Hmpf. I don’t care if I had 17 kids under the age of 4, I would most certainly arrange my own get-together on the same day as asshole bro. I would not allow his lack of testicles or his wife’s rudeness to cancel my family’s Christmas gathering.
We enjoy the company of 20+ family members every Christmas. It’s a carry-in so no one person is cooking all day and we have a blast. Eat, open gifts, play family games. Enjoy your day and don’t even utter their names. Whoever hosts has to clean their house but the rest of the party takes care of itself.
I thought from the OP that maybe your brother had jumped the gun and invoted more people than she expected. But – since he didn’t – this makes her actions incredibly rude.
I agree that it isn’t intended as a deliberate insult. It’s more a matter of massive indifference to anyone else’s feelings, including your brother.
My family has always been big on intramural feuds, so for us this would be grounds for a 20 year shunning.
Does someone in the family take anti-psychotic medication? I think you should send her a few doses as her Christmas present. Along with a nice card that says, " Hope you’re not such an evil bitch next year". Put a smilie on it,
I’m hoping that the holidays are easy between my family and whoever I marry’s. My paternal grandfather decided to have nothing more to do with his four kids (Dad’s #3) and two stepkids after his second wife died the year before I was born, so we always spent the holidays with my maternal grandparents. I can’t help but hope it’s that easy when I find the right guy… it’d be lovely to end up with someone whose parents are geographically near mine, so we can split the time between both sets of parents. Or maybe a nice orphan like you got…
OP, I’m sorry that happened. I understand that it’s a big effort to cook a meal with three little ones, but have you considered a catered meal? Most of the grocery stores around here do meals for 8-10 people that include all the trimmings and merely need to be warmed up. They’re typically $60 for the full meal, which is more expensive than doing it yourself, but might be worth it for the ease it offers.
If my brother pulled this on my parents I would give him what for, but I’m the older sister and have never had any trouble scolding him when warranted.
Uninviting family members to Christmas dinner just seems extremely rude.
I wont say that I am moody, but I have chronic pain, and have my good days and bad days … but I try my damnedest to be upbeat when my very hard working hubby gets home.
Univiting people to an event like this is extremely rude!
Perhaps, but it’s hard to say from just this scenario. You don’t actually say in your OP that the wife had made the decision to only have her family over - maybe it was a joint decision made between both of them? Maybe, having realised they had over-stretched themselves, they both thought your family would take the uninvite better than her family? Maybe your brother knows how crazy her family is and didn’t want your family to have to deal with that, and so they came up with the excuse? There could be a lot of reasons why this has happened, is all I’m saying.
I hope you’re able to come up with your own family plans and have a fantastic day together.
I like that code word, stocks up and down. The Dow is a bitch!
Sounds like a SIL of mine - Once when a dear friend was killed, his funeral was held like the next day (he was jewish) and in another city. We called my BIL to see if we could crash at his place for one night, coming in late leaving early so we could go to the funeral and not have to mess with finding a hotel in the area we are not familiar with and it was late at night that sort of thing. He says sure no problem, there’s lots of room in the finished basement. An hour later he called back and said his wife did not feel like entertaining so no we were not welcome after all. What kind of entertaining did she think we were expecting? I mean come on really!?
In that case, your BIL really should have checked with his wife first. You don’t invite overnight guests without running the idea past your spouse. IMHO, “didn’t feel like entertaining” probably actually meant: “What? You said they could stay in the basement? TOMORROW??? But it’s a mess! The cat has been peeing on the rug, we have no clean sheets, and the extra mattress is mildewed from when the basement sink backed up! It smells like a brewery from all the old beer cases you have stacked in the corner, and it will takes us days to clear the floor enough to vacuum, there’s dog hair everywhere! They’ll think we live like animals!”
Given the circumstances, it’s still a faux pas. However, since he called back within an hour, I would have taken his initial unilateral invite as conditional. It may honestly not have been feasible to accommodate someone at the time on such short notice. I wouldn’t have assumed the wife was not trying to be an uber-bitch. She may not have fully realized that her husband had actually said: “Yes, come” rather than “Well, we have room, let me just check.”
Understanding that inviting and then disinviting people is about as obnoxious as you can get, and I in no way support what the SIL did, I must chime in and offer a smidge of support to your bro.
Men who support their wives before their mothers aren’t pussies - they’re smart. If you want to have marital harmony you support your spouse, period.
My MIL is a total twat to me on a fairly regular basis in ways I won’t get into; however, she does like to manipulate with guilt. Hubby and I had a talk a long time ago about the fact that I’m now the number one woman in his life and he should continue to do nice things for his mom, but not at my expense. Shockingly this pisses her off. Go figure.
Anyhow - even if my MIL was at her raging bitchiest I wouldn’t un-invite the whole family a week before x-mas - that’s just rude.
Now, I don’t know what triggered the un-invite; however, assuming it was a slight, real or imagined, your bro should have called and discussed it rather than un-inviting. God knows my husband has had to call his family more than once and say things like ‘If you call Alice a bitch to her face, we won’t be coming over anymore.’
Anyhow OP, I’m sorry this is happening at this time of year (or any time really). Being disinvited with so little notice sucks, and I hope you are able to put together something fun and enjoyable for your mom, hubby and kids.
Your sister-in-law does sound like a piece of work, but from these things you’ve said, I think it’s taking two to tango here. I wonder about your brother and mother - if they feel caught between two warring parties most of the time.
Yes, it was shitty…but your family has got to let go. Maybe she’s a bitch. Maybe she’s overly emotional - but LET GO and encourage your mother to do the same. Maybe she also looked around and said “oh, shit - with everything else going on right now I just can’t handle that many people - and I can’t handle my in laws who don’t like me. If I’m going to take care of my own mental health, I can’t do this.” She gave you enough notice that you aren’t sitting around with no groceries in the house.
I agree with Cat Whisperer - I think there are two sides to this deal.
Why is that? I know I normally post about people not sharing their expectations of each other, but people tend to think I’m stupid for suggesting it. I don’t see anything else that is happening on the OP’s part.
BigT, the in-law issue can be a complex one. Unless the person you’re marrying is an orphan with no family, s/he comes with family baggage. Sometimes everyone gets along just fine. Sometimes not. Maybe Mom makes SiL feel like an inadequate wife and mother and the SiL doesn’t want to deal with that on Christmas. (My own MiL is guilty of this.) Maybe her family doesn’t especially like her husband’s side of the family. Maybe her family is going through a difficult time and doesn’t want her husband’s side of the family to be privy to those problems. Maybe there’s some other reason that SiL isn’t talking about. It doesn’t matter what that reason is, there is probably some reason and SiL is hiding behind an excuse she thinks is valid.
None of this makes SiL’s actions any less assholish, and I still think there are communication problems between SiL and Brother. I’m just saying that maybe SiL had a reason for doing what she did. It has nothing to do with sharing expectations and everything to do with the complex dynamic that is marriage. When you get married, you’ll understand this a little more.
My mom has been nothing but kind to this woman.
She is saying its too much work to have our side of the family over but yet she still has the time and energy to cook for HER side of the family. She invites everyone and then decides to un-invite only our side of the family. Why not un-invite both sides? Why blatantly favour one over the other?
My brother called my mom twice to say he feels bad about this. Apparently he doesn’t feel bad enough because if my husband pulled a stunt like this I would tell him that we are not inviting EITHER side of the family. In my world you don’t invite someone over for dinner weeks in advance and then decide it’s too much work.
