How strong is the obligation to attend a close family member's wedding?

In My Humble Opinion
21

FWIW, I didn’t attend my youngest sister’s wedding. We were going to go, but her fiance backed out, and they when he un-backed out, the reschedule was when our daughter was back in school. We were faced with driving from FL to Baltimore and back, missing work and school, and frankly, we didn’t trust the groom not to back out again.

We used daughter’s school as our official excuse and that was that. Not only were there no hard feelings (at least not expressed to us) but the groom ended up in jail 2 months after the wedding, then he hocked some of my sister’s stuff and split town before their first anniversary. Not that that has anything to do with the OP - I just wanted to toss that out there. :smiley:

So for my official “me too” answer, I think it’s just fine that your wife goes alone. A wedding is a ceremony, not a command performance.

22

Your mother in law should consider herself lucky that your wife is willing and able to travel such a distance to go to this wedding. Florida is a long way away from Indiana and many families would be unable to send even one person.

As far as etiquette goes, I’m pretty sure one of the very worst violations possible is entitlement, which is what your mother-in-law is dishing out. Sometimes people are only able (or willing) to do so much, and if she’s so proper she should know that the proper response is to thank them, not to ask for more.

23

Just chiming in to support the consensus. You tried to see if it was workable for your whole family to be there, and it isn’t, even with MIL’s offer.

Frylock, your MIL reminds me of my mom, who was a SAHM back in the era where that was expected of middle-class moms, and worked only briefly even after that. So she’s got no sense of the fact that money, by itself, can’t solve a problem like this - that in particular, you can’t just take as much time off from your job as you’d like to, when you’d like to. (And I see that by then you’ll be in a new job, where that’s way more true than usual.)

I don’t know if that’s true for your MIL, or this as well: while my mom traveled a lot with my dad while they were married, and even more so with her second husband, her husbands did all the travel planning, handled all the logistics, so she has no sense of the difficulties involved in travel. (And has never had to stagger back in to work the day after a grueling trip.)

Like I said, I don’t know how much of that applies to your MIL, but ISTM that people who haven’t experienced various aspects of this stuff just don’t see it: it’s like trying to describe the difference between blue and green to a blind person.

So no advice here (other than concurring that your wife going alone is the best solution you’ve got), other than to say I feel for you.

24

If you really wanted to go, you’d go. If there was a million dollars in small bills at your destination, you’d go.

You have made the decision that this trip would suck, and you might be right. I think you’re the poster that has the four kids that are all little, and you’re under the daily grind of child rearing, and have posted about it. I’ve been there it’s a lot of hard, frustrating work that will wear you down.

If you reframe this as an opportunity rather than an obligation, will that help? If you can have a road trip of a lifetime, have you mother in law pay for it, see cool things with your kids, and fulfill a family obligation with bonus martyr points, I’d call that a win all around.

My brother in law is getting married in Florida! The weather here in Indy is going to be awful right about then, my mother in law is paying for a brand new, all the bells and whistles minivan with the video, etc, so we’ll be able to drive in luxury.

We’re going to stop at the Arch, the kids have never been up to the to top, and if we’re driving all that way, we’re going to pay hooky and relax at the beach one day, the kids have never seen the ocean, it’ll be fantastic!

With iPads, video and radio, it’s better than you think to make the drive, promise.

It’s all about attitude.

fisha, who has made the drive from Minnesota to Miami, has five kids, was pleasantly surprised, and would do it again. Minnesota is a lot farther. A lot.

25

I think you made the right decision. Not having the kids here will probably be sad for your MIL, but we don’t always get everything we want.

Could you do something like hook up via Skype to a laptop placed unobtrusively in a place where the vows can be seen taking place, and have you and the kids dress up all smart and take part in the wedding from a distance? Then later on have them all wish the couple well via Skype in their wedding outfits?

I’ve known quite a few Skype weddings like this, although usually it’s because of multiple distant family members like Lo Slung Denim’s. It takes some setting up, but it can give you a great video of the ceremony to boot.

26

When my niece married in California a few years ago, my brother (her dad) was in a similar situation. With a wife and three kids at home in Tennessee and a vehicle that really couldn’t be relied upon to get them there and back, he alone flew out to walk his daughter down the aisle.

Sure, his wife and other children missed the celebration and his first wife had some choice words for the situation, but my niece was fortunate that he flew out given the tight finances of the time.

27

The man said he will be in a new job and is (wisely) hesitant about taking off from work. IIRC, you run your own businesses. Those are two worlds apart.

So no, it’s not about attitude. If Frylock goes to this thing and afterwards informs us that he was fired from his new job for taking too much vacation time, all your “it’s about attitude” isn’t going to help him or his family. He has to make this decision based on the risks he’s willing to take on. Not on his M-I-L’s judgment and not on the judgy boasting of some random internet person.

Frylock doesn’t have to actually be there to show he cares. Frylock can take his B-I-L and the new wife out for drinks and shower them in all kinds of drunken praises the next time they’re in town.

28

IMO, your wife has an obligation to go if it’s at all possible, assuming she and her brother have any kind of decent relationship.

The rest of you have an obligation to *try *to go. Which you have done, and it sounds like, for multiple reasons, it just isn’t going to work. Do something else to show that you do care about the couple and their wedding.

