Hi. Yes this is a long story. If you are not willing to read it, then that's fine. This is for me to fully explain the story to the fullest. If you are interested, please buckle up because I have a lot to unpack here.

All names are changed in this story.

Currently: Me (24F), Mark (Brother, 22M), Mom (45F), Dad (50M), Jake (My Fiancé, 24M), Carly (Mark's Fiancé, 21F)

To be frank, my mother is emotionally abusive and a compulsive liar. It was not the best time growing up with her or my father. My father is straight up a pushover. He never stood up for me when my mom would have her freak outs and often would add onto it. However, he would sneak in later and apologize to us and say how she was wrong, but we had to apologize to her to make it stop. Even after I left to go to college, it was like they always had a leash on me and criticized everything I did and every decision I made. The kicker is, my little brother, Mark, was exempt from all of this. This is the most important part of this story.

Mark is the definition of favorite child. Some quick scenarios of us growing up.....

- Me: Clean the whole house every week or I can't hang with friends. Him: Take out the trash on Wednesdays (But he throws a fit each time)

- Me: Works a job in high school to pay for the things I want. Him: Doesn't work a job, plays video games all day and gets money from parents for whatever he wants.

To put into context.... he still lives at home with my parents and his Fiancé, Carly, and doesn't pay rent or utilities, as well as not being able to work a dishwasher, do his own laundry or even walk 20 feet every Wednesday to put out the trash. He also gets free meals that my parents cook for him every night as well as free groceries for the week....

On top of everything, I have never had a good relationship with my brother as well. We both were straight assholes to each other, but some of the things he would sling my way were nasty and have stuck with me for a while. I'd like to say our relationship is strained and like a roller coaster.

I also have a strained relationship with my parents. More so with my mother. They are my parents and I love them, but sometimes I can't be around them and their toxic behavior.

Now that we have that out of the way. On to my current dilemma.

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I recently got engaged last year to my longtime boyfriend and the goal from the start was to have a wedding pretty soon after. My brother also proposed to his longtime high school girlfriend as well a few months before us. They however, wanted to elope in a few years and have a small reception. Once I had figured out my preparations for my wedding I told my family that I would be getting married exactly a year from when I was engaged. Not even a few days later, Mark and Carly decide that they are also getting married around the time they got engaged and they no longer want to elope, but have a ceremony. To be honest, I didn't mind and was excited. Carly and I even had similar ideas for decorations and decided we would share some things like tablecloths and greenery.

About a month goes by and Jake and I ask Mark and Carly to be in our bridal party, which a few weeks later they do the same to us. At this point, everything is great and things are in high spirits.... until January of this year.

JANUARY

A friend of mine sent me a screenshot of Carly's Facebook post about "Finding the Dress" with her mom and 2 sisters (who are the only other bridesmaids besides me). I thought it was a bit strange at first that my mom and I weren't given an invitation, but shrugged it off only because I'm not that close with Carly in the first place. However, my mother confronted Carly about the incident and she said, "It was on a whim and we were all together and decided to go. I'm sorry, I didn't really think about it."

Again, shrugged it off and thought it was a stupid reason, but went on my with my day.

FEBRUARY

Carly announces that she is going to be having her Bridal shower the day before Easter and how her mother was going to be organizing the event and sending out invites soon. (This is highly important to the story)

MARCH

March rolls around and my great aunt passes. My Dad's side of the family comes down and we all talk after the service about meeting up again. As my cousin is leaving she tells Carly that she is looking forward to the wedding and she still has to RSVP. My Mother overhears and mentions the bridal shower coming up in a month. My cousin is confused and asks, "What bridal shower?"

My Mother proceeds to tell her about the shower and the date, but my cousin is still very confused and claims she never received an invite.

My Mother, then informs her that it’s all done on Facebook and she should have an invite on there. Which was news to me because I never recall seeing an invite to this bridal shower, but I also knew the date so didn’t think much of it. My dad‘s sisters also were confused and said they also did not know anything about the bridal shower. They said that they would look into it and RSVP as soon as they could.

As soon as they left, it was just Carly, Mark, Mom and me. We talked about going across the street for a get together after the burial. In the middle of my mom still talking to my brother, Carly interrupts them and snaps at Mark asking if he’s ready to go. It caused my mom and I to give each other a look like what the actual hell just happened? My Mom and I proceeded to go across the street and as we were talking about what that behavior was about, my Mom receives a phone call from my brother. My brother essentially starts yelling at her about how disrespectful it was for her to bring up the bridal shower in front of our family because Carly had not invited them and now it was making her look bad.

