AITAH for telling my daughter she is a spoiled brat and doesn’t know what a hard life is?

Family dynamics can be complicated, especially when past trauma is involved. In this case, a father explains how his 16-year-old daughter invited her mother’s abusive parents to a birthday party, despite knowing about the pain they caused.

The situation escalated when the grandparents arrived uninvited, leading to a serious altercation. Now, he’s wondering if he handled things correctly or if he went too easy on his daughter, considering the harm her actions caused. Was he too lenient, or did he handle it right?

‘AITAH for telling my daughter she is a spoiled brat and doesn’t know what a hard life is?’

Okay so background I 40m am married to a 38f. We met in high school. Wife’s parents are terrible. Completely abused her until she moved out at 18. My wife has always tried to be a good mother, and break the abusive cycle. We both have good jobs, they want for nothing, we tried not to spoil. They have chores, know there manners, are good kids in school.

So my daughter came home one day and asked us to go visit her grandparents house, we said yeah because we thought she meant my parents. But no she meant my wife’s. My wife immediately said no. Then I backed her, and said they will have no part in their lives. She said I was overreacting and that she deserves to meet all her grandparents. And we were being selfish. My wife was diagnosed with ptsd, and still sees a therapist,due to all the bullshit that she went through. It really annoyed me and I sent her to her room.

I talked to my wife and said that I should tell her what happened. So she understands why we are saying no. That her parents aren’t good people. My wife was reluctant but agreed as long as she didn’t have to be there so she wasn’t triggered. I went to my daughters room the next day and I talked to her. I said, “look I understand you are upset but, we are not saying no just to say no. There is a lot you do not understand, but I’m going to explain it, so that Mabey you understand more.

Your moms parents where abusive, she was humiliated daily, screamed and terrorized since she was 6 yrs old. Every moment and holiday was ruined by fear, and she almost died on Thanksgiving Day due to her stepfather. that your mom and her sister still suffer from the trauma and that we will never have a relationship with them. And I hope that she understands now” something along the lines of that. I told her and thought she understood.

Anyway it was my wife’s birthday a week ago and (she doesn’t like celebrating honestly but does it for us) it was actually a really great day. My wife’s sister and our two other children and my whole family were there celebrating at our house. Until around 7 at night a knock at my door and my daughter went to answer the door, we figured it was a friend of hers. But when she came right back in the living room it was my shitty Mother in law and Father in law.

My wife and her sister both frozen, and they came in like they f*cking owned the place. Trying to be buddy buddy. My wife asked them in a timid voice and said “what are you doing here” they said “our grand daughter invited us” she then tried to speak up more and tell them they needed to go. But they wouldn’t I got up and went between my wife and them and said to “leave, they are unwanted here”. My daughter really stood up for them and said that she talked to them. And that mom just exaggerated what happened. And that they where good parents.

That’s when my father in law said “that’s right whatever we did to you ungrateful kids you deserved” that pissed my wife off and she shouted to leave. I went up with my dad and we were going to push him out. But he 64 250lbs at least got us off him and he pushed my wife into the wall her head hit straight back at the wall . She had to get stitches. As soon as that happened me and my dad and brother forced him outside. And said they needed to leave or we would press charges.

Her mom kept saying that she was a good mom and my wife was dramatic, and she just had bad children. Anyway my mother took my wife to the hospital because we where still trying to get them to leave the driveway.my mother brought her there and back once they left completely. My wife didn’t say anything the rest of the night, besides thanking my mother for the ride then going to our room. Her sister was really freaked out too and left, right after hugging my wife.

My children were in the living room, and I told my son and my younger daughter to go into there rooms, I needed to speak to their sister. I admit I lost it. I f*cking screamed. Said she was so selfish, and i couldn’t believe she did that. That she still got into contact after I explained what they did to her mom when she was younger. How I was honestly disgusted with her.

She started to cry and say , she genuinely thought I was exaggerating. And it would be good for them to get together. She said she got in touch with them on social media. And they seemed great. How they made everything seem not as bad, and she said she didn’t think they could be that evil and be related to us. I told her there are evil people everywhere, we have just tried to shield her away. Because parents are supposed to protect their kids.

I was so upset, I genuinely wanted to call her a idiot but I didn’t. But every move my wife did to move past her trauma was demolished by this idiotic decision. My daughter apologized and I said sorry doesn’t cut it. Her actions risked her mother’s health and everyone’s safety.

My wife talked to her and said that she no longer trusts her, and how these are the consequences of her actions. For meddling in something that was not her business to meddle with. She has no more phone and no more visiting friends until she earns that trust again. And we can add a punishment we see fit. I’ve comforted my wife as much as I can but she’s not great, while I think honestly I went to easy on my daughter, I figured i should have other opinions. AITAH?

