Woman Telling Stepmom She Has No 'Role' as Mother of the Bride Cheered
A woman has been backed for telling her stepmom she won't be the mother of the bride at her wedding.
The bride-to-be, a Reddit user called u/Own-Nature-4960, explained the dilemma sparked by her wedding preparations in a post on the Am I The A******? thread.
Her parents divorced when she was a young child, she wrote, and her stepmother had since "tried to fill a second mom role." The bride-to-be said she gets along with her stepmom, but has a far deeper bond with her mom.
The 2019 American Community Survey estimates that there are 2.3 million stepchildren living in households across the country, compared with 59 million biological children.
While planning her wedding, u/Own-Nature-4960 wanted to make some memories with her mom, including her dress appointment. However, other family members suggested the stepmom should experience those moments too.
The Reddit post read: "I wanted to make it small and something for just me and my mom. I wanted the experience with her anyway, but I also wanted to give her something she doesn't have to share with my stepmom.
"This became more of a thing when my grandma and great aunt, on my dad's side, called my stepmom mother of the bride on [Facebook], and the three commented that it would be a great experience for her to see me pick a dress and stuff."
The woman decided she had to tell her father's wife that she wasn't going to play the mother of the bride role. She suggested they "figure something else out" so the stepmom could help with the wedding, such as choosing the flowers.
Her dad intervened, suggesting it would be fine for both women to fill that motherly role on the big day and at the dress appointment, but the bride-to-be insisted "he was wrong."
"I told him nobody is perfect and it's unfair for him to expect my mom to be," the woman wrote. "I asked him if he'd be happy to be one of my dads. He said of course not, but he always thought mom would be better than him."
The confrontation left the dad and stepmom with "rough feelings and she made it clear she was upset."
Wedding celebrant Christopher Shelley is no stranger to family dilemmas and offered the bride-to-be some advice to defuse the tension.
"This poor bride, I feel for her," Shelley told Newsweek. "She is absolutely right to include only her real mom in some part of the wedding process. She needs to plan it one on one with her mother so nobody else can interfere.
"Weddings are wonderful opportunities for brides to shower love on specific people in specific ways. The bride should do something private with both her mom and stepmom, so that both can feel the love that the bride obviously has for each of them."
Shelley added that the bride should address the situations with each woman privately, and not listen to any external interference.
Since the Reddit post was shared on March 30, it has racked up more than 7,900 votes and over 800 comments. Most commenters felt the stepmom shouldn't be overstepping when the bride has a mom already.
One user wrote: "It's incredibly narcissistic for your father and your stepmom to think that she is going to serve in the role of your mother for your wedding preparations, when you have a living mom that you are close to."
Another posted: "Your dad pushed his wife on you long enough and took so many things away from your mother. She didn't willingly share, she was forced to, so she didn't look like the bad guy to you. So, from now on, you can put your mom first instead of having to worry about your dad's wife's feelings."
Newsweek hasreached out to u/Own-Nature-4960 via direct message for comment. We could not verify the details of the case.
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