Parents call son 'moron' for getting married; 'I hope the next time I see you is when you're in a freaking casket.' AITA? + UPDATE
"My parents are distraught that I'm getting married."
I (23m) have been together with my fiance (22f) for almost 5 years now (engaged since January 2023), and she's the first person I've ever had a romantic relationship with. We're planning on getting married in summer 2025 after my fiance finishes her teaching credential.
For the entirety of our relationship, my parents have made little to no effort in getting to know my fiancé. The only time she was invited to our home was when she offered to take care of me the day I got my wisdom tooth surgery.
To this day, they haven't made any attempt to meet her parents despite all the invitations they've extended to my parents. On the other hand, my fiancé's parents have welcomed me with open arms.
I met them 6 months into our relationship, and have consistently invited me to dinners, vacations and holidays. They even let me live with them while I finished my degree because of the toll my family dynamic was having on my mental well-being.
Ever since I told them I was planning on proposing, they repetitively tell me that I'm making a monumental mistake choosing to marry her. What usually comes up is how I'm too young and that I should date more people before committing to someone.
They even try to gaslight me with conspiracies of why she's marrying me, saying things like: "Her parents might be coercing you with their wealth to marry their daughter", "She's just using you to live out her fairy-tale wedding", and "You just give her everything she wants and as soon as you stop she'll leave". Every time I ask them to back up any of these things, they always respond with "you just don't see it".
Also, because my parents are Catholic, they are upset that I live with and have sex with someone who I'm not married to and that her parents are okay with it. It's almost always brought up whenever they try to deface my fiancé and her family.
What confuses me the most is that my parents, through everything else, have always been supportive of me. They always tell me that they love me and that they want what's best for me.
Our dynamic has improved drastically since I was in college, and I enjoy coming home to visit them. This makes me feel so conflicted because I love my parents, but I can't help but feel manipulated and betrayed by the way they talk about my fiance and her family.
My fiancé is my best friend and I love her like no one else. I couldn't care less that she's the only romantic partner I've ever been with because I don't want anyone else. We respect each other, we trust each other, we want what's best for each other, and we communicate everything with each other.
Her family is no different. They treat me like family and love me like their own son. What frustrates me the most is that my fiance and her family are some of the best people I've ever known in my life, and if my parents just made an effort to meet them, they'd see how wonderful they are.
At this point, I've given up trying to reason with my father on this because he doesn't even listen to what I have to say, so I've been trying to help my mother understand what my fiance means to me and what I see in her.
Even though she seems to listen and think about what I say, she'll revert back to the same mentality within a week. In the most recent conversation I had with my mother about my wedding, she told me that the thought of me marrying my fiance makes her feel "distraught", and that makes me sick.
Despite everything, I still want my parents to be part of my future. Although I resent my parents for putting me in this position, the thought of losing them over this is equally devastating to me.
Nevertheless, part of me wants to quit trying and let my parents isolate themselves from my future, but my fiance and her family still want my parents to be part of our marriage and our future, despite everything my parents have said about them.
As I begin planning my wedding with my fiance and her family, this eats at me every single day. Part of me feels like I haven't tried hard enough to change my parents perspective to justify cutting them out of my future, so I keep trying.
At the same time, every day I spend with my family makes me feel guilty for loving people who say and feel such heinous things about my soon-to-be wife and in-laws. I don't know what to do.
Here is what readers had to say in response to the OP’s post:
You can’t control your family. You’ve presented them with opportunities to change their perspective and be supportive of your relationship, and time and time again they show you they’re unwilling or unable to change.
Mourn the relationship you wish you had with them. But for your own mental health, stop trying to change them. If they come around, they will let you know. Until then, don’t go out of your way to let them into your life. It sounds like your in laws are lovely people truly deserving of your love and time. Embrace them, lean on them, and cherish those relationships.
Comfortable_Trash781 (OP)
Yeah I just have a hard time accepting that they really feel this way. I made it clear with my fiance that I wouldn't let them get in the way of our wedding and every day after that. Thank you for the kind words and advice :)
You can’t change other people. Their actions and beliefs are their own. The issue you need to face now is accepting that your wife is now to be above anyone else, even to the point that asking people who are disgusted with her to not attend your wedding- yes, that includes your parents.
Your wedding is to celebrate your love. Seeing their faces there and later in pictures will only remind you that do not support you and actively dislike your chosen life partner. I say this because I did allow my mother to attend my wedding. She looks absolutely pissed in every picture. She didn’t show any joy for me. I wish i had had more self-respect for myself and not invited her.
A full year later, the OP returned with an update.
Shortly after I made the original post, I decided to set a boundary with my parents. I told them that I couldn't continue to tolerate their baseless attacks on my fiancé and her family, and that until they were willing to put in some effort to change their perspective, I would be halting any and all contact with them for the sake of our own peace and happiness.
Understandably, my mom was distraught to hear this from me. My dad didn't really acknowledge it. My grandma (mom's side) continued to help me reconsider the way I was handling this, because my mom was having a really hard time dealing with this.
