Mom wants to return personalized baby gift from family, says 'this gift is offensive.'
When this mom is annoyed with her family, she asks Reddit:
'AITA For Returning a Personalized Baby Gift to my Family?'
I had a baby 3 weeks ago and just received a personalized pillow case in the mail with my daughter’s name and birth stats (weight, height, etc.) from my Aunt and Uncle. This would be a nice gift, except the package was addressed to my daughter and my mother.
Some backstory, this is my mom’s side of the family. My mother lives in California, we live in Texas and my extended family live in Iowa. I’m 28 and this is my second child.
As a child, I would have said I was very close to my mom’s side of the family, but growing up I’ve slowly come to realize they don’t actually give a sh** about me. Up until last year, we all lived in Iowa within 30 minutes of each other.
So if there was a holiday that they were hosting, they would invite my mom and expect her to invite me instead of reaching out to me themselves. I have lots of cousins from this Aunt and Uncle who are 10+ years older than me.
My cousins will invite my mom to their kids activities and expect her to invite me (or not). I’m always the last to know or be invited to anything.
Not sure if this is because they still see me as the baby of the family (I’m the youngest of all of the cousins, with a large age gap) or if they just truly don’t want me around. They are nice to me when I do go to family events.
Getting this package that has absolutely nothing to do with my mom (who again lives three states away from me) yet was addressed to her, just seems like the last straw to me.
I have not done this yet, as I wanted to poll and see if this would be an AH move, but I’m very tempted to seal the package back up with an added letter detailing my feelings, and send it back to them.
It’s not something that they can return, since it’s personalized, but I really don’t want it as it’s just going to be a reminder of how little they care about me. I’m so confused why they seemingly refuse to acknowledge my existence. Am I overreacting? AITA?
Let's find out.
OnRecordStreet writes:
Yes, YTA. Who cares if they sent the package through your mom? My dad regularly sends me gifts to pass on to my adult son. You know what my son does? He calls his grandpa and thanks him. Everybody is happy. I suggest you try being thankful for the gift and get over yourself.
Basic-Traffic-1837 OP responded:
They did not send the gift to my mom to pass on to me though. I probably would have been less offended if they did it that way. They mailed it to my address, where I live without my mom. But still put her and my daughter’s name on it and excluded me. They excluded my name on a package sent to my address. Feels like a slap in the face to me.
OnRecordStreet writes:
Who cares? Get over it. You have issues.
Basic-Traffic-1837 OP responded:
I do, which I why I made this post.
rightbee180 writes:
YWBTA. Just call them or write a delayed thank you note. Say something like, ' Thank you for your very thoughtful gift, little Priscilla loves it and you already.I wish you had sent it directly so that I could have thanked you in a more timely manner....' Done.
pudge-thefish writes:
Honestly I am not going to judge you, but I think you are overreacting to send the gift back. Send them a thank you note addressed to their mom
hellolittlebears writes:
YTA this seems like a big overreaction to something that is quite common in families, where people communicate through the parents even when the child is an adult and has a family of their own.
My aunts and uncles still do this with me, often telling my dad stuff that then filters down to me and it has never occurred to me to get upset or offended by it. If it really bothers you, why not just talk directly to them and let them know it bothers you?