People Share Unfortunate Stories About Marrying Into Familes Who Immediately Disliked Them

It's wonderful when two families can come together through marriage. But that happy ending doesn't always happen.

Reddit user TheWardenOfFive asked "People who married into families that didn't like them, what ended up happening?"

Here is how some people were (or weren't) able to get past the rejection.

Kill Them With Kindness

22 years, 2 wonderful kids and a happy son later (my husband, their son), and they love me. I killed them with kindness, loved them even when they weren't sure about me (I am a different race, that did not go over well) and I finally wore them down.

Disowned

My sister-in-law's parents didn't come to the wedding. She has no relationship with them now and can't see half of her siblings anymore (they still live at home or are underage) and it just sucks. Our family has accepted her as one of our own, but she did lose her family.

Burned Bridges

My parents never liked my boyfriend. They thought he had no ambition, never going anywhere in life, why didn't he like talking to them, yada yada yada. They were mean to him, gave him dirty looks when he came over, tried to get me to break up with him. Well we dated for 8 years then I married him. He's a software engineer now and he makes more money than my parents ever did and he's awesome.

I go visit my parents, but he doesn't come with me. I try to rotate which holidays I do with my parents vs my in laws. They tell me to bring him over next time I stop by and I'm always like, yeah okay dad and brush it off. It doesn't bother me, there's just been way too much hurt from my parents and I don't blame him for not wanting to see them.

I see it as my husband is my number one family now and I don't really care what my parents think.

Small Doses

I limit contact with them. I'm polite at holidays, but I'm even scaling back attending those. My husband does a good job of running interference, but I hate putting him in the middle. The best alternative it's to just remove myself from any potential bad situations.

Definite Red (white & blue) Flag

The first time I met my husband's step father, I said "hello" and his response was to turn his face away from me and loudly ask "what did that she just say to me?" He's from Pennsylvania, yet rocks confederate flags like they were ever in style.

We don't really spend time with them at all. He isn't welcome, and my mother in law doesn't like to go anywhere without him. We tried to invite her to our last child's birth, but she actually expected to bring that racist idiot with her. So... nah. Plus, I surely do not want that a-hole near my kids.

Divine Intervention

Her family was heavily religious, thought I was atheist, and I had a kid from a previous relationship which led to some pretty heavy... skepticism from them.

Her career took off after we moved in together and especially after we got married. They swung totally the other way and started ascribing her sudden leap in career success largely to my influence. Really I chipped in a bit, but it was mainly a coincidence (in my eyes). So it worked out OK I guess.

Done

This is where its ended up with me and my mother-in-law. She has bi-polar and has had episodes here and there, during our wedding she was quite... 'stressed' (aka manic) and was pretty awful, trying to make everything about her.

Then I got along with her (I thought) really well for years, despite the stupid things she would say.. how she pit her sons against one another (granted her eldest is a waste of space).

Unfortunately last year she went 'off' again when she found out we were moving away. Said some wretched things about my husband (her own son) and I defended him while he was out of the room. Apparently that earned me the top spot on her s#$! list. She s#$! on me to her entire family, told lies about what horrible things I've done to her through the years. etc. Told my husband how I refused to respect her and wasn't a part of the family, and on and on.

She's medicated and 'back to normal' now, but refuses to acknowledge what she did and said. She's too embarrassed apparently.... so she's going to pretend that she never said them. And I'm not going to pretend to be her friend. Everything is through my husband now and I talk to her as little as possible.

12 years+ of putting her first because she's divorced, alone, low income, and her older son treats her like garbage. Done. I'm done with it. I refuse to engage any longer.

Hate at First Sight

They hated me from the start. That hate has only gotten worse. We've been married a decade. No sign of it letting up either. My wife acknowledges that they treat me poorly, so she doesn't have a lot to do with them. Some of the s#$! they've said to my face, I'd never say to my worst enemy. I can only imagine what they say behind my back. It's okay though, I've got an amazing wife and kids. So I'm the winner here.

Mommy Dearest

We were married for four years, together for seven when I realized I couldn't do it anymore.

His mother was more important. She and the family could make fun of anything, even a small amount of weight I would gain and he would never stick up for me. If I tried they would make it seem like it was in my best interest and he would get mad at me for trying to cause problems with mommy.

Worst part was when my niece, not even a year old, died of a genetic disorder...and she told me that she was better off dead than with me or my family. My now ex-husband heard it....and she convinced him that she either didn't say it or it wasn't "meant like that".

Not in it for the Family

Me and my wife's family have no contact whatsoever, except for some occasional contact with my father-in-law. He's a nice person.

Me and my wife have been happy together for 15 years now. My mother-in-law has done her best to try to separate us, with no luck whatsoever.

You marry your partner, not their family!

