This is a very complicated story but I will do my best to be as clear as possible. My mom passed away 6 years ago on Boxing Day, my mom's best friend helped my dad with her while she was dying of cancer. In appreciation of her help he paid her way on a trip to Reno, my dad's sisters and sister in law also went on the trip to take care of him, but were pushed away by my mom's best friend. This trip was two months after my mom passed away. When my dad informed me that he and this friend were dating I said OK you have known her longer than I've been alive, I'm sure this is a natural thing. (I didn't know then she had done what she did on the trip to Reno, just learned this.) Since my dad and her have gotten together I have also recently learned that my older sister has never been able to talk to my dad alone, she even had requested for my dad to go alone with her to my mom's grave and this was not allowed. This was something my sister desperately needed but it was denied her. For me everything has been fine, as I have recently learned that I am her favorite (she had 5 boys, no girls, my mom and dad had 2 boys, 2 girls, I am the youngest girl). On a trip to my sister's one summer my dad took my sister aside when the friend was in the shower and told her that he was being pressured for the friend to move in but he wasn't ready. A week after they returned home she was moved in. Again, dad in 2004 had expressed to his own sister and to my sister he was being pressured for marriage, not long after they announced to the family they were married, the day after they actually married. There has been a major change in his will, we do not know what the change is but we do know that our now step mother lives in the house until she passes if dad passes away first. What has brought all of this situation to a head is that we had planned a family reunion along with the reunion we would celebrate my dad and two aunt's birthdays, two were turning 75 and 1 turning 85. A very small hall had been booked and my cousin sent out an announcement about the Family Reunion. My step mom sent an email back stating that she, my dad, her 5 boys their 5 wives and she didn't know how many grandchildren would be attending the reunion. All panic broke lose because nobody had thought about her children and our family without her children would be cutting the hall pretty close. The hall held 80 people, 61 attended, 19 that would have attended but didn't because of the fiasco would have made it to 80 count her children and family into this and it would have made 95 people. The hall was pretty full with the 61. Anyway, my one cousin called my other to please talk to my step mother because she was closer and the first cousin was going on a vacation the next day. My cousin called and the nightmare began. My cousin explained it was an oversight and she was sorry this happened but there was just no room for her children, we were already cutting it close. My step mother insisted her children were "our family name" and if my cousin didn't recognize her children were "our family name" then she didn't recognize my the mother as "our family name". My cousin explained that yes the boys were part of my dad's family as he married her but they were not "our family name". My step mom has put on such a display that it has caused so much embarrassment to my father. She announced that they will never go to a family function again, and because they didn't go neither did my brother or my sister (other brother across country so couldn't come anyway, lucky guy). Her intention was to try and cancel our family reunion by putting up such a stink, it didn't succeed and I was the only one from my family that came, with two of my children and my granddaughter. The reunion went along like a dream everyone had a wonderful time even though the only uncle left in the family was not in attendance, he was missed very much though. We all did picture trees of each of our families. My cousin having a van took mine up Island to the reunion and returned it back to her mom's when it was over and I picked it up from there. My dad and step mom were at my aunt's when I picked it up and my dad was having a great time talking about it and family stuff when suddenly my step mom got up from the table, grabbed her purse and left. Dad went after her and came back in and said she was upset because I failed to put a picture of her on my family tree. This picture board was of my mom and dad, my childhood, my 6 children and my 2 grandchildren. When I returned home I called her and explained this to her and had to go through quite a bit before she accepted what I was saying.
My mom and dad were married for 46 years before she died, she was very special to all of my dad's side of the family, she held a very special place in all of their hearts. When my step mom married my dad she started signing cards to my cousin's Uncle ___ and Auntie _____, the cousin's would not accept her as their Aunt, she was their uncle's wife but nobody could replace their Aunt (my mom). She signed cards to my dad's children from Dad and Mom II, that was extremely hard on me because I already had a Mom II and she had been that since I was about 3 years old, my children called this woman Grandma II that is how close we are. To top it off my step mom knew this because my mom, second mom and step mom were all close friends. I still to this day call her by her name, not by mom, she's my step mom.
I can't make any waves at the moment, I am getting married on Christmas Eve and in my dad's house as that was my mom's house and if she can't be at my wedding I want to be as close to her as possible and where else would be best but the home she raised her 4 children and spoiled her 12 grandchildren rotten in? I walk on pins and needles scared to say the wrong thing.
When my dad and step mom married all 9 children from both previous marriages were 42 and over, we had children of our own, and some of us grandchildren of our own.
Because my one cousin will not apologize for her for saying that her boys are not "our family name", a tradition my dad and mom started and it carried on with my dad and step mom will be broken this year, it looks like, and they will not be attending my cousin's for New Years.
I need to know what others think, people outside the family and are not biased in any way. Since my dad and step mom married when we were all adults out on our own, does this give her children my dad's family heritage? Not one of her children or grandchildren (she has no great grandchildren) call my dad dad or grandpa, they call him by his nickname. There is not a family member in my cousin's, brothers, or my sister or myself that are willing to say they are entitled to our family heritage, but only one family member is being blamed for this and she is so hurt, my dad means so much to her and she has been totally cut off from him.
I apologize for the book, but I thought I should tell the whole picture instead of bits and pieces.
