Monthly Archives: February 2012

Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV

Regardless of the diatribe of texts from the SIL2B last week about how much she hates me (but still expects me to be in the wedding), and regardless of the stream of passive-aggressive jabs from her sister on Facebook, and regardless of the betrayal I feel from my brother-in-law, I sucked it up. I apologized to make peace in the family and then promptly cut off all contact with the whole lot of them before I could change my mind.

I blocked every last one of them on Facebook, and put a filter on my phone and email so that all communications would go straight to voicemail or a folder other than my inbox. I sent one last one text to the effect of, if you need anything for the wedding – call – otherwise leave me alone for a while.

And the peace lasted for a few days…

Monday the SIL to-be called Bryan to grill him about the bachelor party. When she couldn’t get a hold of him, she called me to ask why he wouldn’t answer her phone calls.  He was on the phone with the advocate that is helping him with his unemployment hearing, but she automatically assumes there is a sinister intention when you are not at her beck and call these days.

Tuesday she called me to ask why my family and friends hadn’t all sent back their RSVPs yet. I told her it was because they weren’t due yet.

Yesterday she called Bryan, screaming, and asking why we had both blocked her on Facebook (He unfriended her on FB over a year ago.) Bryan, who has no love for her and is at his wit’s end with all this shit, let it rip and blew up at her. In turn, she rehashed every “wrong” I had ever done to her and, for good measure, accused me of “talking bad” about him at the bachelorette party “all night.” In the end, he told that she was lucky his brother was marrying her because there wasn’t another man in the world that would put up with her shit.

She hung up on him when it became clear that Bryan wasn’t going to become part of her tibe.

Later that night I got the standard diatribe of texts from her, again telling me how awful I was. I was on the edge of the cliff, sick of being everyone’s whipping girl and candidly told her I was five seconds away from telling her to go fuck herself if she didn’t stop fighting with me.

Raise your hand if you think that worked.

Eventually I asked if she would meet for breakfast so we could just talk face-to-face and stop fighting. She responded with, “I don’t care.” And threw in a ” [brother-in-law] is mad at you too,” for good measure. As if it wasn’t already abundantly clear that I wasn’t part of his tribe anymore.

I told her that ganging up on me and rallying the troops wasn’t helping and to stop it. She responded with, “Nobody is ganging up on you. I haven’t talked to anyone about this!”

*cough* bullshit *cough*

Today I started getting texts around 11:00, asking if I was going to go get my dress fitted. I knew she was going today and had asked me weeks ago to go with her. She never gave me a time and, well… after these past two weeks, WHY THE FUCK WOULD SHE THINK I WANT TO GO ANYWHERE WITH HER?!

I looked at Bryan, sitting across the table from me, and asked him how I was supposed to respond. No matter what I said it was going to be WRONG. Eventually I responded, rationally even – without one single hint of OHMYGODIHATEYOURFUCKINGGUTSRIGHTNOW-LEAVEMEALONE! – and I got the standard, “Whatever. Really, Ursula? It doesn’t matter. I don’t care.” series of texts that have been the soundtrack of my life for the past week.

A half hour later she was normal again – and pleasant. I took that as an opening that maybe we were finally entered into a truce and sent her a nice text, not about the wedding. And I got no response. Not even a “Whatever.”

To which I say… whatever.

You know, my SIL2B has always had a demeanor that drives most people away. For years I was able to see beyond it. Now, I can’t even remember that person. Now, I wholly define her as a completely irrational, self-centered BRIDE, OH MY GOD! that needs validation at every turn. And the damage feels so big that I don’t know if I’ll ever stop feeling this way about her.

I completely hate it but, for tonight – for this minute – I think I’m completely okay with that. I don’t want to be part of her tribe anymore. I don’t want her to be part of mine.

Part I | Part II | Part III

So, yeah, back to the Bachelorette party that will go down in infamy – for all the wrong reasons…

The SIL2B insisted that she wanted to get dressed up, take a limo to a fancy dinner, and then go clubbing at one particular club. Never mind that she is always self-conscious when she gets dressed up, cannot relax in a limo because she’s a control freak, is ultra-picky about new restaurants and never has fun at clubs because she spends the majority of the night comparing herself to the other women.

I know this about her. I have yet to figure out why she doesn’t know this about her.