Pruned from the Family Tree

My paternal grandmother hated my mother from the moment Dad met her because she only had a Master's degree, not a PhD, and therefore wasn't good enough for him. She treated mum like s#$! for the first few years of my life, even after mum moved here to New Zealand from Canada with my Dad and baby me just so my paternal grandparents could spend time with their grandkids.

Grandad was a lovely guy and never had a problem with anything, but after he died when I was 6 there was no one that could reign my grandmother in. Eventually it got to the point where Dad would take us round to visit her and mum just stopped coming.

Dad died a few years ago, when I was 14, the eldest of her only 3 grandkids. Since then she has cut off all contact with us and our mum and the only thing we've heard from her since the funeral is that she cut us out of her will less than a week later in the same letter that she accused my recently widowed mother of being selfish and not letting us see her (we didn't want to, we were mourning and she's a b!@#$). Since then she complained about us to my uncle who is now also not talking to us and we have no contact with any extended family at all.

But I'm Your Mother!

My mom treated my wife like s#$! before we were married. We hosted Thanksgiving a month after getting married and there was a blowout. I asked her (my mother) to leave. I wrote her a letter explaining what's what. She tried to pull the whole "but I'm your mother!" thing but I didn't bend. Over the next few years they both put forth a lot of effort and were able to build a healthy, mutually respectful relationship. Now they get along great.

Mama's Boy

My ex's mother was an insanely jealous, insecure and competitive woman who did not want to share her son with any other woman. No matter how outrageous her behavior, he refused to see her in any bad light, to draw any boundary lines or to demand an attitude of respect towards his wife. We're divorced now.

No More Enabling

I'm anticipating my father-in-law dialing up the crazy when we move. Right now we're next door. We're moving 42 miles away, not planning to give them our new address. If they want to see us, they can meet us in town, at a park or for a meal. Our son will definitely not be over at their house without us.

Not sorry at all, I'm not going to have him around an abusive alcoholic and an enabler with serious issues of her own. They expect him to sleep over/come for weekends when he's older. I don't think so.

Crazy Train

My mother in law treated me like s#$!. I tried humoring her, I tried talking to her, I eventually had to just ignore her. She cranked the crazy up to 11 at some point and my wife cut off all contact. After about a year of that she started sending threatening texts and leaving threatening voicemails and one day I came home from work and everyone was crying. Apparently she had knocked, ducked below the peep hole, and kicked the door in as soon as my wife turned the knob to give our children Christmas presents. I returned them to her and offered to turn her skull inside out if she ever set foot on my property again and that's about where it's at.

She occasionally sends texts ranging from "r u going 2 send school pics 2 me THIS yr????" to "my attourney has adviced me to my grandparents rights, r u going to play ball or do i have to take full custody AND support IN COURT?" or "am redoing my will. If u don't want my estate i guess i will leave it to my dogs."

Monster-In-Law

When my now husband and I got engaged, Mother In Law told my parents.. and everyone at the table at our engagement dinner... that I was his second choice and could've decided between me and a doctor (I was working for a great company making very good money for my age - more than her son tbh) I Have never ever seen my dad so angry in my life.. and adding to it... her crying because she's losing her 'baby'

3 years later we barely have any contact.. she's insulted me and my family countless times and I don't need someone who plays games in my life. She recently texted me that she was disappointed in me.. well IDGAF.

Witchy Woman

His grandma accused me of being a literal witch and putting a spell on him. That's the only reason he married me.

Toxic

My husband already knew his family was toxic; them not liking me was just one more thing on the list. Once we had a kid of our own, he realized that he didn't want his children growing up around them. He has no contact with them.

Apologetic

My mother-in-law was pretty clear she didn't like me. Would ask me racially charged questions about my family. Was passive aggressive when I was around. At our wedding she made comments to everyone about how she couldn't see why we were bothering to get married, and speculated that I was secretly pregnant.

Two years after we married, she sent me a birthday card. She acknowledged her lousy behavior and apologized. She said she realized I was a good person and a good choice for her son.

The courage it must have taken to apologize made her stock shoot right up. We've been aces ever since.

Facing Reality

My wife's parents made it clear from the beginning that I wasn't who "God intended" to end up with their daughter even after 4 years of us being together. So on October of 2015 I asked for her hand in marriage out of respect and I get a "We'll pray about it" then November comes and goes then December flies by and in January, I say f#$@ it and ask her anyway.

So my wife and I kept a secret for months until her mother and father were basically talking bad about me at dinner and she just blurts out that we're getting married in June..... In two months....I didn't know that since we hadn't set a date.

So this is where I get serious and find us a house and appliances. One day I'm struggling pushing the washer into our new home and here pulls up my future father-in-law and helps me put it in the house and even hooks it up. After that was said and done he asked if I truly loved his daughter to which I replied "isn't it obvious?" And that's when he hugged me and said welcome to the family. And that was it.