'AITA for disinviting my fiancée’s mom from our wedding for saying I 'cheaped out' on the ring?'

Nothing throws a sour taste on wedding planning quite like navigating people's unsolicited opinions.

In a popular post on the AITA subreddit, a man asked if he was wrong for threatening to disinvite his fiancee's mom from their wedding after she called him cheap. He wrote:

"AITA for threatening to disinvite my fiancée’s mom from our wedding for saying I’m stingy and 'cheaped out' on the ring and wedding?"

I (34M) am engaged to my fiancée “Emily” (31F). Both of our families are lower class so we have to pay for the wedding by ourselves. We talked it through and I suggested we have a more chill, smaller wedding and save our money for a down payment on a bigger house.

I make significantly more than her (she’s a teacher and I’m a doctor) so I told her I would take care of the majority of expenses like the venue, catering, and planner if she just paid for her dress and smaller stuff like that.

Last week her parents hosted a party for us before the wedding and her mom kept making comments about how she can’t believe how small our wedding will be or that we’re not hosting it at the fancy hotel downtown that’s “just so much better and elegant” than what I chose.

I even overheard her talking to her sister about how small the diamond is in Emily’s ring and that it’s embarrassing a doctor won’t treat her daughter better (I spent about 5k which I thought was fair). She just seemed so hung up on the fact that her daughter is marrying a doctor but the wedding/ring aren’t on a “doctor level.”

Based on what I know, I think she is a little embarrassed about her family’s socioeconomic status, and was hoping her daughter marrying a doctor would help “improve” her image to her friends and extended family. Throughout all of it, Emily looked extremely embarrassed and awkward and kept trying to tell her mom it was fine and her mom just said “you need to learn to stand up for yourself.”

This is when I just lost it and told her mom she can be uninvited from the wedding if she has so many problems with it and is embarrassed by how “cheap” I am. AITA?

Redditors had a lot of opinions about the situation.

LazyRiverDawg wrote:

NTA. This sounds incredibly exhausting and selfish—she’s ruining the atmosphere of a special day for her daughter and for you. I hope this doesn’t foreshadow how she’ll be throughout your marriage. Sounds like a nightmare.

HeadBonk wrote:

NTA as long as your fiancé has the same goals in life as you. Make sure she is happy with your choices as well.

alex3tx wrote:

NTA. She's projecting. She's clearly embarrassed about her own socio economic status and how she's not contributing and so is deflecting. You'd be totally within your rights to let her know that her views towards money over the years have no doubt contributed to her inability to contribute to her daughter's wedding.

ceratophaga wrote:

YTA for not coordinating with your fiancée. You should've talked with her first. You are supposed to be equals, and you disinviting her mother from her wedding without talking with her says a lot about you and how you plan to control the relationship. If Emily came here with her side of the story, most of the comments would regard your behavior as a red flag and tell her to run.

Why_Teach wrote:

NTA for being annoyed, though truly uninviting MiL might be going too far, since I think fiancée would want her there. I also agree with you about a smaller wedding and saving money for purchasing a house or travel or other things the two of you can enjoy.

Regarding the ring, did your fiancée give any indication that she wanted a bigger stone? Why is her mother assuming that she needs to “stand up for herself”? Is this all in the mom’s head, or was fiancee hoping for a different ring?

It seems to me that you should talk things over with fiancée. Get a sense of whether she feels like her mother. If, after this conversation, the two of you are on the same page, the two of you should sit down with her mom and explain why you both want to do things this way and the long-term advantage of saving the money.

Explain that even doctors need to budget and that you are saving so both of you can enjoy things more lasting than a party to celebrate your wedding. She may truly not understand that though better off than her family, you don’t have unlimited funds. Anyway, I support your position, but advise talking things out more.

While most of the commenters agree that OP is NTA, there does seem to be a consensus that OP should talk to his fiancee about what she wants.