Dear Eric: I am the sole surviving step-grandparent of a young man who recently married. I have always been very fond of him. I was not invited to the wedding.
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His mother informed me via text of the marriage two days later and stated, “Immediate family attended.” It was a local event. My late husband and I attended the weddings of both the groom’s siblings some time ago.
I feel hurt that I wasn’t invited. Your thoughts?
– Left Out
Dear Left Out: I’m sorry you felt excluded. On the one hand, it seems like it would have been easy to include you or at least reach out to you in advance. On a slightly different hand, their budget or space constraints may have dictated just how small they needed to keep it.
Since neither you nor they can go back and change anything, the best path forward is one that leads to a deeper relationship with your step-grandson. Reach out to him directly with your congratulations and see if he’s open to a visit, a lunch, a phone call or something of the sort.
It’s not clear to me how close you are right now, but since you’re fond of him, it’s worth telling him that and asking if he’s open to forming a tighter bond with you.
A wedding is an important day, but it’s only one day. A relationship is made up of many ordinary days and many milestones; I hope you can be a part of his life for the ones still to come.
Dear Eric: Our married son and wife share all their plans, ideas, life experiences with her family and we hear nothing.
We watch our grandkids, help them at a drop of a dime, we even spiff up the house when watching the kids and let their dogs out.
When we hear what they’re doing or planning from her side of the family, we’ve had to stop acting like it’s a surprise. We just smile and nod.
Our daughter-in-law is definitely one-sided. She’s slowly stopped inviting our side of the family to do things. My son goes along with it to keep her narcissistic behavior under control, but he doesn’t see it is controlling him and us.
There’s even inequality in the way they give gifts. Last Christmas, they spent $300 on my husband and $10 on me. Her family received very large expensive gifts. I tell them gifts aren’t about being equal but fair.
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So, do I back down on my gifts to my daughter-in-law?
– Unequal In-Laws
Dear In-Laws: As you probably know, it’s not really about the gifts. So, pulling back on what you give your daughter-in-law isn’t going to bring you the satisfaction you want.
There are a lot of strong feelings here about your daughter-in-law, but there is some information missing about your relationship with your son. Have you talked to him about what you’re feeling and suggested concrete ways that you’d like to feel included?
Is he telling you about the plans or just leaving all communication up to his wife? It’s possible that she’s just better at communicating with her side of the family and your son needs to communicate better with you.
They’re not shy about including you in parts of their lives – you babysit and help them around the house. So, the crux of the issue could be the plans you’re not hearing about. Do you expect/want to be doing things with her side of the family? Or do you want to be doing similar things with your side of the family? If it’s the latter, you may have to be more proactive about getting the ball rolling on those things.
It’s also possible that your daughter-in-law is aware of the negative feelings you have about her. She may be pulling back because of that conflict (which, of course, only makes the conflict worse). See if there’s a way to smooth things out.
You don’t need to just take it, but if you’re not seeing eye-to-eye with her, you can talk it out and see if you can come up with a new way of interacting so that everybody feels seen and heard.
Dear Eric: Another response possible to the wife who wrote about her husband who got very upset when she would call a professional about home repairs (“Mrs. Fix-It”):
Your response was good, but another is that this couple do not belong in an owner-occupied home. They should be renters who can call the landlord when something needs fixing.
– JW in Minnesota
Dear JW: This could, indeed, solve this problem once and for all. If the couple can’t come to an agreement about how and by whom repairs are done, taking it off of their shared plate could be the next best option.
Send questions to R. Eric Thomas at [email protected] or P.O. Box 22474, Philadelphia, PA 19110. Follow him on Instagram @oureric and sign up for his weekly newsletter at rericthomas.com.
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