Sister says 14yo nephew not coming to my wedding because of his sports tournament. Thoughts?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What the hell? I can't believe these people who are saying that a soccer tournament is more important than a family wedding. It's not like this kid is going to be a professional athlete -- and if he was, missing one weekend tournament would not get in his way. People have FUCKED up values around here if they would really let a teenager choose a hobby over his extended family. Jeez.

There's a 40% chance that the kid would miss out on a big sports day only to come attend something that will fail.......

[Anonymous]

We see families skipping holidays and big events at even younger years. We have a small extended family and my cousin let her 10 year old skip out on attending his great grandfather's funeral dying at age 99 because of a sports tournament. She said "he didn't know him too well" which is true, but only because the grandfather was in his 90's when the kid was 5 and already had some dementia. This grandfather has been the patriarch of the entire family, being an inspiration for all of us the way he conducted himself throughout his life, buying entire vacations for extended family over the years, buying a summer house for everyone to visit every summer, and encouraging all of his children and grandchildren to play sports which this great grandchild is benefitting from. We spent hours at the funeral reminiscing on stories of his life and met people who'd known him from all different times in his life. You can't recreate that event at another time and age 10 would have been a perfect year for the child to have heard some of these stores and remembered them growing up. My neighbor says she never has Thanksgiving with her sister because the sister is always at a pageant for her daughter which is scheduled every year on Thanksgiving weekend. The pageants started at age 10 as well. Maybe at the high school level, this type of commitment is justified, but I think in general parents are not pushing back enough to create more time for family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Haven't followed all of this but thought I would add something. When I got married--later like you I would have been horrified if a nephew didn't attend. I am very close to my nephews and would have been upset. Thankfully they were too young to be in anything so competitive that it would have mattered. Now years later, I have different perspective and believe it not you may have different perspective in years with your own kids. If this is a sport where it is a big event (who cares boy or girl) then I would say they should go to that game and miss the wedding. Why? You have said you live far away because if in same town the child could have gone to the sporting event and then made part of the festivities--rehearsal dinner or reception but not the wedding or wedding and not the reception. This child is sort of boxed in because they have to fly across the country so this is a big production during the school year. Your sister may love you to pieces but she is being a good mom. She knows she is having one of her kids there to represent the family and her other child needs to be where he sports commitment is. I totally get. The people who say to bag probably don't have the understand of competitive sports--frankly though this could be a what if child was in a theatre production so the reality is if a child has a commitment to something and is learning follow through. It could be argued that if this family was the most important thing,you could choose to have a wedding in their town. You didn't because it didn't work for you..totally understand that but please understand that when you are flying people in, logistics can get in the way. Maybe find a way to celebrate with him this summer. Please do not let the stress of a wedding cloud your mind. This is how family wars start and it is not worth it.

+1 well said

I'm the OP. I know there are limitations with this forum and it's hard to read the whole thread, and I appreciate your thoughts and perspective, but just thought I would still say that facts you inserted into your post have zero to do with the reality. There is no flying across country. They live a 4-hour drive south. There is no rehearsal dinner or other festivities - just the 50-60 person ceremony/celebration at a restaurant that occurs smack in the afternoon. Your theory that if family was most important to me I would have shown that by having the wedding where they live is interesting. Besides two NYC cousins and my sister's family, the rest of the guests are all based in Maryland or Southern PA. So I would have had 95% of the guests drive down south for a wedding to accommodate a niece who we just learned last week had a surprise conflict? I need to anticipate better apparently. Let's just have the wedding hours away in the off chance that the confirmed clear schedule could have an unexpected 11th-hour hiccup. Ooookay.

[Anonymous]

You know, my husband's family can never understand why some of their kids can't make family events because of prior sports commitments and they give them such a hard time. But my family was like that, and you know what? It paid for my college education IN FULL. So suck it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One day that 14 year old - and the other "sports at all cost" 14 year olds will get married - and guess what - I bet nobody will think twice about blowing off their wedding(s). Because there's a great big difference between the all-me-all- the- time people and people that genuinely love and care about their family and friends. And I know this is true because everybody blew off one of my sisters 3 kids weddings because he grew up to be an entitled pompous ass and so was his wife. It was a packed house for the other two. End of story.

