Facebook Photo Sadness

[JaneF]

This photo issue must be pretty common! Pooh it is the same for me. My DIL/DS have pictures all over Facebook and hanging in their home. These photos only contain people in her FOO, not a single one of anyone in DS's family. I too have never been given a single wedding photo, and only got two 3x5 COPIES of a family photo and a COPY 8x10 (that I did myself) in 12 years. Her FOO has tons of them and GC photos, I have been given 2 or 3 total. I never have said a word because it would have caused issues. I understand how upset a person would be to be cut out of photos that your MIL displays...sorry you have to deal with that. I used to get sad and have hurt feelings, but I let go of it. It's the way it is, and it won't change, so staying sad would be unhealthy and is a waste of time. I quit displaying photos at home except for one 4 foot tall multi frame display of grandchildren. Of course I do not have up to date pictures of DIL/DS's kids since they don't share, and I don't see them to take my own photos. At least I have a few of the kids, even if they aren't recent. Facebook can be a hurtful tool for some folks, I know because there have been awful things said on there for the world to see. Sometimes it's best to not even look, and also wise to block those that put awful things on your wall! I do not have time for childish games. To all that have posted on this topic, keep your chin up. We are important people too! I am sorry there are people that are so thoughtless to others, but that's reality and life is too short to question why. Wishing all of you wonderful ladies a wonderful day.

[LaurieS]

I can't help but think that she did this deliberately to hurt me. It makes me feel so unwanted. I just want to cry. What explanation is there for this in the day and age of digital photography? She uploaded these pics DAYS after our engagement. Shouldn't that have still been on her mind? Shouldn't she have wanted to include her new (soon to be) DIL?

Anywho, I'm just SAD and could use some insight 

Adil... what  did your dh say about this.. I know that guys are often oblivious to these nasty unnecessary games, but doesn't it bother him that the woman he is married to has been so callously excluded from his family?

Holli, I guess I have the same question for you.. has your dh even noticed that his mother has chopped you out.. thank god she didn't insert her own face on your body or something really sick.

I could be summing it up to easily, but I can't help  but to see the insecurities in people who conduct their lives in this manner.   I know that I was thinking about trying to have my three kids photographed together.  Of course I would also have one taken with my son and his wife, but I would like to have one of the three brothers and sisters.. My son approached me with concerns of leaving his wife out of the picture.. I said I'm not I'll have a pic of you two.. he said yes but she feels that she should be with us kids... I thought why?  Am I slighting her by thinking this way?

[overwhelmed123]

FB is the root of a lot of problems, especially when you're dealing with a passive aggressive person.  I have also been in that boat but with a different situation.  My DH's stepsister took pictures for us at our wedding (a verbal agreement we made ahead of time- she was basically acting as our 2nd photographer) and decided to hold them hostage after my MIL fussed enough about what a big meanie my DH was for giving her boundaries and enforcing them.  Furthermore, I requested new family photos be done while people were in town for the wedding because their old family photo was years and years ago and DH's ex wife (she was only his girlfriend at the time) is in all the pictures, which of course were plastered all over all of their houses.  So I thought- hey, now that we're married and they hadn't had a family photo in probably 7 years, it would be a good opportunity and they can have a new picture without DH's xw in it.  Well, I coordinated that with stepsis as well and the whole family acted as if they thought it was a great idea and were completely on board with it.  When stepsis sent her letter to us telling us she was not giving us any of the pictures she already agreed to take for us, she told us she wasn't giving us the family photos either and she wasn't going to "spend any time" on them until she saw that "a real family existed."  Fine, no sweat off my back because quite frankly at that point their pictures weren't going up in my house anytime soon anyway...