Edit: to clear timeline my daughter sought them out after I told her what happened during her moms childhood. I asked she said she reached out first as well. My daughter is 16 yrs old

Update: More information: we did make a report, and are pressing charges. And will be doing everything we can to get a restraining order. We didn’t call the police because we live in a secluded area and it would take too long for them to get there. We deleted all my daughters social media’s, and I did look at her text between her and the in-laws. She reached out first. And kept pursuing them. There where 3 messages before that my in-laws ignored until they eventually responded.

Also that was not the first conversation we had with her about my wife’s parents. It was just the first in detail conversation. I told her specific scenarios and events that happened without getting to graphic. But she and my other children always knew that their grandparents were bad. We had multiple talks growing up when we first started to explain why they only have one set of grandparents. Unlike most of their friends. But we never said anything in specific details about the actual events. Only that their grandparents were bad people, who hurt their mother and aunt a lot.

She told me she’s doing her best and feels bad for distancing herself from her daughter but she’s just extremely hurt. My wife’s going into more therapy sessions then she normally does, and we have set a appointment for my daughter to see one as well and we will try family therapy to get back to normal. Anyway did not think this would get so many views, thanks for all the advice!

Here’s what people had to say to OP:

SirRabbott – That man should be in jail. Press charges. You have all the witnesses you need, your wife went to the hospital! CALL THE POLICE AND MAKE A REPORT. HIT HIM WITH THE LAW.

Holiday_Horse3100 – File assault charges against them. At a minimum try for a restraining order. I don’t know if there is really any way to get your kid to understand just what she did.

thisisthrownfar – NTA. Your poor wife… she has been made to feel helpless by her parents once again after literal decades of working to distance herself and heal from it. I think it’s important you stay firm on your punishment to truly relay the seriousness of this to your daughter.

The_Ghost_Reborn says:

I think it’s important you stay firm on your punishment to truly relay the seriousness of this to your daughter.

As an adult, if I betray my family I don’t get punished, our relationships gets re-evaluated. There’s no punishment they can give me that makes anything better or makes me respect them. Ultimately the only part I care about is the actual bond between us. That’s the part I don’t want to lose. The worst thing they can do to me is turn their back on me.

We don’t expect 7 year olds to be sophisticated enough to always listen to reason and make wise choices, so we try to encourage them with basic punishment. If you do this thing you want to do that we say you’re not allowed to, this is what will happen… But that’s not appropriate for older teens. They need to know by then that punishment isn’t the entry fee to doing whatever you want, that you’re ruining your relationships when you do the wrong thing to people.

A 16 year old can be reasoned with, and if you reason with them and they choose to go behind your back and violate your trust after you’ve had the discussion, then you can’t fix that with punishment. The consequences of their actions are that they have damaged the relationship, and they need to know that. The consequence that fixes that isn’t chores and no TV, it’s realising that if you betray people they don’t want to be close to you. Some kids need to learn that relationships can be destroyed from disloyalty, and it’s up to them to rebuild the relationship if they want one.

Intrepid_Potential60 – I can’t imagine how I’d handle this, it is a fundamental betrayal of your, your wife’s, and familial trust. 16 year old’s often think they know a lot – when in reality they don’t even know what they don’t know – and this is a scary example of it.

She’s got a lot of work ahead of her, to earn the trust and benefit of the doubt back. She just burned whatever capital she had and then some. As a dad, you do need to show her a path to do that work. It;s our job as parents, we need to make our kids into good adults of their own, and she needs to see a path to be that from where she is. NTA, and wish you luck in this.

Reddit User – NTA. I hope your wife heals well and quickly. You’ll have to find a way for your daughter to understand fully how what she did was wrong and how to gain back trust (if possible). I am amazed (in a bad way) how they decided to come, explaining how things were not that bad during your wife’s childhood and just prove right away how messed up and dangerous they are. Now that your in-laws know where you live, you should see what kind of protection you can put in place for your family’s safety. See with your daughter to what extend she told them things.

Did she say what’s their school, your or your wife’s work and so on. And take any measure possible to keep your family’s safety. Go to the police to make them register what happened, so they have a record. Talk to the two other children too, they need to understand what happened, how it was wrong of their sister and remember them security tips for children. I hope things will go smoothly and that nothing worse happens in any way.

Jazzy404404 – F*ck and now those evil people know where you live. I hope your wife’s progress with her trauma gets back to how it was before that interaction. Just keep loving on her and showing her, she is still standing in spite of all the traumatic events in her life. Also I really hope your daughter grows up and knows what she did was soooo f*cked up. Like that’s your mom and you did that to her.