A widow has gone viral after revealing her former sister-in-law demanded she give back jewelry made from her dead husband’s wedding ring.
give back jewelry made from her dead husband’s wedding ring.
The 27-year-old woman took to Reddit to explain she is now engaged to another man after her first husband died five months into their marriage when his car collided with a drunk driver.
After his death, she eventually took their wedding rings to a jeweler to have them melted down and reformed to “a pendant and some small stud earrings.” Since then, she has worn the necklace everyday partly because “I like the idea of having a tangible part of him with me always.”
The woman explained that she eventually began dating again and is now engaged after her 34-year-old boyfriend of two years proposed last week. After the proposal, she met with her former sister-in-law who “congratulated” her on her new engagement before presenting her with a surprising request.
“… She then asked me if she could have my necklace since it would mean more to her as his sister then it would to me now that I was getting remarried and moving on. Which honestly stunned me that anyone would outright ask for something like that,” the bride said.
She explained that she told the sister that she would “think about” giving her the necklace, which had been made out of “a small emerald ring” that they had found “on holiday at a local jeweler.” She then sought out some advice from her best friend who recommended that she let go of the necklace.
“She thinks that I should probably give it to [the sister] as it would mean more to her, and I should shed anything from my old life and embrace my new one. She said that I should get a new necklace and make new memories, and that she would go with me or I could ask my fiancé,” the bride said.
The 27-year-old said that while she has “moved on” and was “completely happy” in her new relationship, she still felt compelled to keep the necklace to remember her former love. She added that her fiancé did not care that she kept the necklace and that he “understands that I will always have some level of grief.”
“A part of [me] will always have love for my former husband and mourn him and the life that we could have had together, and I don’t think that that takes away anything from my new relationship. They are different loves and lives,” she noted.
Several agreed that the woman should keep her necklace made from the wedding rings, including one person who wrote, “The necklace is yours and it is wildly inappropriate for your former sister-in -law to ask for it. I see nothing wrong with hanging on to a memento of someone who helped make you who you are.”
“The rings were something that sealed your bond. Between you and him. Not anyone else, not his and his sister,” another person commented. “Even though the rings are now a necklace it still is a reminder of the life you had together. Your past is your past and you are allowed to keep stuff from the past.”
Others noted that it was “inappropriate” for her sister-in-law to have asked for the item, including one who said, “I can’t even imagine asking someone for a commemorative piece of jewelry that they had made specifically for themselves. Wildly inappropriate.”
The bride shared in an update that she ultimately decided to keep the necklace and would take advice from the commenters in the post on how to break it to the sister.
“Because of our history I want to give her the benefit of the doubt at first, but if she pushes the topic then I will have to make some choices,” she explained. “I am not sure how I am going to word it yet or if I want to say it via text or in person. But I will figure that out.”
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