Hi! Wow, I did not expect to return to pages of discussion about this, but again, am very grateful (also slightly regretting using my real name and so many details, haha, hope no one ever tracks me down here but if they do, please realize I’m just trying to get clarity on how to proceed and mean no ill will).
Having 24 hours to think about all that’s happened (thanks to whoever pointed out I’m off the grid for shabbat), the thing that bothers me the most is his mother’s insistence that he’s only choosing my venue to make me happy. I don’t believe her, but even if it was true, why would she tell me that? If my fiance had made the decision to pretend to love the country club to make me happy, why on earth would she ruin that by revealing that he actually hated it? I think it just shows her priorities are not the 2 of us.
My parents are exasperated with all this and we agree to limit communication. Like I said, my mom had called his mom as a courtesy before we put a deposit on the venue, but instead of her just saying “well, we obviously preferred PersianVenue but we understand the kids like this one,” it was combative all the way. When my mom mentioned we’d save money because the chuppah is outdoors surrounded by trees and flowers and wouldn’t need to be decorated like their venue would, his mom said, “oh, really, you’re not going to buy flowers to decorate it?” You can’t say a single sentence without getting a criticism.
Marian is correct that Persians truly see this as intermarriage. He is certainly on the more modern side of modern orthodox but like doschicos surmised, the most important thing to him is honoring his large family and having close relationships with grandparents/uncles/etc. For this reason, I’ve accepted that the guest list will be skewed on his side and that we’ll put in our own savings for his family. Re: the 250 number, that’s what my parents said they can pay for. The venue fits 350 so he and/or his parents can choose to cover up to 100 more. And “cover your plate” is a real concept in Persian culture. I’m not naive enough to think we’ll simply make it all back in gifts, but if he puts in let’s say $10k, I’m certainly prepared to get a good chunk back. Not that we’d need it to stay afloat, but it’s not exactly a total $10k loss. I know that my parents usually give $400-500 when the four of us go to an affair so it’s not unheard of in this area.
His parents definitely didn’t take our relationship seriously in the beginning but after a few years they accepted it was going somewhere. He has stood up to them in the past but admits he could’ve done a better job. For example, a week after the incident after we got engaged, his mom wanted to go shopping with me. I wanted to tell her that I still needed time after what she did, but he thought it’d be best if I didn’t tell her the reason for not going so as not to open the wound more (ex. just tell her I was busy with work).
Again, I’m so sorry to have hijacked this thread, I really didn’t expect everyone to offer so much support, but I definitely appreciate it. I Skyped with him tonight and went over a lot of these concerns. He agrees that we’re going to be a team and pointed to the fact that we’re not doing his parents preferred venue as proof that we have the ability to say no to them. His career, too, is something his parents loudly disapprove of but he loves. He says he will always want and value their input but is upset that I would imply he’s not his own person. In the past, he’s used the phrase “us versus the problem” and as long as we can stick to that, I think we’ll be okay. But he did agree that counseling with a rabbi is a good idea.