And yeah, sending a representative kid (maybe the one who’s closest to his/her uncle) would be nice.

29

Work was his fourth or fifth excuse. It’s a valid one, but I didn’t get it was the main one, it seemed like he had made up his mind, which is fine, I just was bringing up an alternate attitude.

I also thought maybe the wife wanted to be by herself, but didn’t want to go off on a tangent in the thread.

Judgy boaster? Hell, you should see me in person, I’m perfectly lovely once you get past the bodyguards and personal attendants.

30

I’m a little surprised that Frylock isn’t going as well as his wife. Can the kids not stay with a neighbour or his parents?

31

^
Exactly. Did this BIL come to *his *wedding? He should make an effort to go if he can arrange reasonable childcare. As it is, he is putting his Mrs in the firing line when she gets there in trying to explain his absence.

32

I’m lucky, in my extended family there is zero OBLIGATION.

33

Your mother-in-law may resent it, but I expect the parents of the bride or whoever is paying for all this is perfectly OK with it.

People are weird about weddings, which is why there are all kinds of rules about it.

I was raised by someone who is bugs about etiquette. You are not breaking any rules, nor committing any breach of etiquette. Your wife, the sister, is going - that’s great. The nieces and nephews and brother-in-law is not, because it can’t be reasonably arranged. That’s perfectly OK - it’s an invitation, not a command to disrupt your life.

Send a gift and a nice note, and if your MIL continues to be upset, smile regretfully and change the subject the next time the subject comes up. You don’t have to justify it. Your wife, on whom the primary obligation falls, is going to represent you and the rest of those who cannot make it.

Regards,
Shodan

34

If you can’t go, you can’t go. It’s a disappointment, sure – especially since few weddings are kids-included, and I could see MIL being a wee bit disappointed. But for her to get super-freaked out is HER problem, not your’s. Your wife is going by herself, which is perfectly fine.

Your wife is attending, you made the effort, and it’s not like you’re not going because, “aw man, I hate weddings, they’re so boring, blah blah blah, my wife and kids want to go, but I just want to sit around and watch the game, etc”. It happens.

Don’t feel bad. It’s life. MIL will get over it. Besides, it’s not even her wedding.

(Do, however, RSVP – don’t just assume that if you don’t send the card back, they’ll know you’re not coming, and just your wife is.)

35

How much more gas would it take for 6 or even 8 people to go than just the wifey?

36

My mom wouldn’t let us go to my cousin’s wedding, a few hours away, back in the early 90’s. She didn’t want us missing school and probably didn’t want to pay for a hotel. Nobody freaked out and we’re still all good friends with my cousin and his family.

Taking the kids out of school and paying for hotels is still a huge burden, even if the transportation is paid for.

And without the stress of driving (I assume she’s flying?) and having to wrangle the kids, your wife will be able to enjoy her brother’s wedding much more.

37

What everyone else said. You tried to make it work and you can’t. Offer sincere congratulations and offer to do something for the new couple (or perhaps the whole family) when they’re in a more geographically feasible location.

I am going to vote against sending a representative kid. Unless they’re all very, very young (toddlers or younger), sending just one kid will likely lead to the one left behind resenting their sibling and thinking that you’re playing favorites. It’ll just cause a lot of friction that you don’t want or need between them.

38

The wife is flying. The vehicle isn’t reliable enough for the trip.

39

Regarding etiquette: the MIL probably remembers an obscure point that was stale by the time women could vote, but was still followed in some circles until the 1960s. I remember my mother occasionally fretting about whether something was “this kind” of invitation. The rule was that if everyone on the invitation could not attend, the entire group had to send regrets. It had to do with the old rule (which disappeared during WWII) that a woman did not attend a social event unaccompanied, and it wasn’t seemly for men to leave their wives behind for family-oriented events, because it would lead to gossip, even if the reason the wife couldn’t make it was because the baby was due right around that time.

It was for this reason that when small children were included on an invitation, they were included with the parents, but adult children who still lived in the household (which could mean 17-year-old girls who were last years debutantes, and young men in college home for the summer) received separate invitations. (Hosts usually paired off guests by gender, so women were not unescorted.) Guests of the family might be included on the invitation, or might receive their own, depending on how well they were known to the hosts, and whether the invitation was being extended to them as a courtesy to their own hosts.

You see how times have changed. People don’t often have extended guests who will be left with nothing to do if their own hosts are called away to a wedding anymore, and we don’t have debutante balls for the middle class, or for anyone who doesn’t live in a few southern states, so there it no clear delineation of which young women should have separate invitations. Besides, most people order engraved invitations now that cost more than the caterer, and want to have a few as possible, so the rule “If one can’t come, all must regret” has gone the way of the calling card. MIL may have some vague memory of it, though, and not remember it exactly, nor what the reasons for it were, and yet is still letting herself feel slighted. She shouldn’t, because as the mother of the groom, she probably isn’t the host of the wedding. Traditionally, the bride’s parents are the hosts, although some couples host their own weddings. If the bride has no parents, nor anyone willing to step in, I suppose the groom’s mother could be hosting, but the OP has not said.

At any rate, whatever her disappointment, she should not be trying to play any “etiquette” card, because she has none.

40

Can one of the kids go to work on Frylock’s behalf if he’s not able to get those days off?