agonyaunt | (no subject)

Dear Carolyn: Is being truthful always the way forward? For the first 10 years of our committed relationship, my wife’s family disowned her and us because we are two women. We became parents through kin adoption, and the in-laws slowly forged a relationship with us and our kids. Our kids have deep, meaningful relationships with their grandparents.

We sent out a save-the-date for our 30th anniversary. We’ve never celebrated our marriage, and we want to do it with friends and family near and far. My in-laws informed us they have never believed in our marriage, because marriage is only between a man and a woman. They will not be coming. They told our kids (older teens, young adults) they won’t be coming because they have a long-planned trip across the globe.

In-laws have warned us that we will destroy the family if we tell the kids the real reason the in-laws aren’t coming. They aren’t wrong. Our kids would be devastated to know.

With the adoption and messy extended family, we have built a family based on truth and transparency. My kids would also be devastated if they knew we lied to them. Kids are pressuring us to change the date so grandparents can come. I really have no idea what I’m supposed to say or not say.

— To Tell or Not to Tell

To Tell or Not to Tell: Gotta love people who insist on multiple years of multiple lies to protect themselves from the consequences of their so-called acts of conscience.

Don’t for a second accept your in-laws’ sorry attempt to pass the blame onto you.

If anything destroys your family, it will be, in descending order of culpability: your in-laws’ homophobia, their lies and any lies you tell to cover their lies and homophobia.

They may have meaningful relationships with your children, but not deep ones — not when they’re burying who they really are under layers of deceit. The relationship is only as deep as the dirt that covers their secret.

Think about it: If your in-laws are in the right, then why can’t they say so out loud?

They know exactly what they’ve done and how hateful it is, so for your own sakes, and especially for your kids’, let them finish the job of outing themselves.

Now, because they’re your wife’s parents and she didn’t write to me, you need to talk to her about your approach before you make any decisions. But you don’t need her permission not to lie to your kids. Integrity is not negotiable. There’s a range of responses that aren’t lies, though, from, “You’ll have to ask your grandparents that,” to, “They’re boycotting because they don’t recognize our marriage,” and where you fall on that range is a valid topic of marital discussion.

My advice is for one of you, ideally your wife, to make it clear to your in-laws that you will not say anything to your children that you know to be untrue. Then connect the dots for them: That means the kids will either hear the truth from one of their parents or piece it together after the first honest but screamingly obvious non-answer. So if they would like the opportunity to explain their own moral reasoning to their beloved grandchildren, then they’d best get on that right quick.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/advice/2023/06/09/carolyn-hax-grandparents-homophobic/

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In-laws have warned us that we will destroy the family if we tell the kids the real reason the in-laws aren’t coming. They aren’t wrong. Our kids would be devastated to know.

Wow, talk about some nerve! Just, wow. Wow, wow, wow.

Indeed. I feel bad for the kids -- finding out your relatives are hateful bigots can't be fun -- but it's the bigotry that is destroying things, not the telling.

I'd want to know both their shunning and their request for silence.

I am hard to shock and this shocked me.

The inlaws can get fucked. I'm so sorry for the kids, who will be learning this awful truth.

I mean, if their manipulative attempts to get LW and Wife to lie for them are typical, the kids have got to know that their grandparents are toxic. They may be relieved that it's all out in the open and they don't have to pretend anymore.

This was my thought as well. I would not be at all surprised if it turned out that the kids picked up on this a long time ago.

This is my impression. Kids are way smarter than we often give them credit for and often have extremely good emotional intelligence unless they are in a family system that gaslights them or practices tons of denial.

Why no, why would you think this was personal experience talking... ahahaha.

I love Carolyn’s whole answer so much. It’s their problem. Make sure you talk o your wife. And then MAKE it their problem.

And upon reflection, if they're going to lie to some of the people in the family, they could've just lied to everybody. Told their daughter and DIL that same "long awaited trip" story. They didn't have to tell the truth to some people, then insist that everybody take a vow of secrecy regarding it.

God, the more I think about it, the worse they are.

Seems like they wanted to be deliberately cruel and tell the LW the real reason, but not tell the kids so they could avoid the consequences of their actions. If they had told the same lie to the LW and wife, they would have lost out on the satisfaction of telling them they don't think their marriage is real.

Oh, yeah, no, I get it. That's why it's such an asshole move.

I would be extremely tempted to just sic the kids on the grandparents. Pass them the phone and have them try to negotiate for a date that would work better for the grandparents. That's probably unfair to the grandkids but I bet the grandparents would crumple pretty fast and either fess up, change their minds about coming, or fumble it so bad that the grandkids realize they're lying.

This is kind of genius.

This is unfair to the kids unless they're old enough to understand this kind of manipulation (I might enlist college age or 20's, but not younger than that). That said it is GLORIOUS and I am really enjoying envisioning this.

I understand why this is potentially terrible, but also, this seems like the position LW is in. LW doesn't want to break trust with the kids by lying to them, kids are pushing the issue. Having the kids talk to the grandparents about the timeline allows LW to avoid lying to their kids and avoid outting the grandparents as bigots.

I would just phrase it to the kids as "We'd be happy to change the date. Can you give grandma & grandpa a call to find out when would be good for them?" Does it seem manipulative? Yes. But also, if the grandparents weren't willing to make the choice in being honest with their grandkids about their bigotry, this is the consequence. They have to answer to the grandkids about why they can't make it to a wedding, no matter the date. If they had opted instead to either use the same lie to everyone, or acted like grown ups and sucked it up ("We can come, but we're only able to stay for a day due to $Reasons") the grandparents wouldn't be in this scenario.

For what it is worth, LW states their kids are teens/young adults.

I feel like it's fair to push them: what family are they afraid will be destroyed? who is in that family? how did they get there?

Because their grandchildren did not arrive by teleportation, their MARRIED daughter adopted them WITH HER SPOUSE and almost certainly would have made different choices as a single person, so...totally fair to point out the absolutely breathtaking doublethink involved in "don't destroy the family...that wouldn't exist in its current form without you."

In this case LW might have made the same choice re: adoption, since it's kinship adoption. Unless it's Wife's kin, that is.

That's fair, and in that case pushing them might be counterproductive. It's also possible that she wouldn't have felt able to make the same choice if she didn't have a partner (all props to my friends who are single parents, it is A HARD JOB that not everyone is up for even when they're looking at kin in a hard spot) but her parents have convinced themselves she would have, and pushing them would be counterproductive there too.

Yeah, and there may be more complicated things going on here too, where breaking contact with the grandparents might make it a lot more difficult for the kids to stay in contact with their bio parents, or something along those lines. They're navigating a complicated path between these people being both their adopted kids' bio family and their own horrible family that's different than if they were their full bio kids or if the kids had a completely separate bio family.