Weddingbee boards

My son is getting married on Sunday. I'm thrilled that my son has found someone he loves, who also loves him, and they are getting married. The wedding, though, is going to be incredibly stressful. For an example of a family that puts the fun in dysfunctional, consider the following:

1. The mother from whom I have been estranged since 1994 will be there. She has a tendency to try to disguise our estrangement by running up to me and giving me big hugs, which I cannot escape without causing a scene. And my father (who has been steadily drinking two liters of wine a day for my entire life) will no doubt get drunk and maudlin and start trying to persuade me yet again to reconcile with my mother.
2. Virtually everyone NotFroofy knows will be in the wedding. My ex and I will be escorting the groom. My daughter and her partner are in the wedding party. The only other people from my family who will be there are my parents (see preceding paragraph), and my sister (who is a bit much even for those of us who love her to handle, and who was responsible for the whipped cream fight at our reception). So NotFroofy is likely to end up feeling like a fifth wheel.
3. The bride's father tried to kill my son. Yes, literally. At one point, the bride was having an argument with her parents, and my son tried to defuse things by suggesting that she come over to his apartment to cool down. Apparently, the very suggestion that she might go to a man's apartment was such a blow to her honor that her father pulled a knife on my son. He's also extremely homophobic.
4. The bride's mother seems nice, but she's memorably clueless; see this story of her reaction to our wedding.
5. NotFroofy is also stressed out because she got a haircut yesterday in preparation for the wedding, and her hair got completely butchered.
6. Given my other alternatives, I'm thinking that the person I most want to be seated with, aside from NotFroofy, is my ex-husband. And it's not so much that I enjoy his company as that he is the best of a lot of really bad alternatives.

I'm thinking my entertainment at the reception may consist of my beating my head against a wall.

This sounds awful, but it will be a wonderful day for your son and daughter-in-law. Anything you can protect them from, any of this drama you can hide from them is a blessing and a gift.

I am so sorry you have to deal with this! 

As for "a family that puts the fun in dysfunctional,"  I love this phrase and I'm sorry you have the chance to use it.

For #1: Mentally prepare for the big hug with a big plastered on smile. It's amazing what even a pretend smile can do.

For #2: Sitting alone during the ceremony is no big deal at all, for my brother in law's wedding the rest of the family was in the wedding and I was sitting up front all by myself until the processional. No big. Don't worry about her so much (but it's sweet that you do).

For #3: I have no advice for you. That is just wrong.

For #4: I could not stop laughing when I read that post the first time. Hopefully her cluelessness can add some comic relief for you that day (something that not everyone will notice, but something that will make you smile).

For #5: Get a new haircut and/or get it "done" for the wedding.

For #6: Well, it is what it is.

I hope it goes the best possible way, and I hope you can enjoy yourself at least a little bit.

This just keeps getting better and better!  Today, we learn that although the bride's mother has figured out that my marriage is a same-sex one, she has not told the bride's father. She assumes he will just figure it out during the reception. And there will be a "parents' table" for:

• NotFroofy
• Me
• My ex-husband
• The bride's father
• The bride's mother
• My son's old nanny

Umm, ok. So this means I have the prospect of coming out to the bride's virulently homophobic father (whose impulse control is lacking enough that he once tried to knife my son) at the reception, while sitting at the same table as him.

But you know what? I have just reached the blissful state of not giving a flying fork. My son, his wife-to-be, and the bride's mother all had the chance to tell the father beforehand. And they all decided it was ok for him to find out during the reception instead. So if he makes a scene at the reception, it is officially Not My Problem.

Oh, and NotFroofy has now got a second haircut, that left her hair shorter than she meant it to be but very cute.