'Our bio dad wants to walk you down the aisle': Adoptee pressures sister to invite their birth parents to her wedding despite her wanting nothing to do with them

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Emmy Pratt • Senior Editor
Jun 9, 2024 8:00 PM EDT

In families, as in all relationships, it's important to be able to take no for an answer. It doesn't matter how many times I ask my sister to go to Six Flags with me: if she says no, we're not going! Obviously, it takes two to tango, but it takes one to listen and learn the boundaries and comfort levels of your loved ones. If you can't do that, I don't know what to tell you. 

One pair of sisters recently got into a squabble over one not respecting the other's boundaries. They are biological siblings adopted as babies, and one of them has a close relationship with their birth parents. The other wants literally nothing to do with them. Despite how much her sister has pressured her into talking to them, she's stood her ground. Now, her sister is trying to get her to invite them to her wedding despite them being functionally strangers to her. 

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    via Jakob Owens
  • 02
    AITA for not inviting my birth family to my wedding even when my sister offered to pay for them?
    via u/Proud_Crazy_7666
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    I was placed for adoption at birth. My older (bio) sister was placed when she was 5 months old. We're three years apart in age and we were adopted by the same parents and raised in the same family. I also have other siblings I grew up with who have no bio connection to me. My sister tried to rope me into a birth family search but I told her I didn't want to find them and offered her my support from the outside but that was as much as I was willing to give.
    via u/Proud_Crazy_7666
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    She found them 5 years ago and has been in regular contact with them since. Our family supported this and my parents have met my birth parents in an effort to support my sister but I still choose not to meet them or have them in my life.
    via u/Proud_Crazy_7666
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    My sister has passed letters to me from them and has been trying for years to get me to agree to meet with them and build a relationship. They keep saying how much it hurts them that I want nothing to do with them. She passes this onto me and tells me how much it hurts her that I won't be a part of this with her because our connection as blood related siblings is huge and now we have more blood related family (her way of putting it). I told her there is no part of me
    via u/Proud_Crazy_7666
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    that wants to meet them and nothing I want from them. She told me she knows I have to want answers and I said no, I already know the answers, they were young when they had us and didn't want to be parents at that time. She asked how I knew that and I told her I did listen to her after she met them for the first time.
    via u/Proud_Crazy_7666
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    It's been so messy. I get letters from them about once a month and I try giving them back to no avail so I dispose of them and have never read them. I'm not interested. I can't be more clear than that.
    via u/Proud_Crazy_7666
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    Now I'm getting married and my sister fought for them to be invited. She offered to pay for them to come and told me she would cover all the costs associated with their place on the guest list and I still said no. She called me crying after she had been at their house because they were so upset to be missing it. She said "our bio dad wants to walk you down the aisle" and I told her that's not going to happening and that them being upset wasn't a strong motivator for me. I
    via u/Proud_Crazy_7666
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    also warned her that the place we're getting married at has security and we already added them to our package (my fiancé has a couple of family members we need to have monitored in case they get too drunk) and I can easily pass on info about our birth family to keep them out if she tries sneaking them in.
    via u/Proud_Crazy_7666
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    My sister said I'm being unreasonable. My parents assured me they support me either way but want me to know I don't need to take my stance for their sakes (we had this discussion before too) and they'd be fine with them coming. My sister said if mom and dad don't care I should want my whole family at my wedding and I told her they will be. I don't consider our birth family my family for real. Her reaction was even stronger when the invites were sent out and our birth family didn't get any. AITA?
    via u/Proud_Crazy_7666
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    NanaLeonie 7 hr. ago NTA. Good grief. The biological father wants to give OP away a second time. Did he think he was fostering out his two daughters till he was ready to claim them as his heirs?
    via u/NanaLeonie
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    Proud_Crazy_7666 OP · 7 hr. ago Our birth parents always hoped we would all reconnect one day and become the family they were too young for us to be at the time. That's what they told my sister and what she believes. I believe it too. And I don't hate them. But I feel no inner desire to have that be our reality. They're just random strangers in my eyes.
    via u/Proud_Crazy_7666