But then, MIL opened up a facebook account and made her profile picture a crop of herself from the family pictures we took.  (I only found out because stupid facebook did the "people you may know" on the side and she came up one day)  Then I see that her sister- DH's aunt- changes her profile picture to a cropped pic of herself from the family pictures that I had requested.  I can't help but think that they did this to show me- "Haha, we got these pictures and you didn't!"  Then when MIL writes to DH, she tells him 'I don't know why stepsister won't send them, I would like a copy of them too!"  So she clearly flat out lied, because she obviously has copies of some of them.  I eventually took his aunt off my facebook friends and of course his mom and I never added each other.  But I remember being so hurt that the pictures that I coordinated and I had the agreement with stepsister on OBVIOUSLY went to my MIL while being held over my head.  I would bet a good amount of money that she also received the wedding pictures that are being refused to me as well.  I know fb causes so many problems, but I still don't think I will deactivate anytime soon.  I already cancelled one of my social network accounts because DH's xw was stalking me and I finally just had to cancel.  I refuse to let them ruin my fun with my friends again.

ANYWAY, really stop looking at her stuff.  I agree (and had to finally realize myself) that pondering why and what you ever did to her to make her dislike you won't get you anywhere.  It's not you- she's the one with the problem.  If this is going to upset you, I'd avoid her page and maybe put her on limited profile on your end if you don't feel it's an appropriate time to just flat out block her.

[overwhelmed123]

Laurie- are you talking about your 3 kids WITH you and H?  Or just your 3 kids together by themselves?  If that's the case, I think DIL needs to get a grip.  I can't remember, are your other kids married?

[LaurieS]

Laurie- are you talking about your 3 kids WITH you and H?  Or just your 3 kids together by themselves?  If that's the case, I think DIL needs to get a grip.  I can't remember, are your other kids married?

Yeah I wasn't real clear.. sorry... just the three kids by themselves.. and no my other kids are not married..and I could see them saying but shouldn't so and so my bf/gf etc be in the picture blah blah blah.  I thought I was being nice to offer to have a photographer take a picture of them together.  I doubt that she really wants one hanging in her house with her dh's kid bro and sister, who btw might be making ugly faces behind dil's head.

[overwhelmed123]

Uhhhhhhhh yeah I'm still going with DIL needs to get her panties out of a twist.  She's not a sibling.  It's not like you're including the rest of the family without her, and you're still getting a picture of the two of them.  Dang, DS needs to tell her to woman up!

[tryingmybest]

I've been married for almost 36 years now, and on a visit to my MIL's apartment I noticed a beautiful family photo montage hanging on her wall, everyone was in it..well almost everyone - not one picture of me. Hmm, but she's a strange person. I remembered when my my SIL got married in 1993 I was going through chemo for breast cancer -  and was the only family member not asked to participate in some way in the ceremony..not only that neither she or her daughter even spoke to me during the reception..can you say cancer isn't catching ladies?... finally decided none of it had a blasted thing to do with me, her stuff was her stuff and I could choose how much energy I wanted to spend dealing with it, answer - none!  .  And 17 -years later I'm still here, probably drives her nuts

[Pen]

Oh, the photo issues. I'm so sorry for we who are dealing with the passive-aggressive tactic of DIL/MIL using photos against us. How childish.

It's odd because I woke up this morning thinking about DS's childhood pics that DIL "borrowed" for a slide show at the wedding. She requested pics that only had DS in them (should have been my first clue.) They were never returned. One of them is framed and hangs on their wall now with all the photos of her FOO, not one of DS's FOO.

Note to self: Next time, I won't let anyone hurry me; I'll make sure I have time to scan and print. I'll never let go of the originals. (My thought was "She's family, I can trust her.")

DS/DIL's wedding pics or video? Still waiting. Luckily my friend had a camera, LOL.

[overwhelmed123]

I have to give full disclosure:  My MIL has not received any of the professional photographs from our wedding.  A month after the wedding she really lost her mind with testing DH's boundaries.  That when when our "time out" started and ultimately evolved into a cut off.  It was still a time out when we got our pictures back.  We got our video back before the pictures, but still when we were in a time out and I still sent it to MIL.  But after I heard that stepsister had conspired to hold our wedding pictures hostage because of all the lies MIL was telling her...I wasn't too keen on the idea of spending my energy copying all my other photographers' pictures to CD for her.   I suggested it anyway as I thought maybe it would help her warm up to the idea of conceding and compromising with us about her behavior and DH tossed that idea out the window really quickly.  Truthfully, I was kind of glad he didn't want to, so I didn't press the issue.  Besides, I figure she can get wedding pictures from her little pet stepsister since she won't give them to us.

