Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I’m 27, female and white. My fiancé is 33, male and black. I’m from America and he is from Nigeria. We met in college when I was studying for my Master’s, and he was doing his PhD. He came to the States four years ago. We’re engaged and get married next year. I’m also 6 weeks pregnant.
Cold as ice. You're so righteous that you won't even try to understand your parents' concerns for your welfare based on their background and life experience. You also aren't even married- that probably concerns them as well- how incredibly backward of them.
This isn't the 1700s but it is a time when there is plenty of racism- ask any black or brown person. To deny this is to deny reality. You mention that your mixed race child will probably encounter issues, but yet you go ahead and condemn your child to potential issues. If my parents had done that to me, I would have loathed them.
But then all parents are required to have unconditional love no matter what their kids do- right? Let us know how that works with your own kids.
Her parents cut her off. That is cold as ice, on their part. If they were truly concerned they wouldn't have shunned her, they would have just expressed that concern.
CONDEMN her child? Holy hyperbole! And I say that as a child from parents of different ethnicities. Being mixed is just different, not a condemnation. It was such a non-issue for me that my own is not just mixed ethnicity but mixed race. She is 24, fully launched and non loathing of anything about who she is or at her parents.
I’m 27, female and white. My fiancé is 33, male and black. I’m from America and he is from Nigeria. We met in college when I was studying for my Master’s, and he was doing his PhD. He came to the States four years ago. We’re engaged and get married next year. I’m also 6 weeks pregnant.
My parents have been against the relationship from the beginning. I mean, I’ll be honest – I kinda expected resistance. This was something completely new to them. My parents are pretty old fashioned. But I didn’t expect such great objection.
They were furious and demanded that if I wanted to remain in their lives, I should end it immediately. My dad was more passionate about his objection than my mom – he branded the relationship “disgusting and unnatural.” Of course, he claimed he wasn’t a racist (like a lot of racists claim) and that he thought “the races shouldn’t mix.”
Of course, I didn’t end it. Despite their continuous objections. Right before disowning me, they threatened to cut me out of their will. I told them to go ahead and they did, and we haven’t spoken in two years. I’ve been back to my hometown to see extended family and old friends (I’m an only child) on several occasions. I once bumped into them on the street, when I was with my fiancé. I said “hi” but they didn’t even respond. Acted like I didn’t exist.
When I told the people closest to me that I was pregnant, word reached my mom. My mom sent me an email. In the email, she was very remorseful for everything that happened. She said that she has always followed my father’s lead in matters (which is kinda true – they do have an old-fashioned relationship that sees the man as the head in most matters) and that yes, while she had her reservations about the relationship due to the background of my fiancé, her defiance wasn’t as passionate as my father’s. She said my father still hasn’t changed his stance, but she went on to write that she is willing to challenge – and even break from him – if that is required. She said she hopes I find it in my heart to forgive her and give her a second chance. She also said the same of my husband, and that she was ashamed by the way she had treated him.
I’m conflicted. On one hand, I’ll always love my mom and do believe in reconciliation. But it’s hard to erase what has happened over the last few years. I still remember the day of meeting my parents in the street, greeting them and being completely blown off. Like I was nothing to them. But my biggest concern isn’t myself – it’s my family. It’s our child.
Our baby is going to be mixed race and he/she is most likely going to face racial-oriented issues as they grow and make their own way in the world. My husband and I can’t protect our child from all the racial BS in the world, but we can protect our child from it when it comes within the family. I don’t fear conscious racism from my mom – but the kind of subconscious comments someone from a different time may make and think they are harmless in the face of a biracial child. When they are harmful.
After what happened, I’m not comfortable at all with the notion of leaving my baby alone with her. To add, I’m also an only child and part of me is wondering why my mom only reached out now. I’m her only chance at being a grandmother, and part of me is wondering whether this is just a vain attempt to satisfy her maternal instincts, and to blend in with all the friends who are also becoming grandparents. I also don’t like the situation with my father – my mother was honest, saying the man hasn’t altered his stance. I just predict a lot of drama coming from all this and I want no part in it.