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    Antique_Wafer8605 - 6 hr. ago NTA. Tell your sister to stop mentioning bio parents, stop passing messages and letters, . Just stop! Tell her firm, hard NO. They aren't invited. End of discussion.
    via u/Antique_Wafer8605
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    Swimming Possible_68 6 hr. ago Sounds like she's already done that... Her sis just won't accept it!
    via u/Proud_Crazy_7666
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    Antique_Wafer8605.5 hr. ago Yeah, you're right. I'm glad she has security at the venue. The gall of bio father thinking he can walk her down the aisle
    via u/Proud_Crazy_7666
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    TreyBouchet. 6 hr. ago They ARE random strangers. They know nothing about you, never celebrated your triumphs or consoled you in your sadness. "Blood" does not a family make. I am adopted and feel the same as you. Your sister is being horrible and your parents (actual parents, not the strangers) are a bit of an AH by not intervening and telling your sister to knock it off.
    via u/Proud_Crazy_7666
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    Normal-Fun-868 - 6 hr. ago NTA. The birth parents might've been too young when they had you. OK. Luckily a stable, loving family was there for you and it worked out. But then the same birth parents did this AGAIN 3 years later. They don't get to claim the same excuse again. Sorry, they are in no way your family. You are 100% right
    via u/Normal-Fun-868
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    . midnightsunofabitch · 5 hr. ago . edited 4 hr. ago The gall of the sister expecting OP to allow their bio father to supplant their adoptive father who raised/cared for them for all these years. All through the post I was thinking the sister was wrong, but I could understand where she was coming from, until she mentioned the bio father walking OP down the aisle.
    via u/midnightsunofab*tch
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    So she has no issue with the bio dad waltzing back in and taking that honor/right away from the actual dad? How heartless/self-absorbed can one girl be? If I were OP I would have been like "girl, have you LOST YOUR MIND? Because I'll help you find it!" OP, NTA. And tell your sister if she doesn't back off there may be one more name added to the wedding blacklist.
    via u/midnightsunofabitch
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    TRACYOLIVIA14 · 5 hr. ago. edited 4 hr. ago its hard for the sis to understand why she doesn't have the same desire to be with her bio family like she has . I mean to are certain degree both have the right to their feelings many kids feel lost and suffer not knowing their bio family but it seems like Op doesn't feel the lost in her heart and that is something her sis doesn't understand because she felt the lost
    via u/TRACYOLIVIA14
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    jeparis0125 4 hr. ago OP has made it crystal clear that her sister is welcome to her relationship with the bio parents. Sister is not treating OP with the same regard but is pushing and pushing for a relationship between OP and bio parents. That's wrong on so many levels.
    via u/jeparis0125
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    KaliTheBlaze 7 hr. ago NTA. You get to choose what place your adoptive parents have in your life. It's good that they realized that they didn't have the wherewithal to be good parents when they were kids having kids, because it sounds like that choice has given you a secure, happy upbringing. Adoption can involve a lot of big, strong feelings for adoptees, and there's often some degree of psychological trauma involved. Their choices and their mental health should be the priority. For some adopte
    via u/KaliTheBlaze
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    with them. None of those choices are wrong, and every adoptee needs to make the choice for themselves. Your bio family can be very important to your sister, and nobody to you. The reason she's TA here is because she's insisting that you have to want the same things she wants and consider your genetic donors to be family. She doesn't get to decide how you relate to them any more than she gets to decide who should be your romantic partner or where you should work. It was okay for her to be excited
    via u/KaliTheBlaze
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    Proud_Crazy_7666 OP. 7 hr. ago Yes! Adoption is such a complex issue and my sister and I are proof of how different adoptees can feel about it. For my sister, there was a strong desire to know the people who made her and where she came from. She always felt a part of her was missing by not knowing them. She loves our family but always felt like she needed to know and deserved to have a relationship with her birth family. It was something so important to her and I always sorta knew that. She wond
    via u/Proud_Crazy_7666
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    It was so different for me because I never felt anyone or anything was missing from my life. I was never curious about who I looked like. I never thought about one day meeting the people who made me. I always knew they existed and that I was theirs first technically. But for me I always felt like I ended up where I belong and I never saw myself wanting to have two sets of parents and two sets of siblings or anything. My sister loved the idea.
    via u/Proud_Crazy_7666

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biological parents family drama adoption wedding drama sisters adoptee birth parents adopted wedding dad adoptees family sister parent weddings parents
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