After about a month of no contact, my fiance and I tried to reevaluate the situation and agreed that it would only be healthy to pull back the boundary for my mom if she was willing to approach my relationship with an open mind.
These were our expectations:
My mom had to get together with my fiancé and I. My fiancé had to be openly invited to family events. My mom had to meet my fiancé's mom.
Over the course of about six months, my mom was able to meet all of these. My mom and my fiance were getting along superbly well, beyond what I expected. My fiancé was coming to family gatherings, and my extended family thought she was lovely (as I expected because she's awesome).
And, we had a lunch where my mom got to meet my fiancé's mom. Despite everyone being pretty nervous, that also went very well. Through all of this, despite my mom feeling a bit better about my fiance, she has been slow in coming around to the idea of me getting married.
She's made a lot of progress though, so it's something we've been understanding of. The only thing left to do was to get my dad on board. I knew that would be tough from the get-go, but I was expecting my mom to help guide his perspective as she developed her own.
With 2.5 months until the wedding, I decided to visit my parents and touch base with my dad about how he's feeling in terms of my relationship and getting married. I communicated to him that even if he wasn't fully on board yet, filling the gap with trust instead of fear would be the healthiest thing for everyone, including himself.
I said that if we wanted everyone to celebrate with us on the day we got married. He was quiet and clearly holding back anger. My mom decided to try and communicate his concerns to me and we got into a bit of a heated discussion.
I reiterated the fact that they would never truly know everything that was going on in my relationship, and that the only way for our family to stay strong was to fill the gaps with trust; not with fear. When I added that I learned this from my therapist, that's when my dad snapped.
He told me therapists don't care about anyone, and that the one and only therapist he went to compared him to "satan". I tried to be respectful but he just cut me off and began going on a tirade which was as arguably worse than any conversation we had in the past about my relationship.
You can probably guess how the conversation went, so I'll just lay out some of the crazy things he said:
"I was a moron when I was 24, and believe me, so are you. You don't have a clue what you're doing."
"You two have had it easy being together during and since COVID. You didn't have enough hardship to test the relationship. You both never had other options."
"I don't know her parents, and I don't care to ever know them."
As you can probably guess, I was furious. I was about to walk out, but I decided to try one last thing. I told my dad about a time I had made my brother feel bad about how he wasn't doing enough to better his life and his mental illness.
I told my dad that even though I was coming from a place of love, I was hurting my brother, and that I apologized dearly to my brother when I realized this because all I could do to help was be there for him and be optimistic for his future.
Unbelievably, my dad decided to start guilt tripping me about how I made my brother feel and the whole message went right over his head. At that moment, a light bulb went off in my head. I always knew my dad was a narcissist, but I never really knew it until now.
All his life, he had emotionally manipulated and scorned everyone in his life whenever they tried to confront him on something he did wrong. I was wasting my time, my emotional well-being and harming my relationship; all for nothing. I got up, grabbed my keys, opened the door, and said:
"Mom? If you want to come to the wedding, come to the wedding. Dad? I hope that the next time I see you is when you're in a freaking casket."
I slammed the door with the intention of breaking it, walked out to my car, and dipped.
Right after, I went to my fiancé's parent's house where my fiancé and her mom were drinking wine and having fun. I tried to pretend everything way alright so I didn't ruin their night, but my fiance read right through me and I broke down.
I told them my dad wasn't allowed to come to the wedding anymore, and I told them everything that happened. My fiance's parents felt so horrible for me. They consoled and reassured me that I was a like a son to them, and that they have always been so happy their daughter "has a guy like me".
Despite how awful these last few days have been, my fiance and I have never been stronger. I told her that I was putting her first, and that it was time for us to look forward to this wedding and the future we're building together. I told her that I am not going to let anyone treat her like this anymore, and that we didn't need anyone's permission to choose the life we set out to build together.
My therapist has been helping me to heal and grow from this in the best way possible. I am cutting ties with my dad, and I am sticking to it. Not out of the hatred I felt that day, but out of the compassion and respect I have for my soon-to-be wife and soon-to-be in-laws. If he wants to make amends, then it’s on HIM to do that. Not me.
My fiance is my soulmate. We are and will continue to be happier than we've ever been by continuing to respect, love, and support each other till the very end. And we aren't going to slow up for anyone who doesn't see or want the same for us.
Here is what readers had to say in response to the OP’s post:
Hey, happy to see you sticking up for yourself and your fiance. You did the right thing, even though it was hard. Sorry your dad sucks. i can't imagine what it took to do that, but you did it and you can be proud of that.
The man TOLD HIS NEW BRIDE he might have made a mistake marrying her ON THEIR HONEYMOON. And she still had kids with him. Lord save us from Catholic guilt*.
*I grew up under hard-core Irish Catholics, I Am Allowed This Grievance.
Dad really showed his whole ass huh? Well its better to learn this lesson before the wedding than during it. Also who says couples living through covid had it EASY??? Freaking boomers.