic relationships.

If the DH chose to get married to a woman with a daughter he should have put a lot of thought into considering the impact on his kids. And never made his daughter feel like she is the same to him as someone else’s child.

That isn’t to say that her can’t be a father figure to SD or be kind, but his own DD should be made feel that his bond with his children is unique.

What did the Op do when she heard about this? She rushed to project her own DD because her own DD is her No.1. including saying she is willing to divorce DH after 22 years.

I feel so sorry for your DH. He is in the most terrible lose-lose situation. I would urge him to talk directly to his dd and see if this is all really true. It’s pretty outrageous given that dd isn’t even thinking about getting married. How mean and selfish of your dsd.

In your shoes, I would be gracious and walk dd down the aisle myself. Because it is literally impossible for your dh. But dsd would be in no doubt as to how despicable I think she is (if this is actually what she said and not projection from the mother).

Well we don’t really know because OP hasn’t answered any questions yet but the more likely explanation, to me, seems that the SD’s feelings have been extremely over-indulged her whole life. The fact that her DF is pandering to this ridiculously entitled attitude, that her DM has backed her up, and that she actually thought it was reasonable to voice aloud the idea that she could prevent her DF from walking her Step sister down the aisle… this to me screams spoilt narcissist far more than poor, overlooked cinderella!

Did he have a daughter of a similar age? If he did, it would be telling that you didn’t mention her feelings.

It screams abandoned child to me

Completely agree with this. There is no reason for him to walk her down the aisle if it’s going to cause this much upset. Plenty of mothers walk their daughters down the aisle these days.

You are being too dramatic. What does your DD think of this? How is the relationship with your SD, DD and you?

And why doesn’t the Op care about why the SD feels this strongly?!

She didn’t voice aloud anything. She shared her hurt with her mother and brother and they chose to intervene.

It doesn’t read to me like she’s been over indulged at all. If she was, this wouldn’t have come as such a dramatic shock to the OP. If anything it sounds to me like OPs daughter is over indulged considering her mother would contemplate divorce if he partner doesn’t do what she wants.

But then I suppose we all come to these step family thread with our own experiences.

I think it’s pretty cruel to issue your DH an ultimatum. He can’t win in this situation. Whatever he chooses to do, he is going to hurt someone.

It doesn’t sound like your SD and DD ever had a close relationship? I wonder if your SD felt pushed out by your DD?

Either way, if my DH threatened me with a divorce over an already sensitive issue, I’d be questioning his character. Your DH is not a villain here!

As PPs have suggested, why don’t you walk your DD down the aisle?

I can’t get to now anyone whose father moves out and then moves in with another women and her daughter could be described as “over indulged”. I think it’s a heartbreaking thing to happen to a child. And while I get while some relationships need to end I think we normalise putting adult wants over children’s needs in society.