I (50) have two kids: my daughter (25), who is getting married next year, and my son (23), who came out as gay in high school. My son had a really rough time in school. He was bullied relentlessly, and it took a toll on his mental health. He’s doing much better now, but those years left scars.
Last month, my daughter introduced us to her fiancé (27M). I recognized him immediately as one of the kids who made my son’s life hell. When I quietly brought it up to my son later, he confirmed it but told me not to make a big deal about it because he’s “moved on.”
Here’s the thing: I haven’t moved on. I can’t stand the thought of helping pay for a wedding to someone who tormented my son. I told my daughter this, and she said her fiancé has changed and regrets his actions. She asked me to let it go for her sake. I said I’m happy for her but that I can’t, in good conscience, fund the wedding.
Now, my daughter is furious with me and claims I’m punishing her for something she had no part in. My wife thinks I should reconsider, but I feel like funding this wedding would betray my son.
My son is staying neutral and says he doesn’t want to be the reason for family drama, but I can tell the situation is making him uncomfortable. My daughter says I’m ruining her big day and being petty.
AITA?
TOP COMMENT
You met your daughter’s fiancé for the first time after they got engaged? What’s the rush to get married? If her fiancé has truly changed, then he should be making amends to his future brother-in-law before the wedding, and he should be taking the time to integrate better into the family before the wedding.
EDIT: y’all, I am BEGGING you to stop commenting that this story is fake. I agree it’s probably fake. You are at least the twelfth person to reply to my comment with “it’s fake.” My advice still stands. Stooooppppppp.
REPLY
“Whoopsie! I shouldn’t have done that” to consider even being in the same room with someone who bullied my sibling. People have ended their lives over that. And clearly, nothing genuine was ever said to the brother, even though fiancé was totally fine just walking into the family home like all was well. How gross. Time doesn’t fix what he did.
I believe that there are people who can redeem themselves and even then, it’s still up to the injured party to forgive or not. Unless there’s context that OP left out, daughter and fiancé just don’t seem to give a shit.
RESPONCE
Yeah, I used to work with the girl who bullied my sister, and I was polite to her for the sake of not losing my job, but there was no friendship there. I didn’t want anything to do with the person who harmed my family. I can’t understand why OP’s daughter decided to date this guy.
Also, if he really has changed and is a better person now, why hasn’t he sat down with the entire family to take accountability for his past actions and make a sincere apology? If he hasn’t done that yet, OP has no reason to believe he’s changed.
Additionally
Yeah. At my 20th year HS reunion, I was speaking for a few minutes with a mildly mentally handicapped woman from my grade year. I wasn’t close or anything to her; she remembered that I was never mean to her on the bus and never made fun of her. (I mostly figured it sucked to be her—dirt poor family, overweight, unkempt, and different the bad-unfun way—so why make it worse?)
She told me that many people who had bullied her had come up to her and apologized at this reunion. Now that they had kids (some of whom had been picked on and bullied), they understood fully how awful they had been to her and they were sorry, and they were teaching their kids better.
If my classmates, who had nothing to gain from apologizing to her, could sack up enough to own what they’d done and apologize, then OP’s potential son-in-law absolutely needed to reach out in a meaningful way as soon as he realized things were getting serious. The fact that he’s not said anything? GIANT RED FLAG.
* Her life was going great, btw. Her happiness glowed in the dark, her clothes were much more flattering, her hair was nicely styled, etc. She did custodial work (through an agency that employed the mentially handicapped) and was even a team lead, was married to a nice man she met on the job, and they had a very cute, sweet, and bright 4 year old son.