HOWEVER, Pen, I know you never did anything like this so I really feel bad for you about not getting wedding pictures.  Have you guys ever asked for them?

[holliberri]

@Laurie, I made mention of it to DH once (especially since they were photos I took) and he insisted I was seeing something that wasn't there.

Also...I was at Christmas with my ILs. MIL has 7 other brothers and sisters (4 brothers, 3 sisters). They were ALL married at the time the following photos were taken: GMIL and all of her children, GMIL and her girls, GMIL and her boys.

@Pen, I can not get a legitimate glossy photo of my DH growing up. My wedding had printed copies of his photos while mine were glossy copies of originals. His were really grainy and an awful mess. That should've been my first clue. I certainly would've paid to get photo-quality copies of the originals, but I wasn't trusted to do that. I never would've kept anything. I also think that if I was in her place, I would have had fun collecting the photos (being a part of the wedding planning a bit) and then paid for glossy photo prints myself to give to my child. I would be part of making their day special that way.

I've never seen one photo that MIL has taken of us, yet she has all of mine (yes, she has printed out all 1500 photos I've taken since DD has been born). She's like a photo hoarder, and I feel like I'm not able to give a piece of my DD's history to her. She must have all my photos but when it comes time for sharing..no way.

The clincher?

I needed a photo of DH and I for our adoption papers. I figured I'd ask my mom for one and her for one (since they do take photos of us on special occasions). Digital photos are the norm nowadays, right? She should just e-mail me one over...no problem, I'll take care of the rest. She did e-mail. She e-mailed me a scanned copy of the photo instead of a copy of the original photo file. It was unusable. This is the woman I invited to go along to travel with me when the time comes to adopt.

Facebook photos don't bother me a bit, not being on her walls doesn't bother me either, the copies of the photos at the wedding was just small stuff, but the photo for the adoption? Something that I'm including her in and something that is very important to DH and I? I don't understand it.   

[LaurieS]

It might be quite possible that she doesn't understand what you actually needed for the papers.. I know my own fil is so bad about photos.. he prints out photos from cell phone files and then tries to frame the computer paper photo that he finally printed and he sees nothing wrong with the quality.  I'm into photo quality.. some people just don't see it.

[holliberri]

Haha. I asked, Laurie. I asked. So, the adoption agency has a photo of DH's especially long arm holding the camera for us, with me standing on a chair to get on his level. And when we take self-portraits like that, I never realized, but I stick my nose up. It took like 10 takes before I was able to avoid nostril shots.

[luise.volta]

Regarding people deliberately doing hurtful things...that is always about them and how we respond is about us. It took forever for me really get that and I have felt so much better since I got it. I used to think my reaction was their fault and then I felt so helpless.  I'm not! They do what they do and I am my own person.

[holliberri]

But, Louise! Controlling what other people do is so much easier! 

I definitely see the wisdom in your statement, and while it has gotten me far trying to live by that (7 years ago, I'm sure I'd have been steaming mad about my photos being altered)...man...what a work in progress I am. There's always something else I find that bothers me. Maybe, I'm just too difficult. 

[LaurieS]

Haha. I asked, Laurie. I asked. So, the adoption agency has a photo of DH's especially long arm holding the camera for us, with me standing on a chair to get on his level. And when we take self-portraits like that, I never realized, but I stick my nose up. It took like 10 takes before I was able to avoid nostril shots.

Oh are you talking about the two faces and a shoulder shot?   I hate those.. it's like facebook gone adopting  ... I think that 80% of all fb photos have that same shoulder shot