My guess is that he will have a huge wedding because he spend years fostering relationships with teammates. Long weekends in crappy hotels, trying to stay entertained between tournament games, sharing their Gatorade when their teammate forgot theirs.
He will have a hard time picking the best man since he has so many close friends.
They will all toast their friend who got cancer in high school and talk about the time the whole soccer team raised money for his recovery. They will dedicate a toast to him and his wife and 3 kids. At the wedding will be a coach or two that were mentors to him and helped him get his first job.
He will go onto to coach multiple sports teams and mentor many kids in his future... just for the love of it.

Lol this must be what nutty parents think will happen to justify the nuttiness. I played sports my entire life and through college at a D1 school and it was great, but this is quite the romanticized version of it. I was also in a sorority, travelled abroad, etc., and all of that was great too and I am sure contributed to who I am. So did my dad's sarcastic sense of humor and my ingrained family ethos that we show up for each other. Sports can be a piece of a puzzle, but it's not the whole puzzle. And, a lot of people have shitty sports experiences and would be better off having just foregone it. Or sports just weren't that influential (e.g., they sat the bench, didn't get too much joy from it, and never really played again post-high school). I have friends like this.

Sports is not the whole puzzle but neither is the Aunt he sees once a year.

The kid will have many people in his life regardless or missing this one family event.

OP again! Reminded of the big limitations of this type of forum. I don't see my nieces once a year! I guess people are projecting their family experience onto this, understandably.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You know, my husband's family can never understand why some of their kids can't make family events because of prior sports commitments and they give them such a hard time. But my family was like that, and you know what? It paid for my college education IN FULL. So suck it.

The time for both the parents and children and money involved in competitive sports is way more than the cost of college, not even factoring in the cost of your relationship with your family. I think most families are accommodating of special events. When you can't make any once a year family event because of a sports commitment year after year it gets to be old.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One day that 14 year old - and the other "sports at all cost" 14 year olds will get married - and guess what - I bet nobody will think twice about blowing off their wedding(s). Because there's a great big difference between the all-me-all- the- time people and people that genuinely love and care about their family and friends. And I know this is true because everybody blew off one of my sisters 3 kids weddings because he grew up to be an entitled pompous ass and so was his wife. It was a packed house for the other two. End of story.

My guess is that he will have a huge wedding because he spend years fostering relationships with teammates. Long weekends in crappy hotels, trying to stay entertained between tournament games, sharing their Gatorade when their teammate forgot theirs.
He will have a hard time picking the best man since he has so many close friends.
They will all toast their friend who got cancer in high school and talk about the time the whole soccer team raised money for his recovery. They will dedicate a toast to him and his wife and 3 kids. At the wedding will be a coach or two that were mentors to him and helped him get his first job.
He will go onto to coach multiple sports teams and mentor many kids in his future... just for the love of it.

Lol this must be what nutty parents think will happen to justify the nuttiness. I played sports my entire life and through college at a D1 school and it was great, but this is quite the romanticized version of it. I was also in a sorority, travelled abroad, etc., and all of that was great too and I am sure contributed to who I am. So did my dad's sarcastic sense of humor and my ingrained family ethos that we show up for each other. Sports can be a piece of a puzzle, but it's not the whole puzzle. And, a lot of people have shitty sports experiences and would be better off having just foregone it. Or sports just weren't that influential (e.g., they sat the bench, didn't get too much joy from it, and never really played again post-high school). I have friends like this.

Sports is not the whole puzzle but neither is the Aunt he sees once a year.

The kid will have many people in his life regardless or missing this one family event.

OP again! Reminded of the big limitations of this type of forum. I don't see my nieces once a year! I guess people are projecting their family experience onto this, understandably.