Okay, first of all. What the actual fuck? What does she mean? She was not going to invite my two aunts and cousin to her bridal shower? Which so happens to be my brothers favorite family members.....

So as my brother is bitching out my mom on the phone, I go to Facebook to find this event. Sure enough there is an invite to her bridal shower. Interestingly, there are 30 people invited and out of those 30, two of them are my mom and me. Nobody else from my family has an invite on the public invite list.

So now I’m pissed. My mom finally gets off the phone and we start discussing what the hell is going on. Her and I are both confused as to why none of our family members are invited to her bridal shower and now my mom is starting to blame herself for even mentioning anything in the first place to my cousin. At this point, I’m trying to communicate to her that it seems like Carly doesn’t want to be associated with our family at all. Eventually after an hour, Carly and Mark show up and Carly doesn’t speak a word to my mom. So at this point, I’m like okay whatever, I’m kind of pissed, but maybe the truth will come out within the next couple days.

APRIL

My mom has a conversation with her sister-in-law, Shari, and towards the end she mentions about seeing her in a couple of weeks at the bridal shower. Shari, isn’t aware of what my mom is talking about and again my mom fills her in about the Facebook invite and she ends up seeing that she was invited. However, she then asks my mom if her daughter-in-law is also invited. She tells Shari that she will confirm with Carly and get back to her. My mom texts Carly while she’s at work and mentions briefly the conversation she had with Shari and the question that she asked.

Carly: "If anyone has a problem or questions about my bridal shower, they need to talk to me first."

Mom: "I was just asking I didn’t want to say anything or go above you. I just wanted to give Shari an answer."

Carly responds with a long text message about how my mother is being disrespectful towards her and putting her in a position again where she’s uncomfortable and now has to invite people that she doesn’t want to invite like she did before.

Mom: "I’m sorry you feel that way, that was not my intention. I don’t know how you’re running your bridal shower. I was just assuming and that’s why I wanted to confirm with you first."

From here, Carly just basically ignores her and then proceeds to screenshot a portion of the conversation and send it to my brother. Mark comes out of his room and proceeds to yell at my mom about interfering with the bridal shower again. My mother, who has never snapped at my brother, finally does. She yelled at him and told him that he obviously did not have the whole story and that he needed to read the text messages for himself and how it’s actually Carly who’s being disrespectful. My brother read the text messages and agreed with my mom that Carly was being disrespectful.

To put into context, my brother is the biggest mommy’s boy in the entire fucking world. Whatever mommy says, he does. 

During this argument, Mark is texting Carly about his perspective on the entire thing and how she is being disrespectful. This then leads to an all out war between the three of them. Carly goes off the rails and proceeds to call my mother a fucking bitch. She also calls Mark a fucking loser who always agrees with his Mommy. She keeps going on talking about how she can’t live in that house anymore, and she’s thinking about leaving and getting an apartment. Mark responds by saying he’s not moving out and that she can get an apartment if she likes, but he will not be going with her. This of course angers Carly and she asks about their relationship and maybe Mom shouldn’t even be invited to the wedding if it’s gonna cause this many issues. Mark then tells her he thinks it’s best if she does move out if she’s going to act like this.

Now, I was only told this information from my mom. I saw the text messages, so I can confirm what was said. But I was not there for word-of-mouth conversations. Here is where I am now dragged into this war.

Before I was privy to this information, my dad came over to my house and asked if he could have a conversation with me. He proceeds to sit me down on the couch and give a very non-detailed description of what happened and how I apparently talked badly about Mom to Carly about the wedding and agreed with her about my mom's behavior. I’m now upset because I have never talked to Carly about my mom and the wedding. So at this point, I’m being accused of something that I have never done or said while being dragged into this fight. On top of everything, my mom is supposedly crying at home because she thinks that I hate her.

I told my dad that I would meet him at his house so I can try to clear this up with Mom. This is where she proceeds to tell me everything that has happened so far. Of course, at this point, I am also amped up with all sorts of emotions. I’m upset that she called my mom a name, I’m upset that she is also calling my brother names, and I’m still kind of upset that this issue with my family and the bridal shower is still occurring.

