I Didn’t Want to Pay for My Daughter’s Expensive Wedding, Now She Won’t Speak to Me

While weddings are cheerful celebrations of love and companionship, planning a wedding can also bring a lot of stress and unwanted conflicts. A dad who has promised to pay for his daughter’s wedding found himself in a tough situation when he found out the price tag the occasion came with. So he decided to share his story with Redditors and find out whether he was in the wrong.

A dad got into an argument with his daughter over her wedding.

My daughter is getting married, and she wishes to have a destination wedding and I told her no. My wife feels I should do it because we can afford it, but I find it to be a pointless showing of wealth. Now my daughter is not talking to me, nor is my wife. Which got me thinking should I bite the bullet and essentially burn money, and alienate family members to make my daughter’s dream wedding a reality?

My daughter wants to get married in NZ, but we are from NY. She is currently asking for around 200k. This is not counting what guests would have to pay to come.

Tomorrow I am going to start making phone calls to price what a wedding in NY would cost at different head counts from 100 to 200 people. I do not know the exact size I just know he also has a large close family. After I get that information I will use that to make an informed choice, but it will be an either or situation. Because they are playing this game I will tell both of them my wife and daughter that it is a wedding or house. If my wife makes a fuss over it that is a battle I will have to face at another time.

The poster offered more information in the comments.

• “Yes, I told her I would pay for her wedding, but never agreed to pay for a destination wedding.” Solid-Pass8944 / Reddit
• “If I give her a set amount she would just use said amount as a down payment for her dream wedding and end up putting me in a situation where everyone is coming and either I foot the bill or waste the time and money of everyone that was meant to come.” Solid-Pass8944 / Reddit
• “I will admit she did have a privileged life. I grew up poor and experienced a lot of hardship. I did not want her to experience that. I wanted to give her every experience I was not able to have. The amount itself is not what gets me, if she asked for 200k for a house or something I would do that in a heartbeat.” Solid-Pass8944 / Reddit

Netizens sided with the dad.

• “If she can’t pay for a destination wedding on her own, then she shouldn’t be having a destination wedding. It seems cruel but it’s true. Not to mention there’s so much more money involved with the flights and the hotels and stuff. Is she going to be paying for her own ticket or are you expected to fork out for them too? And her fiancées ticket.
  Not to mention the fact that she’s thrown a strop and isn’t talking to you tells me she doesn’t deserve it. I’m a believer of we are not entitled to our parents’ money. I don’t expect any inheritance off of my dad if he ever passes, even though he has a big life insurance. I would rather have my dad than the money.” Gumgums66 / Reddit

• “Decide on the amount you will contribute. Should they spend it on a destination wedding, that should be up to them, and yes, you have to go. Afford is different than it being an intelligent use of your money.” OLAZ3000 / Reddit
• “If your daughter wants to spend a boat load of cash on her destination wedding, she needs to be prepared for her potential guest to not be so thrilled about having to spend a boat load of money to attend. I frankly get so tired of hearing about bridezillas who expect everyone they know to spend thousands on them because they’re GeTtInG MaRrIeD.” Ok_Conversation9750 / Reddit

Weddings can be stressful, not only for the bride and the groom, but for any family members. Recently we published an article about a woman who found her SIL to be too demanding when it comes to the dress code at her wedding.