My (30F) partners (30M) family actively excludes me and I don’t know if it’s a dealbreaker
A 30-year-old woman has been in a relationship with her 30-year-old boyfriend for 3 years. Initially, she was excited about his close-knit family, but over time, she learned about the abusive dynamics in his family.
After the troublemaker in the family turned their aggression towards her, she found herself being excluded, despite her boyfriend cutting ties with the abusive family member. The tension and emotional toll of the situation have her questioning whether love is enough to overcome this ongoing family issue. Read the full story below.
‘ My (30F) partners (30M) family actively excludes me and I don’t know if it’s a dealbreaker’
I will try to make this short. My partner (30M) and I (30F) have been together for 3 years and live together. We both have seriously messed up families. Years ago I decided to cut contact with members of my family and am pretty low contact with others as none of them are healthy. I have been in therapy for years specifically about my family dynamic
When my partner and I first dated he portrayed his family as very close and that they could also be my family, which I liked the idea of. That slowly began to unravel. There is one member of the family that has abused the whole family since childhood and that continued into adulthood.
I have heard stories from EVERY member of the family about how horrible this person is and how they make everyone miserable and ruin every holiday. Despite this description, when I expressed concern to my bf he initially would get very angry that I would tell him this abuse was not normal.
This person turned their abuse to me and began to turn the whole family against me, whereas initially we had a good relationship and they were always nice to me. He has since started therapy and realized that his whole family is dysfunctional and this person is actively abusing him/me and cut off contact with them.
The rest of the family has proceeded to harass him for the past year about going no contact and has proceeded to treat me very differently because the initial troublemaker has blamed all of this on me.
He still wants a close relationship with everyone except the troublemaker. I don’t feel right continuing to say he should not be OK being close to people who actively exclude me and make it clear that they don’t care if I am around.
They live far away but I don’t want to spend my holidays with these people or have to listen to his weekly or twice a week phone calls with people who treat me so terribly. We have talked marriage but I have told him under no uncertain terms that it isn’t happening until this family drama has been fixed. At this point I feel like even though I love him so much that there isn’t a future with both me + his family. And I don’t want to make him choose
TL;DR bf’s family is a nightmare and I don’t know if love is enough to keep dealing with it
Here’s the input from the Reddit crowd:
Calm_Translator_1980 − If your boyfriend is not standing up for you regarding any type of abuse then he shouldn’t be your boyfriend anymore. This happened to me before my now husband and I married. The b**ly in the family turned everyone against me.
Husband realized this right away and cut out the b**ly and his entire family for how they treated me. A few years later his parents left his family to join us and they no longer have a relationship with the b**ly of the family. They now have a healthy relationship with husband, I and our children.
BrokenPaw − This is the family dynamic that he has chosen to have. You do not have the power to change it. The *only* thing you have the power to do is choose between these options:
1. Accept that this is the family dynamic that he is in and is going to *remain* in, and decide that you wish to be a part of that, or
2. Accept that this is the family dynamic that he is in and is going to *remain* in, and decide that you do *not* wish to be a part of it.
There is no option available to you that does *not* begin with “Accept that this is the family dynamic that he is in and is going to *remain* in”.. So. You cannot change him, you cannot change *them*, and you cannot change his dynamic with them. For as long as you and he are together, *this will be your life*.
If that’s the life you want, then congratulations and the best of luck. If that’s *not* the life you want, then this is not your guy, this is not your relationship, and you have to create a future for yourself that includes *neither* of them.
TheLastWord63 − At this point, he knows what’s going on is wrong. He has chosen to keep the toxicity in his life, and it’s affecting you. It is completely up to you to choose if this is the life you want. Would you let your family treat him like this? If not, ask yourself why not.
ChillWisdom − If they’re still calling him then he hasn’t gone no contact. The phone numbers should be blocked. He needs to set a boundary with other family members that he’s not going to discuss the a**sive person or the relationship and they can talk about other things.
unsafeideas − It is perfectly ok to not want to visit them. It is ok to ask him to call with them from another room. It is not ok to tell him he is not allowed to call with them or have own relationship with them. It is ok to distance yourself and ok to ask him to not involve you. But telling him he should cut whole his family off is just beyond and would be a dysfunction on itself.
tert_butoxide − Well, it is a choice between you and his family and he’s currently choosing his family. The only way to not make him choose is to make the choice yourself. And you are on a trajectory to leave if this continues.
I don’t know if there is anything to lose then by telling him how you feel and clearly laying out the choice that is already present. Essentially just giving him all of this information so that he has an opportunity to choose before you reach the point where you choose to leave.
You named two concrete issues you can address though, have you had those conversations (holidays and phone calls)? How did he respond? If you decide that you will not be doing holidays with them (or at least explain how you would extremely prefer not to) that does make him choose, but again it’s because a choice has already been forced on you to suffer through those holidays or not.
You aren’t exactly the precipitating factor there. On phone calls, is it just the fact that he calls that bothers you, or something about the conversations they have? Maybe there’s a solution you can find together where you don’t have to overhear things.
Even if not, he should at least know how you feel about them, and can choose whether to take that into consideration when he calls. How he handled these two issues is an insight into whether he’s capable of respecting your needs and boundaries when it comes to his family.
chaotoroboto − The way boundaries work – and this applies for both you and your partner, in different ways – is that you set a boundary: “Stand up to your family when they are harassing or badmouthing me”; “Don’t discuss my abuser or try and reconnect us”. Then you set a consequence: “I will leave the toxic environment your family is creating”, “I will go low/no contact with you if you continue extending their abuse”.
Then it’s up to the person who sets the boundary to enforce the consequence. You don’t have to say each boundary explicitly, by the way – most are implicit. But if you lay out your (developing) boundary explicitly, forcing the between them and you, then it’s an ultimatum. To me an ultimatum is a last resort because it takes the relationship hostage.
But you may be at a last resort – you are in the same toxic family situation that you made the decision to leave for yourself. But when you announce “Do this or I’m leaving” then it does heavy damage to the relationship, even if the other person does it, and even if you don’t leave. The relationship can recover over time, but there’s usually another method that’s less disruptive.
I think a healthier option may be to set the requirement that he set and enforce explicit boundaries with his family, and that you will support him in doing so. That leaves the other part implicit, prevents it from being an ultimatum. You can express it as an act of support and healing; it will give him the space respond appropriately; and if he can’t meet your boundaries then you’ll know what to do next.
docNNST − I got my bonus and went out and got my wife a bonus Christmas gift, a diamond necklace, your husband sucks
17IsLucky − The holidays have happened already so you don’t need to worry about that part til next year. The place to start is the constant phone calls. You said that his family uses those phone calls to try to get him to reconcile with the abuser right?
As long as the family keeps doing this it’s impossible for him to really have a “close relationship with everyone except the troublemaker” because they have placed themselves firmly in the troublemaker’s camp.
He needs to tell them he doesn’t want to talk about the abuser and if they mention their name or refers to them in any way, he’s going to hang up. And he needs to actually do that. That way, they have to divorce themselves from the troublemaker in the context of their relationship with your boyfriend. You live far from his family. Hanging up is arguably the easiest way to enforce a boundary. If he can’t do this and stick to it, then I would say you can’t stay with him.
tihiyiludoma3892 − Look, it’s not a shield for misery. Make the tough call. time to face it. The family is toxic, and he’s letting you drown in it. You can’t change them, but you can decide if you’re willing to stomach this turmoil forever. Love’s great, but it’s
It’s hard to know what to do when your partner’s family makes you feel like an outsider. Have you ever been in a similar situation where family issues affected your relationship? How did you handle it? Share your thoughts below!