BIL suggested I never pay enough.

[Peoplearesoweird]

I recently got divorced and am really struggling what to make of life going forward, there just doesn't seem to be much point any more.

Of late, I've been trying to make sense of some of the things that we argued about so I'll give you one of the lighter discussions that was never fully put to bed... What would you have done?

To give you some context, I had to leave my family home where I grew up abruptly, my younger brother who has issues with drugs, came at me and not for the first time with a carving knife and my parents just watched. I had to move out for my own safety and I did so without a penny to my name and quickly got into debt as you can imagine.

I'm not looking for sympathy at all, this is just to give you some context for the next part of the story. This start in life has always made me feel that I needed to make sure that I had enough money, that I paid my way and it would often mean that if we were going out that I'd be the first to buy everyone a drink, even if I didn't have the money right away (credit card). I didn't want anyone to think I was a sponger.

Now for the next part of the story....

Quite a few years later, I got married to the woman of my dreams. Beautiful, funny, sharing lots of the same interests but above all she was kind, like I had never seen before.

Her sister and BIL had a small house in France that they visited every year and we were often invited to go and stay 'for a cheap week, just pay for the flight'. Of course it wasn't just paying for the flight, you're family and you want to chip in where possible, why should we cost them to look after us? So we would pay money into SIL's account before the holiday for groceries, we'd paid for thanks of petrol, additional grocery bills, the odd meal out as a thank you and drinks etc. Because it always feels like they're doing you a favour, you can never really feel grateful enough. It wasn't ever a cheap holiday and we couldv'e one cheaper elsewhere but it wasn't about that, it was quality time spent away with the family.

Anyway... one evening we were out at a restaurant, myself, my wife and my BIL and SIL. The evening went fine and we were all having a good time as far as I could see. We finished our meal and both myself and my BIL went up to the bar area to pay the bill. We'd generally split it between the couples. I always like to leave at least the recommended tip but I know everyone is different. I asked the waitress if we could add the tip onto the card payment but unfortunately they don't allow it for some reason as is the way in a lot of European countries, so we had to pay cash.

I rarely carry cash (I should've remembered to take some) and so I asked if my BIL could pay the tip and I'm sort him out later as I always would. He said fine and paid the tip in cash (€10) and I said thank you. He then said and I quote " Any time you want to pay the full price, rather than the special price you often get, let me know".

I didn't know what to say so I just smiled a bit and said "ok thanks".

When we got back to our room that night, I told my wife about it. She looked quite upset and said "that doesn't sound like something he'd say but I'll handle it" and we obviously discussed a bit about recent and past bills and reassured ourselves that we always pay our way and that nothing was owed.

Two years passed. Over that time it had been needling away in the back of my mind and a few times I mentioned it to my wife to ask if she'd approached the subject with her BIL and SIL yet. It mattered to me because he seemed that he thought he was having to sub me all the time and I hated that because of my childhood and the fact that I absolutely always pay my way. During those two years, I was absolutely sure that we always paid our wy or more but it was a mental drain always thiking that they thought we were spongers no matter what. After the two years, it came to a head as we'd been invited to go to France again and all of the memories came flooding back. I asked my wife outright to tackle it as I waited patiently for two years. Reluctantly she agreed.

I don't know what she said to him but he first said to her "oh yes I remember that conversation and I'd negotiated a discount on the bill (he spoke French). That absolutely didn't happen, only me and and my BIL were present and we spoke in English and there was no discount. So I contacted him via text and said that didn't happen. He then replied "I don't what I did yesterday mate let alone two years ago, you should've come to me earlier" Coming to him earlier was a fair point and I'd wanted to but I was respecting my wife's wishes that she wanted to handle it. The point however was that now his story had changed.

Then my SIL waded in, "I'm sorry but that's not what was said" (she's telling me that my story isn't true). Neither my wife nor my SIL was present to witness the conversation, only myself and my BIL.

Then things got a lot worse. My wife started to gaslight me, she started to say that the story I was now telling was different to the one I told her two years ago. She started to repeat the story that my BIL was now telling that he'd allegedly negotiated a discount in French and she started to say "I sometimes forget what actually happened and get carried away". I remember what happened like it was yesterday and I thought about it constantly, my wife presumably never thought about it because it didn't bother her so my memories are not cloudy.

After my SIL said "I'm sorry but that's not what was said", she never spoke to me again. I'd known her for over 15 years. To date, my wife has never waivered on the fact that BIL was innocent of what he said and that I must have lied, despite never having lied to her in the past.

I gave possible explanations for him, he may have been a bit drunk, SIL may not have made him aware or may have forgotten that we used to pay in for groceries etc as she handling the finances and he was known for having his head in the clouds sometimes.

When I eventually realised that full grown, seemingly sane adults weren't going to ever give in to their pride. I said "Ok, we both have different recollections of what happened that day but this is not something worth wrecking relationships over so let's just shake hands and call it a day" They never spoke to me again.