But, I kinda get it. When you’re getting ready to take a leap in life you kinda want to leave the old you behind with a “bang” – make a real statement. It’s why I insisted that we all go on a scary-ass ride the night before my wedding. It was completely out of character for me. (And, for the record, I didn’t do it – but it had nothing to do with me chickening out, but rather my fat thighs and their tiny seatbelts.)

It is also why, the night before my wedding, I found myself in my room, alone, pouting and disappointed. It’s not a good idea to try and completely reinvent yourself in the middle of stressful situation.

So, yeah, I get it. My job, as her friend and Maid of Honor, should have been to make her as comfortable as possible in an endlessly uncomfortable-for-her situation. I should have shown up full of self-deprecating humor, telling her how awesome she is and making fun of any other person that she found the least bit threatening.

It is always my job to make people comfortable – even when I don’t feel like it. A lot of people in my life really love me for this quality and people have come to expect me to be the glue, the peacemaker, the “maker of comfortableness,” if you will. But, right now, I don’t have it in me. I expend almost all of my energy these days being my own cheerleader. Everyone else will just have to put on their big girl panties and muddle through it on their own – or at least without me.

That’s rubbing some people very wrong. It’s rubbing the SIL2B wrong, it’s rubbing my brother-in-law wrong and they are VERY vocal about it. I’m being “selfish,” “ridiculous,” a “thief” and a myriad of other adjectives.

I’ve come to expect these accusations and outbursts from the SIL2B, but not my brother-in-law. He knows me well. We’ve been family for a long time and I love him dearly. He’s always been rational, supportive, and a part of my tribe. But not anymore – and I won’t try to convince him otherwise. That’s not how I do things anymore.

But it hurts so much. I feel betrayed – by the both of them, but him in particular. I cried myself to sleep over it.

It seems that no one is who I thought they were these days. My tribe felt depleted and small.

Part I | Part II

My coat is now an innocent POW of this war. The SIL2B will not give it back – even going so far as to come to the house and drop off items left at the hotel room for other people, but not the damn coat.

It has become a running joke among my close friends. My inbox is littered with WANTED posters featuring my coat and daily jabs that read, “That coat you have on today is nice, but not as nice as your gray coat.”

I’ll probably never get the damn thing back, but whatevs – I have a closet full of coats.

Wardrobe diva says, “What? What!”

So I said all I had to say about tribes in the last blog post to say this… this blog is a complete exception.  Lately I find that this is where I come to defend myself when I am feeling sad and insecure. So, just know now, this space – 100% bias and tribe-gathering – MY SIDE OF THE STORY.

What can I say? I’m a work in progress. You don’t change all your bad behaviors overnight…

I promise, we’ll get back to the funny and irreverent writing that I love to do someday soon. For now, here’s the latest person you should hate on my behalf (until I tell you to stop)…

People, my sister-in-law to-be (SIL2B) has flipped her fucking lid. We’re talking full-on meltdown. Bridezilla, if you will. She’s been upset with me ever since her bachelorette because (in no particular order)…

I didn’t bring her a birthday card to her bachelorette party. This is among the most insignificant of all the accusations she made, but I still I don’t know how to respond. Really? I mean, really?!

I didn’t bring white wine to drink in the limo. I didn’t have time to shop for wine for our 30 minute ride, so I brought the two most expensive bottles from my collection, which were reds. I don’t have white wine because I have already given the SIL2B all my white wine or served it to her when she comes over. Not to mention taking the 30 minute limo ride to a certain restaurant specifically because it sold wine at retail and we could bottle it and take it with us in the limo. And, yes, I bought her white wine at the restaurant.

I “ripped” her off by stealing money. I call bullshit, BIG time, on this one. When it was time to pay up for the limo, I tried my damnedest to get everyone to pay one of the other bridesmaids. I have had my fill of dealing with this lot and money. But, I was sitting closest to the driver, so people sent the money my way. I took $40 out of my wallet with the intention of adding in more if need be.

Lo’ and behold, I was hella surprised that we were $140 over when the money was tallied. So I handed $100 to the Bride-to-Be and put $40 back in my wallet. Hand to god (you know, if I wasn’t an atheist), I honestly though the other two bridesmaids had anted up because they had stiffed me the weekend before. I was so appreciative that I bought them all drinks – to the tune of $125 – at dinner!

