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The original was posted on /r/AmItheAsshole by /u/B33PB00PThrowaway1 on 2023-08-31 17:08:09.

My wife’s brother (BIL) is getting married next week and we are coming in from out of state (3-hr flight). We are the only people coming in from out of state and are bringing our 8-month old daughter because we can’t trust her to be home alone by herself /s and we don’t have family in our state that could watch her for a weekend.

My BIL and his fiancé have decided to have a child-free wedding, if all the nieces and nephews were there (wife has lots of siblings with kids), there would be at least 9, not to mention friends’s kids. The thing is, they’re all local, their kids are older (5-8), and they can line up care for their kids. Anyone that we could think to ask to watch our daughter for the evening is going to be at the wedding. Leaving our only option to find a “random stranger” (my wife’s words) to watch our daughter during the ceremony/reception. I proposed to my wife to use a site like Care.com to have a vetted sitter come to the hotel where we’re staying, or to have a sitter join the other watched kids so there would be other adults/cousins there but was rejected.

The proposed solution from my BIL is to have me come to the wedding with our daughter and sit outside the venue for the entire ceremony. Then drive behind the party bus with her while my wife and the rest of the immediate family ride to the reception area. Then, I can “have a plate brought to me” while I sit with her in another room during the party. My wife isn’t thrilled about this but she thinks it’s “the only option”.

I get the desire for a child-free wedding and reception and don’t fault them for wanting one. However, we are being incredibly inconvenienced and there has been zero empathy from them. Just a “show up and figure it out” vibe. Again, they’re planning a wedding - we are guests, they have a lot going on, they can’t accommodate everyone for everything.

Given that I am shlepping halfway across the country to be remanded to the “other room” for a wedding/reception, WIBTA if I “get sick” the morning of and just stay at the hotel with my Daughter?

EDITS:

  • Wife is nursing

  • In town in general to do other family visiting we haven’t done in a while

  • For clarity: Faking sick is childish, was going to be upfront with wife about reasons but that would have been the line given when asked about my absence. Better than “your proposal was asinine and OP decided to stay at the hotel vs coming over”

  • Other kids being watched nowhere near venue/hotel