Husband's birthday party ...How to handle rude relatives??????

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My husband recently celebrated a significant birthday. He was very reluctant to do anything, but I finally convinced him that we should have 4 other couples over for dinner. He then insisted that he wanted his son and daughter-in-law to be there. It then became too big for us to host in our apartment so we found a local restaurant with a cozy room to have it in. Long story short - his brother from Michigan insisted on coming as did his one and only 1st cousin from California. Okay -fine.

His cousin from California asked if her daughter can come. I say NO .We are NOT inviting the next generation as that would be too many people. (Including her daughter= 4 adults and 2 children under age 7). About 10 days before the party the daughter calls and says she will be in our city and asks to come. I say no,but please join us for coffee and cake at the apartment after the dinner. She INSISTS on coming to the dinner saying that my SS had said okay. I try to explain that it is NOT OKAY, SS is not organizing the party and that the other cousins her age would feel badly that they were not included. SS then calls me and asks if it is okay for HIM to invite the other cousins.. (No offer to pay or to participate in anyway even though he does quite well.) Again, I say no. This is NOT what his father wanted.

By this time, I am furious. Daughter calls yet again and asks if she should call the restaurant to see if they can make room for he and if necessary "she will sit on her monther's lap". (BTW- She is 45 years old.) THis woman REFUSED to take no for an answe.I finally said if you want to come even though you are not wanted, it is up to you. In the end, she did come,and did call the restaurant to make sure there was a place for her, I had prepared name cards and gave quite a lot of thought to the seating arrangements. As soon as DIL walks in, she exchanges her name card to another seat. I say to her "What are you doing"? "Oh - I thought so and so would be more comfortable here."

DH knows nothing about the back story and the party turned out well. I was a gracious hostess and thanked everyone for coming.. These people either have no manners or think they can walk all over me. I also have the feeling if I tell DH he will defend the party crashers. I was not brought up like this, don't live like this, and don't like to be treated like this. How can I handle this on going disrespectful behavior?

You should have taken the cue

You should have taken the cue from your husband, he didn't want to do a big thing but you convinced him. Maybe next time, you will listen to him.

A little harsh

But I have to say, if my DH wanted US (as opposed to him, becuase I assume this is coming out of joint funds) to host friends, but not my DC, I would be pissed. I think all the relatives that glommed on were wrong,

This. I find it rude to push

This. I find it rude to push someone to do something they don't want to do, especially on their birthday. The easiest answer is to not host things in the future.

So your husband said NO to

So your husband said NO to you, but had NO trouble saying YES to everyone else (or saying nothing which is the equivalent of Yes).

You should let him plan his own milestones from here on out and you REFUSE to be responsible for any aspect of it. That way, HE is responsible for not saying NO to the gatecrashers and you can sit back and relax.

I have re-read this

And do not see where he said NO to her (he agreed to party), and the others did not ask him (which I would expect, they asked her)

OP said her DH was reluctant.

OP said her DH was reluctant. I'm a man and reluctant for me means I don't wanna do it. At all. Trying to be nice by not saying no flat out.

OP had specific people invited and people crashed on her cuz she sent orig invite. Her DH overrode her decision on son and dil. Maybe op was tired of fighting it and caved.

It seems you got steamrolled.

It seems you got steamrolled. That would be the last time I ever invited those cretins to anything.

In steplife, we often have to let go of concepts like graciousness and etiquette and resort to blunt talk and unequivocal firmness. Nice gets you nowhere with poorly reared CODs who lack manners and are accustomed to getting their own way. I’ve only learned this after years of being trampled and taken advantage of.

Should something like this happen again (Dog forbid), shut. that. carp. down. Don’t hesitate to turn things around on them, and remember that NO is a complete sentence. Here are a few responses to file away:

No.

No, I don’t want to do that.

Will you be paying?

That doesn’t work for me/us.

Feel free to host your own event.

Geez

I am overwhelmed by the negativity in this forum. Let’s not pick apart the person having the issue, we are supposed to be here to support each other. I’m sure she was a gracious hostess and did the best to keep things to her standards while doing something nice for her DH. My step family also has grown up without manners and basic etiquette so I understand.

