When the wedding invitations went out, a cruel line was drawn. His brother’s wife deliberately excluded his fiancée, revealing a painful truth: prejudice disguised as convenience, a blatant rejection that cut deep, exposing the ugly face of bias within family ties.
I’m engaged. My fiancée is fat. She was when I met her. I’ve always found her irresistibly sexy. Not looking for commentary or unsolicited advice on this point.
My fiancée and I sent out save the dates for the wedding. My brother got one, his wife very intentionally did not.
He got married last year. His wife had all my siblings’ significant others as bridesmaids, whether they were married or dating. Even my (other) brother’s girlfriend who he’d only been with for a few months.
I’d been with my girlfriend for nearly five years at that point and everyone knew it was a question of when, not if, we’d get married.
She didn’t ask my girlfriend to be a bridesmaid because she didn’t want to be constrained to picking a bridesmaids dress available in plus sizes and did not want to have my girlfriend in her wedding photos.
I’m not speculating. That’s not something I ever could’ve guessed. That’s what she said, in her own words, when we arrived at the wedding to find everyone else’s SOs were bridesmaids but her, and asked what was going on.
I thought maybe it was a Bridezilla moment and she’d realize how hurtful it was later, but it’s been over a year, and while my brother has apologized again and again for ever having allowed that to happen (why he’s invited), his wife never did at all.
Even when it’s been brought up in front of her.
We’ve only seen them a couple times since the wedding, and my fiancée has tried to forgive and forget, but it’s still uneasy between us because of the singular lens we now know she views my fiancée through.
My fiancée doesn’t mind grinning and bearing for the occasional family event we have to attend, but I didn’t feel like it would be right to make her spend her wedding day with someone who would ever treat her as less than human.
We’re having a very intimate wedding, (20 people and 12 are family.) Having that woman there would taint the whole dynamic. That being said, the rest of my family is understandably upset.
My family, my brother especially, feel like we’re trying to make them choose sides. (In my other brother’s words “Even if that wasn’t your intention, it’s the result, and that’s a real asshole move none of us deserve.
*We* didn’t do anything to [your fiancée].”)
I definitely don’t want to make anyone choose sides, and he’s not wrong that they didn’t cause the problem and don’t deserve the fallout. But my wife also deserves a wedding day with only people who love and cherish her.
AITA for not inviting my brother’s wife?
Conclusion
The original poster (OP) is faced with a difficult choice: upholding his fiancée’s dignity and emotional safety on their wedding day versus maintaining peace and avoiding perceived partisanship within his extended family. His decision to exclude his brother’s wife stems directly from her past public insult toward his fiancée regarding her size, creating a clear conflict between personal loyalty and familial obligation.
Is the OP justified in prioritizing his fiancée’s right to feel cherished and respected on her wedding day by uninviting the sister-in-law who previously slighted her, or is this action an unfair imposition that forces the rest of the family to take sides against his brother?
Here’s how people reacted:
Fellow fat broad here. Your SIL purposefully and proudly excluded your wife, a member of her new family, because she didn’t find her body aesthetically pleasing enough. That shit HURTS, and it stays with you and keeps hurting. There are a lot of people out there who just assume fat women are easy targets and that they’ll be so grateful for any attention at all, that they feel like they can get away with treating them poorly. What your SIL did was aggressive, vicious bullying.
You’re supposed to feel happy and loved at your wedding and you’re both allowed and encouraged to feel beautiful. Bullies don’t get the honor of celebrating your love with you.
Also, given what she is willing shamelessly to say to your wife’s face, I wouldn’t trust her to not trot out full-on backhanded compliments and straight up trash talk at your wedding.
PS. I hope you and your lovely bride have many happy years together.
Your fiancée has the right to feel assured that everyone gathered on her wedding day is truly there to support HER. Congrats to you both, wishing you every happiness ❤️
She’s the asshole for having every girl but one, including those who were much newer to the family, in the wedding party because of how a person *looked.*
She definitely became an even bigger asshole when she shared the reason, but come on, even if she’d made up a white lie, she’d still be an asshole for having every woman in the family but this one in her party, whether she explained the reasoning or not, full stop.
You don’t make social decisions based on physical appearance as an adult. That’s the kind of thing a young child does until an adult steps in to correct them.
Your brother’s wife is the major captain chief asshole here, and anyone supporting or minimizing her past actions is in her asshole crew.
NTA
It’s not just that your brother’s wife didn’t ask your fiancee to be in the wedding party.
It’s that your WHOLE FAMILY KNEW while this was happening, and they let you walk into that ceremony and be sandbagged. Think about all the texts, and dress fittings, and so on that had to happen in the weeks and months leading up to that wedding. And not one single person in your family said, “hey….this makes me uncomfortable, and I don’t know if you realize…”
They just let you walk in, and let you and your finacee be humiliated.
So, screw them and their “choosing sides”. They **already** chose sides when they let that happen to you.
“Dear family,
X and I are getting married. We are having a small intimate wedding which we want to fill it with people who love and cherish us just as much as we love and cherish them. It’s our very special day on which we choose not to surround ourselves with people who have intentionally been cruel to either of us.
We ask you to respect our decision to surround ourselves with love, not duty. If you cannot show us, our love and our wedding this respect, \[insert nice way to say they’re uninvited\].”
Might be mean, but the wording strongly implies that they should think about it again.
Your SIL is a mean female dog and if that’s the hill she wants to die on so be it.
All of that said, I do hope that in doing so your brothers wife will get the freakin message that she needs to get her crap together and apologize and make it right and you can have a wedding where everyone is happy.
It’s not your family’s place to question who you invite, especially considering how intimate the ceremony is. Your brother put himself in that position by not advocating for your SO when it mattered.
Yes they did. They all participated in your brother’s wedding knowing your fiancee was being ostracized because of her weight. Yu had no idea and she had no idea. You only learned of it when you showed up at that wedding. Do not swallow the bs they’re shoveling. The innocent victims they are not. I’m sorry your family doesn’t have you or your fiancee’s back. You both deserve better.
NTA
I say NTA and continue with your plans. You might lose contact with some family over this, but I dont know if that’s necessarily a bad thing if theyll support your brothers wife but not your own.
Look, nta for your reasoning, it makes total sense you don’t want someone who was cruel to your wife at your wedding, but realistically you are very much asking him to pick between his wife and you. She’s his family now just like your wife is yours. Would you go to a wedding where your wife was purposely not invited ?
Listen, your brother has to do what he has to do, that’s his wife. If he picks her side here, so be it. But YOU have to do what you have to do too, this is YOUR wife here. Pick her side.