Dad won't accept fiance

Saveitandsee

Dad and I got on well up until a few months ago when my fiance and I announced our engagement. Fair enough if I was a youngster but I'm in my mid thirties with children of my own, I'm not some giddy teen who doesn't know what she is getting into. At the time, he congratulated us but spoke to me on the phone a week later and proceeded to say that he wasn't happy about it. For the record, Dad barely knows my fiance and won't even try to get to know him. Anytime they have been in each others company, my fiance will initiate conversation and my Dad will cut the conversation dead.

A few months after the initial engagement, we announced that we'd set a date and paid a deposit. Dad was asked if he wanted to escort me down the aisle and he said yes. However, as time passed, his behaviour became progressively worse to the point where I couldn't sit in the same room as him and my fiance because of the tension he'd create. I ended up having a word with him privately about it, I was open and just said that it was obvious Dad didn't like fiance and he'd already said he wasn't happy about our impending marriage so if he had any concerns, let's hear them now because I was no longer prepared to feel strain in my own home. It took him a good few minutes to list anything, and when he did, it was all so unreasonable - he was making assumptions about my fiance which were completely baseless and when I pointed out that they had no foundation, he huffed.

I also found out that he'd been to another member of my family and come out with some stuff which was just plain made up. I was naturally livid. Family member stated that Dad was just upset that I've finally met someone and am taking the plunge cos I'm 'Dad's girl'. Harbouring a dislike for my fiance was one thing but making up untruths to members of my family was taking it too far and so asked Dad about it - and he appeared to have even convinced himself that it was true. I told Dad that his attitude toward my fiance was unreasonable, that I'd given him opportunities to justify it and he had so far been unable to. I also told him how much this was unsettling me but it didn't seem to bother him any.

If my fiance had said or done anything - even unwittingly - that might have hacked Dad off, I'd try to be a bit more understanding. But he hasn't. Dad has been rude, obnoxious and plain ignorant to my fiance. My fiance had kept a dignified silence on the matter and had gone out of his way to be respectful and polite to my Dad out of respect for me, but lately it's started to take its toll on him too and he has now confessed that he's just about had enough of it.

Now it's got to the stage where Dad hasn't seen his grandchildren for months because he won't come here anymore in case my fiance is around, and I can only take my children down to where Dad lives with the help of someone else which is usually my fiance - and Dad's made it abundantly clear that my fiance is not welcome.

We get married in less than a year and I am at my wits end with Dad's behaviour, but I don't know what else I can do - I've already told him how it upsets me and have given him ample opportunity to raise any genuine concerns he has but I've had nothing of any substance.

Tiglath

It seems you've done all you can - the rest is up to him if he wants to see you and your family (which apparently he doesn't, from what you've said). Is your Mum around? Reactions like this are usually based on fear - what does your Dad fear? That he's being shoved out or sidelined? That you won't be there for him now he's getting older? That your fiance will treat you badly?

go_cat

Have you spoken to your dad on your own and asked him what his issue is..it could be even though you are on your 30's you are still in his eyes his little girl and no man is good enough etc

Does he feel your fiance is taking you away from him?

We're you close before this ?

HPoirot

Sorry to be blunt, but other than being "Dad's girl", does your dad stand to lose anything when you eventually get married?

Person_one

I'm guessing that for the first 30 odd years of your life he's been kind and loving and has always wanted the best for you? You say you've got on, is this the first big disagreement since you've been an adult?

Why would he suddenly change? I don't really buy the 'daddy's girl' thing, most dads are proud and happy when their daughters marry. Is your fiance the father of your children?

Are you 100% absolutely sure that there's nothing about your dad's concerns that might be right? I hate to admit it, but my parents have always been right about my exes...

nom_de_plume

Dad needs to decide; does he want to gain a son or lose a daughter!

Saveitandsee

Yes, I've spoken to him about this on a number of occasions. Mum is around but it's complicated with her as she's been quite ill in the last month. If anything, this should have shown Dad that I'd always be around - finance has been the one to watch the kids whilst I've sat at mums bedside, and it's me who has been there for Dad too through it all which I would not have been able to do without finance's help due to the distance involved and finances. I had thought this would have changed Dad's opinion of fiance but it didn't.

Initially he did suggest that he was worried I'd move further away and that my fiance wouldn't be able to support us. I thought I had put those concerns to rest when i told him fiance would be moving in with me rather than me moving to be with him, and that he works a second job in addition to his main career to boost his income but it seems that whenever I put one fear to bed, he comes up with something else that either has no substance or can be easily resolved and then when he runs out of things to try and base his attitude on, he just huffs.

sassyblue

He's someone said something to him about your fianc! that he hasn't told you?? Is there something you know of in your fiance’s past that you know your dad would have trouble with?

There has to be something for your dad to become so unreasonable.

Ames

Could it be something like racism that's usually hidden? Or some other prejudice?

pukkamum

It seems time for tough love, unless dad can come up with a justifiable reason you must tell him to put up and shut up.
Tell him it is happening regardless of his feelings so he can either spoil it for you or put on a happy face.
We can't guarantee we are going to get on with in-laws so he's just going to have to deal with it.
If he can't be civil to your fiance then he either makes an effort to see you and the kids without fiance but accepts that resticts his involvement with you all or he starts acting like a grown up and accepts he is never going his best friend but he can at least be civil.

bagpussbear

sassyblue wrote: »

He's someone said something to him about your fianc! that he hasn't told you?? Is there something you know of in your fiance’s past that you know your dad would have trouble with?

There has to be something for your dad to become so unreasonable.

Totally agree with you. Dad's reaction seems so extreme, that it felt to me like the dad knows something about this fiance that he is not letting on (or has been told), but trying to put his daughter off via other ways.

OP how long have you been with your partner? just thinking about how well you really know him, could dad know about a criminal record that you aren't aware of? or some sort of dodgy past.

Sorry hope you aren't offended by the questions, simply trying to get to the bottom to why you dad might be so extreme in his reaction to this man, without any apparent justification.