I have been a distant reader of this site for a few months now. I have always felt that my situation was so not bad compared to some of the stuff posted here. I really love my SO and I get along with and actually like his kids. He feels the same about my kids too. However, I do not know if some of the issues are cultural differences, me over analylzing, hidden agendas on others part or just how everyone behaves.

My SO and BM are both immigrants to the US. My SO has an aunt and an uncle that lives near us in the US. But the rest of there family lives outside the US. My SO classes himself as agnostic however he celebrates Jewish holidays more out of heritage than belief and I have no particular beliefs. However, my SO celebrates all the Jewish holiday and there are MANY with BM, kids, aunt and uncle and their kids. My kids and I are also invited and have attended for about 2 years of our relationship excluding covid times when it was not possible.

I honestly hate these gatherings because I feel so left out. One, English is not the only language spoken even though my kids and I can only speak English. Some of it is due to customs and so on taking place. But, BM and SO’s aunt sometimes talk in Russian when speaking to one another when I am in earshot. Second, they are a very science/techy family. They love to talk/debate/argue about 5G and chips and all sort of stuff I know nothing about.

Another thing I struggle with in this family is how close BM is to them. I feel like SO’s aunt prefers BM to me. BM nor SO aunt has been overtly rude to me or my kids personally. I struggle between am I over analysing or are they sending signals to me. BM hasn’t been poisoning the kids as far as I can see. They are kids and are not perfect but they haven’t done anything in which I can say that poisoning occurred.

Just recently one of my SO’s cousins did a Instagram story where she asked people for suggestions of things to do on a trip that she is taking this summer with BM. I don’t know if the entire family is going. I was shocked that they would go on vacation with their nephew/cousin’s ex-wife.

This precipitated into me telling my SO that I don’t actually like going to his family gatherings. I only did it because I thought it was sweet of BM and him to put aside their differences and do that for the kids. And because I loved him and wanted him to be happy. I told him I felt like an outsider and excluded. I told him that I think his aunt prefers BM and thinks BM is smarter than me and whole lot more. I told him I hated how all his text with BM was in Hebrew and that it wasn’t that I didn’t trust him but the fact that it is in a different language it makes me think about it. I just released all my issues with everything unto him.

SO got upset and extracted all his text and translated them on google and was pushing it in my face and telling me to “read it, read it”. Honestly I was so emotional I felt so embarrass by that whole episode. There wasn’t anything inappropriate in nature. However, BM does over communicate in my opinion. She sends a lot of updates on kids behavior, assignments that they have, stomachaches. I swear everything. But it is mostly about kids/ family stuff.

He then asked me if I wanted him to tell his aunt and uncle to uninvite and stop being friends with BM. He talked about how BM has no family and support system in the US and how he is not going to take that away from her because it would affect the kids. He went on about how I have never experienced moving to another country where I do not know anybody and how isolating that can be. 

SO has been silent on the issue to me. However we recently went to a jewish holiday event with other people (it was a public event). SO’s family tried to be friendly but I felt it was forced and awkward. We just basically talked about nothing. SO tried to talk about topics that I can contribute to but it all sort of fell flat. BM busied herself with other guest at the event. And we all just ended up mingling with other families. I knew something was said and I asked SO what he had told them. He said he told them that they should try and include me more and get to know me. I feel like I went from an invisible outside to under a spotlight that is awkward. I really do not know how to navigate this family dynamic.