I thought it was your nephew. Anyway, didn't you say that you live out of town. You drove all the way to their house for the holidays? You don't live in the same area they live, do you?

How often do you see them. When you visit, how much time do you spend with a teen?

[Anonymous]

OP.. originally you said " She says my nephew can't come because of this soccer tournament. "

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We see families skipping holidays and big events at even younger years. We have a small extended family and my cousin let her 10 year old skip out on attending his great grandfather's funeral dying at age 99 because of a sports tournament. She said "he didn't know him too well" which is true, but only because the grandfather was in his 90's when the kid was 5 and already had some dementia. This grandfather has been the patriarch of the entire family, being an inspiration for all of us the way he conducted himself throughout his life, buying entire vacations for extended family over the years, buying a summer house for everyone to visit every summer, and encouraging all of his children and grandchildren to play sports which this great grandchild is benefitting from. We spent hours at the funeral reminiscing on stories of his life and met people who'd known him from all different times in his life. You can't recreate that event at another time and age 10 would have been a perfect year for the child to have heard some of these stores and remembered them growing up. My neighbor says she never has Thanksgiving with her sister because the sister is always at a pageant for her daughter which is scheduled every year on Thanksgiving weekend. The pageants started at age 10 as well. Maybe at the high school level, this type of commitment is justified, but I think in general parents are not pushing back enough to create more time for family.

No. The 10 year old would not have been listening to stories, at best he would be hanging with cousins but most likely would be bored and trying to entertain himself.

This is a very glamorized vision of what would have happened but when my dad died I had my in-laws take them home after an hour so I could mourn properly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You know, my husband's family can never understand why some of their kids can't make family events because of prior sports commitments and they give them such a hard time. But my family was like that, and you know what? It paid for my college education IN FULL. So suck it.

Sounds like you grew up to be a lovely person.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One day that 14 year old - and the other "sports at all cost" 14 year olds will get married - and guess what - I bet nobody will think twice about blowing off their wedding(s). Because there's a great big difference between the all-me-all- the- time people and people that genuinely love and care about their family and friends. And I know this is true because everybody blew off one of my sisters 3 kids weddings because he grew up to be an entitled pompous ass and so was his wife. It was a packed house for the other two. End of story.

My guess is that he will have a huge wedding because he spend years fostering relationships with teammates. Long weekends in crappy hotels, trying to stay entertained between tournament games, sharing their Gatorade when their teammate forgot theirs.

He will have a hard time picking the best man since he has so many close friends.

They will all toast their friend who got cancer in high school and talk about the time the whole soccer team raised money for his recovery. They will dedicate a toast to him and his wife and 3 kids. At the wedding will be a coach or two that were mentors to him and helped him get his first job.

He will go onto to coach multiple sports teams and mentor many kids in his future... just for the love of it.

Lol. I hope this was sarcasm. People don't really think like that, do they?

No. It's not a joke. You think these kids don't have tons of relationships they foster every day. This is actually a true story from a wedding I attended 2 years ago, right after the story of how the mom locked the team out in the snow for 2 hours because they got her floors wet for the 10th time.

I tend to agree with this assessment of the future, but I also agree that many of these people are the kind of people that only hang out with other like minded people. They may raise money for the kid with cancer on the team, but not the kid who lives down the street who also has cancer but isn't into sports. They are caring towards their friends who are just like themselves. They mentor other players as adults because they love playing a game, know how to coach, and want their own children to succeed. They are the parents who leave local teams for travel teams as early as possible. They think anything that doesn't involve sports is a waste of time. I admire the dedication of these kids and adults toward their sport, but I'm also struck by how single minded they are.

I find many people have a chip on their shoulder about athletic kids and don't know these kids play instruments, are active in their church, volunteer with SN kids and have friends in their neighborhood also. They take 1 situation and extrapolate it to their whole live but really are biased by their own life experiences.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So I think this thread has shown us that different families work differently. For those who didn't already know that, here you go. Try not to be so horrified that everyone doesn't do everything like you would.

