Finding the person you want to spend the rest of your life with should be a cause for celebration, but one woman didn’t get the reaction she’d hoped for after telling her family she was getting married.
The unnamed woman claimed her parents, and other relatives, have refused to attend her wedding as they “hate” the man she’s engaged to.
The 28-year-old explained all in an anonymous Reddit post, where she asked fellow users for advice on how to rectify the upsetting situation.
She began by explaining how she met her fiancé, Ryan, while at university – she attended as a mature student (age 22) as she’d had to take a few years out after Sixth Form as she had a baby, a son named Teddy.
During her second year of study, Ryan was hired as a lecturer, he was 27 at the time and is now 31.
“I hated him at first,” she admits. “He was nervous and overcompensated by acting like a w***er, and I was not impressed.
“By my third (and final) year he eased up a lot and was genuinely nice. The turning point was when Teddy got sent home, and I emailed Ryan to say I’d be missing his lecture. He suggested I bring Teddy with me. He was only four at the time and very easily bored, and Ryan spent the lecture alternating between helping us and entertaining Teddy.
“This whole time, I was having regular phone calls with my parents. They noticed the shift from me ranting about Ryan every chance I got to singing his praises.”
A few months after graduating, the woman says she bumped into Ryan in a coffee shop and she invited him to sit with her and Teddy.
A few months after graduating, the woman says she bumped into Ryan in a coffee shop and she invited him to sit with her and Teddy.
“We talked for a bit and I gave him my number,” she said. “It was platonic for a few weeks until he said that he hoped this wasn’t too forward but he’d asked a couple of hypothetical questions at the university and if I wanted to date, then we would be allowed.
“I told him it was very forward, so he was lucky he’s cute. I didn’t tell my parents we were dating until a few months in, which is also when Ryan officially told the university and about six months after my graduation.”
She continued to explain: “We’ve now been together two years. We’ve been the butt of a few jokes, which we’ve been fine with, but my parents and siblings immediately came down hard on Ryan, due to how we met, and what I told them about Ryan throughout his first year of teaching.
“They also seem to think that when I started being nice about him in third year was when things began with us. We’ve made clear to everyone that he’s not really a w***er, how the timeline works, and Ryan has done his best to impress them.
“Ryan proposed at New Year’s (with Teddy’s help). I said yes. We’re planning the wedding, and when I asked my mother for help out with the guest list regarding my family, she said not to bother as no one wants to come, including her, dad, and my siblings. The only person likely to come is my brother (32m), but that’s it for my whole extended family, solely because they don’t like Ryan.”
“Is there anything that can be done at this stage? Something we can do, on our end, to get them to come? Is this the point where I should just give up?”
More than 300 people have since responded to the Reddit post, offering advice.
One person said: “If I was you, I wouldn’t take my mother’s word for it that everyone agrees with her (because people often pretend to agree to avoid an argument). Send the invites out regardless and make people decline themselves – don’t let your mother decline on their behalf.”
Another replied: “It’s frustrating, but I’ve learned to not vent EVER to friends or family about my partner, unless it was truly egregious behaviour. All they hear and remember is the time your partner ‘mistreated’ you. The cat is out of the bag here, though.”
A third wrote: “I would talk to your family again very seriously. Lots of people don’t like their in-laws but if you want a relationship with that family member you have to grit your teeth and be supportive. It sounds like the issue here is that they believe this relationship either started inappropriately/may be abusive in some way.”