Kate Hackett
Welcome to another post from Reddit’s sub, Am I The Asshole, a forum where people can post and get real feedback from others about the “rightness” of their actions.
u/nosleepbeauty was faced with a difficult decision about who will walk her down the aisle. Her sister wants, and deserves, this role, but her fiancé and his family are against it.
So who is right?
OP was raised by her older sister; she never met her father and their mom died when OP was very young. To raise OP, her sister gave up her family, college, and a lot more.
I (23F) was raised by my older half sister (32F). I never met my dad and our mom OD’d when I was 10 and my sister was 19. My sister’s dad was still in her life and was willing to support her, but not me. My sister chose to be my guardian and her father’s family went low-contact with her as a result. In order to raise me she gave up a lot; her relationship with her father, college, her 20s, and so much more.
OP asked this incredible sister to walk her down the aisle, but her fiancé wasn’t happy.
A few months ago I got engaged and I told my sister that in addition to being my maid of honor, I also wanted her to be the one to walk me down the aisle. All my life she’s had to fulfill so many roles for me — big sister, mother, father, friend — that it only felt right that those multiple roles be honored on one of the biggest days of my life. My sister was ecstatic and so was I, but when I brought it up with my fiance he objected.
His family is traditional and he expected a traditional wedding. They also seemed to assume her father in law would walk her.
My future in-laws are very traditional and my fiance had always expected that his wedding would be a very traditional white wedding. He said that it was great that my sister was my MOH, but that her having two roles wasn’t and that it wasn’t appropriate for her to walk me down the aisle since that’s usually done by a man. Apparently, his family had assumed that my future father-in-law would be the one to give me away since I don’t have any male relatives.
OP very sweetly and politely declined; the argument spread to the in-laws and now OP is fielding calls from THEM.
I told him that I appreciate his father being willing to fill that role, but that the one who make me the person I am is my sister and so it’s right that she be the one to give me away. It turned into an argument that’s spread to my in-laws. My MIL called me a few days ago to say that although she understand how important my sister is to me, that it’s also my fiance’s wedding and I shouldn’t be putting my sister before him on his day.
OP doesn’t want to give in here and isn’t sure anymore: is she a jerk?
I definitely heard her on that, but this is still important to me. At this point, my sister has even said that she doesn’t mind just being the MOH and that she doesn’t want to turn my happy day into something stressful. So now it’s just me holding out and being stubborn, but I really don’t want to concede on this point. Am I being the AH?
She also added some edits, including a note that the in laws are paying for most of the wedding.
EDIT
I did not expect this to blow up like this and haven’t been able to read through all of your verdicts and comments yet, but I wanted to clarify on some of the inquiries which I’ve seen repeated so far.
Are the in-laws contributing to the wedding?
Yes. In fact, they’re paying for about 75% of it since I’m in still in school and don’t have the money to put towards a wedding the scale that fiance wanted.
She explains a little more background about her fiancé and their lives together.
Does your fiance have sisters?
No; he has two younger brothers.Did he ask your sister for your hand?
He did, actually. She also helped him custom design the engagement ring. She showed me their group text and at one point they spent three weeks trying to decide between five different diamonds. “Maybe I should just propose with an infinity gauntlet”. It was very sweet and cute.What about when you have children/Have you talked about children?
Because of a medical condition, I am infertile, though neither of us feel a particular strong urge to be parents anyway. But we also know we’re still young and that may change, but even if it does it would be very far in the future. I know all to well that things happen, people leave or fall down or die and so even if we got to the point of wanting to adopt it would have to be when I’m financial stable enough that even alone I’d be able to support and care for a child without it being major blow to my or the child’s quality of life.
A person in the comments suggested OP walk down the aisle alone and she didn’t want that. They also noted that the sister is amazing and hope to hear updates.
Could you walk down the aisle by yourself?
That was my sister’s suggestions when she said she was fine just being the MOH, but I rejected it. Because of her, I never walked alone on the worst days of my life so I’m definately not going to walk alone on the happiest.Your sister is amazing!
She is, as far as I’m concerned, the definition of strength and love and I am collecting all of the kind kind things you all have said to show her because she doesn’t realize how amazing she is and it’s a gd crime.Please update us
I absolutely will. You’ve all given me a lot to think about, including underlying motivations and larger implications. I’m going to be taking a few days to sit with that and with myself and my feelings, but I promise to make an update about how I’ve decided to move forward.
People knew right away that OP was not the asshole. “Tell your MIL that your FIL can walk your fiancé down the aisle if he wants to give someone away. Or better yet, strongly consider not marrying into this family because they’re the assholes,” one person said.