OP here. I think this is my takeaway from this thread. So thank you everyone - it's a valuable takeway and helped me process and move through this.

I actually believe my sister is pretty darn consistent with me on how we view family and I think we both agree that celebratory family gatherings like this present a tremendous opportunity and reward. But somehow sports in her kids' lives seem to trump everything for her for whatever various reasons. I can't tell her how her nuclear family should work, even when it impacts others. I can just be disappointed for me, my partner, my mom, my dad, my grandmother and others who all want my niece to be there with us, and even for my niece (because I subscribe to the fact that these types of moments can be a thread in the beautiful fabric that is a family over the years; sorry for the cheese!). And even for my sister who I am sure wishes she would not have forgotten the tournament and could have her kid in both places. But it is what it is. I told my mom to smack me upside the head if in 14 years I end up with a different outlook. She said she absolutely would.

You will think differently in 14 years.... and if you mom is a good mom, she will let the lesson just be learned and not smack you upside the head.

There are tons of things you will do in the next 40 years that your 40 year old self can't imagine you would do.

Good luck with the next 60+ years, it will be educational.

I love the people who think and say Oh Just Wait, as a way of dismissing a value or perspective or position,. Guess what, there are people on this thread who have teens and think the same as OP does pre-kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Obviously not a lot of Italians on this thread

Italians here (well my H is)... I can't even keep track of who is not talking to us.

So funny -- there is a big fallout in my extended Italian family about whether my mom's cousin can be buried with his mom and dad. Nobody is talking.

[Anonymous]

He was 99. The funeral was a celebration of his life. Our grandfather was a fun and caring man. The 10 year old can understand funny stories about a person's life. People gave speeches at the funeral about how great he was at his business and taking care of employees, with family, and with friends. My 10 year old is able to understand most of these stories. Sorry yours isn't. And either way, a 10 year olds basketball tournament is not that important. Even if he didn't understand all the stories, he would have spent time with his entire extended family and his cousins which I think is still more important than a 10 year olds tournament.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One day that 14 year old - and the other "sports at all cost" 14 year olds will get married - and guess what - I bet nobody will think twice about blowing off their wedding(s). Because there's a great big difference between the all-me-all- the- time people and people that genuinely love and care about their family and friends. And I know this is true because everybody blew off one of my sisters 3 kids weddings because he grew up to be an entitled pompous ass and so was his wife. It was a packed house for the other two. End of story.

My guess is that he will have a huge wedding because he spend years fostering relationships with teammates. Long weekends in crappy hotels, trying to stay entertained between tournament games, sharing their Gatorade when their teammate forgot theirs.

He will have a hard time picking the best man since he has so many close friends.

They will all toast their friend who got cancer in high school and talk about the time the whole soccer team raised money for his recovery. They will dedicate a toast to him and his wife and 3 kids. At the wedding will be a coach or two that were mentors to him and helped him get his first job.

He will go onto to coach multiple sports teams and mentor many kids in his future... just for the love of it.

Lol. I hope this was sarcasm. People don't really think like that, do they?

No. It's not a joke. You think these kids don't have tons of relationships they foster every day. This is actually a true story from a wedding I attended 2 years ago, right after the story of how the mom locked the team out in the snow for 2 hours because they got her floors wet for the 10th time.

I tend to agree with this assessment of the future, but I also agree that many of these people are the kind of people that only hang out with other like minded people. They may raise money for the kid with cancer on the team, but not the kid who lives down the street who also has cancer but isn't into sports. They are caring towards their friends who are just like themselves. They mentor other players as adults because they love playing a game, know how to coach, and want their own children to succeed. They are the parents who leave local teams for travel teams as early as possible. They think anything that doesn't involve sports is a waste of time. I admire the dedication of these kids and adults toward their sport, but I'm also struck by how single minded they are.

^^THIS!!