In turn, they accused me of stealing “all” the left over money. Fuck these people – I hate them all.

I didn’t acknowledge it was her party. You know, except for the part where I invited people to her bachelorette party, toasted her in the limo and toasted her at the restaurant.

She had to make all the reservations for the party. SIL2B offered to call around for limo prices when she didn’t like the price I got. And when I told her I would call the restaurant to make reservations in the afternoon because Open Table wasn’t showing any availability at the time we wanted, she couldn’t wait. She made them herself before I could.

Dude, if you’re gonna be a control freak – own it.

I got drunk. I give her that. I got wobbly-kneed drunk (and had a fuck-lotta fun doing it!). It was an accident. SIl2B, of course, is convinced I did it to intentionally spurn her.

I hijacked the limo for an hour. True story. I was having fun and didn’t want to go into the club yet – so I paid the limo driver for an extra hour to drive some of us around to continue the party. This, I admit, was a total asshole move. (And this asshole had some fun!)

I left her party without saying goodbye. I went out for a bit of fresh air with a friend, P, once everybody collectively decided to leave the club. Once outside, P, decided that we just needed to go home. I was way too drunk, she was well on her way, and we were already at valet. So we left while P could still drive and I could still (somewhat) stand. P texted people back at the party to let them know what was up. But, texts are, apparently, only appropriate for the ensuing fights afterwards (more on that later).

I ruined it all for her because she wanted to go to Vegas and didn’t because I couldn’t go and then I bailed early and she had to have her party without me anyway. To clarify, I left “early” at 12:30 a.m. – a full six hours into the party. As for Vegas, I told her up front that I would not mind one bit if she went to Vegas for her bachelorette party, but I couldn’t go. But, just like the wedding, she insisted on having it where it would be convenient for everyone else instead of what she really wanted to do – and we’re all paying for it. We’re an ungrateful fucking bunch of people, this family…

I didn’t make my request to bring my coat home from the hotel and my apologies the next morning in the right order.  I woke up to go to the bathroom (still drunk, mind you) early the next morning and, surprisingly, remembered that my coat was still at the hotel (along with my car – which was in valet – and the valet pass was in my coat), so I sent the SIL2B a text reminding her my coat was in the hotel room closet and went back to bed.  A few hours later, with a much clearer head, I woke up and called her to apologize for leaving without saying goodbye and for hijacking the limo. (I wasn’t yet away of all my other travesties.) She wouldn’t answer her phone, so I text her an apology… twice. If I had done these things in the opposite order, all would have been forgiven, right?

People, skywriting an apology outside her window, first thing in the morning, over Detroit, where everyone could see that I was a sorry, red wine-drinking, limo-hijacking, leaving early-asshat wouldn’t have begun to erase the grudge she is holding. Public taring and feathering might start to ease her rage… might.

I was in a conflict resolution session about a month ago where the speaker talked about the concept of gathering allies. The idea is, that when you are in conflict with someone, you start building allies by saying things to innocent third parties like, “Did you hear what so-and-so did/said?” It’s not that you really care about the person’s opinion – you’re just trying to win them “your side” before the other person does.

That struck a chord with me. I’m a certified ally-gatherer. I build tribes of allies when I feel hurt or threatened. It’s a bad behavior borne of insecurity.

The thing is, if you are in conflict with someone – and confident about your position – there should be no reason to gather a tribe. The right people will come to the right conclusions. And it is so hard to end a conflict when you’ve gathered a tribe – you have to eat a lot of crow, or do a lot of back-peddling, with a lot of people to come to a resolution.

Many times I found myself playing both sides of the fence just to “save face” – pretending to still be angry at the person I was originally in conflict with because my tribe, who I gathered to support of that anger, continued to carry it long after I did. And that’s pretty f’ing rotten.

So, I’ve been consciously trying to curtail this behavior. I have a few, close, trusted allies that are my go-to people when I need to vent. But, for the most part, I’ve been pretty good about not trashing the assholes in my life to our “common people.” (And, trust me, there have been some real assholes lately.) It has been, at times, a scary practice to put in place – to rely 100% on my own conviction when hurt or angry.

But is also SO very empowering.