'AITA for being short in response to my SIL's email about disciplining my child?'
"AITA for responding tersely to a SIL’s rebuke over email?"
ThoughtIndividual114 writes:
Sunday evening we (me F46, husband M46, and daughter F7) were invited to visit my husband’s sister for dinner. She put out a spread of delicious food for adults, but our child rejected most of it (curried fish, eggplant salad, quinoa salad, etc.).
Child wolfed down multiple pieces of a very crumbly bread loaf from a bakery. Child knew that she was spilling some crumbs onto the floor beneath the dining room table but didn’t think much about it; we (parents) were in group conversation and did not notice.
We thanked her, hugged goodbyes, and left at 7. At 11 p.m., we got an email from her informing us that she discovered that (in her assumption) our daughter swept lots of bread crumbs from her chair down onto the floor, and that this is extremely unacceptable behavior and that SIL had to vacuum it up.
SIL wrote that she would have told our child to vacuum it if she had seen it, that this is not the first time she has observed our child leaving “garbage” on the floor without cleaning it up, that this is completely unacceptable “(in MY home, at least).”
Moreover, SIL wants to address this directly with our child in addition to telling us we need to correct this bad behavior. It was three paragraphs of histrionics over this, and no small amount of shaming us as parents.
We spoke with 7yo, who said she ate a lot of bread and knew it was making crumbs, but she didn’t sweep them onto the floor, they just happened while eating. We spoke gently about being a considerate guest. No big deal.
I, however, was quite shocked and offended by the intensity of judgment and shaming in SIL’s email to us. I waited 24 hours, then simply wrote: “Apologies. We spoke with her. Thank you.”
Now my husband is saying I “went nuclear” with my response and SIL is angry about it. It is true that the reply is a completely different tone and terseness than my normal communication style, and the terseness was intentional.
But why am I now the villain when, if anybody went nuclear here, it was SIL who flipped out over finding a bunch of bread crumbs on the floor under where a 7yo child sat at her table? Who is the AH here?
Here are some of the comments from the post.
APiqued says:
Miss Manners states that the person with the worst manners points out a guest's slight faux pas. Instead of going nuclear on her niece, SIL could have joked "I'm never buying (making) that "crumby" bread again."
Embarrassed_Bake1073 says:
OP YTA. CLEAN UP AFTER YOUR KID. I also don't think wither of you were over the top here.
Thorking says:
If you invite guests over for dinner, it’s expected you will have to clean up after. NTA of course.
hedwigflysagain says:
NTA, your husband is. Why didn't he handle his sister?