Groom’s Mom Demands Couple Buy Nephew’s $400 Wedding Flight

From booking a suitable venue to feeding an entire crowd, many weddings come with a pretty hefty price tag. And even if the couple of honor isn’t funding the majority of their nuptials, they’re still heavily occupied with making all of the necessary preparations in the months leading up to their affair. That’s why one couple was outraged after the mother of the groom asked the future newlyweds a few weeks before their wedding to pay for her nephew’s $400 flight to attend their affair, a situation that the bride-to-be detailed on Reddit’s “Wedding” subreddit on January 6, 2024.

According to the woman’s post on the online forum, she’s getting married to her fiancé in several weeks in the town in which they reside. Since many of their loved ones live in different regions around the country, up to 60 percent will be out-of-town guests, per the post. With that in mind, the bride and groom made sure to give everyone plenty of notice, sending out their save-the-dates 10 months ahead of their big day, so their invitees could figure out their travel plans well in advance. And given the travel requirements for many, the couple understood and accepted that some would RSVP “no.” 

Just a few weeks before they were set to tie the knot, the bride’s future mother-in-law gave her son’s fiancée a call, wondering if the two of them would pay for her nephew’s $400 flight, because he “doesn’t make a lot of money at his job,” according to her reasoning, and supposedly can’t afford to pay for the ticket on his own. “I was kinda shocked on the phone and I said ‘I highly doubt he (my fiancé) will agree to that,’” the bride recalled of their conversation. She also told her future mother-in-law that her fiancé’s cousin could drive to the wedding if he wanted, but the woman noted that her nephew “wouldn’t have a place to stay,” the bride said of the mother of the groom’s response. When the bride wasn’t caving to her future mother-in-law’s demands, she voiced that she’d just ask her son, “as in my response wasn’t what she liked and that my answer isn’t sufficient which annoyed me,” the bride said.

When the bride told her future husband about his mother’s request, he was on the same page as her, saying he would “absolutely not” be paying for his cousin’s $400 plane ticket. The bride noted that her future mother-in-law might have expected the couple to oblige to her demands, because her son had paid for her hotel room, which was an “exception,” the bride said, given her relationship to the groom. If they were to pay for all of their guests’ travel arrangements, they’d be spending an additional $100,000, the bride revealed.

The internet agreed that the mother of the groom’s plea crossed the line. One Redditor pointed out that if the bride agreed to this request, it would open up the floodgates. “And here come her other demands!” they said. Some pointed out inconsistencies in the woman’s ask, noting that it wouldn’t matter if the groom’s cousin flew or drove to the event, he’d still have to find a place to stay. Another Reddit user was more concerned with her fiancé’s cousin than his mother. “If he really wanted to come he would have started asking these questions much sooner,” they said. “NTA at all.” In another comment, the original poster concluded that she’d “rather just save even more money and not have him come rather than pay for his flight food drinks, etc.,” she wrote.