AIBU to feel awkward being excluded from my cousin's wedding when she’s coming to mine?

[worryingday]

Me and my cousin are both getting married next summer only about a month apart. We are inviting the whole family including them. They are inviting almost all the family (including other cousins) but excluding us… We are having similar sized big weddings, ours is slightly smaller. They haven’t explained why we’re excluded. We’re still as close as ever, see them regularly along with all the other family members who are invited, and they have accepted our invite (obviously hasn’t officially gone out yet).

I know you can invite who you like but it just feels really awkward with them being part of our wedding plans and getting updates but they talk about theirs and we’re not invited…

Im not going to exclude them from our wedding but AIBU to feel a bit awkward?

"All the other family members"?
So why haven't they invited you?
There must be reason.

Have they not invited other cousins as well? Can you just invite them to the evening instead?

Can't you just ask them ?
(You said they haven't explained why you're excluded......have you asked ?)
So strange.

Very odd.
Are you absolutely sure they’ve excluded you.
If they genuinely have, sorry they’re arseholes.

That would really annoy me. Can’t you uninvite them?

That sounds pretty rude andmean of them not to invite you when they've invited all the rest of the family except for you and when you have invited them.

I'd feel very uncomfortable and hurt. What does your family think? Are your parents and siblings (if you have them) invited?

Fuck that. You need to ask her.

So, if you haven't sent out the official invitations yet, then I would reconsider inviting them. They don't appear to have any qualms about upsetting you, after all.

Have they actually said you are not invited or have they sent out invites and you haven’t got one as I would have to ask in case it went missing in the post. If you are definitely not invited then I would ask why not and also I’d have to ask her “do you not feel awkward about coming to my wedding when you’ve invited all the family and not me” I’d call her out on her shitty behaviour that’s really poor form. Has she invited you parents and siblings?

I don't have siblings. It's looking like my mum isn't invited either but we're less certain.. I'm not sure if they're just being weird about telling her clearly that she's invited because they're not inviting me.

All other cousins and aunts and uncles are invited without exception.

We're the kind of family where if anyone had a birthday, christening, party we'd always invite every single one of us. No one would ever be excluded. They have still excitedly accepted several party invitations, plus informal wedding invitation from us so I don't think we've done anything wrong.

I am about 99% certain I am not invited. As other family members have been told the date and to make sure they're free, invited to a hen do WhatsApp, and there's just a weird reluctance to give any information away to us even when we discuss weddings like the date or hen do plans.

I don't really want to ask why because I feel like I know the answer. For her there's a hierarchy in the family I was never aware of and sadly I'm lower than my other cousins. It's a really rubbish feeling and just making things very awkward.

@worryingday but you don't know the answer, you just feel you do
I'd have to ask - put yourself out of this misery and uncertainty.
And if you are definitely excluded, I'd have no qualms not inviting them to mine.
( Did you expect to go on the Hen do ? Is your cousin expecting to go on yours?)
I don't think you're as close as you state, given that you don't want to ask.
It would drive me mad not knowing why.

I think you need to speak about this to your cousin, because otherwise you will feel silenced by her and the rest of the family.
You might say: 'Anne, it feels weird that you are coming to my wedding when Mum and I haven't yet been invited to yours. Are you planning to invite us?'
If the answer is 'Sorry, must have left you of the list somehow, of course you are invited', then there's no problem.
If the answer is silence or a change of subject or 'well, actually...' you could say 'OK, it's your wedding and the guest list is up to you, but in that case you are not invited to my wedding. It would feel too strange having you there when you've excluded me'.
There's no need to avoid her in future or ask anyone else to take sides, but at least it's clear.

I think I'd drop her a note and say, 'Hi, I'm feeling quite awkward now about including you in my wedding plans when you have excluded me and my family from yours, so I am sure you will understand it's best that we scale down a bit. We won't be expecting your family at my wedding now, any more than you are expecting my family at yours.

I agree with this. Have the conversation. If you don’t get invited to your cousins wedding and it makes you feel weird then don’t invite her either. You want to feel good on your wedding day not feel awkward or less then.

I'm not going to uninvite them from my wedding. That would feel worse than them just not inviting me, and I think my family would think so too.

Ultimately I've had a vision for my wedding for a long time and she's part of it. It would feel more awkward for me and ruin the day if I excluded her.

OK, you know what you want to do which is what matters. Hope you have a lovely day.

This is really weird. You just need to ask. It might be a painful conversation, but it’s worse not knowing imo.

Is it something silly like they got engaged before you, but your wedding date is before theirs/too close to their wedding and you have broken their unwritten rule @worryingday ?

No because we only very recently set our date and booked the venue. All of the informal invites to family members and hen do stuff happened before that. They have always been aware they were invited to our wedding next year, they just didn't know exactly when it would be until recently.

That's a lovely and mature attitude. But it is such a shame you are excluded from hers. People will be discussing hers at your wedding. Can you ask her mother why you are not invited, if you get on well with your aunt?

I've got a few theories as to why this might have happened but it's all just speculation really..

I have a child so maybe she really didn't want lots of children at the wedding (I am the only cousin with a child). Or felt she would need to invite all 3 of us and didn't want to use up that many places.. I would have understood if my child wasn't invited though.

My cousin's future wife is pretty wedding mad and has been talking about her vision for her wedding for like 10 years. I suspect she might have taken over the guest list and be inviting loads of people and only letting my cousin invite a small number / making all of their shared friends come out of my cousin's guest allocation.

But it's just speculation really.

And ultimately it comes down to the fact that she could only invite a certain number of people and I didn't make the cut but other cousins did.

YANBU. Yes obviously people can invite who they want, but the polite thing is not to bang on about plans in front of people who haven’t been invited.

I’m not sure that your theory about not inviting you because you have a child really holds up - surely the normal thing would be to invite you and your partner, and specify “no children” (and it’s then up to you and your partner to decide if you want to/are able to attend without your child or if you will decline the invite).

No I agree. It's just wishful thinking really as if that was the reason it would feel a bit less hurtful, and trying to rack my brain for what the reason is.

I could NOT be so much of a doormat to invite someone to my wedding who excluded me from theirs.

You say do so would make you look bad Op BUT not doing so also makes you look pathetically weak, IMO.

Also I was one of the first people they told when they got engaged and part of a small group they invited to an engagement party! So after that surely most people would assume they're invited?? It's all so odd.