obnoxious in-laws - (vent)

I've met his father and stepmother several times and like I said, major culture gap, but they are otherwise kind and generous to us, and while they fundamentally have no idea how weddings work in this country (I could tell so many stories), they either ask the right questions or stay out the way and go along with things.

His mother and brother on the other hand, I have never actually met (mom has planned two trips to see us and cancelled at the last minute). FH has not seen either of them in years and pretty much invited them to keep the peace with the rest of his family rather than any actual desire to have her there (so he says, anyway...but I still think her behaviour has hurt him)

So FMIL and FBIL don't ever RSVP for the wedding, and so when we contact them, they react defensively and act like we should have just magically KNOWN that they are coming when we received zero communication from them (and getting their addresses to send the invites was met with this weird amount of suspicion and was like pulling teeth!) FBIL suddenly has a boyfriend no one has heard of before this moment, but "oh don't worry, I won't bring him if it will be an embarassment to the bride's family" like trying to paint my (incidentally uber liberal) family that he knows nothing about as bigots instead of the real issue of lack of communication and trying to add a plus one that you weren't given, and after the RSVP deadline to boot. But whatever, they are supposedly in a serious relationship, we had a few more declines than we expected anyway at that point, so it's rude of him but not a big deal.

THEN FMIL apparently gets engaged to some guy who no one knew existed before this moment either. This is about a week later and we were getting tight on the guest list so we were a little more annoyed about this, but again, fine, random fiance can come with you, sure we'll shell out ANOTHER $175 for a random person. Then almost immediately after this, the guy says he can't come because of business. OK? Whatever. Mind you, both FMIL and FBIL said NOTHING about these significant others when we were composing the guest list, so neither one of them were alloted a +1 in our budget.

A few weeks ago we had a snafu with our hotel running out of extra rooms (we filled our block and they couldn't allot extra). So we look at who has a room and surprise surprise, FMIL and FBIL don't have a room. So we scramble to find an overflow block, call them to explain and remind them that they have less than a week to do this, and them FMIL lets it slip that she is now bringing some cousin of hers with her, who was definitely NOT INVITED. and we are just like...wtf, this is not how this works, but she decided she was going to drive from California to Denver rather than buy a plane tickets because airlines are scary and that would be a super long drive to do alone, so AGAIN we groused to ourselves but let the random cousin thing slide. (I would have told her off, but FH thought it would be no good, so I deferred to him on)

Flash forward to two days ago, she calls us up and asks what she should wear to the wedding, and says she has a white dress in mind. FH tells her that is uber tacky and that YOU DON'T DO THAT HERE (unclear what rock she has been living under for the better part of 4 decades not to have figured that out), unclear if that message actually went through but I'm more just irritated than actually concerned...people will talk shit about her for years to come. During this convo, she lets slip that she is now flying and the random cousin is now no longer accompanying her. FH tells her calmly, but with some very justified irritation in his voice, that this was completely inappropriate timing and that we are now paying for an empty seat. He proceeds to ask about her flight plans where she replies that she DOESN'T KNOW and to ask the brother.

We call FBIL who immediately gets defensive and says THEY HAVEN'T BOOKED TICKETS YET and acts like we are complete idiots for not magically knowing the situation with his mom when NO ONE shares ANYTHING and acts completely ignorant to the fact that their carelessness just cost us a lot of money for no good reason.

Then we proceed to get phone calls from every member of FH's family, telling him off for upsetting his mother. ARE YOU EFFING KIDDING ME?!?!?

We finalized all the timelines with venue, photographer, etc. yesterday and sent out a really detailed email to the family and wedding party with all of the important times, locations, and who needed to be where at what when. We included all of the information we had about flight times and who was renting cars, who needed rides from the airport, etc. and invited people to share their travel plans if they had not already.

BIL sends me the BITCHIEST email saying how he didn't understand how we could possibly have been confused about his travel plans and tells us he has a flight at X time and not to worry, he will rent a car and take care of driving his mother since we are too selfish and uncaring to do so.

THEN he goes on facebook and posts a santimonious rant about how you can't always count on the family you were born into, that sometimes your birth family is so horrible but your friends take care of you...etc. I had to sit on my hands to keep from typing "yeah, your brother has that problem....thank god he has me!"

Yikes!!! So sorry you're dealing with this. It would have taken every effort on my part not to respond to that Facebook post detailing all the things you just posted here...and I might not have been able to control myself...

::big hug::

Jeeeeeeeeeesus. I'd keep my contact with these two jerks at a bare minimum from here on out if I were you. Where is FH in all of this? Like does he acknowledge how jerky they are?

I can't stand passive aggressive facebook posts. It's so 4th grade.

Yikes! I'm sorry you're dealing with this It sounds like you've gone really out of your way to explain everything and be super accommodating too!

Just take deep breaths and know that the wedding is so soon!

FH agrees with me, but he takes a less confrontational approach with his family. Like if it had been my relative who added on a guest, I would have corrected them on the spot about that. (Like I said, it wasn't necessarily the financial aspect, but more that I feel like it sets bad precedents)

He really excuses a lot of bad behavior because of culture gap but I'm also like...no pay no say, and I feel like that's an international thing.

So sorry you have to deal with all of this!! :-(

Wooooooow. Your poor FH is related to these people! >

Best wishes, to you! I hope they don't cause a scene at the wedding.

I'm sorry you are dealing with all of this!

Good luck to you if you ever have kids, i feel like what starts at the wedding only gets worse when kids come into the picture. I'm so sorry OP.

Thanks all. Good to know I'm not completely crazy in thinking these guys are completely out of line!

And FutureHouligan, I agree - assuming we ever speak to them again after the wedding, which odds are not looking good at this point.

FH's mother told him she looked me up on Facebook and that she thought I wasnt pretty enough and he could do a lot better and how much did he really know about me, and after that he told me flat out "my parents don't even come remotely close to having the same value system as me, and don't feel like you have to impress my mother - she will not be a part of our lives after this wedding"

So I think he's just letting things slide instead of setting clear boundaries, which is what I would prefer :/

Omg!!!!

I would so want to tell them to just stay home!

Good luck OP!

Hope it gets better for you!

Holy fucking shit. I am so sorry you're going through this. I have no advice, unfortunately, but you're in my thoughts!

So so so many hugs to you. Yikes! I can't believe you are having to deal with that crap right now. I would have had a very hard time not saying something - your self control is admirable!

Wow, I am so sorry you are dealing with this! What a nightmare and btw I can't believe your fiancee told you what his Mom said about your photo!!

I wonder if we are marrying into the same family! My FMIL does the same stuff, has a language/cultural barrier, but I can understand most of it so i know when shes bad mouthing me. But I haven't let her on yet!

Yikes.. seriously though, thisis your chance. Don't intervene anymore, and hopefully they just won't show up, you won't be in the wrong, and you can concentrate on other things.