One aspect of weddings that many look forward to as much, or more, as others absolutely dread is the family reunion that comes with it.
Indeed, relatives from all over often travel far and wide to be at the happy couple’s special day.
Sometimes, the couple getting married will make an effort to accommodate these traveling friends and family members.
Other times, these same people take the happy couple by surprise and ask to be accommodated.
Redditor Sea-Dragonfly-1425 was soon to be married, and many family members of the original poster (OP)’s fiancé were traveling a considerable distance to attend the wedding.
These same family members were also hoping to stay with the OP and their fiancé during this time.
An idea the OP was firmly against.
Wondering if she was out of line for this, the OP took to the subReddit “Am I the A**hole” (AITA), where they asked fellow Redditors:
“AITA for refusing to host overseas family at our home during our wedding?”
The OP explained why they were less than eager to host their fiancé’s family ahead of their wedding:
“My fiancé and I are getting married in just over a year, and we have indirectly found out that there is an expectation for us to host extended family members of my fiancé’s family when they visit to attend our wedding.”
“For context, my partner’s maternal family is from South-East Asia, and we would be expected to host five family members (with the remaining four family members staying at my fiancé’s parents’ house).”
“Flights are yet to be booked, and we still don’t know for sure exactly how long they will be staying.”
“For further context, my partner and I are currently building our very first house, which is expected to be finished in the next few months (so roughly 10 months before we get married), which adds further stress of having to make sure our house is fully furnished and ready for hosting.”
“My fiancé’s family don’t speak the best English, and they will not have access to a car due to us needing them for work (nor will we have the time to be driving people around).”
“My sister-in-law is far better at speaking the language than my fiancé is, and she has a car and license, so we thought it would be helpful for her to stay with us (and she is happy to do this).”
“However, my sister-in-law would have just started her university degree and is also in the bridal party, and realistically, I think it would be a lot of pressure for her to have to manage this.”
“Also, my fiancé’s parents’ house is going to be about a 40-minute car drive from our house, so it’s not like his mum can pop over that regularly.”
“I feel overwhelmed at the thought of having eight people (this includes my sister-in-law and us), as well as our large dog (his family doesn’t have experience with dogs, and they have a five-year-old child), in our house leading up to the wedding and potentially afterwards.”
“We are not going on our honeymoon until a few months after we get married, so after our 2-night hotel stay, we would have to come home as a freshly married couple to a full house of people.”
“After thinking about it and upon discussion with my fiancé, we have decided that we are going to tell his mum that we will not be hosting anybody at our house due to the stress of the wedding and us still working full-time.”
“This is yet to happen, and my fiancé is extremely nervous to have this conversation, and he feels as though it is a burden on his parents, which I totally disagree with.”
“I am also extremely annoyed that this is just an expectation, and we haven’t even been asked whether we are okay with it (nor have we been directly told).”
“An arrangement we will be suggesting instead would be to have my fiancé’s sister and brother stay with us instead, freeing up 2 bedrooms in his parents’ house, but this might look offensive, as though we have something against his overseas family.”
“This would also mean that my fiancé’s parents would have 9 family members from overseas at their house (excluding my fiancé’s brother and sister).”
“So, am I the a**hole for refusing to host my fiancé’s family at our house?”
Fellow Redditors weighed in on where they believed the OP fell in this particular situation, by declaring:
- NTA – Not The A**hole
- YTA – You’re The A**hole
- NAH – No A**holes Here
- ESH – Everyone Sucks Here
The Reddit community was in agreement that the OP was not the a**hole for refusing to host their fiancé’s family ahead of their wedding:
Just about everyone agreed that the OP did not need the added stress of hosting their fiancé’s family, and an alternative solution was not difficult to achieve:
“NTA.”
“I come from a similar culture where it is normal to host a large number of relatives with no questions asked, and I know how hard it used to be on my mom to accommodate this many people.”
“You shouldn’t have to worry about this on top of your wedding preparations and moving into your new house.”
“Also, they should have at least asked first; it should not be simply expected from you.”
“Since this is your fiancé’s family, he should be able to deal with this without anyone taking it personally or blaming you.”- Icy_Leg_3370
“NTA.”
“You do not have the responsibility to host 5 people while also getting married.”
“Look up the appropriate Airbnb options nearest your MIL’s house if hotels are out of the question and encourage her to select something suitable for the family.”
“You are hosting a wedding, not a reunion, not a summer camp.”
“Your focus is on hosting the wedding.”
“When we bought our place with next to no help from my in-laws, my MIL tried to turn our guest room into her overflow guest space.”
“We let it go once because we were excited to see those relatives, but made it clear it could not happen again.”
“She tried it a second time a year later, and my husband shut her down, especially because she tried to pawn off truly unpleasant people we had no relationship with to avoid hosting them herself.”-wildferalfun
“NTA.”
“Didn’t even read the majority of your post.”
“Weddings are stressful, and the last thing you need is having to host guests, family or not, at home while trying to deal with it.”
“Got married myself in September 2024, I’m Irish, living in Norway and my family stayed in a nearby Air BnB in the lead up to and after the wedding (we all stayed at the venue the night of), there was zero question of them staying at our place, it was stressful enough without that and they didn’t expect it.”
“The wedding is for you, not them.”- DeepInASheepOr2
“NTA.”
“Make your house absolutely not ready on time.”
“Give yourselves perfect cover and necessitate hotels.”- SteelBox5
“NTA.”
“Look into an Airbnb or short-term rental that can accommodate them.”
“There’s no way I’d host a bunch of people and deal with a wedding.”- KingsRansom79
There were some, however, who urged the OP to consider that the family of the OP’s fiancé staying with them might have been a cultural thing, and that the OP might want to consider a conversation before dismissing the notion completely:
“So this is likely a cultural thing.”
“While the conversation will be very awkward, setting hard boundaries that SE Asian culture may be a background setting to your lives, you will not be living that life yourselves.”
“I don’t think you’re the a**hole.”
“But I also don’t think your future in-laws are either – they may not have even considered it a question.”
“What will make them a**holes is if they don’t accept your decision.”
“NTA / NAH.”- westwestmoreland
“NAH.”
“You need to discuss the cultural impact with your fiancée.”
“I married into a SE Asian family.”
“We had two weddings, one in his hometown, for the extended family and friends who couldn’t travel overseas, and one in my hometown.”
“It was expected that we would cover costs, including accommodation, entertainment, etc., while they visited.”
“When we visit them, they host us the same way.”
“At the weddings, we were given red envelopes full of money (which actually covered our entire honeymoon costs) to go towards costs, rather than gifts.”
“However, we had a budget wedding, married in a garden with a celebrant, and pub-style dinners in the function centre attached.”
“My older sister is a pastry chef and made our cake as a gift.”
“The Aussie wedding cost $6k total, for 80 people, including bridal party clothes (I got my dress online for $80 and then altered locally for $50, my sisters bought cocktail dresses and the men already had nice tailored suits so just bought the right colour shirts) and renting a guest house for the week ($1k, before air bnb existed).”
“It WAS 26 years ago, so things have definitely gone up.”
“Though if I did it again, I wouldn’t spend much more than that because I don’t see the value in spending heaps for one day.”
“But not hosting the family was not an option.”- The_Boots_of_Truth
Any soon-to-be-married couple already has more than enough to deal with ahead of their big day, so having one last thing thrown at them, including extended family staying with them, will likely throw them over the edge.
Even so, it doesn’t seem that the family of the OP’s fiancé is deliberately trying to inconvenience them, but they do seem to have a certain level of expectations that the OP might not understand.
Hopefully, something a civil conversation might smooth over.