Man leaves son's wedding early because he 'hates crowds'; gets angry call from DIL.

There are a lot of social gatherings where leaving early is no big deal. Company parties, holiday parties, even some crowded birthday parties are simple enough to slink away from if you need some rest from socializing. But weddings, particularly those of family members, aren't gatherings where skipping a large portion generally goes unnoticed.

In a popular post on the AITA subreddit, a man asked if he was wrong for leaving his son's wedding early because there were too many people there. He wrote:

"AITA for leaving my son’s wedding early?"

My son, Alan (26M) has just recently gotten married to Helen (25-26F). I love them both very much. It’s relevant to mention that I really dislike parties and large gatherings, I’m not sociable at all and I really just dislike them. So it was kind of a downer when I heard that Alan and Helen were going to have a wedding with around 150 people.

I told Alan ahead of time that I would probably leave early and that me and the rest of our family would take two cars so that they could stay if they wanted to. He looked like he didn’t mind at the time. So at the wedding itself, after the ceremony, I basically told him that I was glad and it looked great but I was going to go home.

He asked if I was going to at least stay for cake or for food but the food didn’t look all that appetizing to me so I told him I was just going to leave. He said “alright whatever just go” and I went back to my table to get my stuff. I told my wife and she said she didn’t feel comfortable driving back alone (the venue was very far from us and the roads there were not great).

I said in that case she should come with me and after some hemming and hawing she agreed. So we left. Then two days later Alan’s new wife bombarded me and my wife with messages that she was disgusted with us, saying horrible things about us and insulting us as people and as parents. Really just sickening.

I told her off and asked why she thought it was okay to talk to her in-laws like that and she said that us leaving “ruined” the wedding for Alan and that he was very upset for the rest of the night. She continued to berate us. I politely told her to leave us alone and called Alan, mainly to inform him that his wife had a temper that he should know about.

When we talked about it he basically started berating me too and said things like “you always do this” and “just leave me alone” before hanging up. I feel like I’m justified since I told him ahead of time that I wasn’t going to stay. AITA here?

Edit since so many people care about the details: Yes there was a mother-son dance planned. Yes, he included me in the count for the food costs. Yes, I love him. No this does not mean that I do not care about him.

People were very opinionated about this one.

CrystalQueen3000 wrote:

YTA you didn’t even stay for the meal that they’d paid for. What an absolutely disgusting lack of love and respect from you as a parent. You also strong-armed your wife into leaving too so your son had no parents present at his reception. How you don’t see that you’re the AH is a mystery to me.

RB1327 wrote:

YTA. 'Leaving early' doesn't mean 'not going to the reception at all,' and taking your wife along with you was even worse. You need therapy for this level of antisocial behaviour, especially since you don't even seem to understand why you're in the wrong.

OrbAndSceptre wrote:

100% YTA. It’s your son’s wedding and no matter how uncomfortable you feel, it’s your duty as a father to be there. It’s one evening. Suck it up man.

sheramom4 wrote:

YTA. You missed all of the traditional wedding reception things. You didn't make a speech, your wife didn't dance with your son. He didn't have his parents there to celebrate with him, even for an hour or two.

You didn't express love just a 'hey you look great but I am going to leave' and then you dragged your wife with you all because you couldn't be bothered to give him two hours of your time at his WEDDING.

Samael13 wrote:

YTA - The fact that he's telling you 'you always do this' strongly suggests that this recent blow-up isn't just about the wedding, but, ignoring that, this is one of the most important days in your son's life so far, and you couldn't even be bothered to stick around for the toast? Did you make a toast to the couple?

Typically the father of the groom dances with the bride and makes a toast to the couple, welcoming the bride to the family, thanking the guests for coming, and offering some heartfelt warm wishes/advice to the couple. I mean, the fact that your response to the whole thing was 'meh, the food didn't look that good to me, so we bailed and I took his mother with me' speaks volumes to the relationship here.

If the food had looked better, you'd have stuck around? But you wouldn't stick around when your son is clearly indicating to you that he wanted you to stick around a little longer? That right there makes you 100% the AH here.

Clearly, OP is a giant AH who needs a major wakeup call before he loses his son forever.