A few days go by and Carly has still not moved out like she claimed, but proceeds to ignore my parents and fight with Mark. One day, while my parents were out of town they got a notification on the camera and my father proceeded to watch the video. On the video, Mark and Carly were screaming at each other in the driveway. Carly tells Mark, "I’ll call her right now and tell her to fuck off." Mark screams back and says, "Why are you acting like this towards my mom?" And then proceeds to leave for work.

My mom FaceTimes me to tell me about the video. Again, I’m still upset about the last couple days and this just makes matters worse. I then ask if anything has been said about her behavior towards her. She tells me no. So I ask my dad, why he has at least not stepped up and defended his wife? He says he will reach out to Carly and say something.

A couple minutes later, he calls Carly and she answers. He tells her that he saw the video and heard what she said and does not appreciate how she is talking about his wife and that he cannot have that sort of behavior happen under his roof. She says OK and they hang up.

While this is happening, I tell my mom that Mark has been visibly upset at work over the last couple days. (I know this because Jake and Mark work together.) After I say this, she gets very emotional and claims that now she probably has to end it and apologize to Carly. She claims that she is now the issue and that she doesn’t want to have any more drama. She doesn’t want to see Mark upset. Now at this point, I do try to argue her viewpoint. I try to make her see that Carly is the one who started this by calling her names and saying some pretty vulgar things to her son. I tell her that I think she should give it a few days and see what happens and let Mark and Carly work it out. My mom agrees and we get off the phone.

The next day, my mom tells me that she apologized to Carly and that everything is okay now. To tell you that I was in disbelief and utter shock is an understatement.

I am extremely upset at this point and filled with a lot of emotions. I don’t understand why my mom did what she did, because to me she is encouraging Carly‘s behavior. Especially because this is how she reacts every time something doesn’t go her way. 

My parents call me a few days later and talk about the situation. I proceed to inform them of my anger over the entire situation over the past couple days. I explained to them that I am angry for Mom and I am angry for my family. I also mention that I possibly want to reach out to Carly and Mark and talk to them about my feelings over this matter. My mom tells me that it is a bad idea and that I will ruin the peace if I do that.

I argue back and forth with them for an hour. They both tell me that I'm not old enough to know better and I will cause so many issues if I tell them how I feel. Mom then goes on and on about how this will ruin her life because she won't be able to have all of us at the house for Holidays and events because they won't want to come if I'm there. I'm frustrated because they aren't even listening to my reasons and we hang up.

Not even joking, a few days later we have the same conversation over the phone where my mom is now crying and begging me not to ruin the family. I tried and tried to have them see my point of view and how I am so angry about Carly's blatant disrespect towards our family and how she treats my brother. I don't understand how they could let her act like this and be okay with it?

To also give some context, Mark and Carly are unaware that I even know about the argument at all. They think Jake and I never were told and asked my parents to not tell us. Well, that obviously is not the case because my father told me hours after because he was upset with me over my "bad talking" about Mom. To make matters worse, they have asked my parents if they have told Jake and I, and they have lied saying that they didn't tell us.....

After a conversation with Jake and my friends about not trying to disturb the peace, I decided that I was not going to confront Carly about my feelings on the matter. Instead, I would act indifferent and put distance between myself and them. I felt silenced and disregarded. I felt like my thoughts and feelings on the matter just didn't matter at all to my parents. So I proceeded to listen to them and not say anything, but I was not going to act like everything was okay and be fake to their face.

Coincidentally, Carly, Mark, Jake and I all had a pre-scheduled event at a sports game that we had tickets to. When we were on our way to the game, Mark decides to ask me if I was still coming to his wedding. And then Carly asked if I was still coming to her bridal shower. Both of these statements, kind of shocked me because why are they asking me this if I have not said anything to them in a week nor supposedly my mom has said a word to them? I told them that "Of course I was going to the wedding and shower" and that was that. During the rest of the night, I kind of just kept to myself and tried to have as little conversation as possible. They obviously noticed and proceeded to ask my mom the next day about my behavior. Mom asked me why I was behaving that way, and I chose not to respond because I did not want to get into another talk about how I was ruining the family. My mom proceeded to text me that I needed to forget the whole thing and that she is regretful that she even involved me in the first place. She feels like this whole situation is her fault and that I again will be ruining family events in the future because I can’t seem to let it go. She is now ready to let it go and she no longer wants to be involved in the drama any longer. On top of that, I am the reason we can't have Easter as well due to my behavior at the game... nice

Just a couple days ago, I get a text message from Carly.

