Vacations are meant to be an incredibly fun time and a way to decompress and relax from the hardships of work and life.
But when family or friends are involved, it can get complicated, admitted the “Am I the A**hole?” (AITA) subReddit.
When she inherited her grandmother’s family vacation house, Redditor Short-Reflection-423 decided to change the rules for who could go there.
The family divided on how she was handling things, the Original Poster (OP) wondered if she was being too harsh.
She asked the sub:
“AITA for not allowing my brother and his wife to stay over in our family vacation house if they bring their dogs?”
The OP became the new owner of the family vacation home.
“My brother and his wife (both 27) have two dogs.”
“I never liked dogs at all but my brother and his wife both forced their dogs down our throats for years whenever they came into our family vacation house.”
“For the record, the family vacation home used to belong to my grandma, but after she passed a year ago, she passed it down on me, so technically now it’s my house.”
“All of my siblings and my parents are still allowed to vacation in the house, of course, and that won’t and will never change.”
She changed the rules at the vacation home.
“My brother and his wife used to bring their dogs, but now that I’m the legal owner and also a mother of two kids, I made sure to tell them that he and his wife are welcome, but the dogs aren’t.”
“I despise dogs and I also don’t want them around my kids.”
“My mom and dad backed me up on that decision.”
“My brother and his wife weren’t too happy about it, and they said they’d not visit at all if they weren’t allowed to bring the dogs.”
“I told them to leave the dogs in a pet hotel or with some relatives of his wife.”
“They said this is not possible and they’ll just make sure to vacation elsewhere where their dogs are welcome as well.”
The family was divided on the situation.
“I got mad at them for it and so did my parents, and I told them they’re ridiculous for valuing their f**king dogs over their vacation time with family.”
“They didn’t care.”
“The rest of my siblings claim that I’m TA for how I reacted.”
“They said I’m right to not want the dogs in the house but I can’t get mad at our brother and his wife for not being comfortable visiting the family vacation home under these conditions.”
“They claimed our brother respected my conditions and I’m just mad he instead chose to vacation elsewhere instead of catering to me and vacationing in my house without his dogs.”
“AITA?”
Fellow Redditors weighed in:
- NTA: Not the A**hole
- YTA: You’re the A**hole
- ESH: Everybody Sucks Here
- NAH: No A**holes Here
Some agreed with the couple and said they’d rather vacation with their dogs than the OP.
“Yeah, why are you mad though? You can spend time with them some other way. They want to vacation with their dogs.”
“Would you go to their vacation house if they barred your children? Same principle. Let other people enjoy their vacations and mellow out about it. Anger is bad for the body. YTA.” – s**tsuri
“I’m more of a cat person but dogs are 100% better than OP. Unless it’s a small dog.” – Additional-Still1604
“I was just thinking how much I would rather vacation with my dog, or any dog for that matter, rather than OP. Vacations are for relaxing. People who openly admit that others need to cater to them are not relaxing to be around.”
“OP is TA. Even though she supposedly gave them two options, there was only one correct answer for her.” – finntastic74
“OP is mad because they wanted the power rush of forcing their brother to kowtow to their decision, to rub in his face how much ‘better’ a pet-free vacation is, etc.”
“In other words, OP is mad because the brother saw this for what it was, and decided, ‘Yeah no, vacationing with my extended family actually isn’t that important to me.'” – calliatom
“She LITERALLY EVEN SAYS IT, ‘They won’t cater’ to her demands. That’s exactly why she is mad. Because they won’t give her bully self what she demanded.”
“She FULLY expects that ownership of the house now makes her THE ruler, to be obeyed, or suffer the wrath. When all the idiot really has is a vacation home she was given to lord over.” – Cautious_Thought1713
“YTA. Hey, I’m a dog person, but I respect your decision to keep your vacation house dog free. But you can’t have it both ways, for those of us with animals that we love, and take with us everywhere, I too would choose to vacation somewhere else if my dog wasn’t allowed.”
“You don’t get to be mad at them for honoring your request. It feels to me a bit like this was a power play for you, and you thought you were going to finally get rid of those awful dogs that you want to keep your kids away from.”
“Unfortunately means you also don’t get to see parts of your family then. I guess for you you need to figure out if this is the hill you wanna die on.” – Roadgoddess
“OP’s brother is probably happy for the out. Now they can take their dogs to new locations instead of being stuck at the family vacation house every year.” – LadyGreyIcedTea
Others agreed and said it was a sign to them when people said they didn’t like dogs.
“How does that saying go? ‘I’m suspicious of humans who don’t like dogs, but I trust dogs who don’t like a human.'” – Grenflik
“Even though my ex-wife was the impetus behind my first dog (Lovey) joining the household, Lovey never really listened all that much to my ex.”
“Towards other strangers, she ranged from wary to downright hostile. (She was not social with other people, unless they were at doggy day camp because she liked other dogs.) It was more territorial, but she still took cues from me.”
“When my now-wife (we’ll hit 14 years in July) came down to see me, I warned her that Lovey was not necessarily the most receptive to strangers.”
“When her son went upstairs to play on the game console, and it was just me, my then-GF, and Lovey, Lovey’s forehead scrunched up, and Lovey decided she wanted some pets from my GF.”
“My wife says the look on Lovey’s face was, ‘Oh good! You’re here to take care of him now. I didn’t want the job, have fun!'” – GolfballDM
“When my dog was younger, he was so fond of attention, he’d put his ears backward, small tail wiggle to say, ‘attention for me?!’ It worked so often.”
“One day we’re walking home and a guy stops on a bicycle and approaches me with some story of how he’s English and he’s vacationing here with his family and how their passports were stolen. If I had the money for a train to the embassy.”
“Either way, I don’t carry cash when I walk the dog, so he was out of luck anyway. My dog, however, completely ignored this guy, so I decided this guy was probably full of it.”
“Exactly one week later, a Sunday again, same time, the same place, I walk back home. A couple walks in front of me. This same dude gets off his bike and tells them the same story. The dog was right.” – Lead-Forsaken
“And it doesn’t sound like these dogs have any real behavioral issues cause OP would for sure have included that to make their point seem more valid.”
“The ‘I don’t want them around my kids’ line really bothered me, because if the dogs aren’t aggressive, or overly large and boisterous, then what’s the issue? Not allowing your kid near animals is just an AH move.” – NancyNuggets
“As someone with a family cabin (built by my family generations ago) and a family member who’s clearly hoping to inherit it so that he can control who visits and on what conditions, I know what this situation feels like.”
“Honestly, YTA on that basis alone. You don’t get to have it both ways. It’s either a family vacation home or YOUR vacation home that you let family visit.”
“But speaking to your specific question, YTA for expecting your sibling to roll over and do what you want after they respected your decision but chose the “wrong” option offered in your ultimatum.”
“Unless you have a really good reason to not want dogs around, you have no right to expect them to be okay with this change, or to keep visiting when they’ve been specifically singled out.” – Semiotic_Sproud
While the OP was sure that she was in the right for how the situation had gone, the subReddit did not agree.
There’s nothing wrong with not liking or being uncomfortable with dogs, but it is wrong to push those feelings onto someone else. The OP was especially wrong to be angry with her brother for choosing to vacation elsewhere when she’d given him no choice but to leave his dogs at home if he wanted to visit her.