To provide some context, my future brother-in-law (38M) is dating a girl my fiancé and I used to know. Long before they began dating, we had a rather toxic friendship with her. She’s a Negative Nancy who thrives on gossip and lies. Despite trying to reconnect with her multiple times, only to be met with the same drama, we decided it was best to cut her out of our lives.
Fast forward several years, and we discover that she cheated on her husband with my fiancé’s brother and is now pregnant with his child. They’ve complained to friends that they feel we are being childish for not welcoming her back into our lives with open arms. However, we’ve been down that road with her several times and don’t believe she’s changed. We just don’t want to deal with the drama she causes again.
My fiancé and I are preparing to tell his brother that she will not be invited to our wedding. This is a boundary we agreed upon before we knew about their relationship and the upcoming child. While we may be open to working on our relationship with her in the future, I don’t think a wedding is the right time or place to try and resolve things. It’s important to me to have people at our wedding who are happy and supportive of us and our relationship, and she was the complete opposite of that.
My BIL tends to portray himself as a victim in many situations. After learning about the affair, many people were hurt by his actions, and he lost a lot of friends. He’s claimed that they were never good friends in the first place for not supporting his ‘newfound happiness’. He was also very upset that his mother was not more supportive when he told her about it. And this is just the tip of the iceberg of things he sees himself as a victim of.
I’m trying to mentally prepare myself for this conversation, but my anxiety is through the roof. I fear that even if I were to plainly explain that this isn’t a personal attack on him but rather a boundary we’ve set to protect our own well-being, he will still react as a victim. How can I prepare myself for his reaction, and what advice do you have for handling this situation?
TL;DR: My fiancé's brother is dating a girl we used to know, who has a history of toxic behavior. She cheated on her husband with him and is now pregnant. Despite their complaints, we don't want her at our wedding due to her drama. His brother tends to play the victim, so I'm anxious about discussing this boundary with him, and would like advice on ways I can approach and prepare myself for this discussion.
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I think the problem is you're playing into his ideal narrative already. You don't need a conversation, or a discussion, you don't need to "explain", his reaction is his problem, not yours. He wants to paint himself as a victim? That's fine, he can do that to anyone who'll listen, but you don't have to care.
This is a statement, not a negotiation. "It’s important to me to have people at our wedding who are happy and supportive of us and our relationship, and she was the complete opposite of that" basically covers it. "If you're happy I'm happy, good for you, but your circumstances haven't changed our relationship with her, and while things might change in the future, our wedding isn't the time for that, so she won't be invited. You are, and if you want to come that's great, and if you don't want to come, I understand". That's it. Don't get sucked into his narrative, don't buy into the idea that you need to make him like or understand your decision. Your wedding, your decision, you present it as neutrally/politely as possible, but that's the end of it, it's not an opening offer.
As soon as he goes off on any sort of rant/victimhood/whatever: "We understand this is a difficult thing for you to process, you take some time and we'll meet up/talk soon."