There's a lot of backstory so bear with me.
We come from a Balkan country but we live in Switzerland, my parents live a 45 ninute drive from us. Before our marriage I spent half my time in my home country (where I was studying) and half here, and that half here was spent between the two houses.
Before we got married my parents were supporting in our relationship and we hanged out from time to time. My husband had never been the type to be too close with anyone beside his parents and sister, but he made an effort for me to go to dinners at my parents, and we even went for a Venice trip on my mother's 50th birthday. On the other hand, I was much closer to his family, sometimes hanging out even with his extended family when I was back in my hometown.
The wedding preparations started and everything went smoothly, and despite my anxious personality I was surprised by how calm I was those days (in our culture the wedding lasts almost a week). In one of the days proceeding the main ceremony some members of my husband's family had to come to my house to bring gifts, and my father was supposed to meet them at the entrance, but they came earlier than they said they would so he was unable to greet them, they entered without him and he only came after. After this happened he came to me visibly altered, telling me he felt disrespected. I felt a bit sad that he felt that way but I told him they didn't mean to be disrespectful.
2 days later came the most important day of the wedding, when the husband's family comes to the bride's family house to take the bride. This time I specifically asked my mother in law to not come before 2 pm, because I had pictures to take with my family. There are around 10 cars full of people coming so I understood that it was difficult to manage but I asked only for this, it didn't matter if they came late, just not too early.
What I'll write now is an account I got from many people, as I was not present. Before they started a singer had to come to our house to set up his position, my father was dealing with him and he was being fussy about certain things so that made my father frustrated, and that's when my husband's family came, 10 minutes before 2 pm. My father went to the front entrance and shouted at the women who had gathered so they would start sing and dance, saying they were early. My father in law went inside to see what was happening and my father was still angry saying they were doing this on purpose to piss him off. My FIL got angry too and said they would go away if that's what he wanted, thus ending the cerimonies. Thankfully my uncles calmed my father down and convinced everyone I didn't deserve to have my wedding ruined over this.
In the meanwhile I was upstairs taking pics, I did realise they had come early but I was unaware of what was happening so when I saw my mother crying I assumed it was because of the stress and the fact we didn't have much time, I reassured her saying I would go downstairs when I felt ready so it didn't matter they had come early.
In all of this my future husband was waiting at home for us, as it's tradition that he is to await for his wife to come there. He was also unaware of anything that had happened at out house, and my mother in law instructed everyone that knew what had happened to not tell us two anything to not ruin our wedding reception.
The night was great and we had a lot of fun, but the next morning his father broke down in tears and told him what had happened, he said he felt humiliated by my father. My husband didn't tell me anything at first because I had another day of cerimonies ahead and he didn't want to ruin my day, but when he told me in the evening I was crushed.
What followed were weeks and weeks of hearing people's perspective of what had happaned and trying to smooth things out. My father in law eventually accepted my father's apoligies (he had regretted what he had done immediately after). The thing that was most heartbreaking for me was that he had always been for me the example of what a good hearted man was like. It took me three months to forgive my father, but I did eventually because up to that day he had never done anything to hurt me, and I could not ignore a lifetime of good he had done to me for a 10 minute anger fit, no matter how much pain those 10 minuted had caused me.
The problem was and still is my husband. He refuses to see him and he doesn't want to do anything with him, even if his father has gone past this. My parents don't come to our house, they've been only once but my husband refused to show up, I go at least once a week at my parents but he never meets them. There have been times they saw each other and talked just for 2 or 3 minutes just because he was forced to, but that's it. My father is living in regret and has tried so many times to fix this, but my husband refuses. I have talked to him, but he won't listen. He says he wants me to have a normal relationship with them but just asks me to not involve him in it. On the other hand I go along with his parents just fine.
I cannot accept this, I live a double life, one with my husband and one with my parents, the two worlds cannot come together and it's becoming too much for me. I want to be able to have dinner together and share our life together. I am also worried that my husband may be using this as an excuse to never having to deal with them anymore, as he wasn't keen to many outings before our wedding anyway (but I don't think he would do that to me)
After saying all this I must point out that beside this problem my husband and I have the most wonderful relationship together. Besides our traditional families we live a western lifestyle and we can be completely free with each other, so we only comply with the traditional aspect of our families when we have to.
I am a very forgivng person and he's not so I don't know how I can make him understand that for me this situation cannot be permanent. Any kind of insight would be helpful.
TLDR: Father went into an anger fit during my wedding and now my husband doesn't want to have anything to do with my family anymore. I cannot accept this situation.
Submitted March 28, 2019 at 04:54AM by Voshisthing https://ift.tt/2FF1bko
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