I've always been of the opinion that you should treat people how you'd like to be treated and if a friend or family member has caused upset you should talk about ir or if you're in the wrong, listen, understand and apologise.

What are you thoughts, what would you have done? AIBU?

Sorry that turned into a long one, phew!

You said you owned the copyright to magazines that you had designed, and then you said that you couldn’t publish the magazines yourself as they were collections of works by a number of people and your copyright was only a share of the collective rights.

You also said that the £300k represented royalties that were a small percentage of the sale of the magazines. Even if you’re getting 10 percent of each sale (very unlikely as that is a pretty standard publishing royalty on full copyright, which you’ve already said you don’t have), the publisher would have to have made £3 million from sales for that to add up.

Please get some therapy OP. x

I honestly don’t think you were gaslighted, I just think you had a difference of opinion with your wife about your BIL’s motives. She is allowed to disagree. It was a very trivial incident and she probably felt like you were making a mountain out of a molehill and felt like piggy in the middle.

If her sister and BiL live in a different country, she probably doesn’t have a close relationship with BIL either. If you thought he was being shitty (which he very well may have been) then you should have said something to him instead of hiding behind your exDW and expecting her to sort it out. It sounds like she tried.

You really could do with some counselling to help you to move forward. You’re stuck in this and ruminating on things that are completely irrelevant now. It’s really not healthy or helpful.

What I suspect has taken place is that your former business partner set up online publishing of back issues and you have decided that he now owes you £300k while your ex-wife accepted that a figure of £10k is vastly more reasonable.

Because a lot of people don't understand how copyright works, it's a complicated topic. No disrespect to you whatsoever but I just didn't want to get into it. My initial post represents a pattern of avoidance, that's all.

There was no hiding at all, I consulted her out of respect, it was her family. Once she tackled it, I presented the facts.

Your ex wife was an avoidant. There may have been things in her family set up to have caused this. But she didn’t want to rock the boat and thus didn’t support you at the time. It was addressed far too late and then escalated.

but she’s an ex now, you need to move on. Also sorry about your hard start to live, a lot of us have had them in one way or another. I was kicked out at 18. It makes life harder overall as we are always doubting ourselves and feeling judged. Take care of yourself.

Also when you meet someone new don’t do any ‘free’ family sort of stuff. It’s never free there’s always strings attached in some way.

Perhaps MN might not be the best platform for this 5000 word post. Do you have any pics of wedding outfits you needs opinions on?

Ok that makes more sense, you felt the copyright was worth 300k your wife felt it was worth 10k. No one had published them, even you, so as no one else wished to the copyright is worthless. Something is only worth whay someone will pay,

so effectively you decided it was worth 300k, your wife felt otherwise. If your friend forged and went ahead it likely didn’t make him any money, if he’s now bankrupt.

so it’s not someone stole 300k from you, it is someone used your copyright without permission, the value of thay copyright you felt was very high, your wife felt otherwise. I suspect she was right.

Apparently @Peoplearesoweird has legal documents to “prove” that it was £300k and that he was willing to share.

However tumbleweed when actually taken up on the offer

300k? You just wrote off 300k? Was there a shark involved?

From what he says it’s his valuation of the copy right, his wife had a different valuation. Which was 10k. It is unlikely either was close to the mark and it was worth much less, he simply saw a way to make money.

he also spent 9k chasing it legally and the police were not interested, so I’m unsure why he’s saying he lost 300k and it’s his wife’s fault and he just let it go out of kindness. Or even how he lost a house over it.

You were holding a grudge on what was likely a misunderstanding for 2 years... It's not reasonable.

Your versions could both be correct, it wasn't a big deal and you made it into a huge thing.

It was a throwaway comment that you should have addressed at the time or the next day. It was not the sort of comment that needs other people's involvement, including your wife.

You felt the copyright was worth 300k, your wife felt it was worth 10k, HMRC made him bankrupt. That copyright wasn't really worth a penny in retrospect.

What has the murder of your nephew got anything to do with a restaurant bill or people asking for clarification? Where did that thought process come from?

What has the suicide rate got anything to do with a restaurant bill? (to clarify women attempt suicide more often but men are more successful, usually because they use more violent ways). Why did you add that to your post, what's the relevance?

You seem to be spiralling OP, I suggest your feelings can only be helped via professional therapy rather than an Internet forum.

We charged £0.25 per magazine, which It was a carefully calculated amount knowing all the costs of production. Nothing was speculative and all based on actual sales. Plus he stole them, he asked me to sign over the rights but took them anyway. They were published. How can you possibly suspect she was right not having idea at all how many were sold? She was an avoidant, there is no logic in what she says at all, she just wants to close the conversation. Honestly look it up, it's interesting if nothing else.

