Stepfamily Talk: Stepchildren Ruined Wedding
I Just Married a Man whose Kids Ruined My Wedding. Did I Make a Mistake?
By LISA COHN
Dear Lisa,
I married on September 9th the love of my life, who has three daughters. His divorce was three years ago.When he decided to ask me to marry him, he asked the girls first, and they were fine. When he proposed, I even asked the girls were they okay with it before I said yes. When we started planning the wedding, I feared since they were bitter their daddy left them that they would try to ruin the wedding. My husband really wanted them to be part of it, so I insisted that he ask them several times along the way if they were sure they wanted to be in the wedding. They assured him they did.
I went on to try at this point and make them part of it by buying them special dresses, getting them the flowers they wanted, etc. In the end, five minutes before the wedding, the 12- year-old came up to him and said that, 'It was too soon, and what if we got divorced in a year? How would this affect the 5-year-old?’ she asked. My husband assured her that while he understood she felt confused, this was not the time for this discussion. Then all the girls cried and sat sunken through the entire service, would not participate in the pictures, would not speak to me at all and ignored friends and guests. There were only 20 people in total so this could in no way go unnoticed.
While I understand this is hard, we gave them every opportunity to choose to be a part of the wedding and make it special for them. But three years later, they still punish their dad. Now I do not know what to do. I do not want them to feel that they can keep returning my friendship and kindness with ignoring me and ruining time together by being mean. They are only nice when they want something.
