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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To find it hard to be around DH family?

12 replies

TheMasterplan23 · 02/10/2025 21:39

DH family are lovely. He’s one of 5 DC and his mum & dad have been together for 60 years.
All live close by, pop in and out for cups of tea and meet up for birthdays, Christmas, anniversary’s etc.
My family aren’t like this at all. I’m NC with my father. I’m very close to my mum but she lives a few hours away. My brother is close but we’ve never had a particularly close relationship.

I find it hard being around all of them and watching how close they all are. They’re lovely to me but I’m not ‘one of them’ if you know what I mean?
I always feel on the outside of everything. I feel awkward when they ask about if I’ve seen my dad or brother.
Over the last year or so I’ve felt myself distancing myself from them all. Making up excuses to not be at meals or meet up for drinks. I don’t want to upset anyone but I guess I’m just protecting myself from the feelings it gives me being around them all.

Should I keep doing what I’m doing? Or should I put on a brave face and just get on with it?

OP posts:

ComtesseDeSpair · 02/10/2025 21:51

Why not make them the family that you’d like to have? If they’re family-oriented, welcoming, interested in you, are treating you with openness and care, embrace that. I can understand why you’d be sad about the comparison with your parents and siblings, but drawing yourself away isn’t going to fix that, and will probably only make you feel worse about not being a part of things long term.

FuzzyWolf · 02/10/2025 21:54

They sound nice and a normal, healthy family. What you do is up to you but you might find you’re missing out on spending time with your DH because he’s with his family.

Original poster

TheMasterplan23 · 02/10/2025 22:02

You’re right, they are all lovely and the issue is 100% me not them. I guess seeing them all together just reminds me that I don’t have that.
It makes me question what’s wrong with me to have had a father that essentially wanted/wants nothing to do with me.
I feel selfish but I find it painful to watch

OP posts:

BigOldBlobsy · 02/10/2025 22:18

It’s a hard balancing act, to appreciate and embrace this opportunity whilst also recognising the pain it brings due to your own experience. I would start the reframe the view that there is something wrong with you because of the way your dad has behaved. Sadly, children don’t choose the start they’re given, or the family dynamics they are born into.

WhereYouLeftIt · 02/10/2025 22:22

"It makes me question what’s wrong with me to have had a father that essentially wanted/wants nothing to do with me."
There is nothing wrong with you - your father, on the other hand; well ...

Sadly, many children have crap fathers, crap mothers, crap siblings, crap grandparents, crap aunts and uncles and cousins. And sadder is that the child interprets their crapness as being caused by themselves, the child. It never is ((hug)).

Your dad's crapness has damaged your self-worth, and that can be very difficult to get over. Theoretically, you'd think that being welcomed into your husband's lovely healthy family would be all lovely and healthy for you, but real life isn't that simple. I'd expect that what it does is bring old emotions back up to the surface, the emotions of a little girl who had a crap dad who made her feel worthless - and that must be very hard to deal with, hence you not wanting to be around them.

I don't think distancing yourself from them is the answer. I think you'd be better off recognising your dad's crapness and its effect on you, and from your now-adult perspective, try to reassure the little girl inside you that these people are OK, they won't hurt you and make you feel worthless like he did. Maybe explore that with a therapist?

mixedcereal · 02/10/2025 22:23

Would you consider counselling to talk through your feelings on this? It might help you let go of some of the disappointment with your own family set up, and welcome your days family and whether that’s possible.

I to some extent know where you are coming from, I lose my mum when I was 21, Dad when I was 30, and my siblings aren’t close and we don’t have extended family …I really really struggling hearing about friends close relationships with their
large families. As with you, I am very aware it’s a me problem but it doesn’t stop it and it does make it difficult to get close to people as I resent the exposure to something I don’t have.

Pashazade · 02/10/2025 22:33

Get some therapy to deal with the crap behaviour of your father, accept your family is the way it is and embrace your chance of a second family, if they are great people then go with it. I have a very good relationship with my family, but there’s only three of us, my DH is one of many and they are this terrifying institution. Sometimes I’m very jealous when I don’t quite count as a sibling, despite 25 years together, but the flip side is I had some horrible news when at a big family gathering the other month and they were all there for me and they all checked in on me when I had to attend a subsequent funeral. Embrace the second family, your life will be richer for it. Oh they don’t always get that my relationship with my family functions well for us, but a bit differently to how they do things, but they care about me and so want to know that my family are ok!

Xpelier · 02/10/2025 22:51

Definitely embrace this opportunity to have the close family you didn’t have. I get it, my family are like this but my DHs are not, he initially found it hard but after 6 years together he loves them - they are his family and he really enjoys spending time with them.

ButterPiesAreGreat · 02/10/2025 23:39

Not quite as extreme but DHs family is a lot closer than mine and they are very similar sized, with parents and siblings within an hour of each other, nearest member of my family is at least 3 hours away. I’ve always embraced them and I’m glad that I did because they lost BIL 7 years ago and MIL passed away in July so we have those memories. It’s a slightly crazy family, loads of grandchildren and even more great grandchildren who are spread across the UK and even Australia. (Tho most are roughly in the same area) so get togethers are wild. DH visits his Dad every few weeks if he can, and I don’t always go with him but I definitely feel part of the family. They embraced me as much as I embraced them.

I agree with PP that you should perhaps consider and work through what it is about the family that makes you uncomfortable and leads you to avoid them.

nozbottheblue · 03/10/2025 00:44

TheMasterplan23 · 02/10/2025 22:02

But you DO have that now, since you’ve married into this lovely family!
It sounds like they are very welcoming and want you to be a full part of their family, so enjoy it instead of resenting it.

Tourmalines · 03/10/2025 01:11

I think withdrawing yourself will make you more miserable in the long run, make your husband feel sad and his family not knowing whats wrong .

Onlycoffee · 03/10/2025 01:19

Should I keep doing what I’m doing? Or should I put on a brave face and just get on with it? @TheMasterplan23

There's another option. Thibk about building resilience and working though some of your discomfort so that you are able to join in and allow yourself to be part of a lovely family environment.

You're pushing away the very thing that might help you heal and feel more at peace with your childhood and family.

If you're uncomfortable with questions about your father and brother, just tell them that nothing has changed and you don't like to talk about it.

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