“My Boyfriend’s Sister Is Ruining Thanksgiving”
I grew up in a house where Thanksgiving and Christmas were very important and we had a lot of traditions. In order to be with Fred, I had to move across the country from my family, so I can’t celebrate with them. Travel isn’t possible right now. This year, Fred’s sister bought a house with her new husband and they have a baby. She lives two hours away and texted Fred a few days ago to invite him to Thanksgiving at her house, saying she’d already invited his ex and the kids. I was furious.
Fred’s mother (who absolutely loves me and has always tried to include me whenever she can) was also furious, and talked about skipping Thanksgiving because of this. The sister’s husband even agreed and thought I should be invited over the ex, but the sister refused to listen. Fred told his sister he wasn’t going to leave me alone on Thanksgiving and he couldn’t make it, and she said, “Understandable. See you next time.”
Now I’m terrified she’s going to ruin Christmas and every holiday for the foreseeable future. What should I do? The only way I can talk to the sister is through Facebook, but I feel like maybe I should try that. I don’t particularly want to be friends with her, but I don’t see why she should control all the holidays and get the chance to exclude me so she can invite the ex.
Fred doesn’t want to fight with either his ex or his sister – the former because of their children and his feeling guilty about leaving them; the latter because they just reconciled last year and fighting again would upset their mother. I just don’t know what to do. I want everyone to have holiday time, but no one is fighting for me. — Left Out of Thanksgiving
DON’T reach out to Fred’s sister, especially not over email, Facebook, or text or in any way where tone can easily be misconstrued. You know Fred’s sister is a problem, likely difficult to communicate with, and biased against you. You won’t gain anything by trying to reason with her, and you’ll probably make the situation worse. Any communication that happens needs to be among Fred and his sister, family, and ex.
That doesn’t mean you are totally powerless here. You can continue celebrating holidays with Fred when he has his kids. (I’m curious what the custody arrangement is. Do Fred and his ex alternate holidays with the kids? Is it up in the air? Having a set arrangement in place would certainly help in making plans!). You can also be proactive about including extended family in your plans by sending invites out early. For example, it’s certainly not too early to “reserve” a Christmas celebration — Christmas Eve or Christmas morning or Christmas afternoon — at your place, with Fred’s kids, and to invite his parents and his sister and her family. Then the onus is on the sister to accept or reject the invitation, but you know you’ll at least have Fred, his kids, and probably his parents (since they love you, which is great!).
Also, people with multiple sets of parents (because of divorce) or in-laws (because of marriage) often have multiple holiday celebrations, not just over the course of a couple days but on the actual holiday itself. Plenty of people have a Thanksgiving lunch at one home early in the afternoon and either a dinner or dessert at another home later in the day. What would happen if you and Fred, who have basically been iced out of his sister’s Thanksgiving because she invited the ex-wife who has threatened to physically attack you, hosted your own Thanksgiving and invited the same players over (his parents and his kids)? They would be in the position that many people find themselves in where they have multiple holiday meals at different locations. Maybe not super ideal, but doable. People do it all the time.
What really needs to happen though is for Fred to suck it up and talk with his charming sister and ex-wife and make it clear in no uncertain terms that this shit will not be tolerated. The physical threats against you are not ok. Those should be taken up with a lawyer and be considered in custody arrangements. And he should talk to his crappy sister about her crappy behavior, regardless of how his mother will feel if it results in another falling out. Are his mother’s feelings more important than yours? And what kind of relationship do Fred and his sister even have when it’s limited to occasional texts and she feels zero sense of remorse in excluding you, her brother’s girlfriend of four years, from family get-togethers? If this is what a “reconciliation” looks like, I think there’s not much love to be lost to begin with. Their mother needs to accept that her kids don’t get along and that her relationship and time with each may have to be exclusive of the other. She’ll survive.
None of this is fun, I get that. And I’m sure the exclusion stings even more so because you miss your own family and your holiday traditions with them and can’t get home to see them. Maybe focusing on a way to get back next year will also help you deal with your boyfriend’s fractured family scenario. In the end, what’s most important to remember is that you and Fred are in charge and in control of the time you and Fred spend together. No one can “steal” a holiday from you guys, even if it means celebrating it with his kids on a different day. When you get hung up on the fine details — the who and where and when — and let that cloud the more important details of the love to be shared and the ability to get to be together at all even if it’s not exactly when you might prefer, you let the losers win. Don’t let the losers win.
***************
If you have a relationship/dating question I can help answer, you can send me your letters at [email protected].
Wendy gave a lot of good advice. Unless your boyfriend is willing to deal with his sister, this is probably going to be your life for the foreseeable future. I think that you should determine if you’re OK with that prior to making any additional commitments, like marriage. If not, then you should wait for clear evidence that things have changed beforehand.
LW – Did I miss something? Why are the sister and the ex so hateful to you? Did you have any part in his leaving his ex and family? If so, I get why they are hating on you. If not, I am confused as to why, but they may just be trifling bitches.
I understand that Fred doesn’t want to fight with them. I agree with Wendy that he should handle his custody situation legally. He should not have to kiss his exes ass to be able to see his kids. It should all be legally arranged and he should have set dates with them and celebrate with them then. He (or you) shouldn’t ever have to deal with her threatening you. Period. He should see a lawyer and be done. He should quit playing their games.
Fred doesn’t sound like he has a visitation/holiday schedule set. He should NOT be spending holidays with his ex-wife just to see his kids. He needs to speak with her and set up a schedule where they split the holidays somehow. If she won’t cooperate, he needs to speak with an attorney. Typically in divorce, they take turns on holidays or (less ideal) split the day in half. Moms get their birthday and mother’s day, dads get their birthday and father’s day. Everything else is split as yours, mine, yours, mine.
Wendy is right, start your own parties and events. You can have them on a different day- 23’ve hosted holidays on days other than the main holidays. If you have a Thanksgiving on Friday or Saturday, everyone will be more relaxed and the pressure is off.
My husband and I got together after he and his ex had split, but she couldn’t fathom any other reason for him to leave her so she assumed he was lying and has hated me for the almost 20 years since. It’s been swell.
That being said, we do our own thing. When the kids were younger we alternated holidays and made our own traditions. Had he bowed down to her and ruined our time as a result we would not be married. LW needs to think long and hard about whether this is how she wants her life to look because if Fred won’t talk with his family and grow a spine this is what she’s in for forever. No thanks.
Like many of the women who write to Wendy, you don’t have a SIL/ex problem, you have a boyfriend problem. Since he won’t stand up for you, the rest of your life will be exactly like this. Does your boyfriend even like you? Why do you feel like he is good enough for you? Move on already.