Next time I would ask your husband what and who he wants to attend the gathering, and simply leave it to him to choose his guests. If someone invited themselves you don’t need to make a place for them when plans have been made. If they don’t accept no, refer them to your DH. I imagine if he can’t say no and really ends up not wanting everybody who would like to attend actually coming, just call it off.

Well - seems to me that if

Well - seems to me that if people are willing to fly from California and Michigan to NYC to celebrate someone's milestone birthday, you should find a venue big enough for everyone to come.

I get that it wasn't what you planned, but it snowballed, and clearly people care enough about DH to come a long way to see him (and he wanted some of them there).

Thanks for your comments

I had no problem with his brother and cousin inviting themselves. They are all contermporaries and it is a small family. It is the next generation who act as if I am just in the way. What right does my SS have telling his cousin that it is "okay" to come and can he just go ahead and invite all the other cousins? And the nerve of DH's cousin's daughter to call the restaurant! It is like I don't matter and they'll just ignore me. It is completely disrespectful. I am sure the entire family was talking about me behind my back - as usual. I would like to discuss this with DH, but am not sure if he will understand my feelings.

I guess you can hold on to

I guess you can hold on to your "rights", but I think if it were me, I'd have realized I planned the wrong party and made it work, for the simple fact that all these people want to celebrate DH. Then you wouldn't be the one who "tried to cut them out", either. I'd have been happy for DH's cousin to do that extra work to get a bigger place, too.

IMO, you had a strong need to control this party and have it go how you liked - I'm not trying to be mean, just hoping you might see some of what you could have done differently instead of getting in a "me vs. them" situation with DH's relatives.

And all families talk about each other behind their backs, even reasonably healthy ones.

Thanks for your comments

If my SiL organized milestone

If my SiL organized milestone party for my brother and insisted only friends can come and I wasn’t invited and even I called and ask if I can come I was told I can’t attend, I’d be in a total shock. It’s rude.

And so what next generation wanted to come. If my DD wanted to come to uncles party I can’t imagjne my SIL getting mad about it.

If you didn’t want anyone to come to his birthday and only want friends get together, then have get together a at other times. Or keep get togethers secret etc I can’t believd these people were prohibited from coming and were told no after repeatedly asking, I’d be embarrassed if I was you, I’d not have guts to keep saying they aren’t allowed to come, poor people had to call restaurant themselves. It’s insane. People wanted to travel from out of state to see DH and you acted like it was about you. Name cards? Who cares about those. It’s not a wedding

yes they likely talked about you behind your back. The whole thing made you look kind of rude

None of it makes sense

In addition...

OP convinced her DH to have 4 couples to attend his birthday. So she wanted things her way. That backfired. Either don’t convince your DH of anything or do not alienate his family. Both strategies (do things your way and keep family away) sucked.

Geez

oh my I read the first post. Oh boy everything kind of looks different. Instead of focusing on a true issue such as horrible DH and bad marriage OP focuses on unimportant minutae who attended parties or what not. Id not worry about birthday parties and sure wouldn’t give any parties under the circumstances.

At this point I’d stop planning parties. And wouldn’t worry who attends what party.

A friend of mine is a lawyer with 35 years of experience. She says in her experience pre nuts hold no power in divorce or death and it’s what judge decides. She saw many cases where pre nup or post nup is thrown out by the judge. I’d file for divorce and let the chips fall where they may. And I sure wouldn’t plan birthday parties

Where I live prenups stand if they meet all the following

conditions:

1. Both parties had adequate time to review documents

2. Both parties fully disclosed all assets and liaiblites, etc.

3. Both parties were represented by their own counsel (although one party could pay for both)

Given that OP was a successful business and property owner at the time she signed the prenup, she may find it harder than most to overturn a prenup

In the earlier thread, OP said that she signed the prenup two weeks before the wedding, but we don't know how long she had it to review.

My friend says that

My friend says that regardless how pre nup is written, people end up suing and winning. Pre nup stands on paper but in reality there are ways around it. She is single and gas decent savings and she says that she wouldn’t even bother with pre nup because she knows it could be thrown out. She just wouldn’t legally marry later in life, to protect her assets she would just date.

Not only how it is written, but the procdure

Having a seperate attorney, timing is required. Some do work. I have said OP should see an attorney.

