My Father-in-Law Betrayed His Wife In the Worst Way. Now My Husband Wants to Twist the Knife.

Care and Feeding Photo illustration by Slate. Photo by Getty Images Plus. Care and Feeding is Slate’s parenting advice column. Have a question for Care and Feeding? Submit it here. Dear Care and Feeding, My mother-in-law, “Gladys,” kicked out her husband, “Rich,” six months ago after she caught him in bed with a woman half his age. Rich is still involved with the side piece, and they plan on getting married in the spring. Gladys has asked that our family boycott the wedding. I think what Rich did was beyond skeevy and can understand where Gladys is coming from. I think we should honor her request in solidarity. However, today my husband said that his father has asked that our youngest daughter (age 4) serve as the flower girl! Even worse, my husband agreed! For reasons only he can understand, he wants to maintain a relationship with Rich. But I think having our daughter serve as the flower girl would be a terrible betrayal. I’m prepared to abscond to my sister’s on the other side of the state on the day of the wedding with the kids to prevent it. Please tell me what my husband wants is unacceptable. —Won’t Revictimize the Victim Dear Won’t Revictimize, Oh, this is a big “HELL NO” from me. Absolutely not. No. NO! Rich has a right to end his marriage and move on, but the way he went about it does not lend itself to having your family’s participation in his new wedding. It’s a cruel thing to do to Gladys, and it’s a very confusing position to put a 4-year-old in. Explaining why Grandpa is marrying a young-ass woman and won’t be at Grandma’s house is bad enough, but there is no reason for your little one to be part of these shenanigans. Tell your husband that he may support his dirty dick father as he sees fit but that you and your children will NOT be in attendance at this wedding and it is NOT up for discussion. Take the kids out the house in the middle of the night if you have to. Your husband may not respect his mother, but you have the power to do the right thing and make sure that her grandkids aren’t in attendance for what may be one of the most painful days of her life. Hopefully, Gladys realizes that her ex is a tremendous loser. You don’t have to explain that fact to your kids just yet, but you do not have to hide your distaste either. Answer any questions about Grandpa’s new life honestly. Please keep questions short (<150 words), and don’t submit the same question to multiple columns. We are unable to edit or remove questions after publication. Use pseudonyms to maintain anonymity. Your submission may be used in other Slate advice columns and may be edited for publication. Dear Care and Feeding, I got married when my stepdaughters were in their teens. We lived in my house, which, at nearly 100 years old, had tiny rooms with zero closets and maybe would fit a full mattress, but nothing else. So rather than spend a lot on the wedding and honeymoon, we invested in converting the basement into a suite for the girls, allowing them to choose color and decor. At the time, they were super excited and later, they even chose to live with us after they graduated high school. Our home was the teen hang out spot. Well, I got accidentally tagged in something and stumbled upon their social media accounts, where they had made multiple posts about their “horrid” stepmother who threw them in the basement. The pictures they posted made it look like a prison cell. I feel sick. We were literally chatting and laughing last week about what to do about Christmas. I haven’t shown my husband yet. What do I do here? I feel so betrayed and I can’t believe they would put this out publicly. —Hurt Dear Hurt, This is a tremendous betrayal, and I am so sorry you are experiencing this. You need to tell your husband what happened; you shouldn’t be carrying this weight alone, and there is no reason to try and protect the girls from being judged by their father for their behavior as young adults. You can confront them together or on your own, but either way, the girls need to be held accountable. Best case scenario, they are complaining about something that didn’t actually bother them in a performance of teen angst, perhaps as a way of commiserating and/or connecting to some of their friends. There’s also a chance they’re just nasty young women who did a good job of hiding that from you—I hope that isn’t the case. The fact that the home was a popular hangout and the girls chose to stay after high school suggests that there’s more to this story than that. Have you ever felt any cracks in your relationship with your stepdaughters? Did they ever give any indication that they felt some kinda way about being in the basement and not upstairs? Was there ever any resentment or weirdness about having to move into a house that was already yours? If you’ve been ignoring signs of malcontent, it’s time to confront them. If not, simply let the girls know how stunned you were to see what they had written and ask them if they indeed felt that way; if so, probe why they never expressed it to you and ask how to reconcile that with the amount of time they spent there voluntarily, and if not, ask just why they would say those things. —Jamilah More Parenting Advice From Slate My wife and I split amicably 2 years ago over personal differences. I have partial custody (every other week) of my two daughters, 8 and 10. We’re not struggling but I don’t make enough money for a babysitter and I work odd hours, so I’ve been relying on my brother “Don” to watch them sometimes. He works in health and fitness, so he makes his own hours. He’s happy to do this and has a good relationship with the kids. He is cordial to my ex-wife. There’s just one issue I recently discovered. Never miss new Slate Advice columns Get the latest from Prudie and our columnists in your inbox each weekday, plus special bonus letters on Saturdays. Advice Family Kids