Why haven’t you sued him and gone to the police with your proof of the 300k it cost you ?

You sold 1.2 million back issues of a magazine online? Pull the other one, mate.

He has, he already answered that, it’s civil, he also spent 9k on legal fees trying to take action and tried to have apple take it down. So not quite as presented.

Surely it’s fraud though?

If this real, seek proper help from an actual therapist.

I don't think it sounds like a healthy relationship that you could be relaxed in. You are out of it now and should move on knowing that you don't have to worry about family making nasty remarks or counting up whether you've paid enough for the cup of tea they've allowed you to make in their home.

Yes I would assume so but he’d have to prove it. Clearly fhere is a much bigger back story here, than is being said, he’s saying he spent 9k on legal fees, then weirdly lost his house over it, the police were not interested and said it was civil, apple didn’t take it down for him

so his it’s worth 300k and he didn’t go after it as his wife thought it was too much hassle and wished him to be kind is not the full story.

I agree with all of this, OP. Let go of the hurt about your ILs, they’re out of your life now. Let go of your difficult childhood. The loss of your marriage is the major pain you’re dealing with. I hope counselling of some sort can help.

I think you've derailed your own thread with the £300k in copyright. On the past:

Memory is weird. What we are (or anyone is) absolutely 100% sure that it happened, sometimes it didn't. Repeating a version of a story will muddle that story, even in our own memories. Some details of the story can be planted for that reason. Have a look online at false memories, memory planting, or why memories are unreliable. There's some interesting stuff on how our brains work, how they reconstruct memories and full gaps, etc. So based on that, they can be wrong, you can be wrong, all of you can be wrong and recollecting wrongly. If you are puzzled by something, ask there and then. Don't let it for another day. If this happens often with different people (that they say something didn't happen in that way), start writing a diary (not a memoirs, but something you write on the day, not something you recall later). It can be that your personal traumas are interfering with how you remember things or with what things become important and what you focus on. Or not.

It could be that there was a discount negotiated as well. Maybe by the time you got to the bar, BIL had used a voucher or discount to take off his part of the bill. You went and divided the new discounted price between you two, effectively using his discount, membership rate, or special price towards your bill. This happened once to me when I put some points I had acrued in a discount card towards reducing a restaurant bill by £20. My friend divided the bill so we both got £10 discount, when my intention was to reduce my part by £20. I could have uses that £20 towards something else and I was trying to cut my spending and still do nice things within my means, so I used discounts and vouchers all the time. Friend saw it as free money because it didn't cost me anything but I was saving these vouchers so I could use them to balance my spending and do things I couldn't generally do without budgeting, so I felt she shouldn't have divided the bill like that. I didn't say anything but I thought it was a bad move. Your BIL might have said at the time that you could have also paid a bit more so you wouldn't be getting his discount into your bill. You possibly either didn't see the whole breakdown of the bill and noticed or the bill was done directly with members rates. Since he mentioned "special" price and not simply "more than your share", I am tempted to say that perhaps there's a sliver of truth on the discount approach that you simply didn't fully understood at the time. You might have come across as petty, focusing on the minor things, and they just stop talking because it was confrontational and a bit ridiculous. Even if you were absolutely convinced, if they are also absolutely convinced in group, you will be seen as unhinged and obsessive. It doesn't matter who was right, you cannot turn time back to see that moment again. You might be both right and there's truth in both and you are just focusing on your bit as the only truth. Next time, move on. Not everything is gaslighting, by the way. Memories do play tricks and some people will remember things their way, without intending to minimise your way. It's annoying and not helpful but sometimes we need to accept that other people have different experiences and memories from the exact same situation. The longer you leave it to clarify and share, the more the memory will be entrenched as real as you lose all the details and reasonings that could have been added on the spot to explain each version. It's like two tunnel visions. If you talk on the moment, you might be able to open the eyes a bit more and see other stuff happening. You leave it, and there's nothing there to recall outside those two tunnels and you will both swear that's what happen. It seems your wives had both acquired a false memory by talking about it at length. Since it's all part of the day you share and there are real moments sharing dinner etc, it's easier to acquire a memory that just expands into a conversation. Honestly, read about it, it happens more often than we think.

I have people in my circle who try to do things so "right" and "equal" that it sometimes feels petty, robotic and a bit square. Maybe you came across like that. As if you were trying to micromanage and check all financial aspects of that relationship with BIL/SIL when they were perhaps more chilled with the agreement. Your insistence to check now and then might have been puzzling, or felt embarrassing for your exW because she was already convinced that you had indeed taken for granted a special price. Or not, maybe the money you sent to SIL was not mentioned from SIL to BIL and he had no idea you did more than the occasional grocery and restaurant.

In any case, I think two things are relevant here: always clarify things on the day and accept that memories might be wrong, no matter how convinced you are that they are not.