Carolyn Bourne, Mother-In-Law from Hell

Carolyn Bourne and husbane

A nasty email sent by British woman Carolyn Bourne to her son's future bride has come back to haunt her. The vitriolic florist who lives in the south of England hates her future daughter-in-law and decided to put her thoughts into an email.

Heidi Withers

The trouble started when her son’s intended, Ms Heidi Withers, paid a visit to her fiance’s family home in Devon. Ms Bourne described the young woman’s behaviour as “staggering in its uncouthness and lack of grace.” Heidi was furious and sent the email to a group of friends and before long, the email became famous. Here is an excerpt:

From: Carolyn Bourne

To: Heidi Withers

Subject: Your lack of manners

When you are a guest in another's house, you do not declare what you will and will not eat - unless you are positively allergic to something.

You do not remark that you do not have enough food. You do not start before everyone else. You do not take additional helpings without being invited to by your host.

When a guest in another's house, you do not lie in bed until late morning in households that rise early - you fall in line with house norms.

Your should never ever insult the family you are about to join at any time and most definitely not in public. I gather you passed this off as a joke but the reaction in the pub was one of shock, not laughter.

You regularly draw attention to yourself. Perhaps you should ask yourself why. No one gets married in a castle unless they own it. It is brash, celebrity-style behaviour.

I understand your parents are unable to contribute very much towards the cost of your wedding. (There is nothing wrong with that except that convention is such that one might presume they would have saved over the years for their daughters' marriages.) If this is the case, it would be most ladylike and gracious to lower your sights and have a modest wedding as befits both your incomes.

One could be accused of thinking that Heidi Withers must be patting herself on the back for having caught a most eligible young man. I pity Freddie.

I'll wager Carolyn Bourne will rue the day she put those thoughts onto paper because she's not very bright. If Freddy really loves this girl, she has just cut ties with him, probably forever, and ruined her chances of ever holding any grand-children he may have in her arms.