WIBTA If I pull my daughter out of SIL’s wedding?

One Reddit user is considering whether they would be wrong to pull their 5-year-old daughter out of their sister-in-law’s wedding, given the ongoing strained relationship with the in-laws.

Despite not having asked permission, the SIL has designated the daughter as her flower girl, and the in-laws recently organized a birthday celebration for her without inviting the parents. After discovering this, the user feels disrespected and is questioning if pulling out of the wedding is the right choice. Read the full story below.

‘ WIBTA If I pull my daughter out of SIL’s wedding?’

So a bit of backstory, my husband’s side of the family is notoriously not very kind to us. We get excluded from things, last minute invites when we are invited to something, and it is very clear that we are either not welcome or not really cared about.

We have a daughter who just turned 5, and of course everybody loves her. She’s a sweet little kid. Husband and I celebrated daughter’s birthday on Monday with a nuclear family dinner, just the 3 of us. We did not get to go to the restaurant I suggested, but we let daughter pick and she chose something else.

No big deal, but is relevant to the story. So SIL is getting remarried this month. She loves my daughter but treats my husband (her brother) like crap. Without asking us, SIL declared that daughter will be her flower girl. This isn’t a big wedding, it is a small event in a nice park.

I just found out today that the “sleepover” MIL invited daughter to for tonight is actually her, SIL, BIL, their 3 kids, and FIL taking our daughter out to dinner to celebrate her birthday at the place I wanted to take her, without inviting me or my husband. Naturally I’m pissed because they made plans with my child and snuck it around us.

WIBTA if I pull daughter out of the wedding and do not attend? We won’t give them a reason upfront, but the reason would be the lack of consideration of us and generally not involving daughter’s parents in things they try to plan with her. If you want my minor child to attend an event, either communicate for real with me or invite her parents as well.

Edit to add a bit more info: MIL provides childcare for us, on her own request. she is happy to do it. she isn’t generally the problem but isn’t always considerate of us. SIL is the problem and everyone bends to her will, which is where MIL and FIL enable her.

MIL offered to watch daughter overnight to give me and husband a date night since we don’t really get time alone together, and we thanked her and accepted the opportunity.

the family birthday dinner was planned behind our backs around that. Daughter starts kindergarten in a few months and once she is in school we won’t really have a need for her to be at grandma’s house so often.

Here’s what people had to say to OP:

extinct_diplodocus −  Without asking us, SIL declared that daughter will be her flower girl. That’s all you need. NTA for withholding a permission that they never asked for in the first place. SIL has no right to declare what your child will do. P.S.: Why are you allowing MIL unsupervised access to your daughter?

rbrancher2 −  ESH None of the adults seem to have much emotional intelligence at all. None of you are talking to each other about your issues or trying to fix them and keep smashing all over the others’ boundaries. I also have to say that personally I think pretty badly of someone who talks disparingly about people and yet continue to use them when it benefits themselves.

NectarineAny4897 −  All of the adults in this story need to Grow up.

Goalie_LAX_21093 −  You need to look past the wedding. If his family is so rude to you all, why do you spend time with them? Why is MIL your daycare? There are a lot of crossed lines here. If you have a problem with how they all treat you, start dealing w/ those issues as they happen. Or stop spending time around these people. As far as the wedding goes, what does your husband say?

Kixaxstyx −  NTA. It sounds like SIL is taking issues with her brother out on both of you (him and you by extension). I can see why some people may think it’s punishing your daughter for a beef between adults, but that happens a lot with kids that age.

Really though, you should have a conversation with your in-laws about this. Especially the “sleepover” f**e out. It’s not abnormal for grandparents to take grandkids out for birthday dinners without the parents (mine did it a lot when I was a kid) but it IS abnormal for grandparents to do that and take out the whole extended family EXCEPT for the parents of the kid being celebrated.

fizzbangwhiz −  YTA. First of all, it’s perfectly normal and reasonable that your daughter should be allowed to pick the restaurant she goes to for her birthday dinner with her parents. You are taking it too personally that *your* idea wasn’t chosen. You can pick whatever restaurant you want for *your* birthday — your kid should do the same.

I have to imagine that if your SIL hadn’t happened to pick *your* restaurant, you wouldn’t have been as annoyed. You’re making this all about you. Yeah, your SIL sounds like a piece of work.

It also isn’t really *that* out of pocket for your daughter’s grandma, aunt and uncle, and cousins to go out to dinner for her birthday when she happens to be sleeping over at her grandma’s house during the week of her birthday.

And, might I add, you and your husband already had plans together — it’s not that weird that they didn’t invite you *because they knew you were already busy.* I realize that you’re probably just at B.E.C. with your SIL and you just are fed up. But that’s not a good enough reason to prevent your daughter from forming close bonds with her family.

If she’s excited to be a flower girl and is grateful to be included in the wedding, it’s petty and small for you to pull her out just because you don’t like your SIL. If you want to have a conversation with her about how you would have liked to be asked first before she approached your daughter about being a flower girl, that’s an appropriate conversation for you to have.

But you’re overreacting and taking this all way too personally. It’s good for your daughter to spend time with her family as long as they treat her well, which they do.

NoCod3769 −  Just talk to them. This playing games is petty and immature.

Peony-Pony −  Is your daughter looking forward to being a flower girl? If so, why are you punishing your daughter because your upset with your husband’s family?

Icy_Cardiologist8444 −  NTA. You would not be the a**hole for pulling your daughter out of the wedding. In a comment, you said that your daughter doesn’t really seem to know what it means to be a flower girl, so in reality, she’s not going to know what she’s missing.

Also, your SIL never really asked you or your husband if your daughter could be in the wedding, she just told you she was going to be in the wedding… that’s not how this works. It’s time to put your foot down. If everyone else wants to bow down to your SIL and give her what she wants, that’s fine.

That doesn’t mean you have to as well. Another thing… you’re focusing a bit too much on your in laws taking your daughter out to a restaurant you wanted to take her to for her birthday, because that isn’t the main issue.

The main issue is the fact that they pulled a bait and switch by offering you a “date night” so they could all take her out for a big dinner without you. You made comments about your SIL getting her way, but this is an example of your MIL getting her way, just like her babysitting also seems to be, as it seems like she wants to babysit… although I’m wondering if she uses that to show how great a grandma she is.

Also, ignore all the YTA comments about you and your husband going out to dinner separately with your daughter and not inviting the rest of the family, because that is completely different from what your MIL is doing. It is really common for parents to take their kids out to dinner for their birthdays and then have a separate party/dinner with the rest of the family later.

What isn’t common is for the rest of the family to have what is basically a surprise extended family dinner disguised as a sleepover without the knowledge of the parents and without even inviting them.

I think it’s way past the time for you and your husband to take a step back. Unless you absolutely have to do so, don’t go to the wedding… and find another sitter for the rest of the summer.

purplstarz −  You’re mad because they took your daughter to a restaurant that you wanted to go to? After you celebrated your daughter at the restaurant your daughter chose? How does that make sense to you? Your daughter doesn’t have to be in the wedding, but the connection to the restaurant incident is lost on me.

Do you think the user is justified in pulling their daughter from the wedding as a way of setting boundaries, or would this be too drastic? How would you handle the situation if you felt excluded by your in-laws in this way? Share your thoughts below!