So my DD1 is not biologically related to me, she is DH’s from an earlier relationship. They split before DD1 was born but managed to sort of patchily co-parent until she was about 3, when DD1’s mum got a job that involved moving to Berlin and decided to leave DD1 with DH (he was willing to give up everything and move to Germany to be near them but DD1’s birth mother said that would make it impossible to “start afresh” and rejected those plans). When I met DH DD1 was 4, and I met her when she was 5. She’s now 14. I adopted her when she was 9, it was a smooth process - her mum agreed, had been paying minimum maintenance and had come over to see DD1 once in the 6 years she’d lived abroad (but came over a few times in between to see old friends...) and DH had taken DD1 over there to visit four times but had to stay in hotels/airbnbs because ex wouldn’t let them stay with her (she has a new partner and two new daughters and said she didn’t have space and didn’t want want to disrupt their family life), and then only met up with the them a days so it was an expensive and somewhat unrewarding venture for DH.
Since the adoption went through DH has taken DD1 out twice more (but receives the same level of cooperation) and we made the visit a family holiday and tried to arrange for DD1 to spend some time with ex while we didn’t other things, but again ex wasn’t very cooperative.
A few weeks ago I received a text from from ex asking if DD1 would be bridesmaid for her wedding and if I could please pay for flights and accommodation for DD1. I asked why she couldn’t just stay with ex and her family and got the usual vague response about disruption, so it would mean either me or DH going with DD1 as I don’t want her staying on her own. Ex then gave us the dates - they’re when we are meant to be on holiday. I have spoken to DD (who is now 14) about it, and she says she’d rather come on holiday than attend this wedding. She has always said she feels awkward around ex (who she doesn’t even call mum - she calls her by her name and now calls me mum) and knows ex hasn’t made her particularly welcome (even though we’ve tried our best to hide that and make excuses for ex).
How do I tell the ex that DD1 won’t be attending her wedding? (or should I be pushing DD1 to go?).
Current draft is:
Hello,
I’ve spoken to DD1 and she’s not keen on the idea of coming. She doesn’t feel she knows the rest of your family very well, and the dates clash with our holiday which she was really looking forward to! If you’d like to arrange something for later in summer I’d be more than happy to work out how to facilitate that.
She doesn’t have DD1’s number and she’s asked for it but I don’t want DD1 to have to deal with the situation on her own.