The facts are important

The facts are important whether DH wants to hear them or not. Inform him that never again will you tolerate rude people who are uninvited to attend an event that you plan and he needs to be ready for you to call the police and have the party crashers removed. Whether they are his family or not.

Another one of Rag's "Solutions"

That likely wont work in real life. The party was a restaurant. What will happen? If she does call the police, they will show up and ask the manager, is there a problem? He will likely run back to the party room, and then what? OP says, these people are crashing, we want them thrown out. And do you think she would say that in front of her DH? Or he would say, it fine.

She could say it is not fine

She could say it is not fine and since she is the one that booked the event.... DH really gets no say.

The problem is that far too often IRL people will not stand their ground. They let these weasels Weasley instead of not tolerating the Weasley crap.

People in my life know that crap will be confronted. So... they don't perpetrate much crap. My bride struggles with confronting crap. I will listen to her pain for a while then I ask her what she is going to do about it and I let her know that if it bothers her she should do something about it ... or.... I will. And I do.

It is not always appreciated but I get it done and the situation changes. Not always necessarily the way I would want it to, but it does change.

Currently we (my IL clan) are at the one year anniversary of FIL's passing. Still grieving but progressing in the process of moving on. He left a letter distributing certain personal belongings to specific people. SIL took things that were for others. So now everyone is tiptoeing around the issue. Except me. I called her and told her to knock her stealing shit off and give the rifles to her brothers as her father stipulated. I gave her a choice. Do it or deal with the police.

So now there is much tension in the clan. I strongly suspect she sold them so now she gets to get them back or go to jail. My DW is tense, MIL is tense, my BILs are ducking and covering, SIL is crying about it and paranoid. Her deadline is approaching and I will call the police. My FIL does not deserve her crap. She stole the money he had saved to take my MIL on an anniversary celebration the last year he was alive. He vented to my bride about it when it happened. She grieves and regularly says she should have given her dad that money. She feels guilty that she didn't. She knows that isn't what should have happened. FIL should have called the police on SIL instead of leaving the rest of the family to deal with her thieving shit.

So, I am the one that has to confront her over her crap. For some reason she thinks time will change that.

It won't. I have done it before, I will do it again until she either stops her crap or they put her in jail long enough for her to learn. My wife has confronted her in the past. I hope that my bride learns to adopt a zero tolerance perspective with her toxic little sister. But if she won't. I will continue to do it.

What absolutely does not work is tolerating these people and their weasel crap. If nothing is done about it. Nothing changes.

DH gets no say?

Not certain what world you live in, but most people would listen to their spouse if spouse said no problem officer.

If DH had a spine OP would

If DH had a spine OP would not have to deal with this. So, do we tolerate it or do we confront it? That is the question. If we do not confront it nothing changes.

My SIL's crap only impacts me because it breaks my bride's heart. So I confront it. Because I care about my wife.

I would hope that any DH would do the same for their bride.

So sorry about your party!

I am so sorry about your party!! You were trying to do something nice and it seems it didn't go that way at all!!!

Could be your husband was reluctant because he has dealt with these player before and knew something like this could happen. While you could bring something up and waste another precious moment of your life on this day that is already passed, and what good would come of it? Or you could take all the events of the day and keep them in your memory for the next event that comes up and pass on a party!!!!

Thank you all for your comments...

The party happened a few weeks ago and I am over it. It just reinforced what I already knew, many of the people in DH's family have no boundaries.

Some of you referened my earlier post about 4 months ago. I am really trying to be happy each day and to enjoy what i do have. My marriage is not perfect, but right now I have too many issues dealing with my business to focus on it. In an attempt to be happy each day, I have gone to my DIL's home several times for the children's birthdays and Father's Day. My attempt for this party was to make DH happy. I have consulted with a top family lawyer about the prenup. It MIGHT be able to be overturned but it is not a slam-dunk. To do it would cost thousands of dollars with no promise of a guarantee. In the meantime, I know that DH is slowly transferring his assets to his son. Several things have transpired in the last few months which have made me believe in myself again.

Once my business issues are resolved, I will deal with my marraige. In the meantime, I want to appreciate the things that I do have and on my accomplishments - not my failures. I know that I am doing my best and that is all I can do.

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Husband's birthday party ...How to handle rude relatives??????