My dad is letting me down and it has broken something in me
My partner (32F) and I (35M) are getting ready for our wedding in October, and my side of the family is mostly checked out. Frankly, I'm beyond hurt by what they have decided, and I fail to process the logic.
It started with our couple's shower-- my parents are both re-married, but neither of my step parents showed to the shower. Not a big deal, as my stepfather is an emotionally closed off guy and he had a big fishing weekend planned, so whatever. My stepmother has chronic illnesses, and also used to be my childhood babysitter, so I get her not showing up. My mom and one of my cousins showed up, so that was nice.
Our friend went above and beyond throwing us this event and we agreed that if this was our actual wedding reception we would have been over the moon. 5 minutes into the event my dad calls and asks if we are "still doing that thing today." I told him yes, it started 5 minutes ago, and he says that he'll head down in a little bit. An hour later he calls me and says he's at X location. I told him that was the wrong venue, and it was at Y location. 20 minutes later, he shows up in cargo shorts and a dirty graphic tee, hangs out for 15 minutes and leaves. I asked him 3 times for us to at least take a picture together but he didn't. He just left, because he didn't want to get in a fight with my mom.
My partners family included her mom, her dad, her stepmom, 3 grandparents, 4 aunts and uncles and most of their partners, almost all of them from several states away. My family lives in town.
I sobbed like a baby when we got home.
A couple weeks later, I'm at my dad's and he casually tells me that they aren't coming to the rehearsal dinner, and they'll probably just drive in to town the day of, stay for the ceremony and drive back (ceremony is in the next city over) so they don't have to worry about getting a hotel room. I didn't know what to say to that, so I just said "do what you've gotta do, I guess," and left shortly after.
I broke down to my dad a couple months prior, begging him to show up more in my life. And this is what I got.
My brother is flying from across the country, and my sister is coming in from Brazil, and I can't get my dad to be there when we live 3 blocks away from each other.
Rant over. Thanks for reading.