Carly: "My sisters are setting up for the bridal shower on Saturday if you could go help them."

Me: "Sure."

Carly: "Are you okay? Mark and I are wondering because you have been very short with us lately and we wanna know if you still wanna be a part of our wedding party? It’s Okay if you don’t want to, but we would like to know. Hope everything is OK!"

At this point, I don’t really know what to say. I don’t wanna text her how I actually feel because I don’t want to upset my parents. I’m also at work and busy and don’t want to formulate a response. So I don't respond and put it off for later. As soon as I get home, Mark calls me. I don’t answer, because I don’t want to get into whatever he has in store for me. However, five minutes later, my dad calls. I do answer and the first thing he says to me is, "Are you ever going to text Carly back?"

This obviously upset me even more for a two reasons:

1. I thought that they (my parents) no longer wanted to be involved?
2. Why is my dad calling me about a situation between me and Carly? 

He then proceeds to say:

Dad: "You need to text Carly back and fix this situation. You are going to ruin the family. We already can’t have Easter because of you."

Me: "You know it’s a little bit contradicting how a week ago you and Mom told me repeatedly how I am not supposed to talk to Carly or Mark and tell them how I feel because I’m going to ruin the family. And now you’re sitting here and telling me that I’m going to ruin the family if I do not speak to Carly. Do you not see how this is an issue? Or how this is utter bullshit? Why are you guys doing this to me? I will answer her whenever I do."

My dad proceeds to get upset with me and then hangs up. I’m beyond frustrated at this point and I seek out Jake and my best friend’s advice. They tell me essentially that I am in a lose-lose situation. Which is true. I’m in trouble if I speak to Carly. And I’m in trouble if I don’t speak to Carly.

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Last night, I decided to finally tell Carly how I felt. So I did respond to her text message. I said it in the most respectful way that I could. I even used I feel statements. In the nicest way possible, I told her that I did not appreciate how she has been handling the family situation as well as calling my mother names. She never responded. However, Mark did.

Mark: "Do you want to be in our wedding or not? Please stop with all the drama just forget it and move on."

Me: "Do you want me in the wedding? From my viewpoint it seems like you both aren't interested. Which is fine. I would just like it acknowledged. there have been many suggestions today about me not being in the wedding from both of you without me saying a word. So why don't you give me an answer?"

Mark: "We want you in the wedding. But if you still want to be, tonight is the night. You need to get along and forgive. No more drama."

After talking to Jake and my friends, and not responding for a few hours, I finally say:

Me: "Jake and I have made a collective decision to not be in the wedding any longer. I think it’s better if we had some distance and step away from this situation as a whole. We have to put ourselves first." 

Mark: "I have 2 questions. Are you coming to the bridal shower. Are you coming to the wedding at all?"

Me: "I'm not going to the bridal shower. We will go to the wedding if we are still welcome."

An hour after I sent the message, Mark and Carly called me which I both ignored. They then called my parents who I found out through a family member are now very upset with me and blame me for ruining the family as a whole. My mother is now embarrassed that I will no longer be attending the bridal shower, taking place in two days. She is worried about how people will perceive her, and how she will have to face the potential backlash of Carly‘s family.

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CURRENT

This whole situation has made me take a step back and really evaluate my family as a whole. My entire life I have been second best to my brother. To me it seems like his feelings always come first above mine. His happiness comes before mine. And obviously, Carly‘s happiness comes before mine. My mom is blaming me for ruining Easter, for ruining future family events, and overall I am now the problem for this whole fight.

It’s truly opened my eyes to how I am viewed by my family. I am starting to think that maybe it’s time to finally pull the plug and not speak to my family any longer. There are details that are obviously missed in this story and none of you truly know my family or me as a person. And I know that this is a one-sided story. But I’d like to think that this time I am not in the wrong. Especially when my fiancé who is the most unproblematic person I know, and my friends that I have confided in all see what I have been going through the past six months. They also know my family on a more personal level and can have a better opinion on the matter. They also know my personality and can point out my flaws from time to time. 

Truly, I just want to know what you think of the situation as an outsider looking in, am I the asshole for pulling out of my brother's wedding?