Division in the Family

During my daily log in to Facebook I stumbled across a status update of my sister-in-law. It read: "very happy to have four kids in our family now. Come join us for a BBQ to celebrate this Sunday at 2 at the house." My first thought was, "Jon and I aren't doing anything, so we could probably go." I asked and sure enough he didn't have plans. I commented to say we would be there.

About an hour later a different thought crossed my mind. I wondered if anyone in the family had been invited. I wondered if I hadn't seen that post if I would have known about it. I emailed my mom to see if she knew anything about it. Answer: No.

Does my sister-in-law even want us there? Part of me thinks that she wouldn't have told us and that if we didn't come, she would bad mouth us to her friends. "Yeah Frank's family doesn't care about us. They didn't even come to the BBQ." I wonder what the kids would think. "Does Grandma and Grandpa not like Samson? Do my aunts and uncles and cousins not like him? Why don't we get to see Dad's side of the family much?"

Unfortunately this isn't the first time this has happened. After a fight with my parents in Feb. 2005 my sister-in-law turned against the family. They didn't invite us over for birthdays. They didn't come for holidays. It caused friction in the family. Everyone knew something was wrong, but she was too stubborn to work it out. It came to a head in Dec 2008 when she sent a nasty email out to the family about how we aren't involved in her kids lives and what a horrible family we are. My mom confronted Frank about it and he had no clue she had sent it. They did end up coming over for Christmas, which was very awkward.

I called my brother to find out the low down on the BBQ. Turns out it is a family event, we just weren't told about it. He mentioned her being really busy and might not have had time to send out an email. He also mentioned she was probably sending emails to my mom but was probably using a wrong email address. I called her but no response yet. It could very well be she is too busy, but then again, how long does it take to send an email saying "BBQ at our house Sunday st 2 pm to celebrate Samson joining the family." Not long at all.