A Bride’s In-Laws Invited 10 Extra People to the Wedding—Without Asking the Couple First

Creating the guest list for your wedding can be an overwhelming and difficult process—you want to make sure all of your favorite people get an invite, but you don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings. Throwing parents’ wishes and in-laws’ requests into the mix only compounds the challenge. One bride experienced this firsthand when her mother-in-law and father-in-law invited 10 extra people to the event without asking the couple first. The bride took to Reddit on October 20, 2023, to explain the situation and to gauge whether her reaction was justified, which sparked a heated discussion about proper wedding etiquette. 

The bride discussed the dilemma on the subreddit “Am I an A———?” “I married my husband last weekend after about a year of planning,” she wrote. “The ceremony went off perfectly, even with kids in the church. The formal photos weren’t delayed. No one got drunk and wrecked anything. No on insisted on bringing their emotional support goat. The only hitch was that my in-laws invited about 10 extra people without telling us. Not relatives or anything—just friends of theirs we didn’t invited since we don’t know them.”

The bride noted that she couldn’t tell there were additional guests at first, because they blended into the crowd. At the reception, however, their presence was noticeable because there weren’t any seats available for them. Luckily, the groom’s best man and some of his groomsmen found a folding table and chairs, so the 10 extra guests could have a place to sit. However, since the group didn’t have a table number, they were called last to the buffet, meaning that the selection was “picked over” by the time they got their meal, according to the bride.

The bride’s in-laws were upset about the situation, so they confronted the bride, telling her they were “embarrassed” that their friends were being treated that way. “I very politely asked them what they expected when they invited people without telling the people planning and paying for the wedding,” the bride added. Her in-laws didn’t seem to understand her perspective, so they requested that the bride apologize to their friends. “I said I would, but I would also explain that they had not actually been invited. If they wanted their guests told anything else, then they had to go explain.”

In the aftermath of the wedding, the bride said there is still lingering tension with her in-laws. The bride concluded her post by noting that her husband understands and supports her side of the story, but she isn’t sure if the way she handled the situation was right. “I think I could have been more gracious, but I also think it should not have fallen on us to deal with it.”

After the bride shared her story on Reddit, the post received 1,600 comments, and many of them defended the bride. While some were appalled at her in-laws’ response, others were shocked that the 10 guests actually attended without receiving a proper invitation. “Your in-laws are of course entire out of line,” one person wrote. “But the people they invited were also a——— for even showing up! They did not receive an actual invite. Is this their first day on earth? Do they not know how weddings work?” One commenter even called the group “wedding crashers.” Some people who responded to the post said the bride’s husband should have handled the situation because his parents created the mess.