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Bride Furious After Her Cousin Tries To Guilt Trip Her For Having An ‘Adults Only’ Wedding

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Brides-to-be are entitled to have their perfect wedding mutually enjoyed with their invitees.

But they can’t please everybody.

Redditor mashlit is about to get married in two months and is dealing with a family member who will not take no for an answer in regards to an invitational restriction.

She visited the “Am I the A**hole” (AITA) subReddit and asked:

“AITA for telling my cousin I won’t make an exception for her son at my wedding?”

The Original Poster (OP) made her stipulation clear from the beginning.

“I (26 F[emale]) am getting married in about two months. I sent out my wedding invitations recently and at the bottom it says ‘ADULTS ONLY. NO EXCEPTIONS.’”

“First let me say that I love kids. But my fiancĂ© and I made the decision to not allow kids/babies to our ceremony because they get bored, cry, won’t sit still, have tantrums… and I just don’t want that to happen during our wedding.”

“We’re also going to have an open bar, and I don’t particularly want a bunch of drunk adults around my little cousins or my friend’s children.”

“I have a cousin, we’ll call her Sam, that text me last night saying ‘so you’re dead honest seriously telling me I cannot bring (her son) to your wedding’- to which I said yes.”

“Sam responds ‘then I can’t come and that f****** kills me. I just want you to know how badly I want to be there and I have dreamt my entire life of standing next to you at your wedding. But I just can’t want to be somewhere with someone who doesn’t want the other half of my heart there.’”

“She’s trying guilt trip me into letting her bring her son. Saying ‘and I’ve confided in my best friends and they say it’s your wedding it’s your right to have it the way you want, but yeah. I just want you to know it’s not vengeance when I don’t come. I’ll probably cry like a b**** the entire day.’”

“I suggested that she take her son (he’s seven) to his friends house for a few hours, so that she can attend. She says ‘I can’t just tell him no and leave him somewhere. I’m not strong enough to do that to his sensitive little heart. I could, if he wasn’t so aware and sensitive. It would hurt him too much. He’s too smart to manipulate.’”

“I’m not asking her to manipulate her son. I’m asking that she be an adult, and tell him he can’t come and that children aren’t allowed to attend, so she’ll take him to his friends while she’s gone.”

“Not to mention, that she’s angry that I didn’t choose her to be my Maid of Honor. I chose my step-sister. While on the phone, Sam said ‘I don’t mean any offense by this, but F’K HER.’”

“She’s literally only mad because my dad cheated on my mom 10 years ago and married the woman he cheated with. She hates my sister, because she hates my step mom.”

“I ended up being on the phone with her for half an hour talking to her about this. With her constantly telling me ‘I’m trying to get sober, so I just wanted to talk to you and tell you how I feel.’”

“Which to me, sounds like she’s going to blame me if I still tell her no, and she decides to drink/so drugs again.”

“We ended the phone call with her saying ‘will you just promise me one thing, even if it’s a lie? Will you just promise me that you’ll consider it, and that you’ll talk to your fiancĂ© about it?’”

“So I told her yes, that I promised I’d consider it/talk to him about it. And I did, I considered it, I talked (angry cried) to him, and I’m not changing my mind.”

“Am I the A**hole?”

Anonymous strangers on the internet passed judgment by declaring:

  • NTA – Not The A**hole
  • YTA – You’re The A**hole
  • ESH – Everyone Sucks Here
  • NAH – No A**holes Here

Redditors declared NTA and criticized the cousin for coddling her seven-year-old.

“NTA. It takes zero parenting skill to tell a 7 year old that you’re going to an adults only event and he’s going to stay with xxx because he’d be bored going with mom.”

“Your cousin is trying (poorly) to make your wedding about her. She can sit down now.” – mandilew

“Alternatively, it takes having zero parenting skills to raise a child who is actually as sensitive as this woman is describing.”

“Like, how is a 7 year old THAT fragile unless you emotionally f’ked him up or let him get f’ked up by someone else in some way?” – Herculaya

“Right. A three year old crying because they’re not going to something their parents are going to, I could understand. A seven year old though? Why wouldn’t a seven year old want to go and play at a friend’s house instead of going to a boring wedding?” – badgersprite

The same Redditor added:

“Honestly you probably don’t even have to give that much of an explanation to kids. I have memories of my parents being fancily dressed up and just saying they were going out and here’s the baby sitter (they probably told me earlier they were going out that night and I just forgot).”

“It could have been a work thing. It could have been a wedding. It wouldn’t have made any difference to me. I was probably too busy playing video games to care. if anything, I was like sweet I get to hang out at home with my cool teenage babysitters.” – badgersprite

“Jaysus… After reading all that, I’d rather the kid came by himself and she stayed home.” – AKneelingOx

“She sounds like Petunia Dursley talking about ‘her diddy Duddikins.’ I feel bad for the poor kid, he’s probably being smothered.” – Stormdanc3

“She sounds like an emotional vampire. Poor OP really needs to learn not to feed into this and just say ‘okay that sucks well I have to go.'” – Jilltro

This Redditor gave plenty of reasons against having the cousin present at the wedding.

“I-N-F-O: Sober? Alcoholic/drug using Sober? Then you should tell her that she shouldn’t be at your OPEN BAR Wedding anyway. Don’t want her to ruin her sobriety with the temptation of FREE DRINKS.”

“NTA, seriously, she shouldn’t be there anyway. At minimum one of (5!) things will happen if she does: She starts a fight with your step-sister, proclaiming she should be the MOH- and pushing her way into the Bridal group.”

“She gets stupid drunk, because she’s ‘Sober’ and you’re worried about her doing drugs if she can’t come? (Seriously, she’s going to get high or drunk because she wants to and you have nothing to do with it!)”

“She’s going to try and bring her son anyway, a) sneak him in, or b) insist you made an exception for her alone (Which will cause so much sh*t!)”

“Starts a fight with your dad (I-N-F-O Why TF does she care your dad cheated? She want to sleep with him or something?) And/OR Step-Mom.”

“She Crashes your reception High On something, just to pick a fight with you, for not inviting her sensitive 7 year old- HOW COULD YOU?!”

“*Mix and Match the listed above into any combination- swear to GOD! at least one to all five of these happening if she comes.”

“Tell your MOH, your Bridesmaids what’s going on with Cousin; even let your Hubby’s Groomsmen know; the Red Wine Patrol is put together to have a plan to prevent Drama on your Big Day!”

“EDIT: Tell your MOH that she’s in charge of Cousin from now on; and let Cousin know that all future negotiation now must go through your MOH!” – neverliveindoubt

Overall, Redditors said the OP was NTA and encouraged her to leave no room for discussion or confusion with her cousin.

Written by Koh Mochizuki

Koh Mochizuki is a Los Angeles based actor whose work has been spotted anywhere from Broadway stages to Saturday Night Live.
He received his B.A. in English literature and is fluent in Japanese.
In addition to being a neophyte photographer, he is a huge Disney aficionado and is determined to conquer all Disney parks in the world to publish a photographic chronicle one day. Mickey goals.
Instagram: kohster Twitter: @kohster1 Flickr: nyckmo