The Games Children Play

I have been a bit out of sorts the last few days regarding some personal occurrences in my life. Things that have not only had an affect on me, but on those around me. Things that shouldn't even be happening amongst supposed adults.

I contemplated for the last few days over whether or not to write this blog, but decided that if this was the best way to voice my feelings and help myself deal with my disappointment in those involved that I needed to. It also never hurts to get some feed back from others who are not involved in the situation.

As many of you know, I am currently enjoying marriage number two. It still amazes me that I went through with getting married a second time, as I don't have many happy memories from the time of marriage number one at all. My son being my only happy memory from that time in my life means that I am very glad that it was over before my son, who was four at the end, could form any of the lasting memories regarding it that I still currently hold it. The gory details from marriage number one are not important for this story, other than to illustrate how far things have come from where we were to where we are. I won't go into much detail here on where we were, as I don't care to relive it in my memory. I learned what I needed to from it, and have moved on. The past was ugly, and the future was beginning to look much better. I am not going to say we had become friends, but we were no longer enemies.

I have also never made it a secret that I didn't divorced his family. I had divorced him. They had never done me any wrong, and have often left me wondering how such wonderful people could have produced the person that I was once married to, but that is beside the point. I had no reason to divorce them. As I said, this has not been any sort of secret over the years we have been divorced. I have always kept in touch with them. We talk by phone, see each other occasionally, and when they want to have Captain Dramatic visit during the summer, we talk, and make the plans, then call my ex and make sure it all works out OK for him too. This is the way we have operated for years, and had no issues at all.

That brings us to our current happenings. To my excitement, and happiness my current husband and I were invited to my ex-sister-in-law's wedding. We happily accepted. Why wouldn't we? I love her to death, and wanted nothing more than to be there for her on her special day. My ex is engaged to a woman who I also get along with, and we have all attended events together for Captain Dramatic with no issues. I had no reason to suspect that our attendance at my ex-sister-in-law's wedding would be a problem for anyone. Especially after being apart from my ex for almost eight years, and not having any issues of any kind for the last three or fours years of that time apart. Boy was I wrong!

It seems that one person in particular, my ex's fiancé, had a very vocal opinion about our attendance. To make matters worse, this very vocal opinion was voiced in front of my son, which is the last place this should have happened. You should never say bad things about the other parent in front of the child. (To do so makes you a very miserable person. PERIOD.)

My son felt obligated to warn me, that my presence at his aunt's wedding was causing problems, and I am glad he did, because it would have been terrible to have been the reason a wedding was ruined just because I showed up. I did the only thing that I cold do at that point. I called to speak with my ex-sister-in-law. I wanted to know if she thought there was going to be any trouble with me being at her wedding. She stated that she would have never thought there would be a problem, but it seems that there is. I guess that my son wasn't the only one who heard all about it. As much as it hurt my sister-in-law's feelings, and as dissapointed as I was to not be able to be there for her on her wedding day, I felt no other alternative was available, and I uninvited us. My ex-sister-in-law didn't want me to, and stated that they would grow up and be at her wedding or they wouldn't, but I didn't want that guilt if they didn't show.

So, here are all the things I see that are wrong with what happened here. Why is a thirty something woman throwing a fit? Why is she doing it in front of someone else's child? Why is she throwing a fit over someone else's wedding guest list? What makes her think that is justified, or right? Why is my 11 year old more mature? Why do I have to be the nice one and back out of something I would have enjoyed? Why do I always have to be nice about it? Why am I letting her childish antics get her, her way? Why did I even think that she was a nice person to begin with? Why have I been doing either of them any favors? Why should I continue to do so?

I guess the simplest answer to all of the above is that I am nothing like her, don't want to be, and my parents would have smacked me a round a bit, and still would, if I were. Taking the highroad isn't always the easiest thing, nor the most rewarding.

Unlike some others, I am able to see who it is that I am truly hurting, and they mean more to me than myself. Someone else's wedding s not about me, and I won't make it about me. I refuse to participate in the games that children play.

I am now hoping that others out there, who are experiencing either viewpoint in this story, can take some form of knowledge away with them after reading this story.