I’ve spoken at length with my fiancé. He told me it’s my family, and he would follow my lead and support whatever decision I made. But he added that he did believe in second chances – he was given one when he was a teenager.
He had a very troubled childhood – abandoned by his father and his mother went from one man to another and neglected him – and he used alcohol to cope. He was an alcoholic by the time he was 16. Despite excelling academically, he drank every day. When he was 18, a Christian missionary from Germany was in Nigeria. He sponsored my fiance’s undergrad degree at a Nigerian university.
Instead of using the money the man was giving him to pay his tuition, he blew it all on booze and partying. He didn’t go to school. It caught up to him. The German found out, but didn’t give up on him. He got my fiancé help and assisted his sobriety.
My fiancé has been sober for 14 years now. After his rehabilitation, the German missionary paid for my fiance's undergrad degree once again and he completed it the second time around. He passed away 3 years ago, but my fiancé and I traveled to Germany to see him before he died. My fiance sees the man as his father. We also attended the funeral and my fiance was absolutely heartbroken. If we have a boy, we’re going to name our son after him. He has never forgotten the man’s incredible kindness and the second chance he gave him. And he asked me to keep that in mind as well.
It’s quite the complicated situation and I would like some input. I would also like input from those who have dealt with family estrangement.
Thanks
Not sure why this is such a long post, but it sounds like your parents live in the South in 1950.
You can be estranged or you can forgive your parents. Look at it this way. They won’t be around forever. You want your child to know that there are grandparents. Babies and kids tend to soften hearts.
Also look at it this way. People do make mistakes. Mom obviously reached out hoping to make amends.
If it doesn’t work out you can always cut them out.
I too believe in forgiveness, carrying resentment only hurts the person carrying it. That said, I would enter cautiously back into a relationship with the parents. As you said, unconscious bias directed at your child should not come from his/her own family. Perhaps you could begin communicating and maybe spending time with your mom and see how she treats your husband. If your father cannot/will not change, you may want to leave it alone. But maybe you can salvage a relationship with your mom. Best of luck.
The idea of seeing how she gets along with your husband is a good idea. If she only wants back in for the grandchild and not for the entire family, that wouldn't be a positive for the child in the long run. I would definitely keep the child away from your father, as in completely. Good luck, and I hope it works out well .
Why not get married now? Present yourselves to your family as a family with a baby on the way. Let them know you're married, he's your husband, and they don't have to like but you won't let them disrespect your husband.
I have no problems with mixed marriages if the parents are liberal and accepting. My point is that she knew that this will upset her parents. She could avoid it easily: She is young, no kids, she could easily find a person who her parents will accept. They are about 60% of the population, not 13%. But she choose to go the extra mile to upset her parents, or she just did not think about them at all. That how I see it.
So tell us what it is like to live your life revolving around what your parents think.
Her parents have friends, relatives, acquaintances, most of them I guess are conservative and old fashion like them. How they will look in their faces while telling them that their daughter is with a black person that impregnated her and even did not marry her? They are dying from embarrassment and shame, all their world collapsed, all their social connections are maybe dead now.
I'd say they are well rid of these so-called friends, relatives, acquaintances if their daughter being with a black man is an issue.
Her parents were devastated and suffered like I don't know what. And she did it as of revenge to her controlling parents that stopped her modeling carrier.
.
I wouldn't worry too much. I'm betting they had a great time playing poor, poor pitiful me.
I find it difficult to believe this Muslim girl actually confided all this to you.
So tell us what it is like to live your life revolving around what your parents think.
Do you find this satisfying?
Ohh let me answer! It was great! and indeed satisfying. Thanks for asking
Some of us actually LIKE our parents....Hows that for being rebellious against this new group coming into power who have worries of which nursing home to sock there Burdening parents into....Because its just so much easier to dismiss a parent then actually care at all what they think.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
